Parallaxis

Aliens

2010-10-23T11:18:00.000-07:00

I had a dream last night that left a strong emotional effect after I woke up.

In the dream, I was accompanied by another creature that was something like a cat, but also something like a reptile or alien (it was a dull grayish-green and not at all soft and furry).

At first, there was little relationship between us, except that we weren’t hostile to one another.

But then another creature entered our dream – a creature whose life was precious and beautiful to me. Something gentle. Something innocent. Something harmless and defenseless. Exactly what it was is unclear to me now. But the alien viciously attacked and consumed it. Its prey didn’t resist; it didn’t even have time to react.

I was instantly in shock and grief. In tears, I truly could not fathom the brutality of the act, and remember thinking “nothing deserves to be destroyed that way.”

The alien and I were once again alone together.

Next to me, I noticed what appeared to be some rock candy. I reached over, scooped up a handful, and popped them into my mouth. They were white and crystailine, and crunched between my teeth like salt, but were essentially flavorless. Nonetheless, I munched on them.

When the alien saw what I was doing, it cried in agony. I didn’t understand its anguish until, through its tearful sobbing, it spoke.

“Nothing deserves to be destroyed like that!” it cried.

I realized the alien thought me to be savage and barbaric, even primitive, to have committed such an act. It may even have thought me a lesser creature. But when I thought about what I had done, I didn’t think, “I know better now”, because there was nothing about my action that could make me understand the alien’s reaction. I could empathize with it, however, because my feelings toward the alien were the same. And it certainly didn't understand why I felt they way I did toward it.

And again, we were alone together – not hostile to one another, and not wanting to be – but each of us now questioning how we can coexist while knowing that there are fundamental differences between each of us that may very well be impossible for us to ever comprehend and reconcile, let alone accept.

And so I woke up with these lingering emotions, and it made me think about what’s going on in the world today. In Europe, countries are banning head scarves, burqas, and minarets. And this week, German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated, “Multiculturalism is failing.”

And as you well know, America is struggling with it too. But America’s struggle with it isn’t new. We’ve been struggling with it since we invented it. We know better than anyone that multiculturalism is always hard; it’s always a struggle; it always will be; but you make it work because it is so very, very important. And while it's never pretty, it's such a beautiful mess. The rest of the world needs to learn these truths, and Americans may be the only people with the experience to teach these lessons.

And we must rise to that challenge, because multiculturalism is fundamental to the United States of America. If the spirit of multiculturalism dies, the spirit of America dies with it. And who wants “death to America?”

My heartbreak

2010-05-21T20:08:00.000-07:00

Sherman isn't with me any more. He had a host of problems and complications from the problems, including a heart murmur, feline asthma, and chronic kidney disease. He got pneumonia about 4 months ago and his kidneys tanked. We hospitalized him for 3 days, which bought him some time - he was otherwise a goner. The 4 months since had been full of me giving him medicines and other treatments, sub-cutaneous fluids daily, a hormone injection weekly, and multiple pills and supplements twice a day. But I'm so glad I got those additional 4 months.

2 weeks ago or so, Sherman's blood pressure went through the roof and caused him to go blind. Unfortunately, I don't think we recognized his blindness right away - he was already not very active, and knew the apartment well enough to keep getting around. But Thursday night it was unmistakable. His eyes were so big and it was obvious he wasn't seeing a thing. You could really see the bewildered and concerned look in his face - like he just didn't understand what was happening to him. We took him to the ER the next day. His retinas had ruptured and he would never get his vision back. We started managing his blood pressure as well, and got it back to normal. And even though he couldn't see, he kept going, moved about the apartment, bumped into walls and had to hunt around for the familiar places now and then, but didn't let it stop him. Unfortunately though, this was the beginning of the end.

So last week I juggled working from home half days to make sure Sherman ate and drank, which he didn't much want to do. He would only drink or eat when I was holding him, holding food or water for him, then coaxing him for 2 or 3 minutes (and being very patient). By Thursday, that wasn't always working either and he had grown so weak he could no longer hop up to the spot he had made for himself on the love seat (even with the "step" I had made for him to make it easier). Then, when I was putting him down to do some work, I put him in front of his litter box in case he needed to use it before going to lay down. He went inside and I waited... he was in there a long time so I lifted the lid to see if he was having trouble, and he was just laying in it, too tired to come out I guess. My heart broke for about the 100th time that week when I saw him there.

Friday morning, things were even more grim. I came home at lunchtime to check on him, hoping against hope for a sign of improvement, but there wasn't any. So I called a doctor who makes house calls and who had been referred to us to discuss end of life options. I was planning to make the appointment for Saturday (or if he was unavailable, Tuesday, since he doesn't have hours on Sunday or Mondays). While speaking with him, he offered to come over that afternoon as well. That's the option Jay wanted, thinking it would be easier to get it over with. So I went from having a remaining day to spend with Sherman to having about 45 minutes. The vet came into our bedroom and put Sherman to sleep while I held him. Sherman was comfortable and ended peacefully. But it hit me like a wrecking ball when I laid him down, trying to be gentle, and saw him lifeless as I let go of him. It was beyond anything I imagined and I can't begin to describe the grief, which was likely compounded by the absolute helplessness I felt that I could no longer do anything whatsoever for him and the fact that I was making a purposeful decision, without his knowledge, to end his life and hoping it was the decision he would ask me to make if he could.

In the long run, I think Jay was right - Saturday was probably not as bad as it would have been. But Friday afternoon was about the most painful day I have ever experienced - at least that I remember (and of course, the memory is still fresh). And so I'm still trying to say goodbye to Sherman

Ever since he was a kitten, I sang "Baby Mine" to Sherman. This was the last time I got to sing it to him, the day before he died.

I miss you, Shermonster.

Why do so many people hate the word ‘moist’?

2010-05-05T17:09:00.000-07:00

You’ve probably met them – you might even be one of them: People who hate the word ‘moist’.

If my own personal, unscientific tabulations over the years are any indication, ‘moist’ is among the most-hated words in the English language. In fact, I just Googled the term and two of the top four results were about hating the word. So there, I am right.

But why? I don’t get it. Of the words that mean ‘kind of wet-ish’, ‘moist’ is really about the most positive description there is. By comparison, the ickier versions of ‘kind of wet-ish’ include ‘damp’ and ‘swampy’.

Think about it. I endeavor to achieve brownies and cupcakes that are moist. But I would shy away from any baked goods that were damp. When I put my hands down someone’s pants, I am generally pleased to discover the underwear is moist. Damp underwear, on the other hand, I am not as OK with. Moist panties, good. Swampy panties, bad.

So moist is a good thing! Let’s overcome our distaste for moist. In fact, let’s declare May ‘Moist Appreciation Month’. I challenge you to find ways to love and embrace moist in your life.

Do you hate the word moist? Can you get over it – at least for the month of May? What other words to you hate?

Liberal vs. Conservative

2009-02-04T21:12:00.001-08:00

(Note: I actually wrote this 4 years ago, shortly after George W. Bush began his 2nd term as President of the United States. Now that Obama is in his 2nd week as President, I thought it fitting to repost this)

"CONSERVATIVE, n. A statesman who is enamoured of existing evils, as distinguished from a Liberal who wishes to replace them with others." - Ambrose Bierce, (1842-1914) American satirist

I've heard people (both in private conversation and in public forums, such as the newspaper and television) make a distinction between "Conservative" and "True Conservative" (or "True Conservatism"). I asked several comrades, cohorts, and colleagues some questions regarding the term "True Conservative." I got a different answer from every single person.

But now that the election is over and I witness what appears to be deepening division between Democrats and Republicans, Liberals and Conservatives, Blue States and Red States, I feel myself torn along with the nation.

I always thought I was probably more politically conservative (by the definition I thought I knew of conservatism), contrary to what my family thought. Now, I'm wondering if I am more liberal than I once thought - or if the definition of the word is changing (or being changed). And I feel torn by the divisiveness.

Yet, when I have talked to people on one side or the other, I haven't felt a great divide. Instead, we've connected as human beings. And I am beginning to think that maybe our main division is that we're listening to different people yelling at us. There are certainly fanatics on both sides, and these extremes differ greatly, but for most of us I think our beliefs and values are not nearly so divergent. Am I wrong?

"There is danger in reckless change; but greater danger in blind conservatism." - Henry George (1839-1897), Economist, tax reformist, journalist, author

Growing up, I didn't think of the beliefs and values I learned as either conservative or liberal, really. When I thought of conservative, I thought of caution, as in "conserve your energy" or "conservation of the environment"... and when I thought of liberal, I thought of openness and generosity, as in "liberty" and "liberal portions of food." Neither of them are ugly words.

But I come from what is considered a conservative state, and I felt that I shared in conservative values.

Much of Nebraska still resembles the open frontier, moreso possibly than any other state in the lower forty-eight. Hardly anyone lives there (here in San Francisco, I have more neighbors within seven miles of me than reside in all of Nebraska), and the people who settled there were fiercely independent. At one time, they were the political radicals in this country: the Populist Movement, the Farmers Revolt, The Grange. The defeat of Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan (a Populist from Nebraska) marked the end of one of the most challenging protest movements in U.S. history. It is part of our heritage, and in our blood, that individual freedom is our most precious right as an American.

And so, I thought it conservative to believe in individual rights, civil rights, and human rights. I still do.

I had family who were farmers and family in the ranching business. I grew up with an enormous respect for the land and for nature. In Nebraska, you can't plan your day without first checking to see what nature has planned for you. And our ranches are in an area known as the Sandhills, an ocean of grass nearly the size of Maine made up of sand dunes hundreds of feet high. If you don't take meticulous care of the grass-covered hills, you'd soon be dealing with 600-ft tall open sand dunes - dunes that blow, and drift, and literally move. If that happens, we're all royally screwed.

So I always thought it was conservative to care about the environment. And I still do.

My sister was born with Spina Bifida. She survived against astronomical odds and is now in her 30s. To this day, it seems like she has an average of one or two surgeries a year. My memory of her first five years are almost entirely memories of hospital rooms. I think my experience growing up with her has shaped my opinion of healthcare.

It may not be the government's job, or responsibility, to provide healthcare for its citizens. But I believe it is an ideal we can strive for. When President Kennedy announced in 1961 that he wanted to put a man on the moon in ten years, it was an idea that seemed so impossible it bordered on lunatic (ooh I love puns!) We did it in eight.

I don't see why we as a society can't put the same determination into healthcare - the idea isn't nearly as crazy. And it may not have been possible in 1776, or even 100 years ago - but we have advanced as a society, culturally and technologically. We are much more sophisticated and compassionate now than we were two-hundred years ago - at least I'd like to think so. As we advance as a society, don't we also want to better ourselves as a people? And when we can achieve better things, for all of us, shouldn't we? Isn't it sometimes good to redefine our society's role, to keep up with our achievements?

And what's not conservative about caring for people who are sick and need help?

So those are my conservative values. Am I a conservative liberal, or a liberal conservative? Is it an oxymoron, or can we get along after all?

"I'm a liberal when it comes to human rights, the poor; so's George Bush. . . . But Liberal and Conservative don't mean much to me anymore. Does that mean we care about people and are interested and want to help? And if that makes you a Liberal, so be it." - Barbara Bush (1925- )

And so what is our big difference? What makes some people red and others blue?

There's a web site circulating where people have posted their pictures, with messages of apology to the world for the outcome of the election. The bulletin board where I first found this site has lots of posts making fun of it.

And yet, I actually got a tear in my eye reading what the kids (mostly kids, it seemed - people who had probably only been voting a few years) were expressing.

(I can hear Hank Williams croonin' already: "You're Bleedin' Heart!!!!") but I digress...

There was an honest sense of failure - personal failure, disenchantment, and powerlessness. I think people were feeling a sense of responsibility to the rest of the world, but that they had dropped the ball.

Of course, I can only truly speak for myself. But that was my biggest motivator, when deciding how to cast my vote. My domestic issues can and will be dealt with, if not now, in a few years. Even though I believe Bush is a tax and spend Republican - none of my reasons, really, for opposing him are "life or death" to us, and therefore nothing to move to Canada over, except, maybe, the path he is taking our nation down as a world leader, as the last remaining Superpower.

Liberals aren't alone in thinking our president is failing when it comes to foreign affairs. Even among Bush supporters, there are a lot of people who believe that our foreign policy is embarrassing, if not shameful. But to me, personally, this is the big issue. And, again, personally, I do believe he has led us horribly astray.

And no matter how we differ, as Americans, on this point - there is a growing distaste (to put it mildly - hatred, to put it more accurately perhaps) for Americans and America, in the rest of the world. I think that was the despair behind these apologies.

Every human on this planet who is born an American is a lottery winner. I don't think, for us, it is even possible to imagine our privilege (don't take this as braggadocio; it is a humble acknowledgement of a very real truth). Most of us can go about our daily lives without giving a thought to a single foreign nation, not even a fleeting thought to a single thing that is happening outside our safe bubble full of comfortable houses, spacious shopping malls, restaurants, clubs, and theaters. That's fortune.

It's not true of a single person who lives in any country besides ours, because the United States, for better or for worse, is a major player in the lives of every single person on the planet, every single day. Luckily for us, that's US!

But that makes me feel responsible, when I vote for the person to lead this nation, to vote for a person who will lead the WORLD wisely, carefully, and morally. I feel responsible to choose a person who values the environment, and values human life, not just the lives of Americans. I feel responsible to choose a person I think is honorable, and worthy of respect - a person who cares about our planet, and wants the world to be a good place for everyone, not just America.

America has assumed a role among the nations of Earth - kind of like, we're the president. And that gives us Americans a lot of privilege, and also the responsibility to do right by the world. I'm happy to take on that responsibility - the privilege is more than worth it.

And that's why I was moved, when i looked through the apologies on that web site. Because I shared in the sense of failure to that responsibility. And I saw also the smatterings of forgiveness from other nations - also from very young people. And I thought that there was hope and optimism there. And connection.

But again, many conservatives agree that our foreign policy is failing. Many Republicans have acknowledged that we've made a mess in Iraq. Even people who continue to maintain that invading Iraq was the right decision will admit that something needs to change. (And to be fair, a lot of liberals (like me) didn't like Kerry that much. A lot of Democrats still question what he really stood for.) I think that most of us have some common ground here.

It seems to me, once again, that the divisiveness among most of us lies more in our perception of the "other" than anything else. And perpetuating that perception is who we are listening to. It's the Limbaughs, Novaks, Carlsons, Hannitys, Begalas, Carvilles, et. al. driving a wedge between us. Perhaps I'm just a hopeless optimist, but I think we'd all come together, at least in some ways, if we stopped listening to them, and started listening to each other.

Slow Death of a Hospital

2008-07-20T18:30:00.000-07:00

Click to enlarge.

The Public Health Service Hospital
San Francisco, CA

Click to enlarge.

Built in 1931.

Click to enlarge.

Abandoned in 1981.

Click to enlarge.

Today, Monday, July 21, 2008, work begins on its "rehabilitation."

Click to enlarge.

Good news for this old building. But also a bit sad, because there is twenty-year's of graffiti art covering the walls of every room inside that will be lost.

Click to enlarge.

I had to be happy with just photographing the outside of the building one last time before construction begins.

Click to enlarge.

Click the image below to see more of my photos of the Public Health Service Hospital.

Unfortunately, security wouldn't allow me to go inside. Luckily, someone else already did...

Another photographer was fortunate enough to get inside the hospital a few years ago. Take a look.

