San Francisco News Blog

Joe Eskenazi

Green Party state co-chair Barry Hermanson brought his own beer -- literally

​Members of San Francisco's Green Party refused to exude the blues last night in the farewell bash for the party headquarters they can no longer afford to keep, dousing the place in one last coating of spilled soda, beer, and plenty of top-notch hard stuff. State Party co-chair Barry Hermanson even wandered the room with large bottles of his home-brewed ale and a pocketful of sample cups he foisted upon one and all. Here, at last, was a politician who truly served the people.

As anticipated, the mood was bittersweet. It's certainly not a thrilling realization that a matter of a $1,200 monthly office is an untenable drain on party coffers: "It'd be nice if we needed a bigger space because so many people were active in politics," admitted Paul Platt, a member of the party's county council. But, on the other hand, nobody was crying into their absinthe one room over as a DJ gyrated to the beats.

As the music temporarily faded, Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi -- the party's most prominent local member -- urged his contemporaries to keep on keepin' on.  

Joe Eskenazi

Lots of nice folks with dreadlocks for a political event, yes

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Our guide in the spookiest room in City Hall-- the Board of Supervisors main chamber!

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 Attendees knew they were in for a hair-raising time when they were handed a scrap of paper with a long list of illnesses that might be exacerbated by the walk. Listed alongside maladies like angina and colic were pre- and post- menstrual syndrome. "But aren't all women either pre- or post-menstrual?" My friend shrewdly pointed out. We decided to take the risk.

City Hall, it turns out, is built on the site of an old cemetery. During its construction, the bones were disinterred and transported to Colma. All of this was done somewhat unceremoniously, according to our guide, as bones are unearthed whenever new construction projects are initiated in the area. In addition to the owners of the shafted bones, it was speculated that the ghosts of persons killed within the building also roamed the marble corridors.

Jim Herd

There is grandeur in this view of life...

​Text by Joe Eskenazi. Gorgeous photos by Jim Herd.

In the many months between when we first reported the inception of the San Francisco-based United Football League up to the moment we wandered into a largely abandoned AT&T Park for the Saturday night home debut of the California Redwoods, we never did figure out the league's "mission statement." The UFL, it reads, "was developed to fulfill the unmet needs of football fans in major markets currently underserved by professional football."

Within a speedy 15-minute drive of AT&T Park sits not one but two professional football stadiums -- and large portions of Saturday's crowd came outfitted in the gear of both professional squads. And yet, you can't shrug off the unforeseen benefits of locating a team in San Francisco. Within moments of the Redwoods' historic opening kickoff, a pair of breathtakingly gorgeous young women loudly and abruptly ended their romantic relationship an arm's length from your humble narrator; one lithely sprinted up the aisle to parts unknown, her mascara running awkwardly down her cheeks. The other gritted her teeth, sunk low into her green plastic chair, and forlornly began to bang out text messages.

Show me another football venue in the nation that can provide that.

We're going to go fairly lightly on the game details of Saturday's contest in this article: If you cared to know, you'd have probably been there. God knows there was room for you, and this was not a hard ticket to obtain. Half an hour prior to the game scalpers were offering us the best seats in the house for 15 bucks -- 10 dollars below face value.

Jim Herd

Down in front!

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'Harry, would you rather go to the school nearest your home, or have the Dursleys choose out the school they prefer?'

​Last night, San Francisco's Board of Education met for a rousing three hours to weigh and discuss options for a new student assignment system. Sadly, San Francisco lost out on obtaining The Sorting Hat, and critics claim the current system results in racial isolation and concentrations of underserved students in particular schools.

​An evening at the 9/11 Film Festival -- sponsored by, among others, the San Francisco Bay Guardian -- which commenced last night at the Grand Lake Theater in Oakland.

The vibe here is mild, friendly, and decidedly Baby Boomerish. The guy who takes my ticket jovially announces that there's "free popcorn! " I wonder if the vibe is too mellow for people who sincerely believe that Republicans murdered 3,000 of their fellow Americans. 

