Adventures with Hodgkin's

Grandma and Grandpa












I can't decide whether I'm being snarky or not--especially since you know it *bugs* her to be a grandma.

Labels: So San Francisco

Fashion Find

I was out and about, and while walking by the Junior League secondhand store I noticed that they were having a huge sale. $5 for everything in one room--they were hoping to unload a bunch of stuff before they had to do inventory. So I decided to take a look, and found the fashion find of the year.

I liked the colors, and the skirt is pieced together fabrics. Someone else was eyeing it, so I grabbed it and decided to take a chance. Turns out it's a $300 or $400 dress from last fall.

Now, I may not wear it with those boots, or those belts, or that jacket, but I'll be wearing it this fall!

Labels: So San Francisco

It's Wrong! Just Wrong!

This is even worse than ordering "ice tea". But grammar aside, I like iced tea, but only if it's real iced tea, the stuff that's brewed. I will ask, before ordering in a restaurant, if their iced tea is brewed. Most places it isn't, it's that hideous reconstituted piped in stuff. But at this restaurant I didn't have to ask--I could see the iced tea dispenser, the enormous metal cylinder that they pour the freshly-brewed iced tea into. (Okay, I worked in restaurant, so it's also the left-over tea from the walk-in cooler.)

But this is an abomination--it's a fake. It merely dispenses the reconstituted crap! Who do they think they're fooling? Not me--not after the first time, anyway.

My love of real iced tea came from the many, many, not-so-hot restaurants in Texas that managed to make their own iced tea. Which reminds me of one of my favorite Top Chef moments--guest judge Rick Bayless chastised contestant for the brick-like consistency of their Velveeta macaroni and cheese. "Obviously, you've never worked with Velveeta before."

I may not know a merlot from a zinfandel if I can't see the label, but I know when my tea is brewed.

Labels: So San Francisco

Another Sign of the Apocalypse

Seriously, do you really need to BUY bags? I know that us crazy San Franciscans can't get plastic bags at the grocery store anymore, but you can get them everywhere else--corner store, drug store, book store, etc. There doesn't seem to be any shortage of bags, and who is so damn lazy that can't reuse a bag?

Of course, I may be biased. I've become one of those people that brings their own bags. To the grocery store, to the drug store, to the books store, even to Target. I carry spare bags with me. Have I become insufferable? Target is the only place where they look at you weird--everywhere else in San Francisco they've gotten in the habit of asking about your bags--do you have bags? Do you want a bag? And at the crunchiest of places, "Do you want a bag" is loaded with meaning--bags are for Land-Rover-Driving, baby-seal-bludgeoning red-state-idiots. Do. You. Want. A. Bag?

Labels: So San Francisco

Mother Teresa, I am

Conor's school has a new mural, and today on the way into school Conor asked why Yoda was in the mural. Oh, how I laughed! Foolish child, I said, that's Mother Teresa. Oh, he says. Who's the guy on the end? Uh, Chewbacca. Now aren't you late? Get to class!

Update: According to the school newsletter, it is "The Visionaries Mural" and has renditions of Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., Ghandi, and Homer. D'oh!

Labels: Kidding Around, So San Francisco

Street Scene

A woman--young hipster, really--was walking down the street peeling an orange. She was throwing the peel over her shoulder, and at one point she tossed a bit of it right into the lap of a hot-looking guy sitting outside a coffee shop. If this were a movie they would have met and fell in love, but instead he gingerly picked up the scrap of peel from his shirt, flung it into the street, and gave her a dirty look.

Labels: So San Francisco

TMI

Our next-door neighbors have gone abroad for a couple of years and are renting out their house. They emailed us information on the current tenants, a young couple from Finland, including a link to his blog (which has Twitter-like updates.) Kevin and I read through it, and found out a lot of information about the guy, including what he had for lunch, his favorite mineral water brand, and his difficulties with internet connectivity. Oh, and why they're in San Francisco (startup bought by Google), what they think of the neighborhood, etc. Pictures, too.

Kevin runs into him outside one night after they moved in and says hello. During the conversation he congratulates the Finn on the Google buyout, and he looks surprised.

Huh?

This guy posts ALL kinds of information on the internet. His site includes his current location, mobile phone availability (i.e., how long his phone has been idle), links to Flickr photos, his del.icio.us page, and links to his other sites that I've never heard of: Dopplr? Plazes?

Okay, everyone has detritus on the web--old resumes, company listings, etc. But this guy has stalker-ready information there and he's surprised? I mean, I can check his site to determine if we can block their driveway!

Labels: So San Francisco

San Francisco Sidewalk Graffiti

My love of 80's pop, San Francisco politics, and sidewalk graffiti meet! Someone stenciled the sidewalks of San Francisco with these 7 images on 7 consecutive sidewalk squares. I've seen them in two locations in our neighborhood, but I'm sure they're in plenty of other places, too.

Labels: So San Francisco

Happy Halloween!



This was my pumpkin for the year, and below is the inspiration. Quite scary to us San Franciscans!




One passer-by took it off our front step and impaled it on our tree post. As my dad said, "This must have been done in the dead of night, when democracy can flourish."

Labels: So San Francisco

Happy Halloween

It's time to start thinking of Halloween costumes. Conor's always tricky--he doesn't want to wear a costume, probably a direct result of his first costume, 1970's Elvis.

I was inspired by the white terry footed pajamas and added the gold trim, satin cape, and flared pantlegs. He doesn't look traumatized, but he really hates costumes so now I have to find something for him to wear based on real clothes. I'm sure he'd dress up as a soldier, but I refuse to allow it--this is San Francisco, after all. Pirate has worked well, mainly due to the sword.