Of Light and Height

2008-07-17T22:25:00.000-07:00

Images from Ocean Beach and Twin Peaks, San Francisco, California, 12 July 2008

A Walk Around My Block

2008-05-31T21:19:00.000-07:00

I
walked
out
my
front
door
and
around
my
block.

I didn't cross any streets with traffic signals.

This
allowed
me
to
explore
only
four
streets
and
two
alleys.

See what I saw...>

Hasten to Hesitate

2007-09-16T23:25:00.000-07:00

The following is a "magnetic poem" - which gets its name from the word magnets you may have seen on refrigerators. In this case, a magnetic poem is a poetry game between several players. Each round, one player is the host. The host selects an existing, published poem, arranges all of the words in alphabetical order, and gives the alphabetical list of words to the other players as a challenge. Then, the other players, individually, write their own poems using only the words in the list (or try to come close as possible). After a specified time frame, the players all submit their entries and cast votes. The winner gets to be the host for the next round. This magnetic poem won me the round. I'll post the original poem in a comment.

Both legends and theory are quite strewn
with such units of time.
Each event runs by
as in a low ditch that partly led to yourself,
but rather, on the second hand,
will not.
You’re not blind: these are visible but not seen.

The clock's third hand points directly at you,
holds you perilously, infinitely,
until you snag the laundry (the garters, rather) of time
and find yourself on the rabbit, running, entirely out of oxygen,
with a leap through unanticipated architecture -
the chutes, holes and firehouse poles -
among faces, undead and cardinal red, that become
a Stag's crowd gathered at the corpse of cake
where, smelling the sweet icing of you, human delight,
all is as they expect.

You've been surprised
on the very last birthday.
It marks a nice occasion
to plunge between your breasts
through the yielding strata,
transecting flesh and flower,
and dine on your small, ticking viscera -
on the sticky sugar tassels that will also be delicious.
Will it though?

There are two sides, as correct as not.

OK! OK! I'll Talk!

2007-07-19T13:52:00.000-07:00

So I found out yesterday that I am not cut out to be a spy, work in the intelligence community, or generally be trusted with any information that could be considered "top secret," "valuable," or even "juicy." You might want to keep that in mind the next time you're considering divulging anything to me that you want me to guard with my life.

You see, yesterday I went to a podiatrist for the first time because - well, because I could not put it off any longer. For the past six months, or maybe a year, I have been dealing with four ingrown toenails - both of my big toes and both of my 2nd toes. The 2nd toe on my right foot was actually growing like a straw - the kind you drink out of - forming an almost-complete circle so the left and right edges of the toenail were all but touching. And yes, there was a ball of skin being pinched inside this ring. Last week it was finally too much to bear, so I trimmed it, knowing this brief remedy would actually make things much worse - and soon.

So I sucked it up and went to the doctor yesterday to have my toes repaired. The podiatrist, who I will call Dr. Payne, winced when she saw the straw growing out of my toe. "That's what we call a pincher!" she declared. "Don't worry, we'll take care of ya. I'll go get loaded up."

I pondered what that meant while she was gone. She returned with acid, a syringe, a long, sharp skewer, something that looked to me like a lopper, and I don't know what else because she was trying to conceal everything from me.

I'm pretty sure that over the course of the next hour, the Geneva Conventions were violated more than a couple times. She began plunging sharp skewers deep beneath my toenails, laterally splitting the full length of my toenails along the edges, gripping the split pieces and yanking them out (with all her might) at the root, and then dripping acid onto the exposed nail bed - all while cheerfully and casually asking me questions. It was as though Alice had quit her job as the Brady's housekeeper and become an interrogator for al Qaeda.

I asked her, "Are you a sadist who just loves working on toes?" She laughed and shook her head, which I took as a yes.

I said, "This would make a great scene in a horror movie."

"Or a YouTube video!" she added.

When she was done, I looked down at her handiwork: four toes wrapped snugly in blood-red bandages. "Am I bleeding that much?" I asked.

"No no! I used red bandages!" she said. "I'm sorry, I scared you!"

"No," I said. "I'm not squeamish about blood. Just about people touching my toes."

And it's true, I thought later that evening as I lay on my back trying not to think about the pulsating pain coming from the opposite end of my body. Had she been trying to get information out of me, she would not have gotten to rip out four of my toenails. I would have been singing like a bird before she ever touched the first one.

P.S. All joking aside, I want to give my highest recommendation to The Financial District Foot And Ankle Center and the very qualified podiatrist who has saved my toes (whose real name is Dr. Park and who is young, quite lovely, and bears absolutely no resemblance to Ann B. Davis nor a housekeeper circa 1972). I felt nothing but confidence that I was in the most capable hands to be found in the City. And you know what? Jeremy, the office administrator, is pretty awesome too.

If my above story has left you less than convinced, check out their reviews on Yelp - nothing but 5 stars and glowing accolades. That's how I found these great people.

Now, on to the gore:

My bandaged toes... (click image to enlarge)

TMI Alert!!!!

Dr. Payne's handiwork... the "pincher" is the 2nd toe on the right foot. (click image to enlarge)

Record Rainfall in San Francisco

2007-07-18T13:35:00.000-07:00

July 18, 2007 - San Francisco (Parallaxis)

Record amounts of rain fell in San Francisco today. The official reporting station recorded .01 inches of precipitation, the first time it has ever rained on this date in San Francisco since record-keeping began in 1849.

The moisture caused widespread street-dampness and made many residents look askance at their umbrellas for a moment before heading out the door. Some even paused briefly to re-think their afternoon plans.

"I can't believe it's raining," said Linda, an employee of StubHub in downtown San Francisco. "I wanted to go jogging this afternoon."

By noon, the sun was back out and the good citizens of San Francisco breathed a sigh of relief that they could finally get on with their lives.

It was a different story in the East Bay, where the trace amount of rain moistened dusty power lines, causing more than 80 power outages to over 17,000 customers.

Related article: Slightly Rainy Day Makes History

Bolinas, California and China Camp State Park

2007-02-19T11:24:00.000-08:00

Happy The-weekend-after-President's Day Weekend! Last Saturday, I took a little trip up to Bolinas - the town that doesn't want any visitors. It was my first time visiting Bolinas, which sits on a small peninsula between a lagoon and the Pacific Ocean about 20 miles north of San Francisco in Marin County.

Water was being sucked out of Bolinas Lagoon by the tide, and it was flowing into the ocean like a river. There were several kayakers and surfers enjoying the resulting choppy water. Here's a little video I took:

The beach at Bolinas is covered with shells and interesting rocks. You just can't help picking up a few.

The following Monday, Jay and I celebrated the Chinese New Year by going to China Camp State Park with our friend, Allison.

I got some pretty good photos both days. Click here to visit the galleries.

Nebraska Ice Storm Photos

2007-01-05T13:17:00.000-08:00

Just about everyone's heard about the crazy blizzards in Colorado over Christmas and New Year's weekends. But you might not have heard about the devastating ice storm that accompanied the New Year's blizzard, further to the east and north. A friend sent me a link to these incredible photos of the storm's aftermath, the ice, and the damage.

You might have seen this guy's website before - he's a stormchaser in Nebraska, and has some of the most amazing thunderstorm and tornado photos I've ever seen.

Click the link, below, to see his photos of the Dec. 29-31 2006 ice storm, taken last week in and around Nebraska's Tri-cities (Grand Island, Hastings, Kearney). Grand Island is the town I grew up in, as you may know.

Extreme Instability - Nebraska Ice Storm, Dec 29-31, 2006

There are four pages of photos, then a link to 5 more pages of follow-up photos, taken New Years Day. Some of the follow-up photos are really beautiful, so make sure you check them out.

2 Text -n- 2 Tinkle

2006-12-16T14:31:00.000-08:00

I have a very strict policy when it comes to blogging about work. I don't do it. It's just a bad idea.

I'm telling you this because one could easily assume that the following story takes place at work. But it doesn't. I don't blog about work. This story happens to take place in the other location I go every single day and see the exact same people – Noontime Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Redeemer, which is near where I work. (What can I say? I'm addicted to their Eucharist – so flaky, and made from scratch!)

Anyway, so I wasn't at work, but had just finished Mass (and lunch), and was taking my afternoon nap, like I always do, when someone came into the bathroom and stood at the urinal just on the other side of the metal partition from where I was seated (taking a nap). Soon, the sounds of tinkling joined the sounds of my napping.

Tinkle, Tinkle, Nap, Tinkle, Nap, Nap-p-p-p, Nappity, Nap-p-p

So far, nothing out of the ordinary here. But then:

Tinkle Tinkle Tap Tap (beep beep), Tinkle, Tap (beep), Tabeep-tabeep-tabeep

The gears started turning in my mind. What was he doing? Playing a Gameboy or PSP? At the Urinal? Does he have some kind of new-fangled urination technology I don't know about? A bluetooth enabled P-Mobile phone? That's it... He must be texting someone.

I pondered how important the message must be to require mid-tinkle texting. Even on my most frantic and urgent visits to the urinal, the tinkle timetable is no longer than two minutes – tops.

Tinkle tinkle tinkle, Tabeep tabeep tabeep Then – flush, flap, zip – he flushed the urinal, flipped the flap on his phone, and zipped up his fly.

In that order.

By now, I had finished napping and was standing up. I looked over the top of the partition and identified the tinkling texter as he exited the bathroom.

So, I knew who he was. And I knew what he was doing. But why? What text message could be so important that it can’t wait two minutes – tops?

Then it dawned on me: He must be as addicted to those delicious, flaky, made-from-scratch Eucharist as I am and, before he got any, had a sudden, urgent need to go. Standing in line, mouth watering, starting to fidget, he began shifting from one foot to the other, thinking “Gotta go, gotta go, gotta go right now.” Finally, legs crossed, he realized he couldn’t wait any longer. He broke from the line and whizzed off to the bathroom without even having time to tell a friend where he was going in such a flurry.

I imagined him dashing to the urinal while holding his legs together and doing a sort of half-squat-prance, reaching into his pants and pulling out his phone with one hand (while doing something similar with the other) – getting to the urinal just in the lick of time. With a sigh of relief, he began to text his friend who was still in line for the Eucharist.

Brb. Had 2 p. Snag me a cple xtra Eucharists 4 l8r

So, having answered that question to my satisfaction, I washed my hands and made a mental note that if I ever needed to borrow a cell phone, not to borrow his. If someone else asks to borrow his phone in my presence, however, I don’t know what I will do. I am not the type of person to just stand by and watch when someone is in peril. Whether they are trapped at the bottom of a well, have their hair caught in the doors of a Muni train, or are about to cradle a possibly tinkle-tainted cell phone against their cheek, I’m a take-action sort of guy. That’s just how I roll.

But it would be a little shocking to inexplicably bat it out of his hand before the unwitting borrower got hold of it and brought it up to their mouth. I will have to devise a more discreet cell-block maneuver – some kind of ruse, perhaps, or a distraction of some kind. Something that will trigger a reflex, making people immediately want to hide their cell phones.

Omigod! Is that Naomi Campbell with Russell Crowe?!

That could work.

Heavy Surf in San Francisco

2006-12-13T18:59:00.000-08:00

I like big waves (and I cannot lie). So this past Sunday was the perfect day to go to the beach. A series of storms over the Pacific had the water all sorts of agitated. By Monday, 30-foot swells were slamming the beaches along the Northern California coast.

Seeing huge waves crashing ashore fascinates me in a way that thunderstorms used to fascinate me back home. There's something about witnessing such awesome natural power. And the crashing of waves is about the closest thing we get to thunder out here on the WC.

And though it's not quite thunder, you might be surprised how close it actually is to thunder.

On Sunday, I went to Baker Beach to take some photographs and listen to the waves crash. Baker Beach is on the south side of the Golden Gate, just west of the Golden Gate bridge. Being inside the Golden Gate, the waves at Baker Beach don't get quite as big as the ones striking the beaches that directly face the ocean. But something about the shape of the beach, it's angle, or the underwater topography - I really don't know what it is - causes the waves to crash at Baker Beach with an incredible, thunderous BOOM that, in my experience, is quite unique. The waves don't roll in to Baker Beach, they hit all at once: KABLAM!

Here are a couple of videos I took with my not-video camera. I've embedded the videos here, but they don't seem to like to play smoothly from my page. So, if you get fragmented play like I do, I'd recommend going to the YouTube website to view them. Just click the links below each video.

If this plays all herky-jerky, try playing it again. It should play smoothly. And turn on your speakers. See? Thunder!
Click here to watch this on the YouTube website.

And here's one more. Yeah, there's a dude out there. He was boogie boarding and getting totally pummeled. But enjoying it!
Click here to watch this on the YouTube website.
My photos turned out better - probably because that's what my camera was made for. Though there was a lot of spray in the air, and the light was fading, so they're a tad grainy. You can view the entire gallery of 17 photos here.

And a few choice shots:

Here's Baker Beach. The Pacific Ocean is to the left, outside the frame of this picture. Those are the Marin Headlands across the bridge. And San Francisco Bay is on the other side of the bridge. The wave doesn't look that big, but it was easily 10-15 feet high. (Click the photo to enlarge)

Didn't believe me? How's this for a bit more perspective? (Click the photo to enlarge)

I bet that guy would love seeing this picture of him. Maybe he will stumble upon this somehow. (Click the photo to enlarge)

Now you see him...

...now you dont.

See him under there? Underwear! Hahaha! (Click the photo to enlarge)

Looking west towards China Beach and Lands End. The Pacific Ocean is on the other side of that land mass. (Click the photo to enlarge)

Looking out through the Golden Gate to the west, toward the Pacific. (Click the photo to enlarge)

Fiery Sunset in San Francisco

2006-11-18T18:55:00.000-08:00

I took this shot from our patio this evening (click photo to enlarge).

Morning Fog

2006-11-07T09:30:00.000-08:00

Click the photo to see it a bit bigger.
I took this photo with my phone this morning as I stepped out of the Underground in San Francisco's Financial District. It is mild and humid, and the low fog deck was just starting to burn off, but still hanging in between the buildings on Market Street.

Strong Showing for Nebraska at Company Costume Contest

2006-10-31T14:40:00.000-08:00

San Francisco, CA – Two Nebraskans made a strong showing at their company Halloween costume contest on Tuesday, with one of them taking home the top honor: a Starbuck’s gift card valued at over $24.99.

Matt, the Technical Copywriter originally from Grand Island, Nebraska, won praise as the host of a new cooking program on the Food Network, Matt’s Muppet Meals Made Memorable (M.m.m.m.m.). Sponsored by the letter “M,” the pilot episode, which will premiere soon, features Matt demonstrating how to mince three freshly caught young Muppets into meaty Muppet morsels for a magnificent Muppetloaf.

But Jennifer, the Executive Customer Care representative hailing from Kimball, Nebraska, took the top prize with her hand-sewn, sensual and exquisitely detailed pirate costume that would make even Captain Jack Sparrow swoon.

What does this mean for the future of Halloween in San Francisco? Probably not much. San Francisco didn’t really lose face over this Nebraska victory – though if it had, that would have made a pretty cool costume.

Halloween Costume Ideas for the Lame

2006-10-30T13:24:00.000-08:00

If you’re like me, you thought of an ingenious Halloween costume idea months ago, told everyone what you were going to be, and haven’t done a thing to get it together. Now, it’s a day before Halloween and you’re stuck with no ideas, no materials, and no time. Your Halloween costume is doomed to be lame – but even lamer is having no costume at all.

I’m not going to tell you my great costume idea, because, well, there’s always next year. But I will share some terrific, lame ideas with you.

