Ohmigod! City Lights!
Like Mr. Orthofer, I’m both delighted and appalled to see City Lights get the profile treatment. There isn’t time right now to investigate whether Times contributor Megan Walsh has a troublesome history of inserting these corny, oh-so-obvious “comic” observations in her work. But I can assure her that City Lights, while jutting in a diagonal manner along the edge of Columbus, is far from “a cake slice of a bookshop.” This concern for the store’s physical appearance overshadows its more important attribute. City Lights maintains a great poetry selection and also keeps such authors as Eric Kraft, Kathy Acker, Gilbert Sorrentino, and Stanley Elkin circulating in the stacks. And aside from the fact that Mr. Ferlinghetti himself is not what one might call an etiolated individual, countercultures, last I heard, have not faded away. They’re still around if you look a little. Unless, of course, your tastes and perceptive faculties are safer than a reverend who is overly concerned about his stature in a small town.
Cowards Killing Castro
The San Francisco Convention and Visitors Bureau City and County of San Francisco, apparently, is proud to announce that “There will be NO Halloween celebration in the Castro in 2007,” which is akin to telling a martinet-minded headmaster telling a bunch of eager students that there is no Santa Claus. If this isn’t a sign of how frightened the United States of America is, I don’t know what is. The campaign has been launched because last year, a few assholes proceeded to stab people, despite vigorous police protection.
I cannot believe that my former hometown, committed to celebrating craziness and diversity, is supporting this bullshit campaign. In early October 2001, when I returned to San Francisco after a five week stay in Hamburg, I was extremely worried about the state of my country. But when I went to the Castro on Halloween night, and I saw San Francisco’s determination to have fun and the people dressed in all sorts of crazy costumes, I knew that everything would be okay.
That San Francisco is now determined to wilt in the sunshine of a long-standing tradition, that it cannot defiantly celebrate Halloween in the Castro and tell those who committed the violence that its spirit cannot be stopped, is a sign that San Francisco would rather embrace fear than fearlessness. Stopping Halloween is not the answer. It gives credence to those who were committed to destroying the annual party. It enables the hoodlums. And it demonstrates that Gavin Newsom is a coward who does not reflect the San Francisco I proudly witnessed six years ago.
I certainly hope that the good citizens of San Francisco resist this PR bullshit, and celebrate anyway. Life is too short to give into the bad apples.
[UPDATE: A guy named Joe points out that this campaign is being sponsored by the City of San Francisco, as opposed to the San Francisco Convention and Visitors Bureau. Which, in a sense, is a good deal worse.]
Man, I Love San Francisco
New York Times: “The initiative, known as Healthy San Francisco, is the first effort by a locality to guarantee care to all of its uninsured, and it represents the latest attempt by state and local governments to patch a inadequate federal system.”
Chuck Nevius: The Cancer of the San Francisco Chronicle
Forget the horrors of The Family Circus. Do you really think your biggest concern when reading the daily paper is yawning over a comics section that takes no chances?
Frankly, if you’re a newspaper devoting column inches to a far from magnificent man in his flying machine, a far greater danger is that you, your child, or your pets will somehow believe in the xenophobic and thoughtless doggerel that the op-ed columnist in question considers a well-informed take by a responsible citizen for responsible citizens. Step off the paths into ruminative territory, and you’ll have less knee-jerk views on a highly complex situation that won’t go away anytime soon.
I’m not suggesting that the homeless situation shouldn’t be looked at through a critical prism, with criticisms extending to the homeless and municipal failings alike.
But, on a recent Sunday afternoon, I examined the newspaper in my former hometown and found — without trying too hard — a heartless and complacent yuppie writing very much in the thoughtless and vacant manner I used to find in that reactionary cad of a columnist, Ken Garcia. I saw the smiling visage of a man cast lovingly in a blue-toned circle — a smug and self-satisfied man who probably wouldn’t last twenty seconds in a bar brawl, and who certainly wouldn’t attempt to understand those people who were “beneath” him, who were possibly “more common,” and who didn’t sign their columns or their checks with pretentious initials like “C.W.” (If Chuck Nevius thinks he’s some kind of bullshit aristocrat with this preposterous handle, then I’m a small rhesus with a commodious shard of banana up his sphincter.)