As I settle into my seat, the familiar whine of acoustic guitars being tuned wafts through the P.A. system Once again, the American Left shoots itself in the foot by allowing goofballs with guitars onstage at a political event. The first guy sings a song called "London Calling 7/7/05" about the London train bombings: "They blew up some train cars/they blew up a bus/National Security something something/questions from us." He follows it up with a song about the dogs who worked with the rescue effort at Ground Zero, and how "their feet were getting burned by molten steel." Apparently this is significant.

The next guy sings a song which contains the line, "their noses grow longer/The Matrix grows stronger." He confirms my suspicion that Hollywood is largely responsible for the existence of the 9/11 truth movement.

All Photos | Daniel C. Britt, used with permission

That's the ticket: Angelica Olmos, 20, shows off the bodywork she got at the weekend's Tattoo Expo

​Blood. Tattoos. Parking Lot. Cow Palace. It's a combination that's been golden for decades, and when there's a massive Tattoo Expo at the stadium -- so much the better.

Photographer Daniel C. Britt hoped to document "some tat artists mopping up blood" on Sunday but was told that he was unwelcome within the hallowed halls of the Cow Palace if he insisted on taking pictures. Who would have thought tattoo people at a tattoo convention would suddenly turn camera shy?

So, once again, thank God for the parking lot. Britt caught event-goers on the way in and out who were more than willing to show off their ink -- and blood. Click below for the highlight show.
 

All Photos | Daniel C. Britt, used with permission

Drool Brittania: British cougars Rita Sangha (left), 39, and Bea Cameron, 45, take in a lecture on 'the positive aspects of dating younger men' while wordlessly offering younger men a thorough tutorial on the virtues of coupling with older women.

​Earlier this month we reported on the Bay Area laying claim to yet another innovation: The nation's first National Single Cougars Convention -- a night of gaiety for older women who love younger men and younger men who love to be loved by older women.

Well, Friday night in Palo Alto featured more cleavage than a butcher shop run by Eldridge Cleaver as the event came off without a hitch (remember, these women are not looking for commitment, according to the cougar movement's seminal literature).

Photographer Daniel C. Britt -- who has put in time in Iraq -- was kind enough to share his brilliant documentation of the lighter and more carefree fare at the inaugural cougar convention. Click below for more -- but beware young gentlemen. Here thar be cougars.

Air Sex is a novel and intriguing concept. "It's like air guitar, but sex," the Austin-based creators of a national touring Air Sex competition like to say, and with that explanation come the mental pictures of people idiotically humping, sucking, and rubbing up on air. It's practically inevitable to think, hey, that's kind of genius. I should go to that.

Don't.

Unfortunately, it was too late to give this advice to the packed house at the Independent in San Francisco Wednesday night. Everyone had already bought their $20 tickets. They were already drinking themselves silly before the empty stage soon to be overrun with air fuckers. And at that point, I, too was still hopeful that the show would be as hilarious as the concept seemed to promise.

"We want sex!" the audience began to chant, and Color Me Badd's "I Wanna Sex You Up" blared as the host of the evening, Chris Trew, presented himself. Shaggy and bearded in a white button down, he loosely resembled Jesus on a day at the office.

"This is not a fucking game, San Francisco," he said.

Joe Eskenazi

Shiver me timbers! It be Mendozer hisself!

Arrrgh, me mateys! Rum, sodomy, and the lash! Insert some other pirate cliche here (pieces of eight, keel-haul, MENDOOOOOOO-ZER!). This weekend marked the Northern California Pirate Festival in Vallejo -- a fitting locale; the city has faced its share of economic privations.

As with any theme fest, you could sum it up as a celebration of inappropriate cleavage, faux drunkenness, terrible English accents, fried food on sticks, and generous usage of the term "huzzah!"

Needless to say, there were plenty of photogenic folks who were happy to let us take their portraits. Click here for a full slideshow -- avast!  

Adam Weatherford

Eduardo Craig attempts to conquer Raoul Wallenberg High's famed "Big Four"

At first glance, San Francisco's Raoul Wallenberg High looks to be just another city school with peeling paint, tall fences, and randomly tagged walls. And yet, this is one of the most hallowed and revered sites in the world of skateboarding. Just behind the Western Addition school is a broad, four-step stairway that measure six-feet-high and 18-feet-long. On Saturday, hundreds of people packed into the yard to watch skaters -- some pros, others unknowns -- hurtle themselves down "The Big Four."

This competition, "Back to the Berg," hosted by Thrasher magazine, was a grassroots event where anyone could enter and professional rankings didn't matter. But these steps are a recipe for broken limbs and so frightening to most skaters that only a handful actually tried. Before the event, skaters rolled around in nervous anticipation, film crews set up, and kids climbed the fences and trees or sat on each others' shoulders to get a good view.

"Shit happened years ago, shit's gonna happen again today and it's never gonna happen again," said Schmitty, who goes by just that name and works for Thrasher. This is likely the last event at Wallenberg because the school is soon renovating -- rendering The Big Four a big memory.

JROTC students may have gone home whooping about the 4-3 school board vote last night that reinstated the program, but today the JROTC instructors are doing anything but.

That's because although the program will go forward next year, the board also voted to lay off its instructors. District officials say it was a formality in the event some schools don't have enough students to enroll in the program for next year. By law, any employee who isn't laid off by May 15 must be paid for the entire following school year.

"We can always bring them back," says Roger Buschman, the district's chief human resources officer. "It was a precautionary measure, not a measure with the intent to release them. It was a fiscally responsible thing to do."

The 12 JROTC instructors make up the lion's share of the 16 school district employees laid off for next year, a tally whittled down from potentially hundreds after the city's rainy day funds were used to patch up the district's fiscal shortfall. The other four departing employees are a pair of administrators and two vocational ed teachers whose positions had become obsolete.

Joe Eskenazi

San Francisco firefighters discover a light roasting flowers in a planter at the PUC building

New dimensions in mixed metaphors -- Shakespeare and the Old Testament (get ready): San Francisco Firefighters came to extinguish the burning bush, not to praise it.

Very late on Friday, your humble narrator didn't realize there was something unusual about a mesquite barbecue odor permeating Downtown until a fire truck pulled up in front of the PUC Building on Van Ness and McAllister.

A handful of firefighters leaped off the engine and fast-walked up the stairs, where they discovered the source of the smokiness -- the glass in a light illuminating a planter was shattered, and the high-temperature beams were scorching the flora.

A fireman doused the vegetation with his extinguisher -- as Mother Nature would do later that night. All in all, it turned out to be one of the engine company's less intense -- but more photogenic -- calls of the evening:

All Photos | Joe Eskenazi

Quake survivors William Del Monte, 103, and Rose Cliver, 106. No, they don't let you wear a hat like that until you turn 100.

As a convoy of archaic fire trucks led by an ethereally beautiful convertible Jaguar -- of the vintage that Isadora Duncan may or may not have died within it -- turned from McAllister onto Market, the old emergency vehicle's sirens began to wail. It was not quite 5 a.m., and the homeless men snoring on crushed cardboard boxes blearily shook their heads and grumbled.

Those sleeping in the streets exactly 103 years earlier also had an unwelcome pre-dawn wake-up call when the city tumbled down upon their heads before proceeding to burn to the ground.

Every April 18, a commemoration of the great quake of 1906 is held at Lotta's Fountain at 5:12 a.m. -- the fatal hour. Naturally, the 2006 celebration drew throngs of the historically minded out at this ungodly hour to witness centenarian quake survivors flirting with Mayor Gavin Newsom. Newsom wasn't there this year -- a shame, as it'd be intriguing to see what his hair looks like at that time of day, and speculate what time he had to arise to get it that way -- and the survivor count is down to just a pair. The crowd was smaller too, and was populated by the folks who usually show up to events such as these: City employees, history buffs, people who enjoy dressing in costume, and homeless people who happened to be on-scene.

Since you folks probably didn't feel like getting up at the crack of dawn (we know; we didn't see you there), enjoy a few photos of this year's commemoration. Maybe we'll see you there next year -- if you go, perhaps we'll let you take the photos.
 