You see, a great costume doesn’t need to be elaborate or require a lot of thought, planning, or effort. And a lame costume can be great, too. How can you make a lame costume great? By embracing its lameness and wearing it proudly. And it helps if the answer to “What are you supposed to be?” is a hilarious punch-line.

So here are some really lame costume ideas that anyone - even you, lame-o - can put together at the last minute, with almost no effort.

Cut a hole in a tablecloth. Staple some paper plates, napkins, and plastic utensils to it. Draw ants all over it with a permanent marker (the more, the better). You’re a picnic!

Too elaborate? Line an overcoat or trench coat with newspaper and be a “news-flasher.”

No overcoat? Get a big, square piece of cardboard. Paint it a bold color (such as orange, yellow, or pink). Cut a hole in it for your face. Voila! You’re Colorado (or perhaps Wyoming).

Still too much work? No problem, I’ve got you covered. Get a “Hello, my name is…” sticker/name-tag (or make one out of an index card and masking tape). Write “Mitch” in the name space. What are you? A guy named Mitch, obviously.

If all else fails, just go out with a crutch under your shoulder, or walk with a cane (heck, a long, broken tree branch will work) and be exactly what you are: LAME.

Do you have any fun, easy, and exquisitely lame costume ideas to share? Do tell.

Happy Halloween!

P.S. Click the pumpkin photo to see a gallery of drunken pumpkin carving pics from Saturday evening at San Francisco's notorious gay biker bar, the Eagle Tavern!

Photos from My Nebraska Dream Vacation

2006-08-30T13:28:00.000-07:00

I've created a gallery of photos I took during my trip to Nebraska. Unlike the last several Nebraska photos you've seen here, I took these with my camera, not with my phone.

I put some of the photos in the sidebar on the left (see them?), along with a link to the gallery, but I thought I'd put a few up here as well, just to further entice you to go visit the gallery.

The Hall County Courthouse, in Grand Island, Nebraska, taken at 10:15pm (obviously). (Click photo to enlarge)

Not as good as another photo I've taken of Lincoln, Nebraska, this is the view driving toward downtown from the north. The tall building is the state capitol. Known affectionately as "the penis of the plains," it's towering shaft is symbolic of Nebraska's fertility. (Click photo to enlarge)

Perched at the tip of the capitol building's golden dome is "The Sower," a 19-foot tall art-deco bronze statue, spreading seeds over the prairie. (Click photo to enlarge)

Did you know, Lincoln has an acre of parkland for every 15 residents - more parkland per capita than any other city in the country? This is the Sunken Gardens, located near the Capitol Building. That's right, just a seed's toss from our massive phallus, the "sunken gardens" are agape in flower, welcoming any and all who care to enter. (Click photo to enlarge)

So Long, Nebraska!

2006-08-16T10:00:00.000-07:00

The Garden Spot of Nebraska

2006-08-15T23:59:00.000-07:00

One of the most enjoyable and miserable days of my entire trip was last Wednesday, my first full day in Nebraska. The enjoyable part involved meeting the other Indyknow Bloggers, for dinner. The miserable part involved a cruel tag-team of heat and humidity.

Both were pushing the limit of tolerability, and the Heat Index reached 117 that day. Luckily, my rental (a Buik LaCrosse) has a kick-ass AC, so the drive was no sweat.

I met Tonga at the offices of the Grand Island Daily Independent. She introduced me around and even gave me a tour of the place.

The Press - Grand Island, Nebraska, Daily Independent
After my tour of the paper, we went to dinner at Godfather's Pizza. I just want to mention, briefly, that I think Godfather's is just about the best pizza in the world - and their Taco Pizza is a masterpiece of Mexitalian cuisine.

Following dinner, we each took turns trying to help a blind woman find the Wendy's, which was about a half a block to the north. She was lost in the Godfather's parking lot. It wasn't funny, except for the fact that we all tried to help her, and we all failed. She may still be wandering around the parking lot as I type this.

Anyway, Tonga and I then moved on to drinks at a little martini bar called J. Alfred Prufrock's. Nice place, good booze, great people, crappy-ass air-conditioner. We peeled off layers and drank cocktails while fanning ourselves with the leather-bound bar menus. I had five or six Knobb Creek Manhattans. Tonga drank a couple three of her "usuals" (containing I don't know what). Our bill came to $15.50 (it was happy hour - but still... wow).

During my tour of the paper, Tonga took me downstairs to the "morgue," where they keep actual printed copies of every issue dating back to the 1880's. Spread open on a table was an issue dated Saturday, October 4, 1913 with a headline that read Hall County---the Garden Spot of Nebraska.

It was basically a very long-winded article singing (quite loudly) the praises of Hall County, of which Grand Island is the county seat. I'll upload a readable photo of the article from my camera when I get back to San Francisco. But for now, I thought I'd quote an interesting passage describing the Wood River (which flows through the southern edge of town and marked the northern edge of the island) in 1871.

It is a vast serpentine vineyard, literally festooned with wild grapes. To this delightful description might be added that in the bends of this winding river were orchards of wild plums, in their season loaded with fruit, the red and yellow of the ripening fruit with the green of the bordering trees, making a picture of surpassing beauty and loveliness while the fruit itself was most delicious to the taster. Did one wish to cross this river, there were at convenient distances bridges built by those most cunning and ingenious workmen, the beaver. Standing on either bank of this meandering stream, which with its fringe of trees lay like a thread of dark green in the lighter green of the far reaching valley, and looking across the smooth prairie as far as the eye could reach could be seen herds of innumerable buffalo feeding and fattening on the nutritious grasses. Always there could be seen flocks of timid antelope, their white flags discernible even miles distant. Occasionally would pass herds of stately elk, and bounding over the prairie were smaller herds of black tail deer, while the accompanying whir of startled prairie chickens seemed but the echo of fast fleeing footsteps. The Wood River Valley of the Platte. Before the coming of the white man, a land of fatness, a scene of primeval loveliness and beauty. To the white man and his descendants, the home of plenty, a dwelling place of contentment, peace, and happiness.

So, it turns out that Le Grande Ile on the River Platte used to be the Garden of Eden (until sometime between 1871 and 1913). It totally makes sense. You see, I've always held that three of the seven gates to hell were located there.

Steak and Eggs

2006-08-14T20:18:00.000-07:00

I've been in Nebraska six days, now. Among the joys of being here is the fine dining. I'm not talking about eating at Chez Pompeaux, of course. But it's nice to eat the food of my people among my people.

And although I've hit three buffet/salad bars so far, I have managed to not totally pig out (every meal) while I've been here. And just to give you an idea of what I'm up against:

I admit I've eaten a little more ice cream than usual this past week. But I don't see how I've had much choice, really, considering the bowls of fresh peaches and strawberries in the fridge.

I've even pushed my personal culinary envelope while I've been here. When we dined at Chances "R" restaurant in York - which I've read is "a great place to stop between Oklahoma and South Dakota" - I ordered beef in non-hamburger form for the first time in my life. No kidding! Following a lesson in cuts of meat from my mom's beaux, Dan, I took his recommendation and ordered the prime rib. I wasn't totally confident I'd be into it, but I did know that it would be just about the best steak anyone could get anywhere, so the odds were good that I wouldn't puke it back up onto my plate.

The dim light made for a blurry camera photo, but that thing was about as big around as a frisbee and I ate (what I could) without ever needing to pick up the steak knife (just about). Holy crap. Why didn't anyone tell me how good prime rib was before now? I might even order steak again sometime. It was a damn good dinner - I mean, supper.

But by far the best meal of the trip was served right from my mom's own kitchen on Sunday night. We bought sweet corn from a woman selling the cobs right out of the back of her pickup truck. Dan fried filets of walleye he and my mom had caught themselves. My grandma made her (astonishing) potato salad. And I made garlic mashed root vegetables (turnips, parsnips, potatoes) that I accidentally put too much cream and butter in. Mom also made her seven-layer salad (that's lettuce (iceberg, of course), green bell pepper, celery, peas, cheddar cheese, bacon, and sugared mayonnaise). I think I ate ten pieces of fish. But I didn't use the spray-on butter for my corn.

Until today, when we had corn again, and I gave it a try. It tasted buttery, I will give it that!

After the big fish dinner, my brother, his gal, and I were going to go to the Hall County Fair. But that required a 40-mile drive to Grand Island, and none of us could make it to the car.

Heat Index 115

2006-08-11T09:32:00.000-07:00

I guess I'm on a convenience store kick.

Nebraska, Here I Kum (n Go)

2006-08-08T22:00:00.000-07:00

Well, I made it. After a hellish day of flying (complete with delayed planes and terrible, vomit-inducing turbulence that even made me queazy), I landed in Omaha for my week-long dream vacation in Nebraska.

And I made it without incident. This is a relief, you see, because I was a little bit concerned about travelling today. I expressed my concern to Jay last evening as we were following up our delicious last-night-in-Frisco meal of Vietnamese Barbecue Pork and garlic noodles with a glass of bourbon. "I hope I don't have to poop all day tomorrow," is what I said to him.

Pooping while travelling isn't usually a huge concern of mine. But I'm on antibiotics. And I don't know about you, but that has a way of making me rather fluid. "Is there a pill I can take to make it so I don't have to poop?" I asked him.

"Like Squirtz-B-Gone or something?" he quipped.

"Or Runz-Away!" I countered in a stroke of genius.

Of course, Runz-Away doesn't exist - but it should, shouldn't it? Well, we thought so, anyway. And so we proceeded to come up with a long (long) list of advertising slogans for our new product - a brainstorm that proved somewhat viral as we continued to text each other all day today with our latest ideas while I was travelling. I know you want to hear some of them.

Runz-Away - A Solid Bet!
Tell your squirts to take a hike! Runz-Away!
Give your squirts the heave-ho with Runz-Away.
Don't let diarrhea cramp your style - take Runz-Away!
With Runz-Away, you'll never stand for the trots again.

And so on...

But like I said, I made it with no untimely nor unplanned emergences. Yes, I said emergences.

And you're not going to believe this, but it was by sheer coincidence that my first meal in Nebraska, upon landing in Omaha after a full day of not eating, was at a truly Nebraskan (Czechoslovakian, no less) fast-food chain called Runza. And yes, I got a cheese Runza - and it was good. And even after eating the "Runza way," I have no need for Runz-Away. Keep your fingers crossed (and I'll do the same with my legs, just to be safe).

Right next to the Runza restaurant was a convenience store called Kum-n-Go. I'm not kidding. Really - I'm totally serious. Look, I can prove it:

Yes, that's sexual innuendo, right here on the plains, big as day. And you thought people out here in the sticks were unsophisticated!

I took that photo with my camera phone, by the way. Are you impressed with the quality? Because I am.

So, this is your correspondent, signing off for now, from the Heartland. Stay tuned for more Middle-Americana, as I see it.

Overheard at LaunderLand

2006-07-13T09:29:00.000-07:00

A woman driving a scratched and dented white Ford Aspire with a bumper sticker that said, Take matters into your own hands - PRAY, was trying to get her two daughters, Hosannah and Glory Anne, to help carry the laundry into the laundromat.

Glory Anne: But I always carry the bleach!

Hosannah: That's because you're used to getting your way ALL the TIME.

------

Later on, inside the laudromat, as they were assisting in getting the washers started,

Hosannah: Mmmmm! Bleach smells GOOD!

Muni Memories #4

2006-07-07T15:56:00.000-07:00

The 6 Parnassus

It was quite warm today. For an afternoon in mid-July, by San Francisco standards, it was blistering. At least 80 degrees (hush now). Riding the bus on a hot day always makes for an experience – most often a miserable one.

I had to go downtown for a meeting. Afterwards, I walked to Market Street to catch the next bus. I could see an F car several blocks up, taking its time. The F follows the Embarcadero along the bay from Fisherman’s Wharf before turning southwest through downtown on its way to Castro Street. On a day like today, at the height of tourist season, being so pokey, I knew it was going to be stuffed full of people. I wasn’t looking forward to crowding aboard.

But before the F reached me, a 6 pulled up. The 6, 7, and 71 all turn up Haight Street, but they follow the same route as the F to my stop. I don’t usually like taking the 6 because, for some reason that I cannot ascertain, annoying things seem more likely to happen on the 6 – loud-talking, gum-smacking kids misbehaving, stinky people who appear to be moments away from barfing, guns getting pulled out – stuff like that.

But the 6 was almost empty. I knew it wouldn’t be for long, but I stepped on board and took a seat on the shady side near the back. After just a few more stops, the bus was nearly full. A young woman wearing a large, blue plastic watch took the seat directly across from me, facing me and the rear of the bus. She was holding a white paper bag, from which she was pulling chunks of a pastry to nibble on, and clutching a purse printed with Claude Monet’s The Bank of the Seine.

Moments later, a small man with orange-tinted glasses took the seat across the aisle to her right, also facing the rear. With him was a very large dog with a very, very coarse orange coat of fur, and a very, very, very waggy tail. After clubbing everyone at the back of the bus with her tail, she hoisted herself up onto the seat next to her master. I thought about fleas, but decided she was probably cleaner than a lot of other people I rub up against on the bus every day.

He started talking to his dog, “That’s my good girl,” he began, then continued, “You’re a spoiled rotten mutt!” Then he began to sing, “Aye-yai-yaiyai!” (You know the tune, think Tejano).

Then he spotted the young woman’s blue watch. “Is that Spongebob Squarepants?” he asked in an excited tone.

She turned her head, but only to glance at him through her horn-rimmed glasses. Holding up her wrist, she answered, “No, it’s Bart Simpson,” with a smacking of her lips as she reached into her bag for more pastry.

“Oh,” he sounded disappointed. “Yeah, because I have like every Spongebob collectible you can get!”

She smiled, reached into her bag for another chunk of pastry, and turned her head away from him. At the same moment, a young guy at the front of the bus started shouting, “Does anyone have change for a dollar?”

The bus fell silent. “No one has change for a dollar?” he yelled. I took mental inventory of my right pocket. Yes, I have change for a dollar, I thought.

The driver let him on anyway, and he walked to the back of the bus and took the seat across the aisle to my left, facing the dog.

“Hey!” he said as soon as he saw the pooch.

“Hay is for horses! Buy grass, it’s cheaper,” the small man with the dog answered in as unjolly a tone as one can possibly say those words.

Undeterred, the fellow continued to strike up a conversation. “That’s a nice looking dog."

“Thank you,” answered the small man in orange glasses. “She’s a good girl.”

“What’s her name?”

“Astamascramiscrater.”

Following a momentary pause, “Oh.”

“Asta, for short,” the man added, then turned back to his conversation with the dog. “Asta, should we get off at the Haight, or Buena Vista?”

“I was just trying to decide the same thing!” the young fellow said. The man ignored him, now fully engrossed in dialogue with Astamascramiscrater.

The boy moved to a different seat as I pulled the cord for my stop.

Muni Memories #3

2006-06-09T22:25:00.000-07:00

The F Market

I had just come out of a job interview and was riding the streetcar home. I was lost in thought, replaying the interview in my mind, when two young girls got on board and sat directly behind me. It took me a few minutes to pull myself out of my head as I came to the realization that their conversation was much more entertaining than the critical analysis of my interview performance.

The thing that really got my attention was their speech that seamlessly integrated text-message acronyms. This is where my attention joined their verbal exchange:

“I don’t even say anything to them, I just LOL them. They’ll like be talking to me and I just LOL ‘em without saying a thing. Just LOL, LOL!”