Here was a man who was entirely uninterested in coming to terms with the homeless in Golden Gate Park for his piece. (Note how Nevius, like a well-trained corporate bitch, weighs the quotes of city officials and residents over the people who camp in the park.) I saw a man who witnessed needles and ran away and didn’t stop to think that maybe one of the guys he talked to, Christopher Ash, was troubled and didn’t have another place to go. I saw a “journalist” who didn’t have the balls to ask hard questions about where the homeless in San Francisco will sleep or how they will be fed or how they will be cared for. These were questions I asked myself when I lived on the edge of the Park and when I tried to pass along food and a few bucks and when I went out of my way to talk with people and understand a horrible problem. In this wicked web, these were uncertain questions with no immediate answers that sometimes brought tears to my eyes. San Francisco was, in many ways, very cruel in the manner that they threw the homeless to the wolves — now, the coyotes apparently — and in the manner in which they denied organizations like Food Not Bombs the means to disseminate food or help those in need.
With this column, I saw a “journalist” who was more concerned with banging out a piece instead of examining these harder issues, who described “the jewel of a public park” but didn’t consider that the people who slept there simply had no other spot and were just as human as the upper middle-class people who this journalist likewise spoke to.
Inevitably when we write a story like this, there are complaints that we are unsympathetic to the homeless. But this isn’t a homeless issue.
Is Nevius really this fucking daft? Here is a story that involves people camping out in the park and shooting up. If that isn’t a homeless issue, then tell me what is. An unexpected conflagration taking out the many expensive homes above Lake Street and causing San Francisco’s precious aristocrats to check into a hotel? (”Oh dear! I’ve become homeless! Thank goodness I have my driver and valet!”)
In the Nevius world, bravery is attached not to the everyday people who are trying to find a new place to sleep every night and live with their drug addictions, but to those volunteers who work to clean up the neighborhood and who pay $8,500 a year in property taxes. And if Nevius is gullible enough to think that Central Park is devoid of the homeless, he might want to consider this Wall Street Journal item from last month that reported how New York City was undercounting the homeless. Just because Gavin Newsom didn’t see them doesn’t mean that they aren’t there.
Consider Nevius’s nonsense when compared against the Chron’s detailed series of articles in February that examined the homeless problem in depth, hitting it from numerous angles. In writing this sham of a column, Chuck Nevius has demonstrated that he is a hack who defames journalism and who defames what is, for the most part, a pretty good paper.
I may have had my quibbles with William T. Vollmann’s Poor People, but if you want real journalism, you’ll find more honesty on this subject in one highly reflective chapter that begins with the line “I am sometimes afraid of poor people,” and that proceeds to explore the problem of maintaining a neighborhood while contending with the equally necessary quality of human compassion.
73 New Galaxies Revealed by Frank Chiu
Tito uncovers the terrifying news. There are now 85 galaxies instead of twelve. I assure you. My move to New York had nothing to do with this.
Gray Lady Slams San Franciscans with Base Generalization
New York Times: “Most plastic grocery bags are made from polyethylene, which is derived from oil, which is considered by many San Franciscans to be the root of most of the world’s problems, from $4 gallons of gasoline to the war in Iraq.”
Actually, not this San Franciscan. I believe that most of this world’s problems stem from peanut butter that you can’t lick from the roof of your mouth, poorly performed cunnilingus, clip-on ties, bad toupees, and, of course, money.
Teo Kridech, My Hero
San Francisco Chronicle: “The posts ‘nearly killed my business,’ said Kridech, a native of France who has worked in the food industry for 25 years and spent $150,000 revamping the Senses space. ‘Everyone has become a food critic. They think they’re real big shots. They probably can’t even make scrambled eggs.’”
I am one of the few cultivated San Franciscans who can, in fact, make scrambled eggs. So I take no offense to Teo Kridech’s charges. In fact, I agree whole-heartedly with them. It’s about time that someone identified those vermin now sitting in restaurants because they are incapable of cooking a basic breakfast. It’s about time that rebels like Mr. Kridech raked these bastard diners across the coals. I believe in a society in which those who cannot make scrambled eggs are massacred by unscrupulous men in Nazi uniforms and epaulettes. I will begin shooting these so-called “food bloggers” in the head, should Mr. Kridech request my services. These uncultured vultures think that can simply place something in a microwave and call it dinner. They think that they can go to a restaurant and describe its problems to people on the Web! Well, what good are these interlopers with good men like Teo Kirdech determining our cultural norms?
So I salute Teo Kirdech’s unapologetic and somewhat strange embrace of Manichean vales. Since I can make scrambled eggs, perhaps I might be styled a “big shot” and even, quite possibly, a “food critic.” (Many years ago, I was asked to write restaurant reviews. Whether these scribblings count as “food criticism” proper, I cannot say. I was a younger man then and I often described how I was feeling in these reviews, which was probably my career as a “food critic” was a brief one. Nevertheless, I shall send copies of these on to Mr. Kirdech, where he can then offer me his opinion about whether these scribblings constitute criticism. Or perhaps I can simply cook scrambled eggs in front of Mr. Kirdech and earn his trust.)
To settle this matter once and for all, I plan to check out Mr. Kridech’s restaurant at some random point during the next three weeks, investigating these claims of “cheap porcelain plates” and the “little butter dish from Ikea.” If this plateware is causing an inordinate amount of stress among San Francisco eaters, and if Mr. Kridech is indeed stiffing his customers, it will be duly reported here. And I will have to abandon the clear homicidal plan implied by Mr. Kridech.
The ball, as they say, is in Mr. Kridech’s court. And he should be a little frightened. For while other food bloggers have been hard on Mr. Kridech, who I hope will be my friend no matter what I think of his restaurant, I am a harder man to be reckoned with. I can make scrambled eggs.
Litigious Eating in San Francisco
What do you get when you cross DVD Verdict with Chowhound? What else? Fud Court!
Geek Challenge
I’m surprised that nobody has developed a script which merges this this topographical map of San Francisco with Google Maps. Come on, software developers and Web 2.0 tinkerers, I challenge you to come up with a map that offers walking routes for those who embrace walking up steep hills and those lazier types who go out of their way to avoid elevation.
And the Ghost of Steve McQueen Retreats to Nob Hill
Enrico’s has closed. It’s time for Bullitt fans to mourn.
Keep Castro Halloween Going
During Halloween, for those who don’t live in San Francisco, the Castro transforms into a fantastic affair that is held every Halloween: sort of a mini-Mardi Gras in which everybody crowds into the Castro neighborhood and dresses up. Tens of thousands of people are drawn every October 31, and this confluence brings together freaks, drag queens, and everyday people — all of them celebrating the mischievious spirit of Halloween and this City’s rep as glorious weird magnet.
Last night, nine people were shot in the Castro area.
Now, a few years ago, some stabbings occurred and there was some discussion on whether the Castro should be closed down for Halloween. Thankfully, it wasn’t.
But the shootings have now upped the authoritarian ante and now Mayor Gavin Newsom is considering pulling the plug.
I certainly hope this isn’t the case. On Halloween 2001, I went to the Castro with some friends, having just returned from a trip to Germany. With irony declared dead (why?), I had grave reservations about whether or not my country’s innovative and creative spirit would survive the “you are either with us or against us” mentality that followed the 9/11 attacks. Castro Halloween 2001 reassured me, demonstrating that my country’s spirit was there. And I realized then that no matter how authoritarian this country became, there would still be Castro Halloween. There would still be people determined to celebrate their inner Bohemian spirits. There would still be people wanting to have fun and rock the boat, however rightward the national galleon sailed.
But if Castro Halloween is to go or to be seriously restricted because of these treacherous bad apples who spoiled the party for everyone, then I’ll know that my country is dead. I’ll know that our zero tolerance policy, which doesn’t account for the fact that terrible things will continue to occur as long as humans occupy this planet, applies across the board. I’ll know that, much like the great edgy cabaret acts of Berlin in the 1920s and 1930s that inspired Christopher Isherwood were completely halted and uprooted by Nazi thugs, this nation has no interest in one of our most precious freedoms: the right to assemble peacefully under the First Amendment.
If we believe in America, that marvelous land of rabblerousers and cultural innovators, then the citizens of San Francisco won’t let Castro Halloween go because of a few thugs.
Witold Rybczynski: Chickenhead of the Month
Journalistically speaking, Witold Rybczynski is like a paunchy, loutish drunk guzzling MGD at a dive that was cool in 1995 but that’s gone steadily downhill, incapable of citing specific examples (Maybeck had plenty of homegrown architectural followers, you foolish fuck), while he’s castigating two thirds of the bar through his rambling and uninformed generalizations and bitter dismissals, and who people would beat the shit out of if he weren’t so pathetic in articulating arguments or if it weren’t so easy to get the hubristic toad to buy you a drink because you smile and nod as he can’t stop boasting about his apparent “genius.”
(In other words, nobody fucks with my city and gets away with it.)
Bartender Bobby Cook Dead
Robert “Bobby” Cook, the owner of the fantastic Owl Tree bar, has passed away. The Owl Tree, if you haven’t been there, is a fantastic bar loaded with all manner of owl memorabilia. Cook was as much of a staple on the San Francisco bar scene as the late Bruno Mooshei. If you didn’t talk with him or contribute to the conversation, Bobby Cook would order you to the other end of the bar.
No doubt Bobby is up there with Bruno mixing martinis in That Great Bartending Place in the Sky and ordering sanctimonious pricks to sit elsewhere.
RIP Bobby. I, for one, dig the owls.
(Thanks, Kim!)
The Problem with MUNI
For those looking for fresh content, I have a guest editorial at the SFist today. I assure all readers that I have considerably fewer follicles than the photo Eve dug up.
Putting the Black in Black Oak Books
I’ve quibbled about Black Oak Books before, but Barking Kitten offers another reason why the term “indieshock” applies: The staff is willfully ignorant about the latest offerings from Margaret Atwood and Janet Fritch and apparently rebukes customers who ask about these authors. Is this any way to run a business?
Score One for My Neighborhood
Dan Rhodes says his favorite bookstore is the Booksmith. (via 3AM Magazine)
On the Other Hand, “Litterers” Will Be Arrested More Frequently
San Francisco Chronicle: “Famously tolerant San Francisco could become an even friendlier place for pot smokers if the Board of Supervisors passes legislation that proclaims most marijuana violations ‘the lowest law enforcement priority’ for city police.”
Pancho Villa Should Have Rated Higher, However
An Open Letter to Andy Ross
Dear Andy:
Thank you for surrendering Cody’s to a corporation. I’m sure that Yohan, Inc., with its concentration on distributing foreign books and magazines, has the experience and the niche interest to keep the two remaining Cody’s stores truly independent. I’m positive they won’t turn the stores into crappy franchises no less distinct than a B. Dalton outlet. Sure.
But I know how you’ll justify all this, Mr. Ross. You didn’t sell out. You bought in. It was the “market,” after all, that killed off Cody’s. Not the fact that you took over Planet Hollywood’s old space on Stockton Street, which probably had a rent that was a shitload more expensive than the original Telegraph Avenue store that you so gracelessly killed. Fred Cody is spinning in his grave right around now. He never would have let this happen.
The fact of the matter is that you didn’t have the courage to tell people that you were ready to hang up your hat. You ran this transaction through fast — without trying to find a responsible buyer who gave a damn about books and bookstores. Someone who would carry the Cody’s legacy into the 21st century.
Well, I hope you’re sitting pretty on that small fortune. You didn’t even have the balls to talk to the Berkeley Daily Planet, the newspaper that broke the story. Instead, you farmed out the duties to poor Fred’s widow, Pat Cody, who had to begrudgingly remark that this was “a good thing.”
Well, it’s not a good thing, Andy. It’s not good that you let one of the greatest indie bookstores that ever graced the Bay Area die and placed what was left well on the path to ruins. It’s not good that you cower away and let others do your talking for you. It’s not good that you betrayed a Berkeley landmark the same way that Justin Herman killed the Fillmore in the 1960s or that Robert Moses tampered with New York.