Thousands and thousands of mostly young people -- but we did see some septuagenarians -- packed Justin Herman Plaza on Valentine's Day for the annual soft smackdown. Note the girl in this video holding her head as she leaves the fight; I wonder what happened? Moments after shooting the above video, your humble narrator sustained a direct hit between the eyes. Does this mean I can claim I had my eyeglasses broken in a fight?

You know what makes this video for me? The guy with the bike (and the amazing necktie-knit cap combo) swinging his pillow around like the anecdotal dead cat to clear out space.

One bit of analysis to belabor an extraordinarily fun night (we actually overheard multiple people shouting "Is this fun or what?"). The cost to the city was definitely a bit more than marginal; a number of police, park rangers and Department of Public Works employees were out on a Saturday -- Valentine's Day, no less -- earning overtime. Cleaning up a Canadian province's worth of goose down took the DPW more time and effort.

And yet, an alarming number of the participants actually bought their pillows new for the fight at $7 or more a pop! Astounding! What's more, Embarcadero-area coffee shops and restaurants were packed with pillow-toting customers, as were BART and other mass transit agencies.

As one smiling policeman on site told me, "All things considered, you can't complain much." 

Be sure to visit SF Weekly's slideshow of the fight right here.

As part of his quest to become governor, Mayor Gavin Newsom held his latest "town hall" last night in San Jose. The question-and-lecture session attracted about 200 locals and a dozen protesters who trekked down from San Francisco. San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed joked he'd invited the demonstrators to make Gavin "feel at home."

We'll spare you a major analysis for now. In the meantime, here are some random highlights of the evening:

• Newsom let slip that he will be announcing his own economic stimulus package today, which will include $25 million for no-interest loans to small businesses. He didn't make clear where the money will be coming from for his plan.

• Gavin has a foster brother who's been in and out of prison for dealing crack. He divulged that tidbit during a discussion about a federal judge's order this week to release thousands of inmates from overcrowded prisons.

• Quotable: "I will never say one thing publicly that is different from what I say privately."

• Is Gavin a Deadhead? When it came out that a questioner shared the same name as the Grateful Dead's late frontman, Newsom couldn't resist quoting Jerry Garcia: "You don't want to be the best of the best, you want to be the only one who does what you do." Somehow Newsom related this back to education, which, frankly, I didn't understand because I wasn't on acid.

• While Newsom charmed the crowd inside, demonstrators stood outside waving homemade signs like "Gavin Newsom: The Man Without a Plan" and "San Jose: Don't get sick in S.F." The protesters were part of an labor-supported group objecting to, among other things, Newsom's proposed budget cuts to public health. Quipped Gavin: "Chuck's right -- it does make me feel at home."

• Afterward, Newsom talked to reporters and seemed a little prickly when the Chron's Erin Allday mentioned something about new Board President David Chiu convening a meeting with labor and business leaders over the weekend to talk about solutions to the city's budget crisis. The Chron had reported that Newsom was "notably missing" from the meeting. Newsom grumbled to Allday that he's had many meetings with people (surprisingly, he didn't use the word "stakeholders") to deal with the budget, and he'd been having them before Chiu was even elected. Sounds like the mayor didn't appreciate being upstaged by the new North Beach supe. So much for that new spirit of cooperation in City Hall.

• Newsom, who has a major following on Facebook, definitely attracted a younger crowd than you usually see at a political event (at least one without Barack Obama as the keynote speaker). Whether this translates into votes at election time is questionable for a variety of reasons. To wit: After Newsom finished, I asked a young looking gal if she liked what she heard. She did. One problem - she's in high school and can't vote.

Thursday's Planning Commission meeting was the hottest club in San Francisco.

Update: Click here for a full slideshow from the AA meeting.

Ok, now that we know the anti-formula- retail faction successfully thwarted American Apparel's efforts to build a branch on Valencia Street, I figure you're all dying for a blow-by-blow of the six-hour Planning Commission meeting where the final showdown took place. Well, let's get on it, shall we?

The initial crowd started gathering outside room 400 of City Hall around 12:30, an hour before the meeting was scheduled to commence. Early birds included a representative from local human-rights organization Global Exchange, and Ryan Holiday, a PR representative from American Apparel.