“I know… OMG Sean totally tried to hook up with me the other day!”

“Nuh uh… Little Sean? OMG what did you do?”

“I was just like, ‘But we’re friends,’ and he was all, ‘But we can be friends with benefits!’ and I was like, ‘Benefits! Please…’ …ugly little freak!”

“He’s hella ugly! And totally twelve.”

“...and a druggie. I mean, five pills? OMG!”

“And a young druggie is way worse than an old druggie.”

OK, I guess it also shocked me a little to hear "sex," "drugs," and "twelve" mixed so casually into their conversation. And though I'm really not one to get shocked by anything, and that may appear to make me a little bit old. The truth is, it really just made them look really young and pretty damn ridiculous.

Stay in school, kids! (And I mean "school" metaphorically...)

Today is Always the Day Before the "Big One"

2006-04-22T15:34:00.000-07:00

The video above is a genuine treasure. It’s a trip down Market Street by cable car through downtown San Francisco. In the distance, you can see the Ferry Building standing where Market Street meets the bay. The film was shot in 1905. At the time, San Francisco was the largest city in California, with over 400,000 residents.

Within a year, the city captured on this film was gone. In less than 5 minutes, it was leveled when the San Andreas Fault ruptured beneath the city. What survived the quake was razed in the resulting firestorm, which raged out of control for the next 75 hours. At least 3,000 people died, very likely some of the people captured on this film.

No one, not even the camera operator, knew it at the time, but this film is an extreme close-up of a ticking time bomb. When the bomb went off, it released a gigaton of energy, or 1,000 1-megaton bombs. For perspective, imagine if the U.S. had dropped over 3,000 atomic bombs on Nagasaki, instead of just one. That gives you an idea of the magnitude of the event. To this day, it is the single greatest natural disaster to ever strike the United States. But on that sunny day in San Francisco back in 1905, the people you see here had no idea what was coming, nor how soon.

Like many of you, I have experienced a major natural disaster, the destruction of Grand Island, Nebraska by seven powerful tornadoes in a single evening. Some of my most vivid memories of that tragedy are details from the day before: the people I saw, what I had for dinner that evening, the way the sky looked, and most of all, the normalcy – the lack of awareness or any thought of what was about to happen – the not knowing of fate. That’s what strikes me when I watch this film, that all the people are so close to an end of things, and they have no idea that their lives will never be the same again.

The power of tornadoes is an awesome, terrifying thing to behold and the Grand Island tornadoes rocked my world. But even that disaster doesn’t compare to the experience of feeling the entire world rocking. We associate our strongest sense of security with the idea of “being on solid ground.” Therefore, it stands to reason that you’ll never feel more helpless than when you feel the ground you’re standing on waver (and even turn to liquid).

Nebraska has earthquakes, of course. They’re less frequent than in California, and typically moderate. Just two months ago, a magnitude 2.9 quake struck east of Ainsworth, and last year, a 3.9 tremor shook the Valentine area. The strongest quakes recorded in Nebraska were magnitude 5.1 in 1964 and 1877. A major fault line, the Humboldt Fault, extends from our Capitol City, Lincoln, south to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and is part of a seismic region known as the Nemaha Uplift.

But of greatest concern to you folks on the Plains is the New Madrid Fault in Missouri, which has produced the strongest quakes ever recorded on the North American Continent – quakes that nearly split the continent in half about 200 years ago. Check out this web site for an interesting comparison between the San Francisco quake and the New Madrid quakes of 1811 and 1812 (and note the strongest “shaking intensity” of the 1906 quake measured a V and VI – which is the same amount of shaking the entire state of Nebraska experienced in the New Madrid quakes of 1811 and 1812).

In all my years in Nebraska, hardly a year went by that I didn’t see at least one tornado, but I never felt an earthquake. I’ve felt a few earthquakes since moving to San Francisco – all of them little ones that just make things wiggle a little. But we’re all living here on borrowed time, and we know it. There will be another huge earthquake here. And this time, when it comes, it will strike a metropolitan area with a population of over 8,000,000. It will replace the 1906 earthquake as the worst natural disaster ever to strike the United States. Until then, every day is like the day before the tornado. We see our friends. We eat our dinner. We live each day like any other day – like it’s normal.

And virtually everyone agrees – from our city leaders, to engineers and architects, to the citizens themselves – we’re not prepared for another big earthquake.

This past week, San Francisco marked the 100th anniversary of the great earthquake and fire of April 18,1906. In true San Francisco form, we may not be prepared for a disaster, but we’re always prepared to party. All week long, events were held throughout the city. There were documentaries of the disaster on every local station. There were exhibits of post-earthquake photography. A memorial at Lotta’s Fountain drew a crowd of thousands to the streets of downtown SF at 5am. Frankly, I got a little sick of hearing about it all.

However, it was interesting to learn about the history of the city’s rebirth (while frightening to think of it’s destruction happening again). It was moving to hear the sirens wail and the bells ring in observance of the exact moment of the event in the early morning hours of April 18 (visit Jackson West’s Obsessive Compulsion to download his recording of the sirens and bells as a ringtone for your phone!). But the sight of the Ferry Building was most beautiful of all – triumphantly lit in a rainbow of ever-changing colors to celebrate its (and the city’s) survival.

Above: San Francisco's Ferry Building glows with a dazzling array of colors during the centennial celebration of the 1906 Earthquake and Fire.
Click photo to enlarge. Click here to view the entire gallery.
What's different about today? There was such a rush to rebuild, they didn't even bother to count the bodies. Today's San Francisco is no less headstrong in its embrace of progress. But what's different? We know we're living on borrowed time. We know this will all come down around us.

And some day, people will look at old pictures dating from days before the big quake, and they will see us in those pictures. And what will strike them about our faces is that we knew what was coming...

Take a gander at these other interesting web sites for more information on quakes in Nebraska, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Nebraska Earthquake Information
The Great 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire
1906 Earthquake Virtual Museum

And thanks to Craig for providing the following links:
Weird Facts About the San Francisco Quake
Aerial Photos Taken from Kites (with article)

Bigwheels Skidding Down Lombard Street

2006-04-16T20:00:00.000-07:00

If you’ve ever seen Lombard Street, the self-proclaimed “crookedest street in the world,” you’ve probably thought now that would be fun to ride a bigwheel down! Today, a few crazy locals gathered to do just that for BYOBW – the seventh annual Easter Sunday bigwheel race down Lombard Street.

The street was rain-slickened, but the racers were undaunted. I was looking forward to seeing some righteous spills.

Below are some of my photos from the race. Click here to view the entire gallery. You can see more photos at the BYOBW Official Website.

Above: In second place, the Easter Bunny careeens out of control down Lombard Street. (Click photo to enlarge)

Above: With the Hulk riding shotgun, a racer leans into one of Lombard Street's many curves with several more racers hot on his tail. (Click photo to enlarge)

Above: The racers gather at the bottom of the street with a cheering crowd at the end of the first heat. There were two more heats to follow, but the rain dissuaded us from lingering any longer. (Click photo to enlarge)

And here is my video of the exciting, multiple-crash finish!

The Burritos of San Francisco

2006-04-14T16:19:00.000-07:00

Have I mentioned that San Francisco is a food town? Virtually every type of cuisine in the world can be found here in abundance. So if you ask a San Franciscan, “What’s the one thing I’ve got to eat when I visit?” it might come as a bit of a surprise to you that the answer you get is not the fresh crab at Fisherman’s Wharf, Sushi, or some exotic dish from a remote corner of the world. More often than not, a local will tell you, “You’ve got to get a burrito.”

A burrito is to San Francisco what cheesesteak is to Philadelphia – or a hot dog is to Coney Island. A full-course meal neatly packaged between two sheets of tinfoil, it is the ultimate San Francisco staple – inexpensive, reliable, and omnipresent. To find a burrito, simply go to any Taqueria. Though most are located in the Mission District, there isn’t a San Francisco neighborhood without at least one taqueria within walking distance. Only Starbuck’s has a greater presence in this town.

Above: A new favorite of mine, Taqueria Azteca, attached to Antonio's Nut House, serves delicious burritos and other Mexican fare. It's located on California Avenue 3 blocks east of El Camino Real in Palo Alto, CA. Click photo to enlarge.

I recently discovered a little gem of a web site that reviews and rates San Francisco’s burritos. If you’re looking for the best burrito in town, BurritoEater.com is an excellent guide.

What makes a San Francisco burrito so special? Variety, for one. There are infinite ways a burrito can be assembled and that means that there are burritos for everyone. You have your choice of beans: black, pinto, refried, or refried black. Often, you also get a choice of rice. Of course you can get the traditional ingredients, carne asada (steak), chile verde (green chile), al pastor (barbecue pork), spicy chicken, and varieties of fish or shrimp. The most authentic taquerias also offer lengua (tongue) and cerebro (brains). You can also always find combinations of vegetables, cactus, and tofu. You can get burritos stuffed with eggs and potatoes. Or you can order my favorite, the Chile Relleno Burrito – a bell pepper stuffed with cheese, dipped in batter, fried to a golden brown, then chopped up, briefly seared on the grill with some salsa, and stuffed into the burrito. Yum!

Though variety is the spice of life, the diversity of burritos in San Francisco is not what makes them memorable. That’s where size comes in. This is the stuff of legend. This is what inspires people to go home with tales, like fishermen, of “the big one” (while holding their hands apart at ever-widening distances). They’ve been called “blimps,” “the size of footballs,” and “as big as your head.” The first time I got one, my genuine initial reaction was astonishment. Stack two Bud Light cans on end and wrap them in tinfoil. A San Francisco burrito is a little bit larger than that.

Above: A San Francisco burrito (left) towers over a domestic housecat named Mookie (right). Click photo to enlarge.

And when my mom and her significant other, Dan, visited me for the first time, the first place I took them was Taqueria San Jose on Mission Street, because, as I told them, “We’ve got to get a burrito!”

We stepped up to the counter and perused the many options, which were painted on a large board hanging over the heads of the servers. I placed my order and stepped aside for Dan to place his.

Clearly in Taco Bell mode, I heard him say “I’ll have two beef burritos, a taco, and…”

I had to do something. Turning to him, and not wanting to be impolite, I said, “Why don’t you just start with one burrito?”

He gave me a look. It was that look an adult gives someone younger than they are that says, “You’re telling me what to do, you little punk? I can kick your ass. You better believe it!”

“You can always come back for more,” I quickly added.

Plainly unconvinced, but not wanting to argue with his sweetheart’s beloved eldest son, he politely, if hesitantly, acquiesced and ordered a single burrito. And then I watched him with tremendous but totally impreceptible satisfaction as he struggled to finish it, which he did. He did not, however, go back for more. And to this day, like a true fisherman, he sits by the lake with his buddies in Nebraska and tells the tale of the burrito he had in San Francisco that was “this big.”

I'm sure there are a lot of other uses for such a large burrito (besides eating them). You could stuff them in your sheets, for instance, to keep your feet warm and toasty on those cold San Francisco Summer nights. Or use them as a neck rest in the car on road trips.

Below: Sherman, a domestic house cat (bottom), sleeps comfortably, nestled beneath the hefty warmth of a San Francisco burrito. Click photo to enlarge.

Can you think of any other good uses for a burrito this size? (Am I going to regret asking that question?)

I know Grand Island has some of the best Mexican food to be found north of the border. But what about burritos? If you know of a good burrito in Nebraska, write a review on Burritophile.com, a web site that, oddly enough, was inspired by the inability to find a good burrito in Lincoln, NE.

Parallaxis, People and Protest

2006-03-18T21:32:00.000-08:00

Beneath a bright afternoon sun, a crowd of teenagers converged on a busy plaza. Several of them wore black and white scarves wrapped around their heads and faces, and a few waved Palestinian flags while helicopters buzzed overhead. A peaceful but commanding presence, this scene was not in the West Bank or Gaza, but San Francisco. Energized by a Bay Area hip-hop artist with a political message, these young American activists gathered in front of San Francisco City Hall on Saturday to protest the war in Iraq and the Palestinian conflict.

And they weren’t alone. An estimated 25,000 energetic and passionate anti-war protesters marched in the streets of San Francisco Saturday to mark the third anniversary of the War in Iraq. The march ended in Civic Center Plaza, where the crowd gathered to listen to speakers and performers deliver messages of peace and resistance.

Saturday’s march was one of hundreds held across the nation and around the world in an effort to keep the anti-war message alive. In proud exercise of their First Amendment rights, the marchers found creative ways to communicate individual messages, from waving homemade signs and banners, to wearing elaborate costumes and even body paint.

The crowd was a cross-section of the City itself, with Catholic nuns, Muslims, Jews, hippies of all ages, young parents with their children, ravers, yuppies, punks, military veterans and people of all ages, nationalities, and political philosophies coming together for a shared goal.

Accompanying the anti-war sentiment were a variety of other messages and causes, from calls for the impeachment of President Bush to rallying cries to end the Palestinian occupation.

Several dozen youth from San Francisco and Daly City came out to support Hip Hop artist Patriarch, who performed on the rally’s center stage. A native of San Francisco, Patriarch commands a raw style of west-coast, crunky hip-hop that speaks of real life injustices while reflecting his Palestinian and North African heritage.

Among its many definitions, crunk describes being so filled with energy you’re about to explode, and Patriarch’s lyrics and heavy beats convey that deep emotional intensity and passion. “My music is real, straight-forward, to the point, and revolutionary,” he told me. “A lot of people feel it because it’s an educated voice anyone can relate to.”

Delivering political messages about real-world issues, Patriarch and his label, Revolution N.O.W. Records, aim to mobilize youth with music. According to label founder Fuad Hawit, “Our goal is to unite and empower kids throughout the world through music” with meaningful messages that inspire positive political and community involvement. "Now stands for Nation of Wisdom," Hawit said, referring to the record label.

Drawing from personal experience, Patriarch raps about Palestine as well as American injustice and struggles around the world.

“I’m for humanity, man, and that’s a common cause everyone can relate to.”

Read more about Saturday's protests here.

Find out more about Revolution N.O.W. Records and Patriarch from their web site and on MySpace.

Muni Memories #2 – Addendum

2006-03-14T16:24:00.000-08:00

A number of people (that number being two) have expressed a burning desire to know more about my experience riding the 14 Mission - the passengers, the crabs being eaten alive (and recklessly shucked to the floor, still kicking), and their eaters.

The thing is, as I said before, a Muni story doesn’t always have a neat, tidy ending. Sometimes, you reach your stop while a story is still in progress. Sometimes, the stories get off the bus while you’re still riding. And sometimes, the stories just fizzle out or fade away.

Here are some examples of how a Muni story might end:

And then I got off the bus.

She apparently had no idea what she'd just sat upon. And although I wanted so badly to see what happened when she stood up, she was still seated when I reached my stop.

The oblivious performer continued his impromptu striptease as I stepped off the bus. Just before the doors closed behind me, I heard someone shout, “Oh my god! I’ve never seen such a…”

The passenger pulled the cord and exited at the next stop. Alas, the chirping sound coming from deep within his mountain of dreadlocks would forever be a mystery.

As the driver phoned the police, the elderly Jewish man continued to taunt the young Palestinian, shouting, “Come on, bitch! I’ll F- you up, big time!” I decided to take a different bus.

We sat in silence for the rest of the journey, each of us no doubt quietly praying that the pool of liquid would not flow in our direction.

So it was with the crab story. I sat there, not saying a word, not looking up, but simply staring with sick fascination, unable to take my eyes off of the still-moving fourth-of-a-crab that had landed between my feet. It had landed on what was left of its back, if you’re curious. And I think, if it had landed otherwise, the two attached legs might very well have begun to drag its disembodied remains across the floor, perhaps away from me, but maybe up my pant leg. Luckily, it was on its back.

As flabbergasted as I was to have witnessed the eating of two live animals, while being struck by a flying piece of one, it’s possible that the chucker of said crab chunk was just as flummoxed by my (lack of) response. I mean, I just sat there looking down at his food/pet. He might have thought, “Gosh, what’s with that guy just sitting there looking at my crab? He doesn’t even have the courtesy to pick it up and hand it back to me? Now he just touched it with his boot! That’s disgusting! I can’t eat that now!”

I did not have the courtesy, you see, to pick up the twitching partial crab carcass and hand it back to him. I was extremely inconsiderate, in fact. Not only did I just sit there, hoarding a chunk of his delicious pet, but I touched it with my filthy boot, which has been in direct contact with all sorts of vile disgusting surfaces, the floor of a Muni bus among them.

For such a crowded bus, the rest of the ride was oddly quiet, probably because everyone was staring in shock at how impolite I was being just sitting there staring at a piece of that man’s tasty companion between my legs, not even offering it back to him. But I didn’t look up, so I don’t know for sure. When the bus reached 4th St., I stood up and left the crab, and its eaters, behind.

Moments later, someone else got on the bus and undoubtedly took my seat. I wonder what they thought when they looked down. That’s where their story begins. Mine ends here.

How Do You Think?

2006-03-13T16:07:00.000-08:00

Are you a visual person? Do you think in words, or images?
- A question someone asked me last week

I struggled with that question, in part because I'd never really thought about it, and in part because, upon giving it some thought, I realized the answer was neither.

I decided to post the question here, and see how others respond. When someone says, "Think of an apple," how does your brain work? Do you picture an apple, or does the word apple come to mind? Or, god forbid, does your brain work like mine?

I think with neither words nor images unless words or images are required of my thoughts. Instead, I tend to think in broad senses of "understanding" (or perhaps "meaning") that incorporate emotion, the senses, and a library of associated words and images wrapped up in the "understanding." This "understanding" is like a web of interconnectivity, such that the "understanding" I associate with an apple is not separate from the "understanding" I associate with a pear, but rather partially intertwined in the ways that both share some of the same "understanding" in my mind, yet retain elements of separate "understanding" as well.

Thus, when told to think of an apple, my mind accesses the understanding I have associated with "apple" - which includes a variety of colors, waxy, shiny textures, the flavors and colors of juice, the smells of an orchard, the brief pain and surprise of accidentally biting into a seed, logos and computers, associations with gravity, the sound of crunching, the feeling of cool, moist spray on my lips when I take a bite, and on and on - but my mind doesn't automatically focus on any one of those associations in particular (so I don't necessarily see a red apple). I receive all the associations at once in a rush of meaning that I can only describe as "my understanding of apple."

If told to picture an apple, however, I can vividly picture an apple - and I have several images before me, perfectly vivid and realistic, in my mind, when I try to do so.

Now, since my thoughts are not in words or pictures - I also must always translate my thoughts into words before communicating them ... so I wonder, since this is the first time I've tried to translate how I think into words for others to understand... did any of that just make sense to anyone?

And I would like to know: How do you think?

Muni Memories #2

2006-03-02T00:52:00.000-08:00

The 14 Mission

Muni’s purpose is transportation. It is incidental that a Muni bus can also be a vehicle for unusual stories and memorable experiences. As a passenger, when you board the bus you board it with your own story, joining people who are already on board with their stories. And when you exit (through the back doors, please) you leave with your story while others are just getting on.

It’s the nature of Muni transportation that, more often than not, you’ll board a bus with a good story already in progress, or reach your stop before a story’s conclusion. You may never know what started a particular Muni story or what the outcome was. A Muni story is often just a slice of surreality between the realities of your origin and destination. The following memory is a perfect example.

The 14 is a crowded bus that follows Mission Street for miles, from San Francisco’s southernmost suburban neighborhoods to the towering skyscrapers along the Embarcadero. It passes through El Corazón de la Misione (the heart of the Mission), one of San Francisco’s largest neighborhoods, populated primarily by families from Mexico, Central, and South America.

The sidewalks of Mission St. are crowded with people and lined with produce stands selling delicious and inexpensive fruits and vegetables freshly harvested from area farms. The walls and buildings are festooned with flags, banners, and brightly painted murals. There are taquerias selling burritos the size of footballs on nearly every corner. In a city of microclimates, it’s one of the sunniest and warmest neighborhoods. And like many San Francisco neighborhoods, it possesses a unique flavor that hearkens to its immigrant history.

It was a typically warm, sunny Summer day in the Mission when I boarded the 14 at 26th Street. I was going downtown for a movie and had wisely brought a jacket. I could already see a thin plume of chilly fog flowing through the breaks in the hills and hovering among the skyscrapers of the Financial District.

The bus was crowded. There were about a dozen people standing towards the front, but I found a seat facing sideways near the back. When the bus stopped in front of the Sun Fat Seafood Market at 23rd St., a pair of Latino fellows took the last remaining seats, one across from me and the other in the rear of the bus to my right.

The thing I noticed right away about these two guys was that they had crabs. One each, to be exact, held in their hands between folded pieces of wax paper, kind of like you’d hold an Éclair... or a pretzel. But they were crabs. Big ones. Their bodies were about the size of a DVD and their legs extended from their bodies several inches in every direction. And though I didn’t want to stare or appear too interested, I had to confirm what I thought I’d seen, or more precisely I wanted to prove that I hadn’t actually seen what I thought I’d seen, coming from between those folded sheets of wax paper: motion. But my eyes had not deceived me. Those legs – they were kicking. These two gentlemen had, apparently just before getting on the bus, made a purchase at the Sun Fat Seafood Market of two live crabs. And now they were holding them in their hands on a crowded bus that was lurching through heavy traffic down Mission Street.

I’ve always been a sign reader. When I regularly drove I-80 in Nebraska, I used to know every sign between Lincoln and Grand Island by heart, even the little signs. Rest Area Next Right. Beaver Creek. High Winds On Overpass. Weather Info: Tune Radio to 1430 AM. Exit 312.

So as a sign reader and a Muni passenger, I’m pretty familiar with the posted Muni regulations. It is a felony to strike a Muni bus driver. Front seats are reserved for seniors and persons with disabilities. It is against the law for anyone under 18 years of age to have in their possession a permanent marker with a tip greater than ½” in diameter. Food and drink are not allowed on any Muni transit vehicle. Radios must be turned off. Pets are allowed, but dogs must be leashed and muzzled. And of course, above the driver’s head, the eternal, and almost lyrical message: Information gladly given, but safety requires avoiding unnecessary conversation.

Given the clearly-posted rules, one must conclude that the crabs these men brought on board the 14 Mission were not food (which is forbidden), but pets (which are allowed). And thus, it was on this very bus ride that I, and many other mortified passengers, learned first-hand, in graphic detail, of an unfortunate loophole in Muni’s regulations, for nowhere is it posted that one is not allowed to eat one’s pet while riding in a Muni transit vehicle. Well, these two good men began exploiting that loophole in earnest.

I suppose you could say that I was just a little bit flabbergasted. They tore into those crabs and sucked and gnawed the meat right out of them, cracking the exoskeletons and spitting bits of shell onto the floor as they chewed. And those legs just kept wiggling. Try as I might, I couldn’t not keep from avoiding staring (I employ a quadruple-negative here, ladies and gentlemen, in an attempt to depict how truly difficult it was not to stare).

As if the crunching and spitting weren’t enough, the fellow across from me decided to break his crab in half - I guess in order to get to the really good stuff in the middle - but the main shell proved to be a little tougher than he expected. He strained for a moment, then really put his weight behind it and with a sudden loud crack and a well-timed pothole, launched half of his crab into the air. In exquisitely slow motion, it spiraled in a downward arc, losing bits of that delicious center as it spun, two remaining legs rotating around the chewy middle, crossing the aisle as I watched with a growing mixture of alarm and dismay. My eyes grew wide and a little squeak that only I heard escaped from deep in my throat as it struck me on the inside of my left calf and landed with a thunk right between my feet.

My first thought was, “Wow, that made quite a thunk.” My second thought, “Don’t look at it.” And my third thought, upon looking at it, “My god, the legs are still kicking!”

The funny thing is, if I’d been riding a crowded bus with a live crab that I’d just broken in two, flinging a living, writhing portion of it through the air and striking another person with it, I’d have looked up at that person and apologized profusely. However, I never looked up to receive the apologetic gaze of the half-living-crab-tossing Muni passenger across from me, so I have no idea if he felt even a little embarrassed. I just kept looking down at the half-crab at my feet, watching its two remaining legs extend and then curl inward, over and over again.

I touched it with the tip of my boot, wanting to kick it from underneath me. But for some ridiculous reason I thought that would be rude. Yes, I’d just been hit in the leg by a flying chunk of half a living crab, and I was afraid that kicking it away from me would be rude! I’m such a Nebraskan sometimes.

Anniversary

2006-02-13T12:13:00.000-08:00

I got married two years ago today. Of course, I wrote all about the wedding. It was one of the greatest days of my life. Thank you for indulging me as I commemorate my second anniversary by posting the story of our wedding here.

February 24, 2004
It’s been more than three years since I pushed the table aside at our favorite German restaurant and descended onto a knee - clumsily telling J. that I wanted us to spend the rest of our lives together. I remember his face as I did it, how it brightened, how the smile so quickly stretched from ear to ear, how his eyes sparkled to life. He bounced a little in his chair, spreading his smile even wider with excitement and pleasure, as he listened to me tell him I thought we were the best couple on the planet, that we had been made for one another, that there was simply no possibility that I was designed to spend my life with anyone else.

He knew the truth in my words, and I knew he already knew. That psychic connection has been ever-present between us since before we even met – since the moment he first walked up behind me and I felt a coming of something, an urgency, and I braced myself as if a wave were about to wash over me. I turned in the direction of this utterly new feeling and saw his face smiling down at me, his hand already extending in my direction, that smile already spreading over his face as he spoke his first words and introduced himself to me. It wasn’t love at first sight, it was the awakening of a new sensory receptor that only his presence stimulated – an entirely new feeling that I came to realize was true, pure spiritual kinship.

So, I knew when I kneeled before him and asked for his hand in marriage that he would say yes. I knew that we would continue to live our lives together, as we were meant to. And we have. More than three years have passed since that day. And we are together. And we love each other. And we’re happy. We’ve nothing to prove to anyone – not our love, not the strength of our commitment, nor our devotion to one another. We’re just together, as we should be – as we know we are supposed to be. That’s been enough.

And so last week I hardly took notice when I saw the headline announcing that our mayor was going to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, in defiance of state law. I had no idea how exciting the following day was going to be for us. It was around 10:30am, Friday, February 13, 2004 when J. sent me an instant message over the computer, “Do you want to get married today?” I didn’t need to think about it. It would be the most natural thing in the world, and this might be our only chance.

We each left work early and went to City Hall. A man stood on the steps, shouting. He was a large, slovenly oaf. “You’re going to Hell!” he yelled. I walked up to him and took his picture. “You faggots!” he screamed. I smiled at him, and we went inside. “There was only one,” I said to J. “I can’t believe there was just one of them.”

Our friend Melissa joined us, as excited as we were. The line to obtain the marriage certificate stretched around the rotunda, down a hallway, through the cafeteria, down a flight of stairs, down another hallway, around a corner, back through the hallway, up the stairs into the cafeteria again, through yet another hallway, and around a corner down one final long hallway to the County Clerk’s office.

We stood in line 4 1/2 hours. Melissa waited with us the entire time. On either side of us, other couples weathered the line with us. Thousands of tired feet began to ache, but no one complained. There was only joy and hope and optimism. And love. The people around us became our friends, and eventually even seemed like family to us.

Volunteers were standing by to help us, to make sure we knew where to go and to make sure we filled out the right information on the forms. Even these helpers, who had been on their feet all day, giving their time for free, were full of joy for us. Some people came out of their offices and were volunteering to be witnesses, because many couples had shown up not realizing that a witness was required.

Finally, we reached the front of the line and obtained the marriage certificate. When we walked back down the hall, where hundreds of eager couples still waited like we had, they began to clap and cheer for us, shouting congratulations. We walked by, smiling and thanking them, and proceeded upstairs to have our ceremony under the ornate dome of the rotunda.

Some of our closest friends came to watch our ceremony, but when I took J’s hand and looked into his eyes, I was thinking only of him. And when the justice asked me if I promised to love him, to honor, respect, and protect him, come what may, through sickness and in health, ‘til death do we part, it felt like he was lifting the words right from my heart. I felt my eyes filling a bit, but I smiled to keep from crying, and said, “I do.” And I kept smiling as the justice asked the same of J. and he looked into my eyes and made me the same promise. And all I was thinking at that moment was that this wonderful, beautiful man had just promised to love me, before our friends and the entire world – no matter what – for the rest of my life.

I won’t forget how real it was. In that moment, with so much going on all around us, it was just the two of us, just our promises to each other, just us. I wasn’t thinking of the millions of people who want to keep us from making these promises. And now I know they have lost. Whatever may happen, we have had that moment – nothing and no one can take it away from us.

After the ceremony, we went to the final office, where we were given our formal marriage license. Many of the people we had stood in line with were there and many other people we hadn't met before. When our names were called, we got up and were handed our license, and everyone congratulated us.

I asked the lady, "Are we done? Is this the end?"

Someone said, "Now you have the rest of your lives together!" and I said, "Of course! This is only the beginning!"

Six-hundred gay and lesbian couples were married that day. In the days that followed, three-thousand more couples were wed. A coalition of churches and other religious organizations publicly announced its support and belief in the holiness of the unions. Meanwhile, the state, and the nation, were embroiled in controversy.

I didn’t ask for my wedding day to be a political event. It was, for me, a proud declaration to the world of my love and devotion to J. It was good. And it was right. And for anyone who was there to witness that day, to say what we did was controversial – to say we should not have been allowed to do it – is simply unfathomable.

Nonetheless, the following July, the State Attorney General, under pressure from the governor and other political groups, declared our marriage license void.

The governor didn't come to our wedding. If he had, he might have understood how ineffectual tearing up our marriage license would be. It's a piece of paper. Tearing it up doesn't erase the event. We were married, before our friends and before God. Those contracts aren't physical, they're emotional and spiritual. The governor doesn't have access to them.

Muni Memories #1

2006-01-23T19:23:00.000-08:00

When you visit San Francisco, your natural instinct may be to drive to your various destinations. That’s fine if your plans include crossing a bridge or heading up or down the coast. But if your day’s plans are to stay within the city limits, think outside the Buick. Find a place to park your car and leave it there (and by the way, if you leave so much as a quarter in the ashtray, you’re inviting a break-in. So empty your car out. And empty means empty. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure is practiced here to the extreme). Instead, buy yourself a bus map and traverse the City like a real San Franciscan – on Muni!

A buck-fifty will take you anywhere you want to go in San Francisco. And you won’t have to deal with any traffic, search for parking, or pay for it (if you’re lucky enough to find a spot, a quarter will buy you a mere ten minutes on the meter). When you get on the bus, you’ll even get a transfer good for ninety minutes so you can board other buses for free. Best of all, you will be treated to a view of San Francisco that only Muni can provide, encountering real San Franciscans that you could only meet – yes – on Muni. I promise, if you ride Muni enough, you will go home with at least one good story to tell. Because, while San Franciscans are some of the friendliest people in the world, true to our reputation, we’re also a bunch of flappin' loony-boobs. Trust me, you don’t want to miss that.

I’ve been a Muni rider for nigh on eight years now. In fact, from ninety-seven ‘til ought-two, I didn’t even own a car. Muni was it! So you know I have some good stories to tell! I’m going to share these sometimes delectable, sometimes deplorable, tidbits with you from time to time, starting with the following story.

Muni Memory #1 - the 24 Divisadero

It was a chilly night in the middle of Winter, 1998. The sun had long since dropped behind Twin Peaks and the sky was a blackish-orange of low-hanging fog reflecting city lights. I was heading out to a party – a Blue Room party – at 550 Barneveld, a large warehouse-turned-partyspace hidden among a sea of warehouses in a relatively remote, industrial corner of the City. The best parties were Blue Room parties, and 550 Barneveld was the place for the best parties in town – huge and comfortable, with multiple rooms, multiple sound systems, on multiple levels and dizzying visuals at every turn. To get to the party, I needed Muni. The bus that would get me there: the 24 Divisadero.

Seated at the bus stop, I saw the unmistakable glow of a Muni bus come over the crest of the hill. It squealed to a stop and I hopped on board. I flashed my December FastPass to the driver and found a seat on the right-hand side near the back.

The bus was almost empty and lit up brighter than Walgreen's. On the right-hand side of the bus, it was just me and an older Latino gentleman sitting several rows in front of me. On the left, a pair of young Latino fellows were sitting together a few rows ahead of mine, and directly across from me was a young white dude who was dressed to party. I wondered if he was headed to Blue Room as well.

After a couple stops, another guy got on the bus. If I had to describe him in one word, it would be Urkel. He was a little taller, a little older, and much nerdier, but for the most part, he was very Urkel. He took a seat right in front of me. Aside from the two friends, who were talking quietly to each other in Spanish, we all sat in silence, staring out at the city lights from the brightly-lit tin tube that was transporting us to our various destinations.

Enter the crazy person.

Crazy people come in all shapes, colors, sizes, and degrees of cleanliness. In fact, you never can tell who around you might be crazy. For example, this particular specimen was a tall, thin, fashionably dressed, and quite attractive African-American female with beautifully braided extensions pulled back behind her dark, angular face. She got on the bus a few stops after Urkel, and, with a strained smirk on her face (which was a sign of things to come), walked briskly to the very back row of the bus, two rows behind me.

We continued to gaze out the windows, facing forward and minding our business, as we gradually became aware of commotion – restlessness, a disturbance – coming from the back of the bus. The new passenger was struggling - and every couple of seconds, emitting a little twitter of laughter. She was fighting it, but she was losing. Trying desperately to hold it in, little laughs were squeaking and popping out of her. I braced for the inevitable. She was a pressure cooker and she was about to blow. Finally she did, exploding with a loud peal of full-on belly laughter that caused every head to turn. She had collapsed onto her side, laying across the back row of seats, and was convulsing with giggles.

I knew exactly what was going through her mind: mushrooms – the magic kind. I’m pretty sure everyone else figured that out pretty quickly too, except for Urkel, who looked baffled and a little annoyed. He kept looking back at her with a scowl of utter perturbation while she continued to try in vain to bring her inappropriate laughter under control.

The rest of us glanced at one another with the kind of smiles you give to strangers you suddenly find yourself sharing an odd or uncomfortable moment with – smiles that cross all language and culture barriers – smiles that say, this is going to be good. But our smiles didn’t last long because laughter is, after all, contagious and soon enough we were chuckling and launching our own personal campaigns to fight the urge to join her hysteria.

Of course, the harder you try not to laugh, the harder it is to resist. And her own miserable failures in this regard proved too much for us. She brought us right down with her and in a matter of minutes the 24 Divisadero was ringing from end to end with loud, raucous laughter, bursting at first in snorts through our nostrils and fluttering through our tightly pursed lips as we tried to hold the laughs in. We all became the targets of urgent, scolding looks from the increasingly disapproving nerd sitting in front of me.

I imagine his thoughts went something like this:

Oh good, the bus is almost empty. This seat looks clean, I’ll take it. Do te do te dooo…

What’s HER problem? Is something funny? She looked right at me. (Check your nose) Be cool man. Go ahead, laugh. See if I care... (Check your hair)

She’s just a stuck up bitch. Give her a look. Show her you aren’t going to take her crap.

She just laughed harder. SO immature. Now they’re all joining in. Just ignore them...

They’re all in on it. What are they all laughing at? I hate this. It’s not that funny, whatever it is. Is it something about the seat I’m sitting in? I knew I shouldn’t have worn this shirt. Why does this always happen to me? I can’t take this. People can be such jerks! They’re all looking at me now.

“Just leave me alone!” he finally broke down and screamed at her.

Until this moment, I simply thought he lacked a sense of humor. But his sudden outburst revealed to us all in no uncertain terms that he thought this was all about him. I wouldn’t have thought it possible to laugh any harder, but full-on hooting, hollering, and knee slapping ensued. Of course, it was the perfect thing to say to help the original crazy person, the woman responsible for rendering us all fit for the booby hatch, regain her composure.

By now, she was literally gasping for air, but to her credit, she managed to say in a single breath, stringing the words together as quickly as possible, “Sir, I dunno what I’m laughing at, but I ain’t laughing atch-you!” before she disintegrated back into a quivering ball of lunatic giggles. Now, I am quite certain that we were all already over the edge at this point. So that can only mean one thing: her comment literally moved the edge and then flung us all back over it again. Everything was beginning to go white as I wiped the tears from my cheeks and attempted some of my own breathing exercises.

Imagine what this news meant to Urkel. He could react in a couple of ways. First, given his paranoia, he might not have believed her, remaining convinced that we were all laughing at him. Or, perhaps he did believe her, in which case he’d have then suddenly realized that now we were all laughing at him. Either way, we were all laughing at him.

He lasted a couple more stops before he pulled the cord. The bus stopped and he made a quick exit, still clearly in a snit. Upon hitting the sidewalk, he either immediately burst into tears or began laughing himself at the silly situation. I hope it was the latter, but I doubt it.

We finally began to reign in the laughter. By the time I reached the party, I was in an incredibly good mood. Laughter is indeed great medicine. Make sure you get a good dose of it every day.

Oh, and when you're in San Francisco, don't forget to ride Muni.

Christmas Shopping

2005-12-23T19:26:00.000-08:00

Here are some photos I took today as I braved the throngs of last-minute shoppers. Click any image to see a larger version.

The holiday spirit is alive, even without snow, at Union Square in downtown San Francisco.

Street performers decked out in silver entertain the crowds on the sidewalk.

The sidewalks were crowded with Christmas shoppers.

Fancy schmantzy window displays entice us.

Weary shoppers take the Underground home.

Santacon 2005

2005-12-18T16:29:00.000-08:00

December 17, 2005 was a cold, wet, dreary Saturday in San Francisco, but that didn't stop the resilient City residents from coming out in costume to participate in the time-honored tradion of Santacon.

Santacon? How to describe it... Imagine a couple thousand folks hitting the streets in various Christmas-themed regalia, most of them dressed as some version of Santa Claus, to drink alcohol, wreak havoc, create mayhem, cause friendly disturbances, and basically be naughty (in the nicest of ways) while they ho-ho-hop from bar to bar (with a few pit-stops in between for free booze, merry-making, and revelry). Then imagine all that fake fur getting soaked with rain while the rabble-rousers get increasingly merry. Then crank up the noise level you're imagining by a factor of seven or so.

Imagine buses full of Santas, streets and sidewalks clogged with Santas, restaurants feeding hungry Santas and bars stuffed so full of Santas that all movement, aside from the lifting of drinks to mouths and the jiggling of jolly belly-laughter, is impossible.

That's sorta what Santacon in San Francisco is like. But it's a lot more fun - even in the rain - than it may sound. I braved the wind and rain, donned a Santa hat, and met my friends Nick and Michelle (who were dressed as Osanta bin Laden and Santa's little insurgent) and Suzie Snowflake (dressed, naturally, as a snowflake) for the red and white bar-crawl. Joining Santa's insurgency, wishing one and all a Ho-Ho-Holy War, we made up carols to sing, such as "O Taliban, O Taliban," "Little Bomber Boy," and "Infidels!" (sung to Jingle Bells).

The first Santacon was held in San Francisco in 1994. An invention of the San Francisco Cacophony Society, it's intended to be a celebration of the holiday season that is non-commercial, with added sparks of pranksterism, guerrilla street theater, and public drunkenness.

Since then, Santacon has spread from its San Francisco birthplace and is now celebrated in over a dozen U.S. cities (and more cities around the world) each year. It has come to be known by a few other names as well, including Santarchy, Santa Rampages, and the Red Menace.

You can read more about Santacon on Wikipedia. Or, you can just go look at my photos from yesterday's 11th annual San Francisco Santacon.

Spider Sex and Christian Denial

2005-12-16T17:40:00.000-08:00

For the past few minutes, I have been watching a spider repeatedly raise and lower itself by a strand of web, quickly dropping down, climbing back up, then quickly dropping down again. I was alarmed when I first noticed it, but I did nothing because I have made peace with the spiders in my apartment, and have actually named seven of them (Esmeralda, Arachne, Euripides, Trifle, Carlotta, Areola, and Frank; Frank is dead and is hanging with dried, bent legs upside-down above the patio door).

This spider I have been watching, however, just appeared in the window next to where I sit at the computer. It's not nearly as large as my hand, but easily larger than a grain of brown rice (the spider, not my computer). It took me a little longer to notice the second spider, which I have also been watching. It is not nearly as large as a grain of brown rice, but easily larger than the egg of a fertile human female. It too has been up and down its own strand of web, appearing much more frantic in its movements because its minutiae requires it to work much faster in order to keep up with its grand counterpart.

My first thought - I, optimist, idealist, utopian - was that I was watching a mother spider teaching her baby to spin a web. Of course, mother spiders do not have "a baby," they have a swarm of babies, none of whom will ever be "taught" to spin a web because the mother will die pre-natally and the babies will devour her dead carcass after they explode from her egg sac. So that warm, fuzzy thought faded pretty quickly and was replaced with the realization that what I am witnessing is carnal. I am watching a mating dance in progress, and soon, once the deed is done, that large spider will kill and eat her little mate. That itsy, bitsy spider is so driven by his primal urges that he is willing to be killed and eaten by his lover. Wham, bam, bite off my head. This forces the obvious question: Is it possible that spiders experience more powerful orgasms than human beings? Auto-erotic strangulation is a commonly known, albeit ill-advised, practice. What about decapitation? A man can only wonder what this would feel like, and hope, perhaps, that this is how his life will end. And might the female spider be in an orgasmic hysteria that incites her to kill? How else can one explain such seemingly illogical behavior? They're animals, driven by lust - and it must be damn good, if you ask me. It would have to be!

I think most people don't want to be reminded that they are animals. This is why cultures construct taboos around excrement and sexual behavior. It allows us to pretend that we're different from the beasts of the world. But, no matter how hard we pretend, we can't truly eliminate these things from our lives. Instead, their existence is simply denied. We're taught that civilized people don't talk about such things, nor the parts of the bodies associated with them. But of course we run and hide, and lock ourselves away, and poop and pee and screw - like filthy beasts! You do it. I do it. We can't avoid it. It's in our nature. We are what we are.

What does set us apart, perhaps, is this uniquely human desire to not be what we are. Most religions teach us to believe we're something more. And it works. It's lovely. Bliss - as long as everyone else plays along. As long as we poop and pee and screw in secret, and don't talk about it too much, we can keep pretending we're not like those beastly creatures that just do it out in the open, whenever they feel like it.

But when people don't play along, the illusion is disrupted. Religions need the power to control the behavior of the entire populace (even those who don't follow their belief system) in order to perpetuate their illusions of superiority among the creatures of the world. Even more important, actually, is the need to maintain the denial of our place among the animals. Because, if we're not completely separate, we're merely EVOLVED.

Whoa! Hold on a minute... you might be saying. Are you suggesting that people should just poop and pee and screw whenever and wherever they feel like it? That would be anarchy! Civilization would crumble! WE CAN NOT HAVE THAT! blah blah blah...

NO NO NO. Of COURSE I'm not suggesting that! That would be ridiculous... is what I would have said, before I moved to San Francisco. But I have lived in San Francisco now for almost eight years, and I gotta tell ya, people pretty much do poop and pee and screw whenever and wherever they want to here. And you know, I admit it can be a little annoying - but a threat to the stability of civilized society it's not.

I'm neither a spider, nor a Christian. And though I can't recall ever being lathered up into a sexual frenzy so intense that I considered allowing my mate to cannibalize me in the warm afterglow of lovemaking, I do close the door when I go to the bathroom. Call me a prude, I guess. In fact, I'll have you know I can be just as oppressive as even the most seasoned fanatic. For instance, if you'll excuse me, I need to put a stop to this carnality in the window before I have a couple hundred hungry orphans to deal with.

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2005-12-12T19:03:00.000-08:00

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Kathy Griffin: Unaffordable (Allegedly) in San Francisco

2005-12-12T03:15:00.000-08:00

I discovered over the weekend that my favorite comedian, Kathy Griffin, will be performing two shows in San Francisco on New Year's Eve.

I immediately went to her web site to purchase tickets, where I discovered that ticket prices were between $85 and $100 each. Now I realize that, in San Francisco, $85 is scarcely enough to get you bus fare, a chai latté, and a good hicolonic, but still.

Kathy, you're a D-List celebrity. D-List!! Tickets to your show should be $60 tops - for the good seats!

Oh well, with any luck, I'll find a way to go. Or maybe I'll just go get a copy of her DVD, Allegedly, which is hilarious.

If you haven't seen it, find it and watch it. I'm serious. Hilarious!

I love you, Kathy, even if I can't afford you.

Blizzard

2005-11-29T20:12:00.000-08:00

I hear you all had a blizzard.

Blizzards are among Mother Natures assortment of big guns – or, big ‘uns. The old gal has something for every occasion, doesn’t she? Tornadoes for Spring and hurricanes for Summer. Earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis for any ol’ time. And they all have names befitting their ferocity.

Something called a tornado simply must be terrible and you can tell by its name that a hurricane is horrific. Earthquake – the entire planet quakes. Need I say more? Volcano – vicious! And tsunami sounds like something that could wipe out everything with a swoosh, doesn’t it?

And then there’s blizzard. With all the other bluh words (blooper, blunder, blubber, blather, blippy, and even balloon, to name just a few) blizzard just sounds kind of silly. And it sounds like wizard which makes me think of unicorns.

It also sounds like custard, and thanks to Dairy Queen, a blizzard is indeed a dessert. At least hurricane got the proper distinction of being an alcoholic beverage instead of a sweet, creamy treat.

I’m not saying that the blizzard is a wimp among the big ‘uns of nature. A blizzard is fierce, nasty, miserable, and can be deadly. And what with global warming cranking all our disasters up a few notches these days, a blizzard certainly deserves to be taken seriously. Can you imagine a blizzard tearing your house to pieces? Holy crap! That would suck. No, the blizzard deserves our respect.

I looked up the etymology of blizzard, expecting, in my naiveté, to find that it was an Eskimo term. I was pleased to learn that blizzard is not an Eskimo term, because I wouldn’t want to make fun of another culture’s language, if I can avoid it.

