Today, WHYS Radio's 6th Annual "Shortest Sidewalk Parade" culminates
in an Irish-tastic musical celebration. Details below!

From early in the morning and into the night – a lot of fine quality events occurring on Sunday. Wanna know what they are? Of course you do. Our picks are below. Check out the rest of Sunday here.

The proverbial white smoke has risen from Van Hise Hall in Madison: We have a chancellor! OK, they don’t actually use smoke signals down at the UW System office (apparently that method of communication is reserved for the Vatican), but it’s still big news that Dr. James C. Schmidt of Winona State University has been picked as the next chancellor of UW-Eau Claire. On Monday, the UW System announced that system President Kevin P. Reilly and a committee of the Board of Regents have recommended Schmidt for the job. Their choice still requires the approval of the full Board of Regents on April 5. If all goes well, Schmidt will take over at UW-Eau Claire in July.

Schmidt is currently vice president for university advancement at Winona State, which means he oversees areas such as development, government relations, and marketing. Schmidt, who has a doctorate from the University of Minnesota, previously held positions at Riverland Community College, Austin Community College, and Minnesota Riverland Technical College.

“The excellent reputation and the powerful vision of UW-Eau Claire drew me to this university – a university which clearly evidences the very best in higher education,” Schmidt said, according to a news release. “The commitment of faculty and staff to engage students in a ‘rigorous, integrated, globally infused liberal education’ resonates deeply with me, and grew to be my greatest attraction.”

Schmidt will replace former Chancellor Brian Levin-Stankevich, who left UWEC last year to lead Westminster College in Salt Lake City, Utah. Former UW-Madison official Gilles Bousquet has served as interim chancellor since last summer. Schmidt was one of five finalists for the post announced on Feb. 15. However, three of the candidates dropped out of the running in the intervening weeks, leaving only Schmidt and Dr. Kent Neely, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Western Oregon University.

Dwarfcraft Devices, everyone’s favorite effects pedal company based out of Eau Claire, has been making a name for itself in the musical equipment industry. Their various distortion pedals are for sale in music shops both local and national, as well as through big-name online retailers like Musician’s Friend and Pro Guitar Shop. Recently, the company has been getting a lot of love from one musician in particular: Weezer bassist Scott Shriner. Check out the video below, in which Shriner demos four different fuzz pedals, including Dwarfcraft’s Baby Thunda.  Starting about a minute into the clip, Shriner gushes about the cutting edge the Baby Thunda gives him, and why it’s become one of his favorite pedals. Cue the video up to 3:20 for complete sonic proof of the Baby Thunda’s destructive capabilities.

Last June, we heard about how the Wisconsin Department of Tourism (aka Travel Wisconsin) was going to use David Zucker, director of 1980's iconic, crazy-go-nuts, screwball comedy Airplane! to shoot another Sconnie tourism commercial (this was his first one) and that they'd even enlisted Airplane! star Robert Hays to star in it. Well, they're done. And it's about what you'd expect from people famous for iconic, crazy-go-nuts, screwball comedy films from the 1980s. See what you think (below).

The commercial was shot last summer at Plum Lake in Sayner, Wis. The tagline reminds you that, "It doesn't take any special skill to enjoy Wisconsin," and the spot ends with Hays getting slapped in the face by a muskie while four woman look on (cameos from four former Wisconsin pageant winners).

The commercial will begin airing in May, and Zucker has announced that he and Hays will return with another tourism ad set for Winter, 2014.