The day is now on us. For the betterment of everything save the staff’s health/sanity, the 2012 Mission Creek Festival begins today. Everyday, we’ll be posting a cheat sheet for the day so you know what the events are and what everything sounds like. If you want to stay in the know during the festival, follow @missioncreekic on Twitter and put #mcf12 on all of your tweets when you’re out at an event. If you don’t like the Twitter, like us on Facebook and keep coming back here everyday.

Tuesday brings three events for your pleasure. Two are music and the last is literature.

To start with the letters first, Tuesday brings Luis Alberto Urrea and Benjamin Hale to Prairie Lights. A master of all writing genres, Urrea is an award-winning author who will be reading from his newest novel Queen of America, a sequel to 2005′s very well-received The Hummingbird’s Daughter. Benjamin Hale is a recent graduate of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. His satirical first novel The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore has been named one of Amazon’s Best Books for February 2012 and has received many positive reviews from outlets such as The Washington Post.

The music front offers two types of rock-and-roll shows.

On one side, there is the annual KRUI Pizza Party at The Mill. For $3, you get pizza (wouldn’t be a very good pizza party without pizza) as well as the music of three excellent bands from the Upper Midwest: the Chicago-based Like Pioneers, Minneapolis’s The Parlour Suite, and frequent visitors from Ames The Poison Control Center. This show will be fun and upbeat as all of these bands walk the line between rock and pop. If bands like Tennis, Pavement, and The Thermals are on your iPod, this is a show for you. The festivities start at 8 PM.

If you like your rock less poppy and more aggressive, the Tuesday show at Gabe’s might be more your speed. Local garage rippers Solid Attitude will start off the festivities. International man of mystery Jeff Witscher will be playing a set as Rene Hell.He’s always a dynamic live performance. The headliner on this show is the No Wave legend Rhys Chatham who will be playing with the guitar trio. If you call yourself a fan of Sonic Youth, you need to be at this show as he is one of their major influences. This show starts at 9:00 PM and will cost $12.

We’ll be back tomorrow. If you see any of the staff members on the street (we’re all clearly labeled with lanyards and various shadows), throw us a high five. I don’t ask for this because we’re doing this festival but because we love high fives.