The San Francisco Citizen

The perfect accessory for your Pagoda-roof SL W113 Mercedes Benz on the streets of San Francisco is a dog

San Francisco’s been having lots of red skies at night lately, due to all of the recent fires. Check out the Real Time Wildfire Map, if you’d like. You see? It’s all just a bunch of smoke.

So the weather lore contained in the Da Jesus Book doesn’t really apply to our current situation.

“Enjoy” the red skies while you can.

Impressions, Sunset over Smart & Final (2008)

When they’re not eating flowers, the Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill like to fly around San Francisco in big flocks.

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Wild parrots above the KPIX-TV building on Battery Street and also near 202 Green Street, where Philo T. Farnsworth invented television a while back. 

Some people are afraid of these red masked conures, but others would like them to become the state bird of California instead of the Valley Quail. We have some quail in San Francisco as well, but not all that many.

Will the Parrot cell phone-accessory company be able to change our state bird from quail to parrot?

Only Time Will Tell.

At least that’s the way it seems to visitors at Strybing Arboretum, aka San Francisco Botanical Garden  in Golden Gate Park. Something is always blooming in there, throughout the year.

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From Chile, with love

San Francisco’s famous wild parrots have spread out a bit lately, so they’re easier to spot these days.

Watch them eating springtime blossoms (cherry? plum?). You can listen to them also. And of course, you can read all about them.

Click to expand. (With your help, we can fight moiré):

Mmmmm…, flowers.

Well, it appears this will be how B2b 2008 will be remembered:

“It’s often called the world’s longest party, but this year’s Bay to Breakers race through San Francisco was anything but fun for the residents, cops and public workers who bore the brunt of the drunken young “runners” who staggered around Golden Gate Park and the city’s west side, relieving themselves wherever it proved convenient.”

Imagine that!

Turkeybot ably captured a fine moment:

The Golden Gate Park Panhandle had far more than ten portajohns set up and waiting to go the night before the big race. But, Matier & Ross report that there were only ten there on the big day. Mmmm, how did that happen?

Speaking of the Panhandle, the half million dollar bathroom in the Panhandle was closed and surrounded by yellow police tape while racers were passing by during the early part of the day. Why was that?

This might have been the only place in Golden Gate park where people weren’t urinating. That’s all part of the Good, Bad, and Ugly of the longtime footrace. Most people had fun though, purported MUNI Meltdown or no.

See you next year!

You already know about the Good of B2B 2008. A good time was had by all.

But what about the Bad? Muni didn’t appear to be working very well north of Golden Gate Park in the afternoon following the big race. It wasn’t like all the buses were packed with people, it was like there didn’t seem to be any buses around at all throughout the Richmond. Must be tough to get drivers working on a Sunday.

And finally, the Ugly. Garbage everywhere, and more so than usual. Check the Flickr to see Drunken Douchebags Trash the Panhandle. Reopening Fell Street was such a chore that the DPW’s Mohammad Nuru called the cops to get some help.

Heading back uphill to the acme of the race course in Golden Gate Park (which is no where near Hayes Street Hill, the purported highest point on the race route): 

The cold dawn of day reveals a lot of trash still out there on the Streets of San Francisco. Maybe the people from Dutch financial institution and B2B sponsor ING could come down from their aerodynamic house and lend a hand with the cleanup? Just asking.

Hopefully, things will go more smoothly next year. Speaking of which… 

See you next year!

[The Panhandle is much cleaner now around 11:00 AM Monday morning. Yay.]

So sayeth this car’s license plate holder. The owner of this vehicle also recommends you to spay and neuter feral cats.

O.K. then.

John Kipsang Korir won the in Men’s Elite category, as well as overall, in today’s Bay to Breakers footrace. 

Lineth Chepkurui won in the Women’s Elite category.

It can be tough for foreign nationals to compete in marathons and other running competitions in these United States, due to visa hassles and unfair prize schemes designed to favor Americans. But San Francisco’s oldest run is still wide open to all. Good.

The Autodesk team manged to win second place in the centipede category, despite a few distractions:  

See more wacky photos.

Complete results.

See you next year!

A male Allen’s Hummingbird uses sunlight to show off his iridescent orange-red mantle at the Strybing Arboretum / San Francisco Botanical Garden .

It’s his way of saying “we bad” to other Allen’s Hummingbirds.