The San Francisco Citizen

When San Franciscans are hungry for a meal at a restaurant, the first thing they’ll want to know about is the availability of elbow macaroni pasta. And of course, the next thing they’ll need to know is the availability of air conditioning, because sometimes we all need a respite from our continuous, muggy heat.

Well, the BUCA di BEPPO (meaning Joe’s Basement in inglese) at 855 Howard Street in the SOMA has got you covered both ways.

Click to expand:

Buon Apetito!

Here’s your job for today: Set up your $4000 GENIE AWP-40S Work Platform contraption and make it ready to ascend 40 feet up to the heavens. Then hang out there for a long time in the heart of Northern California earthquake country.

No thank you, find someone else to ride this pony. Some jobs just aren’t worth doing.

Click to expand.

Check it out - right in front of the University of San Francisco’s Malfoy Hall (where Draco and Lucius got their MBA’s) are two parking spaces where you may park forever. That’s right, no two, three, or four hour neighborhood parking limit but also no street sweeping hours either.

Just down the hill, you have to move your car on Wednesdays, and just up the hill you have to move your car on Mondays. Just consider these spaces on Fulton your own personal open-air garage.

Just check it occasionally to see if it’s been tagged for violating the rarely-enforced California 72-hour parking law and you are good to go.

Finally, the little guy gets a break!

If you’re looking for this year’s flavor-of-the-month holiday gift item, then consider yourself referred to Tickle Me Elmo, a “quantum leap forward, another breakthrough in the preschool plush category.”

But if you’re still here, you must be jonesing for unique gifts for your loved ones. Well, then head on over to the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park for the 2008 Holiday Artisan Fair this Friday and Saturday, the 21st and 22nd of November, 2008.

See you there!

Clay(!) basket, Shuji Ikeda:

Square(!) ring, Satomi Studio:

Indigo a gogo, Tsurukichi/Matt Dick:

Simple stone, Aiko Designs:

•  
              Friday, November 21, Noon – 8:30 PM

                         Saturday, November 22, 9:30 AM – 4:30 PM 

San Francisco, August 22, 2008 – The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco will present its second annual Holiday Artisan Fair November 21 and 22. This festive seasonal event offers distinctive pieces from tabletop to textiles that make for artful gifting. The Fair will feature the work of seventeen of the Bay Area’s finest artisans, as well as an expanded selection of unique gifts, books, objects and jewelry from noted designers and publishers featured in the Museum Store. The Fair will be held in the de Young’s Piazzoni Murals Room. Admission is free, and FAMSF members will receive a 10% discount on all purchases. 

Highlights will include: 

• Jewelryby Marna Clark (Berkeley, CA), Pam Wiston (Pacifica, CA), Denise Peacock (Santa Cruz, CA), Satomi Studios/Kristina Kada (Santa Cruz, CA) and Aiko Design/Christine Aiko Beck (San Francisco, CA).
• Decorative Arts, including pottery and tabletop accessories, by Grant Irish (Oakland, CA), Still Life (Corte Madera, CA), Mediums to Masses (Oakland, CA), Modern Twist (San Francisco, CA), Nu Approach/Tribal Home (San Francisco, CA), Joanna Mendicino (San Francisco, CA), Jane Woodside Pottery (Fairfax, CA) and Shuji Ikeda Pottery (Berkeley, CA).
• Textilesby Hiroko Kurihara (Oakland, CA) and Tsurukichi/Matt Dick (San Francisco, CA).  
• Books and Stationery from Chronicle Books and Pomegranate Communications.

Every purchase helps to support the collections and exhibitions of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

Check the now infamous Bill O’Reilly / Fox News video of San Francisco. Says Bill, in the context of personal safety:

O’REILLY: “No, you wouldn’t go to the Presidio at night in San Francisco. I wouldn’t.”  

Check out the white zone up by the Golden Gate Bridge here. That’s the Presidio - it’s completely surrounded by low-crime white millionaire neighborhoods. Perhaps the famous Google Street View Car Incident from earlier this year ranks as the most noteworthy crime in the Presidio in recent memory.

The scariest thing ever in the Presidio seen at night - old school Halloween decorations near Arguello:

Click to expand.

Now, it’s easy to see why Bill might not like the official street signs of Presidio Boulevard, but would that sight prevent him from completing an evening constitution? Or maybe Bill confused this park with another? Golden Gate Park has it’s share of dangerous foxes, coyotes and feral cats.

That must be it. Otherwise, one might think old Bill doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

Just call (415) 485-1238 to sign up, according to the ad that occludes the rear view of anyone driving this Toyota Prius.

The first lesson for Prius drivers in the Bay Area is how to turn the headlights on at night. An amazing number of drivers of these cars just don’t seem to be aware that their lights aren’t on. No headlights, daytime running lights, turn signals, tailights - no nothing except the brake lights occasionally.  

Click to expand:

All you can do is yell “headlights!” when they drive past.

That might be the impression you get after seeing these MUNI bus ads promoting USFWORKING ADULTS.ORG from the University of San Francisco.

The Office of Graduate Admission invites you to Graduate Programs Open House tomorrow, and on December 3rd there’s a Back to College Workshop on Financial Aid for Working Adults.  

Click to expand:

Who’d have thought attending university could be so lucrative?

Well, it was before, back in the day, when the military was there. But then the military left and things were wide open. 

And then TI became a real community, complete with a store (and without it’s legendary phone booth, which must have been removed over the summer.)

But what’s this? Is it The Man? Is he there all the time? (It seemed to be just a regular day.) 

Is Treasure Island just like Presidio Terrace now?

Click to expand.

Do incidents such as this have residents scared?

It’s hard to say…

This past weekend’s Green Festival was well-attended, as per usual.

Check out what it looked like here over on the Pixel Vision. (Pixel Vision is new. It’s you.)

These volunteers had to scrutinize refuse with care - things can get complicated when you have three bins to choose from:

Click to expand.

See you next year!

What we got for our recent $400,000 study of the San Francisco Police Department was a bunch of recommendations. One of which was to train officers in the use of Tasers.

This scene from just yesterday shows the detention of a suspect after multiple SFPD handguns were unholstered and drawn in a parking lot near the Golden Gate Theatre. One false move from this suspect and he’d have been plugged multiple times from three different angles. And then we’d have another officer-involved shooting, such as what we had with Asa Sullivan at the ParkMerced.

Of course Tasers can lethal as well. But it’s nice to have an extra arrow in your quiver, another tool in the law enforcement box.

The only way to find out if Tasers are good for San Francisco is to try it and see, right?