1. If it’s Labor Day Weekend, it must be time for the annual National Buffalo Wing Festival, which will be held Saturday and Sunday in Coca-Cola Field. The festival kicks off a day early with a 7 p.m. ceremony inducting three new members of the “Hall of Flame,” the festival’s version of a hall of fame. This year’s honorees are George Shea, co-founder
of Major League Eating, and competitive eaters Sonya “Black Widow” Thomas and Eric “Badlands” Booker. The ceremony will take place at the party deck at the stadium.
2. The longest-running corporate-sponsored event of its kind in the nation, M&T Bank’s Plaza Event Series, closes out its 43rd season of free noontime performances with a flash of showmanship today in front of the bank’s headquarters opposite Main Place Mall in downtown Buffalo. Taking the stage will be flamboyant R&B singer Lance Diamond and his 24-K Diamond Band.
3. The return of midsummer heat should set up just the right atmosphere for the ninth annual Ban-Tiki Caribbean luau from 6 to 11 p.m. in the grove at Banchetti by Rizzo’s, 560 N. French Road, Getzville. Tickets are $38 and include five hours of unlimited tiki bar drinks, a pig roast and other tropical treats, plus music, dancing and limbo contests. For info, call 691-5500.
4. The J. Geils Band could be the highest-powered act ever booked into the Buffalo Place Rocks the Harbor concert series at the Central Wharf at Erie Canal Harbor. The blues-rockers from Boston, Mass., considered by some to be the best rock band of all time, bring two key personalities – singer Peter Wolf and harmonica player Magic Dick – to the stage tonight. Missing, however, will be guitarist Geils, who has been touring as a solo artist and has filed a lawsuit to try to keep them from using his name. Starting things off at 6 p.m. will be the Matthew Facciolla Band and Handsome Jack. Tickets are $20.
5. Pro bowling champ Brad Angelo will own the alleys in more ways than one at the former South Transit Lanes bowling center at 6280 S. Transit Road, Pendleton. Angelo, who won the George A. Obenauer Masters Tournament here for the fourth time last spring, has bought the property and is reopening it today as Brad Angelo Lanes. Angelo is following in the footsteps of one of his mentors, bowling legend Allie Brandt, who opened his own bowling center in Lockport in the 1960s.
6. The high school football season kicks off this weekend with several big-time showdowns under the Friday Night Lights. Bishop Timon will open the season at Williamsville South at 7 p.m. in a rare Catholic vs. Public School Showdown. Another top matchup tonight involves two great programs and state champions of recent years, including one debuting with a new coach. Tony Truilizio, who moved from Riverside to North Tonawanda this year, opens his Lumberjack career at home against Sweet Home at 7 p.m.
7. Feature films arriving on local screens today include “The Possession,” starring Kyra Sedgwick and Jeffrey Dean Morton in a horror tale inspired by “The Exorcist”; playwright Tracy Letts’ film adaptation of his dark comedy, “Killer Joe,” with Matthew McConaughey in the title role of the hitman; “Celeste and Jesse Forever,” with Rashida Jones and Andy Samberg as a divorced couple who can’t stay away from each other; and “Neil Young Journeys,” a Jonathan Demme documentary about the fabled singer-songwriter.
