When the ancient Polynesians invented surfing, they often used a paddle to help them navigate. Fast-forward a few millennia, and Stand-Up Paddleboarding, or SUP, finds itself trendy again. Part of its increasing popularity is that standing upright allows surfers to spot waves more easily and thus catch more of them, multiplying the fun factor. Paddling back to the wave becomes less of a strain as well. The ability to cruise along on flat inland water, surveying the sights, is another advantage. Finally, it’s a good core workout. If you’re sold on the idea, schedule an intro SUP lesson, free with board and paddle rental, and you may find yourself riding the waves like a Polynesian king.More
Many of us remember coming home from our elementary schools with freshly glazed pinchpots, cups, or whatever else our young imaginations could conjure up. Saturday mornings at the Randall Museum can bring that memory back, or create a new one for the youngsters. Ceramics make great gifts — especially on Mothers' and Fathers' Day. Hop on board for the Randall's once-weekly class, and for $6 and two weeks to have your work fired and glazed, you'll have all the materials you need.More
December is almost over - the New Year is coming up and everyone is busy drying off from the rain or holiday shopping. Let's take a look at what's happened this month.
We've all had that day: the one where you accidentally hit "Reply All" on an email intended for one or get rear-ended as you're backing out of the veterinary clinic where you've just spent your life savings to find out that the results on your cat's blood work are "inconclusive."
PostedByJoe Eskenazi
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 5:35 PM
While no journalist likes to get beaten to the punch on a story, we were actually glad to read other writers' online postings about the freshly laid fertilizer smell choking San Franciscans on Friday. Strolling from our Mission Bay office to a SOMA watering hole, we repeatedly checked our jacket. Now we're certain it wasn't us.
Unfortunately, no one knows why large swaths of San Francisco smelled like animal dung, and it appears no one ever will. Kristine Roselius, the public information officer for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District just told us they wrapped up their official investigation -- and have no answers.
"We exhausted all the possible sources," she says. "We went to the wastewater treatment plant, the zoo, and other sites and nothing was amiss."
PostedByAndy Wright
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 4:44 PM
You'd think purse-snatching is a relatively simple crime to carry out: See purse, snatch purse. Not so. From the Central Station Police newsletter come a pair of stories illustrating how difficult snatching purses can be.
Last week, a 28-year-old woman was accosted by a 19-year-old man, and his two female sidekicks. He grabbed the woman's purse and tried to take it. Unfortunately for the suspect, the woman he encountered was not to be easily parted from her bag. A "tug of war ensued," which the woman won. She then called the police, who located the suspects and took them into custody. The female sidekicks were released, the guy was booked on robbery charges, and subsequently told the police to, "tell that lady I'm really sorry." Well, allow us -- Lady, he's really sorry!
A scant four days later, a "young suburban" couple (Chris? Sarah?) on Green and Sansome were "approached by two males, one who simulated a weapon in his waistband." Is that a simulated weapon in your waistband or are you just happy to see me? Ahem.
PostedByJoe Eskenazi
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 2:31 PM
Giants fans agree with Red all too well: 'Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.'
When you root for the San Francisco Giants you get the calls and you make the calls. After Game 6 in 2002, I called my longtime best friend -- who followed me into rooting for San Francisco even though we grew up in the East Bay -- and simply told him "I'm sorry I got you into this."
After last night's 14-inning nightmare in Denver, my father made the call to me. He could not recall watching a worse loss -- ever. And this comes from a former Brooklyn Dodger fan old enough to remember what went down in 1951.
Of course that's ridiculous. The San Francisco Giants have provided their faithful with many agonizing losses over the years; I can think of a number worse than last night's not even including the postseason (Here's a down payment: The Neifi Perez home run off Robb Nen in 1998 to blow an 8-0 lead and a miraculous playoff berth. How's that?).
And yet, yesterday's epic meltdown is the kind of thing that leaves scars. I don't know if athletes think this way, but fans do: Last night's 14-inning monstrosity was the kind of game that has the potential to be an abnormality in the striation of a season. It's the sort of game you can point to long after the fact and think, "See, this is where everything went to shit."
PostedBySteve Elliott
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 11:59 AM
By a 23-15 vote, the California State Senate yesterday approved a "joint resolution" urging the federal government to stop Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) raids on medical Marijuana patients and providers. The Sen. Mark Leno-authored resolution additionally calls for the nation to "create a comprehensive federal medical Marijuana policy that ensures safe and legal access to any patient that would benefit from it."
Marijuana advocates say recent enforcement activity, including DEA arrests following a raid in Upper Lake, Calif. last week, underscore the need for Senate Joint Resolution (SJR) 14, introduced by Leno in June. Although both President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder have signaled willingness to change federal policy on medical Marijuana, the Administration hasn't come forward with an actual implementation plan.
"Patients and providers in California remain at risk of arrest and prosecution by federal law enforcement and legally established medical Marijuana cooperatives continue to be the subject of federal raids," Leno said.
PostedByJoe Eskenazi
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 9:59 AM
Joe Eskenazi
Cosmie Silfa and Skippy
Our more fervent readers may recall a June SF Weekly cover story titled "Service with a Snarl" exploring the city's intriguing rules and regulations regarding service animals. Yes, it was the one with the maniacal Chihuahua on the cover.
One of the service animal users profiled in the article was Cosmie Silfa, who keeps a platoon of lizards in his 80-degree SRO hotel room, including "Skippy," his service iguana.
