BLOG

The days draw colder in the city on the Bay as the fog returns and layering is required in any activity where you're outside for longer than twenty minutes. But, we in San Francisco do not mourn the loss of sun and heat as it trades for the cold and fog that many call winter, yet we call Fall/Winter/Spring. It's our real weather and our real time. Life gets down when the late summer hits San Francisco through September anyways and the cold forces people to be more productive and focused.       So focused that the end of the heat makes everyone speed up everything that they do. For instance, as I sat at a stoplight in my rental car, a fellow next to me was eating his peanuts at a feverish pace. This only made sense as the sun was going down, the temperature falling and summer quickly coming to an end. These would be the last peanuts he would eat in 2004 and I understand the need to push as many as he could in to his mouth.       And then there were the ass chaps. These lovely pieces of apparel are something of a leather pant that comes up and nearly covers all the body, except for the ass. These then allows the bulbous, pock-marked, hairy, pale lumps of fat otherwise known as men's asses to be prominently displayed. While there was nothing aobut the to appreciate, it was obvious that these ass-chapped individuals were taking full advantage of the fading summer as they wandered the Folsom Street Fair over the weekend and even made their way through other neighborhoods, asses and other appendages hanging out.       It was a fine salute to summer. It is nearly over now. Our three weeks have passed and with them, the memories of what it is like to live in stereotypical California where there are beaches, the sun, lovely sunsets and of course, leather ass chaps.

Any kind of water that falls from the sky in heavy abundance is a great thing in San Francisco. In between rain storms, this town gets pretty filthy. A wonderful testament to former Mayor Willie Brown and his squandering of city resources during the dot-com boom.       It is amazing though, how much junk, grime, and other unwanted crumbs of society fall down to and get pounded in to the pavement. There's the one spot on Broadway outside one of the nameless strip clubs that is a rather interesting myriad patten of round spots. It's interesting that is, until you realize that these are all blobs of gum that people have spit to the ground, which have created a new, weatherproof layer to the concrete. Obviously things like this aren't going to get washed away by the kind of sudden downpour we had this morning, but it does go a long way to gather up all the other scraps that appear and flush them out of the city. It also does a nice job of cleaning up the "Pigeon Perch" by the Powell Street Bart/Muni exit, which they normally have to wash with a high-pressured water cannon once a week.       There are of course problems with this deluge of life-giving water. You get clogged drains, people suddenly stranded, and a wealth of other problems, but the net effect is a wonderfully clean smell to the concrete and steel that just makes you take a deep breath in and not not have it tickle your lungs in a slightly disturbing way.

Well, I'm not suprised, but Eric Fensler got slapped with what amounts to a cease and desist letter from Hasbro for his remade GIJOE PSA's that he had done at www.fenslerfilm.com       You can't see them now, except for scattered bits here and there across the web, but they were brilliant. For anoyone of Gen X-Z, you will probably remember these things as the Public Service Announcements that came on at the end of the GIJOE cartoon and had some doofy looking kid saying "Know I know! and then one of the cartoon characters saying, "And knowing is half the battle." At any rate, Eric had remixed and recut all of them into brilliant little clips. Unfortunately, he used the GIJOE logo at the end of the clips. This is probably what really got him whacked when it came time for a legal smack down, since blantant logo use and in this case, animated logo use will always burn you.       I'm not sure how it's going to go with the clips themselves, since they were done in a way that may have allowed Fair Use laws to come in to play. But, there may have been too much of the clips and too much original material, which would give Hasbro a very strong leg to stand on.       Naturally, this is just a case of a company protecting its trademarks and a lawyer doing what they're paid to do, so it's pretty hard to be mad at them. But man, those things sure were tasty.       If you can find them somewhere, the one with BBQ (I think that's his name) where he yells out "Porkchop Sandwiches!" is brilliance that isn't found in much abundance these days.

Whatever you do, don't fall prey to this rebranded extended warranty from Apple Computer called Apple Care.       Most consumer guides will always advise against the extended warranties, since they're ridiculous and if a company cannot stand behind their product, then you shouldn't buy it. Such is the case with Apple Care, which makes you think that you really need this extra coverage, when in truth, most electronics will die within the first 90 days if they're going to die.       But, some may say this seems like a good safety net, but in reality it isn't. While the Apple folks will act upon something you bring in under warranty, if they replace it, they may either give you a new component or a used one. Well, they call it refurbished, but it's a used part. And let me tell you that unlike other equipment I've bought as refurbished, the Apple stuff is junk.       So, let me just tell you that you don't ever, ever want to invest in this garbage. The fact that Apple won't put a warranty that is longer than 90 days on their G5 is ridiculous, especially when the cheapest one of those is $2000.       Relvolt with your wallet! Don't buy Apple Care!

