Breaking News: Crappers in the Castro Tonight on City's Dime

Alix Rosenthal, the co-founder of Citizens for Halloween, sent out a jubilant e-mail this afternoon, claiming "a credible source in city government" revealed that San Francisco will — after all the ranting and raving about urine and feces running wild — rent 120 outhouses for the Castro non-Halloween fest.

"It may not prevent all of the public urination, but it is certainly better than no toilets at all," she wrote. "We are thrilled...

that the City made the right decision, even though they could have done more to decrease our anxiety levels before now."

Since the city was always dead set against overtly placing outhouses in the Castro lest it be seen as sanctioning this year's nonevent, the last-minute move makes perfect sense. This way the city covers its ass P.R.-wise, Castro visitors cover their asses (literally) and the surgical-strike nature of the move prevents anyone from claiming the city offered revelers even a tacit invitation.

In the days and weeks to come, it will be interesting to rehash the city's draconian steps in strangling this year's party in its cradle. It will also be worthwhile to collect the tales from Castro merchants about the city's undoubtedly hardball tactics in persuading them to close up for the night — a night many businesses earn $15,000 or more.

In retrospect, you couldn't really twist merchants' arms into closing up on "Gay Christmas" and then stand idly by while partygoers urinated and defecated on their idle places of business. As my mother says, "You can't shit on my head and then tell me to wear it like a hat."

Round and round the Castro goes, what will happen nobody knows.

See you out there,

Joe Eskenazi