Nobody knows America's festivals better than this dude

The Michelin guide is well known for being very picky about the restaurants it awards "star" ratings to, and the exceptional restaurants usually charge astronomical prices. But the guides also list "Bib Gourmand" awards that are, the guide says, not official stars, but recognition of places offering good food at prices of $40 (£28) or less per person for three courses. That may seem like a splurge, but London is one of the world's priciest cities. It's also arguably the world's culinary capital. A trip to London without sampling one of its renowned restaurants because of the high tab would be like not seeing Westminster Abbey just because it charges an outrageous $17 (£12) admission fee. Sometimes, you have to splurge. The 2009 Michelin Guide for Great Britain and Ireland doesn't go on sale in the States until April, but here's a sneak peak at some of its Bib Gourmand restaurants. One pick is The Modern Pantry, which is a casual, fusion restaurant with a dining room and a takeaway counter in the Clerkenwell neighborhood (47-8 St John's Square, 011-44-20/7553-9210). A sample dish: "A main course of onglet steak (an inexpensive French cut) had been marinated in miso, and was served with cassava chips instead of the more usual potato." Dinner for two comes to $99 (£70), before wine. Next up is Hereford Road, which opened in October 2007. Says one reviewer, "From the deep-fried calf’s brain starter to the use of laverbread and piccalilli elsewhere, you could only be dining in Britain," (3 Hereford Road, Westbourne Grove, herefordroad.org, 011-44/20-7727-1144). Here are the other new additions to the 2009 guide: Le Cassoulet, Croydon, Surrey [Also named "best local London restaurant of 2008" by Time Out London] Giaconda Dining Room, Camden Market, Camden Medcalf, Islington Mango and Silk, Richmond-upon-Thames (011-44/20-8876-6220) Dehesa, Soho Gordon Ramsay Foxtrot Oscar (Chelsea, 011-44/20-7352-4448).

It happens only once a year—the day we place all our hopes for good weather with a groundhog. Punxsutawney Phil, the bearer of spring (or six more weeks of dreaded winter, depending on whether or not his shadow appears), makes his 122nd appearance this coming Monday. The most famous rodent in Pennsylvania has been on Oprah, met with President Reagan, and attracted an audience of as many as 30,000 people on Feb. 2. Festivities in Punxsutawney, about 85 miles east of Pittsburgh, kick off on Friday. One highlight is the Punxsutawney Weather Discovery Center, where you can learn where folklore and science meet when predicting the weather. And Phil's trainer will be making the rounds to teach everyone about the lovable groundhog. On Monday, the doors open at 3 a.m.—Phil is expected to make his prediction around 7:25 a.m. And no worries about missing that weekend's other, even bigger event: on Sunday, the Super Bowl will be shown live in the community center, to be followed by the Bill Murray movie Groundhog Day. If you can't be there to celebrate with Phil, there will be live video of the event on visitpa.com. MORE See a video of Groundhog Day 2008

Perhaps feeling the recessionary pull, the New Yorker's music critic writes this week about the affordable art of concertgoing. For many of the options that Alex Ross attended, it's all in the timing. You can hear the New York Philharmonic for just $16 if you're willing to attend one of their open rehearsals—held in the morning. And Juilliard students have a running gig for Tuesdays around lunchtime at 180 Maiden Lane, an office tower near South Street Seaport. Other times it's a tradeoff in location that gives you the edge. As Alex points out, the "cheapest seats at the Metropolitan Opera are fifteen dollars, slightly more than the bleachers at Yankee Stadium." They also happen to be so nosebleedy that you can't see the stage. But if the music's the thing for you, these "family circle" seats may actually work to your advantage: up there, Ross says, "the sound has excellent balance and presence: the voices float straight up, bounce off the ceiling, and mingle cleanly with the orchestra." (Another Met Opera option are the $25 tickets set aside each week. Given out by lottery, these special deals are all for primo orchestra or grand tier seats. And if you're more interested in smaller, independent opera companies, New York has a rundown.) If you're headed to New York soon and want to catch a classical-music concert, where can you easily find out what's on? The New Yorker, New York magazine, and Time Out all have good listings, but the most thorough I've seen is the concert board kept up by the classical music station WQXR.

Global guerilla-artist icon Shepard Fairey—the man behind Obey Giant and the beloved Obama poster—has his first museum survey at the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston February 6–August 16. The ICA exhibition Shepard Fairey: Supply and Demand, displays about 200 works made by Fairey over the course of 20 years—starting with his now infamous Obey Giant stencils and stickers, and culminating in a new ICA-commissioned mural. True to form, Fairey’s work won't be confined within walls: The artist is creating public art at different sites around Boston throughout the spring and summer. (Move fast to secure your spot at an ICA-organized artist talk, seminar about design as social change, or one of two Sunday afternoon curator-led bike tours of Fairey's work in Boston and Cambridge.) icaboston.org, from $12. EARLIER FROM BUDGET TRAVEL In 2007, we included the ICA on our Cool List. We wrote: The most popular spot has quickly become the Mediatheque, where 18 computers display digital media related to the artists and exhibitions. It's not the computers that are drawing crowds, however; it's the fact that the media center points down at a 24-degree angle from the underside of the cantilever. At the end of the room, there's a 21-foot-wide picture window framing a mesmerizing view of the water's surface. (No surrounding land or sky is visible.) "We describe the experience as vertiginous," says Jesse Saylor, a member of the architects' design team. "When you enter the room, you all of a sudden realize you're floating above the water."