Once the doors opened, the crowd quickly swelled past capacity. You have to wonder whether the Planning Commission is usually attended by such a young and well-dressed audience: High leather boots and decorative scarves were the order of the day. The commission was well aware that the large turnout was due to the review of American Apparel's request to set up shop on the Valencia corridor, which was slated at item No. 12 on the agenda and euphemistically referred to as such for the remainder of the meeting, as in: "Those of you who are here for Item 12 might like to wait in the overflow room."  Many attendees did choose to watch the proceedings on a flatscreen TV in the overflow room.

At 2:15, when Item 12 had yet to be reached, some people showed up with snacks. The elated denizens of the overflow room quickly had their spirits dashed when they were told that, actually, the snacks were not for them and that the room had been booked and would they please leave. I saw some people walking around with plates of snacks later. They looked pretty good.

Think Aretha Franklin's big-ass-bow hat is as whimsical as it can get for the inauguration? Why don't they invite groups like this to perform on Capitol Hill?

While planned parties speckled the cityscape Tuesday night, an impromptu block party broke out on 22nd Street between Mission and Valencia outside Revolution Cafe -- until the cops ended the fun in the name of civil order.

As the clock struck 11, the brass horns and beating drums of the alternative Extra Action Marching Band busted out the traveling circus-like tunes -- think New Orleans brass band crossed with Brazilian samba -- while the gender-bending queens sashayed with their flags and pompons, and onlookers joined the frenzy. A couple even wore Dick Cheney masks.

Could it be that Barack Obama is ushering in a new era of whimsy and creative revelry? Actually, the Mission artists are always like that. The new prez just provided the excuse to bring it out.

The cops rolled up in patrol cars, and a paddy wagon even passed by in case things got out of control, but the line of law enforcement professionals seemed to surmise there was nothing nefarious going on. They mostly just stood by in bemusement (note the hipster cop with his Buddy Holly frames hiding like "Where's Waldo?" behind the officer second from the left) and let the Missionites have their brief moment. The band's tuba player conferred with a cop during a song break, after which he entered back into the circle of fanny-shakers and signaled "one more" with his index finger.

Did you know if you repeat "Obama" several times fast it starts sounding like "mambo"?

Photos by Snitch collaborator Francisco Barradas, whose flash was working much better than mine.

Axis cafe was packed Tuesday night, with attendees of this month's Ask a Scientist lecture jockeying for spaces to crouch between plastic seats and late-late-comers peering over the shoulders of the simply late comers. One woman, an out of towner who had wondered into the cafe simply to wait for her daughter to get off of work nearby, asked what the reason was for the crowd. That can be summed up in one word: Bigfoot

Interest in the mythical beast, who first crept into a generation's  subconscious when he upstaged John Lithgow in Harry and the Hendersons, has been running high ever since a trio of hoaxsters froze a lumpen Halloween suit in a freezer and declared it to be the carcass of Sasquatch last summer.

The crowd ran the gamut of young hipsters, the older socks-in-clogs crowd, and the truly eccentric. One man with a long white beard who was waiting in the food and drink line that snaked out of the building opened his jacket to the women in front of him and proclaimed (one assumes in correlation to whatever conversation they were having without him) "Yes, but wouldn't it be cool if they made hats out of these?" Due to the women's polite giggles and smiles, it's safe to assume that nothing illegal had transgressed.

The presenter was Berkeley-based Eugenie C. Scott, a physical anthropologist and executive director of the National Center for Science Education. For the uninitiated, Scott helpfully told the crowd that the NCSE dealt with the teaching of evolution in public schools. Pause: "We're for it!" She quipped.

Thank you folks, tip your waitresses!

The Prison-Industrial Complex or the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy or whatever form The Man is assuming these days can rest easy in his bed. That's because the rabble-rousing radical left (aka white kids from the East Bay wearing hankies over their faces) can't stay on point.