Very truly yours,
Edward Champion
San Franciso Fringe Festival
As a man who has volunteered his services in the past for various Fringe plays and who even wrote and directed one (and who is, in fact, working on another), it would be unconscionable of me not to point out that this year’s San Francisco Fringe Festival starts tonight.
There are a few things to observe here:
First off, that sexy podcaster Michael Rice has interviewed many of the Fringe participants (and recently reached his 100th show; congrats Mike!).
Second, a number of regulars return to the Exit’s three stages (and beyond). Jeremy Jorgenson, who put on The Thrilling Adventures of Elvis in Space back in 2004 (the year Wrestling went on), returns with a stirring sequel. The nEO sURREALISTS return with Yeastboy and PigKnuckle. Noah Kelly, a cool cat I know, is one of the talents involved in RIPE Theater’s @Six, performed, believe it or not, at Original Joe’s. And if restaurant cabaret rooms weren’t enough to tickle your fancy, why not try out the play performed on The Mexican Bus?
Jimmy Hogg’s Curriculum Vitae is a one-man show outlining Hogg’s employment history. John Rackham’s Exiles, a play outlining a world without bars, cinemas, theatres and other pleasures, looks interesting. Theatre Tremendo offers a Twilight Zone-style play. There’s even a rock opera called Thanatics.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that the excellent Banana, Bag & Bodice has returned with a new play entitled The Fall and Rise of the Rising Fallen, in which Jason Craig and Jessica Jelliffe will not be present, but contacted from the dead.
I hope to catch at least a few of these plays next week and I will report back some of my findings.
Indieshock
Annalee Newitz has coined the term “chainshock” to depict one’s reaction when “a store you once thought independent is now part of a chain.” However, I’d like to put forth an opposing term: “indieshock,” when one learns that a place maintaining a troubling chain-store like atmosphere is actually independent. Here are my own “indieshock” moments:
1. Black Oak Books. Far too antiseptic in its layout. Its owners regularly hassle customers, demanding that they hand over their bags or purses in a rude manner that implies the customers are criminal and/or Gestapo victims. This is the kind of treatment one expects from Borders, not a reputable indie bookstore. (Technically, one might argue that Black Oaks is a chain, by dint of having two stores. But I let this discrepancy stand.)
2. Cafe Reverie. You walk into this place, shocked by the fact that you’re the only one wearing a Spam T-shirt and ripped up jeans and probably making a lot less money than the yuppies seated at the tables, who are all hypnotized by the azure glare of their laptops, as if they are awaiting a message from Xenu. You get shit from the staff for not being particular about your order. What chain-like perdition is this? Oh, it’s actually “indie.” Never mind that the people here are scared shitless of anybody who looks even remotely impoverished.
3. Lucky Penny. The decor of this place resembles a Howard Johnson’s circa 1977, steeped in hideous beiges and browns — the kind of layout only a heroin addict would respond to. The staff here are burned out. Nearly all of them have the telltale look of someone who has spent their shift contending with borderline criminals. The food is terrible, and I’m talking worse than Sparky’s at 3AM, where the only edible thing you can get is a grilled cheese sandwich. And even then, you have serious doubts. I wouldn’t wish my worst enemy to dine at this place. If ever there was a San Francisco restaurant that slung homogeneous-looking hash, the Lucky Penny is it. And yet, astonishingly, the Lucky Penny is independently owned and operated.
The Golden Gate Bridge: Where Would You Like to Leap to Your Death Today?
Bizarre location-based infograph. (via SF Metro)
Get Shitfaced for a Good Cause
Much to my regret, I won’t be able to make this. But Jackson West reminds me of tonight’s opportunity to drink booze to contribute to Josh Wolf’s campaign. House of Shields, 39 New Montgomery Street, 7 PM.
The Rainbow Connection
The SFist’s Sarah L. has a first-hand report of the first Survival Research Labs show in ten years. If the name sounds familiar, that’s because none other than William T. Vollmann chronicled the SRL’s theatrical destruction of machines in a section of The Rainbow Stories. Will there be more shows? Well, who knows? But Your Faithful Correspondent will try and get the inside skinny on this.