The origin of the word blizzard is unclear, but dates to the mid-1800s and first came into accepted use during the fierce winter of 1888. But why is anyone’s guess.

So I think we need to give this fierce winter monster a better name. Something more badass. Snopocalypse. Or Iceaclysm, perhaps! Maybe Freezing Banshee. How about Whitesmash?

Can you picture the headlines? Whitesmash cripples eastern Nebraska. (Hmmm… does it sound too much like an 80s hair band?)

San Francisco doesn’t get blizzards. If it did, we would all die – perhaps not instantly, but in a day or two. It would truly be a snopocalypse. Have you seen our hills? One false step and we’d be helplessly sliding at ever-increasing velocity - and we wouldn’t stop until we hit the bay, a homeless shopping cart, or maybe an organic produce stand. Either way, we’re talking instant death.

In fact, San Francisco doesn’t actually have weather. Not weather by Nebraska standards, anyway. (In much the same way, to a San Franciscan, Grand Island doesn’t have any hills – even though my Grandpa always insisted that the Yancey Hotel was “up on the hill,” I still can’t see it.) No, San Francisco doesn’t actually have any weather to speak of at all.

Sure, it drizzles sometimes. Sometimes, it even drizzles hard. And when it does, houses start sliding down the sides of the hills. We have the fog, it's true – but it might as well be whipped cream up there on the hilltops. Once every couple of years, there will be a lightning strike. A lightning strike. If this happens, you’ll know about it, because it will be on the news. Invariably, the single bolt of lightning will result in the burning down of a couple houses, if not a several-hundred-thousand-acre brush fire. The next day at the water cooler, the hot question will be, “Did you hear the thunder?”

If San Francisco had real weather, this place would be reduced to mush in a matter of hours.

I miss the weather, even the blizzards. I know you’re all miserable, and I’m sitting here complaining because the pavement’s wet. But I miss the thunder. And I miss the snow. I should probably shut up now.

Meat & Potatoes

2005-11-16T18:58:00.000-08:00

San Francisco is a tourist destination. There are a bevy of reasons for this: its rich history (a.k.a. sinful past), its breathtaking geography, the abundance of Victorian architecture, its diverse neighborhoods, the dramatic daily Summer blast of fog, and its proximity to beaches, lava cliffs, redwood forests, and vineyards, just to name a few – all in a little town just seven miles wide by seven miles long - roughly the size of Grand Island.

But the number one draw in San Francisco – the thing the City is known for among all the cities of the world – is its food. Not only is the locally-caught crab the world’s best, the City’s incredible diversity has made it home to over 3,000 restaurants of every type of cuisine on earth - and in fact, beyond. Yes, beyond! That’s because, along with the infinite variety of food have come the world’s best and most innovative chefs crafting fusions of flavor so unique, they’ve become recognized worldwide as a singular, multi-faceted entity: California Cuisine.

But listen, San Francisco doesn’t do all food better. For example, even though some of the most upscale restaurants in town boast that they serve only Nebraska corn-fed beef, you will not find a filet of beef here that even comes close to a fresh-cut slice of angus "right off the ranch and onto your plate" like you’ll find in a Nebraska steak house. Nor will you ever convince me that there’s a catfish here that tastes as good as the ones my grandpa used to pull from the Platte and fry up in his kitchen. And, oddly enough, the Indian food in Nebraska (though there is little to be found) kicks the ass of the many MANY Indian greasepits in Frisco. Finally, the bottom line is, if its filled with cheese, baked in a dish, swimming in Ranch dressing, or smothered with gravy, Nebraska has San Francisco beat hands down.

So when I come home, I come home with a craving for the food Nebraska knows how to do – and does better than San Francisco. I want burgers. I want steaks. I want biscuits and gravy, potato salad, and jell-o. I want Runzas, cheese frenchies, and Godfather’s pizza. I want a hot combination hoagie from Da Vinci’s and an Amigo’s crisp meat burrito dipped in Dorothy Lynch dressing. And if I’m really lucky, I’ll get to have a meal at Harriet’s Danish in Dannebrog – perhaps sitting at the table with Harriet, herself. You can’t beat that. Not in San Francisco. Not anywhere.

That said, there's a fair amount of food to be had here that you just can't get in Nebraska - tons, to be precise. And when you come to San Francisco, I think you should come with a craving for the food you can't get at home - the food San Francisco does better than anywhere else in the world. Believe it or not, that still leaves you with so many choices, you have no need whatsoever to worry that you'll be stuck eating something weird.

But therein lies a problem, actually.

As hard as this may be to believe, when you live in a city with an infinite variety of food, an infinite variety of food inevitably becomes mundane. It is exactly like getting the most expensive cable TV package, with 3,000 channels to choose from, and finding nothing on TV to watch. Along with this comes a truly radical shift in your perspective that you hardly even notice, but promises to come back to bite you squarely on the butt when your relatives visit from back home. You see, when you become a San Franciscan, you completely lose your ability to determine what “normal” food is.

To San Franciscans, it is the most normal thing in the world to devour a big platter of open-faced mussels on a bed of ice, sucking them raw with a bit of Tobasco right out of their shells and into our gaping mouths. Udon noodles are like Mac-n-cheese here. And everyone eats raw fish caked with bright orange fish eggs, surrounded by sugared rice, and wrapped in a thin seaweed paper, then dipped in a salty brown liquid mixed with a green horseradish paste – and we love it.

Eel? Delicious! Squid? Of course! Why yes, I would like tongue in my burrito, thanks for asking! Are you going to eat that fish eyeball? ...May I? Why would anyone think that’s weird?

So guess what happened when my mom and aunt came to visit for a week over Halloween? Oh I’ll tell you.

I was prepared for a bit of hesitation and uncertainty over what can certainly be a challenging host of food options. I know my mom. The only thing my mom would rather have than McDonald’s is a can of chocolate Slim Fast. And my aunt had already admitted to me that she wasn’t a “trier.” So I had a list of ideas in my head that I thought were safe. Nothing “weird” or too spicy, nothing too out of the ordinary, but still highlighting the cuisine that can be found nowhere else but San Francisco. I was sure it was going to be a slam-dunk and I would open their palates to a delectable fantasia of flavors like they’d never before known which would, like magic, transform them into true culinary connoiseurs capable of rivaling any San Franciscan.

I was a fool, completely oblivious to the fact that I’d lost my ability to identify normal food. And I was about to learn my lesson. I asked, on their first night in town, “What would you like to have for dinner?”

In true Nebraska mom and aunt fashion, their reply was, “I don’t care. Whatever you want will be fine. It’s up to you.”

So, picking what I thought was the most normal and delicious food on the face of the Earth, I said, “OK, let’s go out for Thai.” I thought this was a sure-bet. There isn't a Thai dish on the planet that isn't delicious. I knew I was safe, because Thai food is always good.

Well you should have seen their faces. I could feel my flesh ossifying, and I knew that I’d be a pillar of granite if I didn’t look away quickly. But it was up to me, and I stuck to my suggestion with admirable, pitiable confidence. We went to Osha, a Thai restaurant in the Mission District. Go ahead, click the link. Looks nice, doesn't it?

Once we were seated, we opened our menus. And then the questions started.

“Well, what is all this?"

"How am I supposed to even know what to order?"

"What’s curry?”

I assured them that anything they ordered would be delicious – because Thai food is always good. That didn’t help them even a little. It became shockingly apparent that they did not trust me. In fact, I could tell by the looks on their frightened, pale faces that they were beginning to get suspicious. Perhaps I was actually trying to kill them.

So I looked over the menu and found the safest, most non-Thai of all the dishes – the dish that everyone who knows nothing about Thai food orders because it’s the least daring and most non-threatening staple of every Thai restaurant – the Praram ("peanut dish") with chicken. I suggested they order it, explaining it was a simple dish with a mild peanut flavor that they were sure to like.

“It comes on a bed of cooked spinach? Yuck!” my aunt commented with a twisted face of utter disgust.

“If you don’t stop it, your face will stick that way,” I warned her.

“You can pick the spinach out,” my mom said, “Let’s just get it.”

I ordered pumpkin curry with chicken and in the meantime, our appetizers arrived – salmon rolls and vegetable spring rolls – which I had ordered, figuring they could be sampled without any fears of commitment. Of course, I was kidding myself.

“Help yourselves,” I said, grabbing a salmon roll and dipping it in sweet sauce.

They clearly didn’t want to, but cutting the smallest crumb they could possibly balance on the tips of their forks, they each took a bite and, this time in unison, looked at me with faces depicting such horror and despair, you’d have thought they'd just witnessed the Abu Ghraib atrocities, or perhaps a performance by Philip Glass.

Of course, they got the one salmon roll that tasted fishy. I encouraged them to try another, but that wasn’t about to happen. Not in a million years.

Our entrees arrived, and they began to pick through the Praram (the one dish they were sharing between them). “It tastes like chicken in melted peanut butter,” they said, which is essentially what Praram is. I tried it, and it wasn’t the best Praram I’ve ever had. I realized the credibility I was so certain I would earn that night was hopelessly unattainable.

My pumpkin curry, however, was absolutely astonishing.

Next door to the Thai restaurant is a burger joint called Burger Joint. When we left, I asked if they wanted to stop there and get something, since they hadn’t eaten much. “No, no, we’re fine,” they said in true Nebraska mom and aunt fashion.

We made it home alive, and the next day for lunch we had eggs, hashbrowns, burgers, and fries – with American cheese, of course.

Score:
Frisco City Chefs - 0 ... Nebraska Picky Eaters - 1

I Just Hope They Meant To Spell It That Way

2005-10-31T23:32:00.000-08:00

Last week as I stepped out of my flat, I noticed that someone had taped a photocopied flyer to the outside of the building. I paused to give it a quick once-over, figuring someone had lost their cat, the neighborhood association was holding another meeting to protest the new freeway off-ramp, or that someone was advertising their feng shui/deep-tissue massage/green tea hicolonic/aura-healing/chi-balancing/shakra-aligning services. Instead, it was a notice that a film crew would be shooting scenes for a movie titled Pursuit of Happyness on my street the following Saturday, which would involve restricted parking and partial street closures. The flyer promised that every attempt would be made to keep noise to a minimum, and that there would be no explosions or car chases/crashes. (Whew!)

I verified that the parking restrictions wouldn't affect where I parked Pudding In A Cloud (my 1987 Olds Delta 88, a.k.a. Puddin' - which, by the way, is prime material for a Pimp My Ride episode, if any of you feel like nominating me) and made a mental note to formulate a Plan B for picking up my mom and aunt at the airport that day, if the parking restrictions prohibited me from getting Puddin' out of the alley where I park her. Then I moved on, thinking no more about what I assumed was just some low budget film with questionable grammar.

Around 3:30am Saturday morning, the circus came to town - at least it seemed like it. A parade of trucks rolled in and began setting up for the following day's shoot. I have to say, they didn't try very hard to keep noise to a minimum. But most immediately obvious was the fact that this was a film with a budget. There were tents, there were early-80s period cars (even an old San Francisco Muni Bus), there were security guards, traffic cops, and there were police escorts. No question, this was Hollywood.

I looked online (God bless the Internet), and found out that Pursuit of Happyness will tell the true story of Chris Gardner, a homeless San Francisco man determined to become a stock broker, who at one time actually lived with his young son in the bathroom of a BART station. Chris Gardner will be played by Will Smith.

In Pursuit of In Pursuit of Happyness

Will Smith Pursues Happyness

I had to drive through the movie set with Puddin' to get out of my neighborhood and head to the airport, but I didn't catch a glimpse of Will. I did see one guy I thought looked like Cuba Gooding Jr., but he was dressed like a tech and as far as I know, Mr. Jr. isn't even in this film. But it was fun catching a little slice of the movie biz, and I thought I'd give you a little info on a film coming out in 2006 that you might not have heard of yet...(Bam! That's right, Captain Wow - I just scooped your ass, buddy! Do you feel a little nervous, Melia? :)

I'll be back soon with a report on the country's largest Halloween bash (complete with photos you won't want to miss). 'Til then, eat and party wisely and often.

Putting Up A Good Fright

2005-10-24T15:17:00.000-07:00

The Silver Man - Part 2

The Silver Man followed me home and became a frequent visitor.

My memories of his visitations aren’t as vivid as the first time I saw him, which left an indelible impression on me. Seeing him ceased to terrify me because all he seemed to want to do was look at me. I would see him at night, after being put to bed. He’d peek around the corner, through my bedroom door, and look in at me as I lay in bed. Or sometimes he’d peer out at me from the closet, if I left the closet door open.

He looked the same as before, with shimmering features that reminded me of the reflections of moonlight on ripples of water. But now I could see how tall he was. He was well over six feet tall, and very thin. And when he appeared, he just looked at me. Watched me.

I always yelled for my mom when I saw him, though it became less out of fright and more out of a desire for her to see him too. But when I called her, he always quickly retreated into whatever dark folds of space or time he’d come out of. She never saw him.

When my mom became pregnant with my little brother, my bedroom was moved to the basement of our house. My old room became my brother’s nursery. And as he got older, he kept it as his bedroom. We never talked about the Silver Man, and had all but forgotten him until one day at the dinner table my little brother, who was six or seven years old by now, said something that gave us chills.

My mom was dishing out the mashed potatoes when out of the blue my brother said, “Every night when I go to bed, I have to get up and shut the closet door because there’s a shiny man in there looking at me.”

My mom dropped the spoon into the bowl of potatoes. I looked at her, and she was looking at me. I had goosebumps. I said, “Do you remember…?”

“Yes,” she replied quickly, and that was it. We didn’t say anything more about it. I don’t know if we didn’t want to scare my little brother, who didn’t seem too freaked out by it, but we just didn’t say anything more beyond that.

Just a week or two later, a neighbor girl knocked on our door asking if my brother could come out and play. I hollered at my brother, and while we stood waiting she asked, “Who is that man in your garage?”

“What man?”

“There’s a tall white man standing on a ladder in your garage, reaching up into the attic.”

“Show me,” I told her, and we walked around the front of the house to the garage. The garage door was open. In the middle of the floor was a ladder, directly beneath a hole in the ceiling that led into the attic. Through the hole, several boxes were visible. These boxes held items we’d salvaged from my great-grandfather’s farmhouse in Cameron when he died.

There was nobody around. “He was standing there on the ladder,” she said.

I asked her what he looked like, and she described a tall, thin man with white hair and a beard, wearing bib overalls. I showed her a photograph my dad had taken of my great grandfather and she immediately said, “Yes, that’s him!” She had no way of knowing he had died several years earlier.

From that day, the shimmering watcher - who may or may not have been the ghost of my great-grandfather - disappeared from our lives and faded into memory. I don’t know what became of the Silver Man. Perhaps he finally moved on. Or maybe he returned to Cameron, and continues to watch from the woods on the banks of Prairie Creek.

Haunted San Francisco

San Francisco is said to be full of ghosts. Given its history, this isn't surprising. But for as long as I've lived here (nearly ten years), I haven't had any unexplainable experiences. Well, actually, there was one.

I live in a rail flat, which is an apartment floorplan very common in San Francisco. It was built in the early years after the 1906 earthquake, before electricity. Added later, all the electrical wiring is on the outside of the walls. The rooms are laid end to end like boxcars on a train, with a bay window in each room. A long hallway runs all along the entire right side of my flat, the "rail" connecting all the rooms. My hallway is half a city block long.