Monday night's Civic Center protest was supposed to be about 22-year-old Oscar Grant, shot dead by a BART cop on New Year's Day. From there, it morphed into how we're all living in a police state. From there, naturally, pro-Palestinian chants rang out. And from there, somehow, it was tied in to whatever the hell is going on in Greece. In other words, this was a bald-faced, callous exploitation of Grant's tragic death to raise some hell, chant incoherently into a bullhorn, and tell some cops on their best behavior -- who everyone knew wouldn't lift a finger -- to go fuck themselves.

Of course, that's not how the protesters see it. "This struggle is a global struggle. This is not just about Oscar Grant," said one speaker. "The whole problem is connected to people in Palestine and people in Greece being violated," added another. "The media is covering this up!" ranted yet another speaker as eight TV trucks idled nearby and two helicopters hovered overhead.

I didn't get the chance to write down much in my notebook -- I was standing a good eight feet away from the speakers and most of them seemed to have trouble operating the bullhorn. But one fellow did, unmistakably, say that this is "the richest country in America," while another noted that "If I went out and killed someone today, I'd be immediately arrested for murder" -- showing he really doesn't know much about the San Francisco Police Department.
  

Does Gavin Newsom turn into Stalin when the moon is full?

By Benjamin Wachs

(This is State of the Citysode III: The Environment. Click here for Part II: Education, and Part 1: Health Care)

00:00 - Gavin begins philosophically. "I like to say that the world's consumption is the sum of all local consumption."

Well, he's blown my mind already.

00:35 - "SF Forward" is a five year plan to curb our carbon and consumption.

You know, given how inevitable comparisons were between Gavin and communist leaders once he announced a 7.5 hour speech, I'm not sure if he REALLY wants to be in the business of "5 year plans." I'm just saying. The symbolism is terrible.

00:50 - San Francisco's secret weapon in cutting its emissions is its ability to measure its emissions. Does this really follow? Is it really a secret?

01:02 - San Francisco has not only measured it's Co2 emissions (say it with me now: "Knowing is half the battle!") but we've "submitted them to a third party."

Gavin doesn't say who. I'm guessing the Rotary Club?

01:05 - Our Co2 emissions, according to this unnamed third party (Disneyland?), are presently 6% below 1990 levels - despite our growing population and economy. "We're proud of that."

(Rolling out the red for Milk. Click the photo for a full slideshow.)

Notes and Audio by John Geluardi
Photos by Tim Wagner

Hollywood’s star-studded red carpet rolled into San Francisco last night for the world premiere of Milk, a new film that depicts the life of slain gay civil rights leader Harvey Milk.

The event drew hundreds of pro-gay marriage supporters who gathered across from the legendary Castro Theater to wave No On 8 placards and chant slogans. “Harvey would have loved this,” says his campaign manager Anne Kronenberg, “In fact, I’m sure he is loving it.”

It was a classic red carpet scene of the type that is rarely seen in San Francisco. About three dozen media outlets covered the event including one crew from the French version of HBO. The film’s producers, director and actors made their way along the red carpet talking about Harvey Milk and what it was like filming the movie in the heartland of the gay civil rights movement.

"It would not have been authentic in the way that we needed it to be," says Dan Jinks, who along with his co-producer Bruce Cohen could have shot the film much more inexpensively in Canada. "We all thought from day one that this movie needed to be filmed in San Francisco and we are so proud to have done so. We're feeling a lot of love tonight."

Words by Ashley Harrell, Photos by Fernando Orlandi

An estimated 400 people, including an abundance of gays, straights, attorneys, comedians and clowns, descended upon Broadway Studios last night for a performance and bacchanalia in the name of marriage equality.

The star of the evening without question was Margaret Cho, dressed in form-fitting red gown and beloved saucy attitude. "I fucking hate Sara Palin," she told the audience straight away, and went on to explain that any women who votes McCain just because there's a woman on his ticket is "a dumb cunt." Hatred aside, Cho sort of wants to fuck Palin, or at least fingerbang some sense into her, she said.