Josh Wolf Benefits
To follow up on the Josh Wolf incarceration, Laughing Squid points to two benefit events designed to raise money for Josh’s legal defense fund.
Event #1: Cafe La Boheme, Saturday August 19, 2006, 5:00 PM-7:00 PM.
Event #2: House of Shields, Thursday, August 24, 2006, 7:00 PM.
Josh’s case represents a scenario that could apply to all journalists, establishing a legal precedent which will affect the way any story is covered. That local story about police corruption involving a reporter gaining the trust of an anonymous source? (Consider Fajitagate, for example.) Well, the case is under investigation and it’s been transferred to a federal court, sidestepping the California shield law, and the journalist has to give up his sources or be thrown in jail. If you are concerned with preserving California’s shield law and the future of investigative journalism, and you happen to be in San Francisco on either of these two days, these two benefits are worth your while.
If not, you can always donate to Josh Wolf’s defense fund.
RIP Sue Bierman
Former San Francisco Sue Bierman died today. She apparently crashed her car into a dumpster in Cole Valley. Bierman was always one of my favorite supervisors and I certainly missed her when term limitations forced her out of office. Now I’ll miss her even more.
While she got a late start in politics (she was 68 when she first became Supervisor), Bierman brought a compassionate touch and a wise, no-bullshit voice of skepticism to almost every issue she took on. It was Bierman who stopped the freeway from expanding into the Panhandle.
Bierman offered a progressive voice that was distinctly San Franciscan: tolerant, quirky, and independent. She frequently adopted interesting and controversial positions, such as voting against an alcohol ban in the Panhandle, arguing that the homeless should have a place to drink alcohol as the homeowners did. (The only other supe to vote against the ban was Ammiano.) She even passionately defended the rights of the petitioners to reinstate the former Doggie Diner restaurant as a landmark.
I’ll miss Bierman, one of the few local politicians I never got a chance to meet. But her run as Supervisor through the 90s is a clear reminder that it’s never too late to get involved in politics.
(via SFist)
San Francisco Freelance Journalist Jailed
Back in July 2005, videographer Josh Wolf shot this compelling video of an anti-war protest, where he raised a provocative question: did the SFPD apply too much force against the protestors in response to an unrelated assault on a police officer? As it turns out, the case later made its way to federal court (because the SFPD receives federal funds), Wolf was asked to reveal the raw footage and refused, under his First and Fourth Amendment rights, as well as the California Shield Law, and is now being charged with contempt of court for refusing to hand over the tapes.
Judge William Alsup has stated, “Every person, from the president of the United States down to you and me, has to give information to the grand jury if the grand jury wants it.”
Well, that’s all fine and dandy, but consider what this means for journalism at large. What does this mean for establishing and maintaining confidential sources? What does this mean for pursuing a story?
If you’d like to donate to Wolf’s legal defense fund, the link is here. I’ve donated. Will you?
(via the SFist)
[UPDATE: Josh Wolf's mother is now reporting that Wolf lost on all of the motions and is jail. Efforts are being made to appeal.]
For Those Who Download Their Porn on the Go
Caltrain + WiFi = Genius!
Frank Chu Documentary
“Lunch Inside the 12 Galaxies.” Many unexpected personal details. I had no idea that Frank served jail time (or was a Budweiser fan or a smoker), assuming that he can be believed. Hopefully, an intrepid journalist might be able to confirm this. For those outside San Francisco, more on Frank Chu here. He’s part of a great San Francisco tradition. (via Eddie Codel)
To Porn or Not to Porn, That is the Question
A pal of mine attends a sex writers reading and a burlesque show, lives to tell the tale and invents an impromptu game on the spot: “I started playing a game with myself during the opening of the burlesque show, where I’d ask in my best inner announcer voice, if what was going on on the stage was Porn or anti-Porn. If you find it exciting (oops, almost wrote ‘arousing’ but my inner prude balked at that word) the answer is ‘porn’ and if its not, its ‘anti-porn.’”