My front room is the living room, and there's a "pocket" door that opens up into the second room, which I use as my music studio and office. Being an old building with no insulation, you can usually hear traffic going by, people in the stairwell, and the noisy neighbors upstairs who seem to enjoy dropping bocce balls onto the wood floors. But one night I was standing in the studio and it was unusually quiet for a change.

I heard a voice say, "Hi!" followed by a chuckle. It wasn't out in the stairwell, or upstairs. It was right next to my ear. I even thought I felt breath on my neck. I turned my head, but of course there was nothing there. I was standing alone, and everything fell silent once again.

I looked down at Sherman, the cat who lives with me. He was sitting in the doorway between the two rooms, looking up, with his eyes wide open and his ears perked. But he wasn't looking up at me, he was looking just a foot to the right of my head, gazing at the exact spot where I'd just heard the voice. I don't know if he could see anything there, but he definitely had heard the same thing I had - coming from the same source. It was weird - and he obviously thought so too!

Haunted Places

Here are some web sites with details of haunted places in Nebraska and San Francisco.

Haunted Nebraska
Shadowland's Haunted Places Index: Nebraska
Ghost Towns of Nebraska
San Francisco's Most Haunted
Bay Area Haunts from Haunted Bay.

The next time you're in the City by the Bay, consider a haunted walking tour! San Francisco Ghost Hunt!

Haunting Season

2005-10-14T14:38:00.000-07:00

The Sun don’t pity you,
The rain don’t envy you,
The wind don’t follow you,
And the snow sees right through you.
-Nebraska proverb

It’s October and Halloween is coming. There’s a chill in the air and the trees are starting to look more skeletal. Winter is just around the corner, when it’s dark most of the time, and almost everything out there in the darkness is dead. In the spirit of the season, I thought I’d talk about some haunted places, here in San Francisco and in Nebraska.

THE SILVER MAN - PART 1

Years ago, a tiny town called Cameron sat along a dusty road straddling a meandering creek. An old German settlement, it was never much of a town, but it had a few businesses, a few homes, a school, and a church with a cemetery. It also had a little park right on the bank of the creek, lined with mulberry bushes and shaded by cottonwoods, that was the site of old fashioned religious revivals, snake oil sales, family picnics, at least a couple Klan rallies, and maybe even a circus or two.

The town gradually died. The old park stopped hosting social gatherings and grew thick with weeds and rogue alfalfa. Cameron became a ghost town. There are actually a few buildings still standing there, but if you didn’t know what you were seeing, you probably wouldn’t recognize it as a former town. By contrast, the old Cameron church is still in pretty good condition, roughly a mile west and a mile south of the old town site. The last time I was there, the creek had begun eating into the cemetery, and some of the older tombstones were in danger of falling into the creekbed. But the little town west of Grand Island on the banks of Prairie Creek is scarcely more than a memory now.

The land around Cameron is my ancestral home. My great-grandfather farmed it, and some of my relatives still do. When I was growing up, two of the homes in the old town of Cameron were still inhabited by my kin. One of these old farmhouses was my great-grandfather’s farmhouse and the other belonged to my uncle and his family. Both houses sat right up against the overgrown woods that lined the banks of Prairie Creek.

Back then, “going to the farm” meant a trip out to one of these two old farmhouses. The days I spent out there are among my most cherished of memories, even though the woods along the creek were thick and frightening to me. We never went into the creek – the trees were full of ticks and the water full of leeches, and my cousin once told me that Bigfoot lived under the bridge. I also never went to the overgrown field where the park had been, which was just on the other side of the creek from my uncle’s old clapboard house. In fact, I only recall crossing the bridge on foot, into what had been the bulk of the town, a couple of times. Unlike many dark places, there was a darkness there that didn’t attract me.

At night, shrouded beneath the woods of Prairie Creek, the old ghost town of Cameron is dark and creatures lurk in its shadows. We’d often hear coyotes howling from somewhere in the mist and owls hooting from the tops of the trees. From the farmhouse we could hear rustling in the bushes as nocturnal animals moved about in the darkness, and sometimes we'd even see the dark bulk of a creature wandering through the dense brush.

But even though they sat at the gateway to what seemed like a dark and mysterious place, our farmhouses were havens of light and laughter and joy. I always felt safe there – until one night – in my uncle’s house – when I came face to face with the Silver Man.

It was an old two-story farmhouse. Built long before central air and heat, there were air passages covered by metal grates between the floors, to allow air to circulate and help cool the upstairs in the Summer and heat it in the Winter. I had just plopped down on the old couch in the living room. My two cousins were on the floor in front of me, propped up on elbows and holding their chins, faces glued to the gigantic wood-paneled television console that sat in the corner of the room, larger than a china cabinet. The grown-ups were all in the next room playing pinochle at the kitchen table. I laid back and looked up at the ceiling. Directly above my head was one of those metal grates covering an air-passage to the upstairs.

As I looked up into the dark space beyond the metal grate, the clear outline of a head and shoulders suddenly appeared there, staring back down at me. It had no facial features – none that I could see – but it was clearly the image of a man, and he shimmered, like the silvery reflection of moonlight bouncing off ripples of water. Face or no face, one thing was certain, the silver apparition was looking through the floor and staring right at me.

I screamed. And when I say I screamed, I mean I let loose a blood-curdling, bone-chilling caterwaul that rattled the windows and had the adults upturning their chairs and bottlenecking at the doorway in their attempts to get to the living room and see what the hell had gotten into me. The Silver Man quickly moved away from the grate opening, and the air passage above me was once again dark.

They tried to get me to calm down, but I was hysterical. I was simultaneously sobbing and screaming and crying – and subsequently hyperventilating, too. When I finally caught my breath, I told them through my tears exactly what I had seen.

Of course this led to pointless reassurances that nothing was really there, that I hadn’t seen anything, and after much coaxing (and ultimately dragging me up the steep staircase), the final reassurance of showing me the bedroom closet that housed the air passage leading to the first floor living room above the couch – the bedroom closet where the Silver Man had been crouching and looking down at me. See, there’s nobody here.

Of course there was nobody there. This only confirmed for me what I already knew: That there was some truly scary-ass, messed up Scheisse going down in the old dead town of Cameron.

Well, I was just a kid and that meant whatever I saw could be easily explained away by adults. And as it turned out, that was the only time I saw the Silver Man in my uncle’s old farmhouse. In fact, the whole incident would have been forgotten completely, except the Silver Man began following me. And eventually, I wasn’t the only one who saw him.

To be continued...

When Frisco Does Bluegrass

2005-10-05T23:16:00.000-07:00

I sometimes think that I’m emotionally distant. That’s probably a typical guy thing, though I suppose typical guys don’t think about it. I’m simply not one to become overwhelmed with emotion, nor to let my emotions control my behavior. But now I’m going to tell you about seeing Dolly Parton.

Last weekend, San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park hosted the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. It was a 3-day long event, with over sixty bands playing on five separate stages throughout the park, topped off with a performance by Dolly Parton Sunday evening.

I would expect that the crowd at a bluegrass festival in Nebraska would probably look like a crowd you’d expect to see at, say… a bluegrass festival. Judging the look of the crowd in GG Park, however, you might have concluded they were in town for a Phish concert – or maybe a gay rodeo – or, possibly, a Star Trek convention.

You had your hippies with miles of dreds tucked into colossal knit caps and women in patchwork frocks, spinning in circles Lillith Fair-style. And there were men with handlebar moustaches wearing hats that looked like gigantic toads. And people dressed as pink cowboys – feet crammed into pink gator-skin boots, shoulders draped in jackets studded with pink rhinestones, necks wrapped in pink feather boas, and heads capped with pink cowboy hats that covered pink hair – clutching matching pink poodles.

And the Galactic Sign Guy was there too. His name is Frank Chiu, and he’s a truly iconic San Franciscan (there's even a local nightclub inspired by him) – though most people know him only as the Galactic Sign Guy.

He protests. Many would say he doth protest too much, because protest is all he does. On the other hand, very few (if any) know just what it is he is protesting. He carries a sign, but it’s hardly any help, and he changes the magnetic-lettered wording every day. For today’s festivities, his sign read, "Stevens 12 Galaxies Quintrozenikulled Suppression Fox: Sydropenicalled Coverage Xekrojenikulled Repudiations Mobilizations Pediatrics." Now do you understand?

You may think the message arcane, but I assure you, it's completely incoherent. I do know that the CIA owes his family a large sum of money for casting them as lead roles in a CIA-produced documentary about an extraterrestrial invasion of the United States back in the 90s. That’s according to him.

So basically, it was your typical San Francisco crowd. And aside from the Galactic Sign Guy, it was no secret why we were there. We were all there to see Dolly Parton – for free.

But before I get to Dolly, I need to briefly mention Split Lip Rayfield. Split Lip Rayfield isn’t another crazy San Francisco character, but three crazy Lawrence, Kansas characters who can spit out bluegrass better than my granny can spit tobacky. With a banjo, guitar, and a bass made out of an old gas tank, they knocked out some bluegrass so hard, it was no surprise that strings were snapping off their instruments.

My favorite song was “How Many Biscuits Can You Eat?” which gave me a serious case of the munchies. At least, I think it was the song – the park air was getting somewhat thick with some rather wacky smelling smoke at this point. But I'm sure it was the song, possibly combined with the fact that I’d been sitting in the sun drinking bourbon for an entire Sunday afternoon.

Anyways, Split Lip Rayfield was worth seeing – and you can. They’re playing at Knickerbockers in Lincoln on November 2. (Whoa! Snap! That’s right Touring Tonya, I just scooped you, baby!) Go see them – you will not be disappointed.

And then she emerged. A sparkling, double-E goddess with piles of blonde, Dolly Parton entered the stage. After a brief comment that we must all be in a good mood, judging by the smell, she opened with 9 to 5. I actually phoned my mom, who was having supper with my grammy in Grand Island, so she could hear for herself. Dolly continued with old favorites (I Will Always Love You, In My Tennessee Mountain Home) and songs from her new CD, Those Were The Days (Imagine, Where Have All The Flowers Gone, and Crimson and Clover among others). The CD's release date is October 11, 2005.

And as she sang, as I watched and took pictures, the oddest feeling came over me. My eyes started watering and I felt a lump forming in my throat. What’s going on? Am I having an allergic reaction to something? Oh my god, I’m getting emotional!

I’m not wowed by celebrities, but the realization that this person has been, in some way, a part of my life for my entire life and after all these years I was finally seeing her for the first time kind of overwhelmed me. I didn’t sob, or scream, or flash my chest at her, but I admit I got a little misty. It was truly amazing to see such a paragon of American music. And she was fantastic.

From our seats, I could really only see her boobs and her hair – and the flashes of rhinestones. But my camera did a pretty decent job of getting me closer. Girl’s had some work done, but her voice was the same as always – wonderful and sincere. Thank you Dolly. I never realized what a part of my life you’ve been.

Nebraska to San Francisco

2005-10-01T16:20:00.000-07:00

I hate hellos. I think they’re harder than goodbyes. With goodbyes, at least you can turn your head away if the tears are coming. With a hello, you’re kind of obliged to make eye contact and it’s bound to be awkward no matter how hard you try not to look like a dork.

Anyways… hi.

I’ve been mulling and mulling over this first post for days now. And here I am, only on the seventh damn sentence (I actually counted, yeah).

I’m a Nebraskan. I’m from Nebraska. That might seem redundant, but I think some people all-too-eagerly give up being a Nebraskan as soon as they move away, and I haven’t. And I can't imagine that I ever will.

But I did move away. After a childhood in Grand Island, and a much older but no less childish young-adulthood in Lincoln, I developed wanderlust. I wanted to find out what it was like living someplace different.

Careful what you wish for, as they say.

In August 1997, I had a yard sale. It’s really too bad if you missed it. This was an unnecessarily desperate liquidation of everything I had. I sold VCRs for a dollar, my guitar for three bucks, and antique furniture for pennies. I mean, there were some incredible steals. Literally. I felt really ripped off after the dust settled. What an idiot I was. But I made $250 and got rid of most of my stuff, which was my goal.

And in September 1997, I loaded what I had left onto a truck and hit the road with my oversized feline pal, Sherman. We started driving west. We slept in the back of the truck when we needed to sleep. And sung out loud to crappy AM radio, when we could get a signal, while on the move. Sherman was pretty damn good company (and he has a better singing voice). Four days later, there was no more west for us to drive. We were in San Francisco.

I was looking for someplace different and I gotta tell you, I found it in spades.

Looking back, I was really dumb. Naïve. The greenest of greenhorns. With no job, no place to live, and less than 2 Gs in the bank – but wearing the biggest stupid grin you’ve ever seen – I had just rolled into the most expensive frigging place on the continent, where a studio apartment was renting for $1800 a month, and the vacancy rate was point-one-percent. (Point!) I was now poised to learn a big lesson in survival (I’ll save the story of my first San Francisco “apartment” for later).

So, fast-forward eight years and Sherman and I are still here. It’s amazing what a fool can accomplish when he doesn’t know the odds. Over the years I have grown, matured, struggled, and questioned a lot of things. I’ve had some of my beliefs tested and some reinforced. On occasion, I’ve had my mind blown. Throughout this process, I’ve gradually become a San Franciscan, fully embracing everything that it entails.

I would expect a San Franciscan who moves to Nebraska with an open heart and mind to undergo a similar transformation. In many ways they are truly different worlds. And though I’m here now, I’m still a Nebraskan, and that is how we will achieve parallaxis.

The term parallax pertains to the viewing of something from two or more perspectives – particularly how differently a thing can appear simply depending on where you’re sitting. I find that I have a parallax view on a lot of things in my life, now that I see them as a Nebraskan, but also as a San Franciscan. It’s actually a really nice view.

So that’s what I hope I can provide with this blog – along with some laughs, and maybe a few things that make us all think a little – a parallax view on our worlds, San Francisco and Nebraska. And that, my new friends, concludes my first post.

Now that I’ve gotten my awkward “hello” out of the way and laid the ground-work for where this thing is – maybe – going to go, I promise a much more interesting post next time – all about drugs and sex (including lots of nudie pictures)! OK? I’ll see you then.

About My Parallax View

2005-09-30T11:54:00.000-07:00

I’m a Nebraskan. I’m from Nebraska.

That might seem redundant, but I think some people all-too-eagerly give up being a Nebraskan as soon as they move away, and I haven’t. And I can't imagine that I ever will.

But I did move away. In 1997, after a childhood in Grand Island, and a much older but no less childish young-adulthood in Lincoln, I developed wanderlust. I wanted to find out what it was like living someplace different.

Now this Nebraskan lives in San Francisco.

I was looking for someplace different and I gotta tell you, I found it in spades. And living here for the past ten or so years I have grown, matured, struggled, and questioned a lot of things. I’ve had some of my beliefs tested and some reinforced. On occasion, I’ve had my mind blown. Throughout this process, I’ve gradually become a San Franciscan, fully embracing everything that it entails.

I would expect a San Franciscan who moves to Nebraska with an open heart and mind to undergo a similar transformation. In many ways they are truly different worlds. And though I’m here now, I’m still a Nebraskan, and that is how we will achieve parallaxis.

The term parallax pertains to the viewing of something from two or more perspectives – particularly how differently a thing can appear simply depending on where you’re sitting. I find that I have a parallax view on a lot of things in my life, now that I see them as a Nebraskan, but also as a San Franciscan. It’s actually a really nice view.

So that’s what I hope I can provide with this blog – along with some laughs, and maybe a few things that make us all think a little – a parallax view on our worlds, San Francisco and Nebraska.