By Lauren Smiley

Roseanne Barr stumping for Cindy Sheehan, say what? It may have passed you by that Roseanne, the star of the nearly decade-long running sitcom about working class America (about as “red state” a family as has ever been on TV) is really a firebrand progressive. But if you only watched the mainstream media, you wouldn’t know much about Roseanne other than her weight, and you probably wouldn’t know a whole lot about “Peace Mom” Cindy Sheehan either. So perhaps it was fitting that the Cindy for Congress campaign would host a town hall discussion to a half-full Brava Theater on Tuesday night on the pitfalls of the corporate media that she says is currently treating her campaign to a “virtual blackout” on coverage.

After a folk song for the Sheehan campaign by local artist JL Stiles (see first video) the independent candidate challenging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the November election kicked off the night by denigrating Pelosi for voting for the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that cleared the way for the consolidation of the vast majority of media ownership into the hands of a few, charging that the “corporate media is a propaganda tool for the U.S. government.”

Sheehan’s fallout with the press started soon after staking out President Bush’s Texas ranch in 2005 a year after her son was killed in combat in Iraq. She says reporters found that, with her fervid criticism of the president and war, Sheehan couldn’t be typecast in the apolitical role of a grieving mother, and charges that they’ve written her off as a left wing nut job ever since. Her advice to deal with the media? “Throw your fuckin’ TV out the window.” Short of that, she advocated creating local boards similar to a school board to ensure that the media answers to the people.

(A really big fish: as seen from above in the underwater tunnel, at the bottom of the four-story rainforest).

California Academy of Sciences
Press Preview Day
Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008
Words and photos by Jennifer Maerz

Better than: Staring at a leopard-spotted eel with 50,000 other people.

California Academy of Sciences designer Renzo Piano sees most museums as "kingdoms of darkness," our tour guide was explaining, standing next to the Cal Academy's "living roof." What he meant by that statement was that most museums have to block out the world to protect the art inside. But in a living museum like this one, light streams in from every angle and creatures of every size swim, fly, slither, and float in one of the hands-down most amazing science museums I've ever visited.

Of course, Cal Academy isn't just a science museum. It has an aquarium, a planetarium, a natural history museum, a rooftop garden, a four-story rainforest, a library, and a lot of other things I don't have the space or time to list here. But the best asset this revamped venue has in its favor is it feels like a modern monument in every sense of the word.

Tobias Wolff at the SF LGBT Community Center
San Francisco LGBT Community Center (Market St.)
July 29, 2008
Notes and Photos by Edward Paik

Tobias Wolff has around 10 days to convince Iowa. He knows that if he can’t help spread word of Barack Obama, the senator will have little chance for serious contention in the coming democratic caucus, let alone the primaries.

So the civil rights lawyer and professor from University of Pennsylvania tours the state, speaking on behalf of Mr. Obama’s (and his own) stance on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues, in his capacity as the then-Democratic contender's chief policy adviser.

Seven months later he’ll remember these events and retell his story on a Tuesday evening at the San Francisco LGBT Community Center, but for now Wolff is on his way to Sioux City from Des Moines, a three-hour drive.

Headed to the northwest corner of Iowa, near the South Dakota border, Wolff asks a companion and Sioux City campaign staffer the question he always asks before visiting new communities.

“Tell me, what are the LGBT issues are and what people are talking about in this area?” he asked. “Tell me what is it that folks [there] care about? What do they want to hear?”

Wolff remembers the response till this day.

Solrak of B-Side Players

"Yes We Can" Tour/Afrofunk Festival
The Independent
July 24, 2008
Notes and Photos by Alex Brant-Zawadzki

Thursday night was a wonderful night to support Barack Obama.

First, the San Francisco for Obama Meetup.com group held a get-together at Crossroads. Then, for the less-coffee-more-dancing set, the Afrofunk Festival came to town, complete with the "Yes We Can" pro-Obama tour.

Crossroads was a great time for those looking to get to know fellow Obama volunteers in an intimate setting. Old-school campaign veterans sat next to bright-eyes novices who were not just working on their first campaign, but attending their first political meeting ever. Desperate, cynical hope and naive, youthful vigor collided over coffee. Meanwhile members of the San Francisco for Obama volunteer committee, headed by Angelica Jongco, made short-but-sweet presentations, after which everyone introduced themselves. Half the point of the meeting was to be able to spot each other in crowds later.