The sad inevitability of change in the modern world and whatever

There is no way I'm going to be able to do this without sounding like an asshole. Luckily, I'm used to that.

We have learned that the Red Vic movie theater on Haight is closing.

Later this month, 31 years to the day after it became an instant landmark in the Haight-Ashbury, the Red Vic Movie House will close.

"Our closure is 100 percent certain at this point," co-owner Claudia Lehan said. "On July 25, our birthday screening of 'Harold and Maude' will be our last, I'm sad to say."

Now, of course it is always sad when a business closes down, whether it be the Red Vic or any other business. (Speaking of Haight Street, does anyone remember Crescent City Cafe on Haight, where Best of Thai Noodle is now? Wow, Crescent City continues to have a lively online presence, despite the fact that it's been closed for years. That place was good. But I digress.)



I hate to sound like a dick about it, but that's commerce. You have a good idea, you run with it, it works for a while, but if people stop showing up, it's time to pack it up or come up with a new idea. Now, the Red Vic was a non-profit, so I guess having fundraisers to save it is cool and whatever, but in the end, if people don't want to pay for the product any more, it's not going to be viable any more.

I think it's sad and regrettable that San Francisco has lost most of its neighborhood theaters over the last 20 to 30 years, but that's life. I wonder if people had benefits to save the last remaining neighborhood blacksmiths in 1911 or the last neighborhood tanneries or whatever. Point being that change is inevitable and nothing lasts forever and even though it's sad, that's just the way it is. Let's all have fond memories and move on.

(Full disclosure: I used to live around the corner in the 90's and saw a fair amount of movies there and always found it slightly annoying, but patronized it nonetheless.)

(Also, I don't remember anyone being especially heartbroken when the Full Moon Saloon - where the Red Vic moved into - closed down. I have this vague memory of going into that place once. But NFI, as the cops say.)

(That's police talk for "No Further Information." I'm rambling now. I was at a ballgame last night until 11:00 and didn't get home until midnight, so you'll have to give me a break.)

40goingon28 PSA: Benefit for Mission Neighborhood Center GED program

This Saturday, the Mission Community Center is doing a fundraiser for its GED program. The money they make is going towards their students' testing fees. I'm basically a smug asshole with a Blogger account but once in a while I try to do something good to make up for it, and this is one of those times.



Here's more info. Support your local kids. They're going to be paying for your Social Security one day, so it's in your best interest that they be smart and get good jobs. That Rascal scooter isn't gonna pay for itself.

(It just occurred to me that in 30 years, Pops will once again be an old man bar if all the same people keep going there. There'll be a whole line of tricked-out Rascals and Larks parked in front with bumper stickers that say "SCOOT OR DIE" and "FUCK THE YOUTH" and stuff like that. Looking forward to trading oxygen tank tips w/ you guys!)

50 Reasons to Love San Francisco

50. It was 81 degrees last Thursday. NOVEMBER 4.

49. It’s usually 60 degrees on July 4. TAKE THAT, REST OF AMERICA.

48. The view from Bernal Hill.

47. The view from Tank Hill.

46. The view from the 20th & