September is here! And the arrival of a new month means it's time for our First Friday Arts segment. It's a perusal of arts events coming to the region in the weeks ahead, completely people-powered. Meaning all the content is provided by people who call to the studio live, at 800-838-3760 . Learn about events from art openings in Mendocino to open-mike nights in Eugene, and everything in between. The segment lasts as long as the calls go on.

Felicia Bornstein Lubliner survived Auschwitz. Her stories of life and death there might have died with her in 1974, if not for her writing and her son's collecting of it. Irving Lubliner, a professor emeritus at Southern Oregon University, pulls together his mother's compelling accounts of her many trials, in Only Hope: A Survivor's Stories of the Holocaust .

We can feed the world! We can poison the world! Those are the approximate extremes of the arguments in favor of, and in opposition to, the use of genetic modifications in food crops. McKay Jenkins, journalist and journalism professor, sought to find the true pros and cons of GMOs. The fruit of his research is the book Food Fight: GMOs and the Future of the American Diet . The analysis points to some issues with the American food system that pre-date the GMO controversy.

A recent White House effort to curtail immigration focuses on the "public charge" concept. That is, if immigrants have difficulty supporting themselves and might need public assistance like food stamps, they might be denied citizenship and even residency. The Oregon Health Authority takes a position, asserting that "health care is not a cash assistance benefit," but a way to strengthen individuals and society.

Ah, the open road. The weather's good, the highway is clear, the wind is in our hair... and what's that sound? Motor vehicles may be more reliable generally than a generation ago, but parts still wear out and vehicles stop working correctly. Zach Edwards and his team at Ashland Automotive make a living correcting things that go wrong under our hoods. Zach visits once a month for a segment we call The Squeaky Wheel, to take your questions on car care and feeding, and otherwise talk shop. Join in

Science fiction movies and comic books made a lot of money by imaging parallel universes. You know... the idea that there are multiple Earths, many with a Clark Kent (and so a Superman)? Sean Carroll says it's more than imagination. Carroll is a theoretical physicist at Cal Tech, and he says new versions of us are splitting into separate universes all the time. The one on THIS Earth wrote a soon-to-be-published book, Something Deeply Hidden: Quantum Worlds and the Emergence of Spacetime . It

The music scene in our region is a very active one. Seriously, two different symphonies playing the Medford area? We focus on music with rock DNA in a monthly segment called Rogue Sounds. Josh Gross , music player, creator, and lover, is our guide. He joins us with a list of band gigs and sound samples to whet our appetites for a live music show.

Nothing like a beautiful garden to stir the senses. And maybe the appetite. Those experiences can combine on the first Edible Garden Tour presented by Cooperation Humboldt on Sunday (September 8th) in the Eureka/Arcata area. The idea is not just to have a traveling lunch, but to present concepts of permaculture, and maybe encourage more people to grow their own food.

Eating local provides benefits beyond supporting nearby farmers. It also puts fresher food on consumers' tables, food that is produced for flavor instead of portability. Two films boosting the eat-local movement screen together as the Food For Thought film project at Eureka Theater (Saturday, September 14th): "Going With the Grain," about the local grain movement, and "Coastal Foods: Sowing the Seeds of Sustainability."

We've seen them in our region: young, seemingly able-bodied people who are living on the streets, panhandling and scrounging a living. Our names for them -- travelers, hobby homeless, street kids -- are a simplistic reaction to a complex societal phenomenon. Journalist Vivian Ho first encountered street kids as a crime reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, where she covered the trial of three street kids accused of a brutal double murder in the Bay Area. She takes a broader look at the