We go costume shopping early, because that's when the best stuff is still there. In the thrift shops. Yes, my children think costumes come pre-stained with chocolate and possibly smelling of vomit. But the upside is that they can choose more than one, and change their minds, too. So far Lucy has chosen a bunny costume, and last year's lion costume is still a favorite. And as the lame fallback, Conor found a T-shirt that said, "Put the candy in the bag and no one gets hurt."

Labels: So San Francisco

Cool...again

After mangling my last pair of sunglasses, I found my pair of original Ray-Bans, circa Tom Cruise dancing in BVD's. Based on necessity, I started wearing them again, but the hipsters in our neighborhood are also wearing them--so I'm cool, again.

Labels: So San Francisco

Sign of the Times



You can enjoy your Coke, but be sure to drink your liquor!

Labels: So San Francisco

Who's Adopting Who?

This billboard is on the corner of 15th Street and Market, and I cannot figure out who is adopting who. Is it a general advice to all who are looking to start a family? The single black man and the white guy with the trophy wife? I may be bad with ages, but seriously, is she a kid?

Labels: So San Francisco

A Little Bit....Country?

My hairdresser called my outfit 'country'. Now I feel you need to dress up for a haircut--you want the hair of the person you'd like to be, not for who you are. So you can't go in sweats with no makeup and dirty hair. You've got to go in with the look you want your haircut to match.

So I put on an embellished skirt, white shirt (surprise, surprise), long jacket and vintage Luchese boots. And he called me country. He said, to be exact, "With the rick-rack on your skirt, and those boots, you look country!"



Maybe that's a compliment from someone from Miami--but I doubt it. "Country", you see, is a blue kitchen with a white duck border and cafe curtains. I'm lucky I didn't end up with big bangs and a mullet.

Labels: So San Francisco

Pagan Easter



The morning was spent with The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Usually the egg hunt starts late, but this year they must not have been hampered by hangovers because it started EARLY! We have spent way to much time in previous years milling around trying to keep the kids from going nuts, so we showed up respectably late and missed it. But we did get to play some games and see the band.

The afternoon at a Big Wheel race down Lombard Street. Kevin caught a bejeweled wheel, so I think we've discovered a new Easter tradition!

And then on our way home from school Monday we saw a very tall man (with a very short woman, naturally) with a big sign that said "This 6 foot 7 inch Jew Will Breakdance for You". Unfortunately, we were crossing the street and couldn't take him up on the offer.

Labels: So San Francisco

Tim Goodman and His Cranky Pants!

"...there's a lot of parental hand-wringing over a Kaiser Family Foundation study that said kids 2 to 7, 8 to 12 (tweeners) and 13 to 17 see a horde of food ads every day and that this less-than-subliminal bombardment sometimes features junk food and that, in turn, may, apparently, make your kid fat. We don't really care what your teenagers are eating. As long as they aren't eating their own misguided angst and regurgitating it back at you, then you should be happy. If you have a tweener, there's really no help for you. That's the group that is apparently seeing the most food advertising. We advise teaching them to use the TiVo to skip through ads, and, if they stop, punishing them somehow (like, say, taking away their ability to watch Sanjaya). If, however, you have a kid age 2 to 7 who's seeing any kind of food advertising, then you're watching the wrong channel. First off, if your DVR or VCR isn't in use, you're just a bad parent. Second, it's easy to avoid almost all commercials, product placement and even PBS-approved ads (yes, they're ads) by carefully choosing what they watch. This couldn't be easier because most of what PBS, Disney (the Playhouse block) and Nickelodeon/Noggin offer is commercial free."

Amen, brother.

Labels: So San Francisco

Springtime in San Francisco

You can tell it's springtime in San Francisco because the homeless play with their pet rats in the park. It's hard to tell, but the little white dot is the rat. I couldn't get a better shot without getting yelled at, or explaining to Conor why I was taking the picture. Honey, mommy thinks homeless people are funny and should be mocked on the internet!

Labels: So San Francisco

Polling

I got an automated call from one of the local news channels asking me to participate in a one minute poll. What did they want to know? That I'm:
a.) godless
b.) 40+ year old
c.) white
d.) liberal.
How very San Francisco! All that in four easy questions.

I must be on a list of people who will sit for these polls because I get them all the time. I answered a radio one a while back, and it was quite fun. The pollster was from Minnesota, and the poll was about the new radio station--the dance radio station. And while I'm not their target demographic (40+ female breeder), I do listen. Conor listens, too, on the way to school. When we get in the car he asks for 92.7-Energy-with-Fernando-and-Greg-in-the-Morning. In this way he's learned that girls sometimes don't wear underwear (thanks Britney & Lindsay!), but it wasn't such a big deal because a couple of girls at his school have gone without underwear because they had an accident in them. That's what he figured happened to Britney and Lindsay.

Anyway, so the pollster was asking if I knew of some of the on-air radio personalities, and when she got to "Greg the Gay Sportscaster" she stopped. "Is that for real?"

Of course, I told her. His slogan is, 'If they're playing with balls, I'm all over it!' Even my son knows that!

Long silence. Then she said she was from Minnesota, and they just don't have those kinds of things out there. Oh, sweetie, you do--they're just not on the radio.

Labels: So San Francisco

Sidewalk Talk

Someone is tagging the sidewalks in our neighborhood, and it amuses me to no end. These are a couple I've seen walking up Valencia, Guerrero, and Dolores between 19th and 15th Streets.





I love San Francisco!

Labels: So San Francisco