Undefeated over lunch, a library class inside the Apple store, and karaoke with a catch

Hey Memphis 👋 It’s Wednesday. Sunny, 93, and down to about 73 overnight — a second straight day with nothing attached to the forecast, which is its own kind of good news. Eight things below, and seven of them are free.

☀️ Today in Memphis

Munch and Learn: From the Forest to Your Floor — Dixon Gallery and Gardens, 4339 Park Ave., noon–1 PM, free. Bill Courtney built a Memphis lumber company and then volunteer-coached Manassas High into an Oscar-winning documentary. Today he’s here for the first part: where hardwood actually comes from, and what breaks when that chain snaps. Buy lunch at Park and Cherry on the way in. Details

Hot Seat Bingo — Gaston Park Library, 1040 S. Third St., 12:30–1:30 PM, free. Prizes, music, refreshments, and an hour of neighbors talking trash over bingo cards in South Memphis. Details

Sand Castles and STEM! — Hollywood Library, 1530 N. Hollywood St., 4–5 PM, free. Turns out you can make sand without a beach. Kids mix up a homemade batch and then build with it, no sunscreen required. Walk in, ages 12 and under. Details

Fable Figures — Cordova Library, 8457 Trinity Rd., 4–5:30 PM, free. Tweens and teens build a model of a creature out of a book they love, or invent one nobody has written yet, and take the thing home with them. Details

Adventures with Apple — Apple Saddle Creek, Germantown, 5–6 PM, free. The Germantown library runs this one inside the Apple store instead of its own building: an hour of coding, filmmaking or digital art for kids 7 to 10, with the topic changing month to month. Registration is required, and there were nine seats open when we checked. Details

The Writer’s Block — Panera Bread at Laurelwood, 4530 Poplar Ave., 6–8 PM, free. A library writing club that doesn’t meet in a library. Two hours, a corner table, bring a laptop or a pencil. No sign-up. Details

Wine Down Wednesday — Pizzazz Craft & Social Bar, 3283 Elvis Presley Blvd., 7–10 PM, from about $29. A midweek wine night on Elvis Presley Boulevard where the ticket is the pour, so you show up and they handle the rest. Details

Evil Karaoke — Hi Tone, 282 N. Cleveland St., 8 PM, free, 21 and up. Pick your song, spin the evil wheel, then do whatever it lands on. Survive it and there’s a prize. Downstairs in the small room. Details

📰 The Rundown

The Walmart on Germantown Parkway in Cordova wants to start sending your groceries out by air. It has filed for a permit to build a drone delivery pad in the parking lot, fenced in with a nesting area, so shoppers inside the delivery zone could order up to five pounds online and have a drone bring it out. The Bartlett Supercenter on Highway 64 is lined up for the same thing. (via Action News 5)

Memphis Botanic Garden is opening a new play space. Fun Studio goes into My Big Backyard, and the Garden is throwing a Jam Session to launch it this Saturday from 6 to 8 PM, with a pickup band of Graham Winchester, Jeff Hulett, Ben Church and Frank McClallen. It’s $15 for members, $20 for everyone else, and free for kids 12 and under. (via Action News 5)

A needlepoint shop is coming to the Collierville square. Blue Suede Stitches opens at 190 Washington Street on September 1, from Shea Taylor of Threaded & Tipsy, with 2,500 square feet of canvases and thread plus sitting nooks for people who just want to stitch a while. Beginner classes run twice a month. (via WhatNow Memphis)

The old Railgarten lot at Cooper and Central has a plan. It’s becoming Stomping Grounds, an indoor-outdoor spot built on the idea that parents and kids can both want to be somewhere at the same time: climbing and play zones on one side, a coffee and beverage tap wall and actual adult seating on the other, with food from Wild Beet. No opening date yet. (via StyleBlueprint)

🍽️ Food & Drink

MingXia Dumpling — Harbin-style Northeastern Chinese out on Germantown Parkway, from a husband-and-wife pair who used to sell at the Asian Night Market. The soup dumplings are hand-folded on a broth they set for 48 hours, and the rest of the board runs to zha jiang noodles, malatang and lamb skewers. It’s been open since March, so this is less a heads-up than a nudge. One thing worth knowing before you drive out: they’re closed Tuesdays. 1014 N Germantown Pkwy. Details

🎟️ Looking Ahead

Deep Purple and Kansas is tomorrow — Thursday, August 6 at Radians Amphitheater. We flagged this one twice without a gate time and then fixed that yesterday, so here it is one last time with everything you need: gates at 5:30, show at 7:30, all ages, free parking and a shuttle, and you can bring your own food and drink. Price is still Ticketmaster-only. Details

8Ball & MJG and Bun B, with an orchestra — the Orpheum has them backed by the Renaissance Orchestra on Friday, September 11 and Saturday, September 12, both at 8 PM. The Friday night is already sold out, so Saturday is the one to look at. Details

Drake White goes on sale Friday — the show is Friday, October 2 at Minglewood Hall, doors at 7 and music at 8, all ages. Tickets open up this Friday, August 7. Minglewood doesn’t publish prices on its own site, so you’ll see those at checkout. Details

🏡 Community Corner

Five of today’s eight are run by a library — and two of those aren’t even in one. There’s a coding class inside the Apple store in Germantown and a writing club that meets at a Panera, plus sand castles in Hollywood, bingo in South Memphis and book creatures in Cordova. We keep finding the best free stuff in the branches, and we suspect you’ve got one we haven’t been to. What’s the best thing you’ve ever walked into at a Memphis library? Hit reply and name the branch.

And the tip line never closes — a pop-up, a band, a Wednesday night we missed — no gatekeeping — send it to hey@heymemphis.co.

That’s it for today — see you tomorrow at 6.

— Josh