Town Square becoming a busy gathering place

This week’s band, Le Bon Temps Krewe, plays — you guessed it — Cajun music. The four-man New Orleans band lists Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong and Dr. John among its influences.

Rockville special events coordinator Andrew Klee is excited about the new series.

‘‘I see it as a great after-hours hangout opportunity,” he said. ‘‘With all of the restaurants offering outdoor dining, including La Tasca, Greystone Grill and ultimately, Lebanese Taverna and Five Guys, people can grab something to drink and enjoy the music.”

Klee and his special events crew troll Web sites, including Myspace, to find out what bands are playing locally, and then go listen to choose the best ones for Rockville performances.

The next day, you can work off Thursday night’s calories at the first Gold’s Gym Fitness Friday on the square from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Personal trainers will discuss your goals and how you can achieve them, offer group classes and conduct body fat testing.

Sandy Berry, Gold’s manager of field marketing for the East Coast, said the latter is magnetic.

‘‘You just have to stop to watch, and then you find that you can’t just stop and look, you have to do it,” Berry said. ‘‘Even skinny people do it, and some of them turn out to be ‘skinny fat’ — they look skinny, but have no muscle.”

This week also hops at the Rockville Library. The Baltimore Zoo will bring animal visitors to the library at 3 p.m. Thursday in a program for ages 6 and up. The Save the Planet Series will continue Thursday at 7:30 p.m. with ‘‘Another 15 Inconvenient Truths,” a discussion by Janet Ranganathan of the World Resources Institute on conditions and trends of world ecosystems.

Plan ahead to participate in the Montgomery County Heritage Day on June 23, co-sponsored by the City of Rockville. The many Rockville activities all have a common theme: Rockville Rocks!

Preservation Planner Jeff Winstel said the city ‘‘went prehistoric in our new Town Square.” Sculptor and Corcoran Gallery instructor John Jason Sonnier will demonstrate stone sculpting and give children a chance to try it out from 1 to 4 p.m. Students will also get to make necklaces with stone beads.

At 2 p.m., kids can participate in a scavenger hunt, matching photos of carved stone to buildings. The first 50 to turn in a correct answer card will receive free ice cream cones from Giffords, which is now open in Town Square.

Finish off the day at 4 p.m. as the Town Square Plaza Stage hosts DinoRock! The Emmy Award-winning musical act will present the magic of science through dinosaurs.

The activities are sponsored by Aggregate Industries, the parent company of Rockville Quarry.

Sally Sternbach is executive director of Rockville Economic Development Inc., the private-public economic development arm of the City of Rockville. This is part of a series of columns written in preparation for the grand opening of Rockville Town Square, the new mixed-use redevelopment project in the heart of the city.