In a nutshell, many people out there shouldn't do it.       I keep seeing it whenever I go to get groceries on a Saturday morning. There are these people who still look like they've got one foot in the bed. They're having some kind of an ugly morning. Something to the effect that they shouldn't really be up when they're up. These people should stay home, maybe have another cup of some kind of caffeine and have another hour or two of sleep. But no, here they are on a Saturday at nine in the morning trolling around the store, attempting to gather their vittles for the week.       There were about three or four such people this morning at Cala Foods (my local Ralph's distallate) and they didn't seem to be aware that they were in something of a public space. Their carts were everywhere, their hand baskets swinging wildly, their faces blank. "Oh, I'm sorry, I just wanted some of the ice cream that was on sale." (I know I shouldn't, but yeah...) to which their reply is "Huuuuuh?" about a minute after I've grabbed by Oatmeal Cookie Crunch and been off with my bad self.       The one that took the cake was the girl who parked her cart long-wise across the aisle. This, in effect left about one half of one foot on either side to walk around. That wasn't the worst part, since I can easily avoid her cart or move it. The thing that really scared me was the amount of food in her cart, which meant that she had to be driving in order to carry all of that. So, if anyone wonders why a car is parked upside down on the turnstyle for the Powell/Mason cable car line, it's not because of modern expressionism, it's due to someone being up far too early on a Saturday morning when she should not have.

As I was walking around Ocean Beach, enjoying the summerness of everything I couldn't believe how flabby SF is. Naturally I had to forget the fact that everyone is English-pale, since that's just a fact here and I am very much in a pale way myself, but still, even with no working out, I'm in better shape than at least 90% of the people that were out on the beach.       What gives SF? Everyone always complains about how skinny were are here and "exorexic" (you over-exercise to stay too thin) but looking out on the sand, things seemed contrary to that. Maybe it's that in the tru irony of SF, all the normal people were out in the sun, while the people that live for the treadmill were inside, jogging off the pounds. Come to think of it, that's probably the case.       Oddly enough though, it was the guys that were in better shape than the girls. It seems that it's always the other way around. But, it may be that a lot of the guys out there were surfers and I think you must have to have a massive glandular disorder to be fat and surf.       It was great to see people getting some color, but it wasn't so great seeing how much of some people there is that needs coloring.

Most everywhere else, people seem to see Labor Day Weekend as the end of summer and so there's this huge push to go out, do barbecues, do camping, driving, travelling, etc. in this last weekend before it's no more fun and games. Of course, everywhere else in the country has seasons, which is something that San Francisco seems to be rather lax on. Well, it's true, there is basically September-October which is summer and then there's the rest of the year.       I was lucky enough to rent a convertable to drive around in over this three-day weekend and that was mighty fun, since it is one of the few times here where you can actually put the top down and not have to wear a parka in order to avoid hypothermia. Of course it was unfortunate that the car was a Chrysler Sebring, which is this gutless, pokey, bumpy car that makes me wish I had gone with the Toyota Prius instead.       But, at any rate, summer is here for the next two months SF, so get on out and enjoy it!

So, I read this article about Ashton Kutcher today http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/dailydish/ about how he fears that his receding hairline is going to cost him roles in Hollywood and who this is "every man's worst fear."       Um... no, I think some of use have come to terms with out impending baldness and dealt with it as well as we can. I would not say that it is our "worst fear" since I would think that having both your testicles removed for cancer would be pretty bad or any number of other things.       If I live to the day when I have no hair on my head and am in good health, I'll be pretty darned happy.       Worst fear. My ass. Try being buried alive with Kenny G recording that you can't turn off. Now that, is some frightening crap. But, I guess if you have your hair when that happens, then everything will be just super.

I don't know why, but it seems that everyday I come across the Bay Bridge with my carpool group, there is some doofus in front of us using the carpool lane who, for some reason, stops at the toll gate and either sits there dumbounded for a bit or tries to pay.       They don't seem to get that the Free and $0.00 signs that appear, along with the fact there is no toll taker in the booth mean that the damned thing is free. I'm not sure if these are tourists or just people who don't get this stuff or what, since I never saw this happen when I was coming from the East Bay into SF, as people understood there was no toll in that lane and that they could blaze on through.       Of course, the fun one is when people don't have enough people in the car to be in that lane and they get nabbed by the CHP. This was really funny last week when there was a CHP officer who didn't even bother being in his car, as he stood out in the middle of the two carpool lanes and flagged people down to pull over who only had two or less in their vehicle. Ballsy, very ballsy.       So, let's just summarize real quick in how the whole carpool thing works. During certain hours which are notated along the side of the carpool lane, you can use that lane and bypass traffic if you ahve three or more people in your vehicle. If you have vehicle that was built with only two seats (pickup or sports car let's say) then you only need to have those two seats occupied. If you're on a motorcycle, you can also use the carpool lane. When you get to the tool booth (and this is the really hard part) you part no toll at the gate. Yes, pretty amazing, but hey, that's just the way it works and yes, there are many, many, many signs along the way to let you know all about this.       Oh, and don't try to play dumb with the cop if you go through and get caught. That's only going to make them mad and give you every ticket they can, since they hear that lame excuse everyday.

I was just looking at my old archive listings and it looks like I've been at this for about a year now. 182 articles in the system now, which means I'm writing just about every other day. I wonder when my Pulitzer is coming?       I've realized that based upon the searches people are doing to come to the site, I really need to get a search function in place. I just need to figure out how the heel to do that and have it be functional. There's a lot of writing in the system now...