"To whom it may concern, I am the treating psychiatrist of Mr. Cosmie
Resendez. "I have been treating Mr. Silfa for depression. His pet
iguana, Skippy, helps him to maintain a stable mood as she provides
companionship and motivation for him to stay well. She is an essential
component of our treatment plan, and I recommend she continue to be
able to live with Mr. Silfa in his apartment."
Ostensibly, this should be all Silfa needs in order to leapfrog (no pun intended) rules regarding pets in his room at the Knox SRO in SOMA. But his building managers want more, and have told him if he doesn't hand back some forms, he'll have to get rid of his service iguana.
PostedByJoe Eskenazi
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 9:20 AM
Carl T. Hall, the local representative for the Media Workers Guild, told SF Weekly this morning that he has been informed by San Francisco Chronicle management that another round of layoffs is in the works.
"We're anticipating some discussions," he said. "And it's not good news. But that's all I know."
When asked how many layoffs were possible, Hall noted "Obviously that's the question everyone wants to know." He also added that no reason was given for the paper's announcement other than "what one might infer: I guess it's a continuing problem of getting costs in line with revenues given the state of the economy and the goings on in the news business."
PostedByMatt Smith
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 8:30 AM
Chief George Gascon
New San Francisco Police Chief George Gascon has not announced plans to liquidate top SFPD brass and fill positions with his own people, as he did during his first year as chief of the police department in Mesa, Arizona.
Notwithstanding, a proposed amendment introduced by Supervisor David Campos last week would change the city's administrative code to allow him to do just that. The proposed rule change would let the chief make appointments to his command staff from lower ranks, or even outside the department.
In the July 22 cover story "The Outsider", SF Weekly quoted former police brass in Mesa, where Gascon served as chief before being sworn in as the top cop in San Francisco earlier this month, as saying local police supervisors should expect a purge.
"I think 60 percent of the staff members
that are there now will be reassigned or move on," said 30-year Mesa veteran Hector Federico -- who was among the 10 of 14 Mesa commanders who decided within a year of Gascon's arrival that the
PostedByMatt Smith
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 7:30 AM
El Hombre Plástico is no longer welcome in Mexico City either
Finally, a city that will follow our bone-headed, pseudo-environmentalist lead.
For the two years since San Francisco passed an ordinance limiting the use of plastic grocery bags, residents of this trend-setting city have waited for other green-minded urban centers to followed suit. This week San Francisco's policy has moved from the category of singular experiment to hemispheric trend as Mexico City barred grocery stores serving its 8.8 million residents from handing out non-biodegradable plastic shopping bags, the Los Angeles Timesreports.
The move is the latest in a series of environmental-minded measures in the extraordinarily polluted and sprawling Mexican capital. In December, the city plans to launch a bike-lending scheme similar to one under contemplation in San Francisco. The city has also replaced hundreds off downtown pesero mini buses with more fuel efficient ones evocative of San Francisco's fleet of biodeisel public transit vehicles.
As in San Francisco, however, Mexico City's green initiatives may be less earth-friendly than meets the eye. As reported earlier this year by Joe Eskenazi, San Francisco's plastic bag ban may actually harm the environment by encouraging use of wood-pulp paper bags.
PostedByJoe Eskenazi
on Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 6:30 AM
Burl Toler's plaque at the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame
It's never easy to write an obituary. If someone outlives their contemporaries, it's often hard to fill in the details of a life beyond inane observances such as "she really was a good hostess" or "He really loved to play canasta."
Burl Toler presented a radically different challenge. He was a man who accomplished so much in life, that his obituary could begin to read like a C.V. (thankfully, local and national obits were riveting, as they should be). Toler -- whose funeral will be tomorrow at St. Ignatius Church in the city -- was truly a local legend. He was a standout football player at both City College and USF (back when the Dons still had a team, let alone "The Best Team You Never Heard Of"). A grisly knee injury suffered, heartrendingly, after he'd already been selected as the Cleveland Browns' top draft pick kept him from making the NFL gridiron -- but instead of suiting up as a player he became the league's first black official and the first black man to work a Super Bowl. Locally, he was also a city police commissioner from 1977 to 1986, a middle school administrator, and both his son and grandson played for the U.C. Berkeley football team.
It wasn't until I read Toler's obituary that I realized that I had shared an afternoon with him eons ago. I remembered the kindly face I saw staring back from the paper as the massive, elderly black man with a cane who was seated next to me 15 years ago in the Memorial Stadium press box.
It's another thing to wonder if, in filing a complaint against Newsom with the Ethics Commission, Supervisor John Avalos is asking the commission to undertake something its critics say it has always been loath to do: Seriously investigate potential wrongdoing by the mayor, the man who pulls Ethics' purse strings.
Unlike the setup in other cities, it's the mayor who decides how much to give -- or take from -- the Ethics Commission in San Francisco. The Board of Supervisors can opt to augment the yearly Ethics allocation via add-backs, but, for the most part, the mayor is the sun and the moon when it comes to deciding Ethics' budget. If that sounds problematic to you -- and advantageous to the mayor -- then you are not alone.
Sub Pop recording artists 'clipping.' brought their brand of noise-driven experimental hip hop to the closing night of 2016's San Francisco Electronic Music Fest this past Sunday. The packed Brava Theater hosted an initially seated crowd that ended the night jumping and dancing against the front of the stage. The trio performed a set focused on their recently released Sci-Fi Horror concept album, 'Splendor & Misery', then delved into their dancier and more aggressive back catalogue, and recent single 'Wriggle'.
Opening performances included local experimental electronic duo 'Tujurikkuja' and computer music artist 'Madalyn Merkey.'"
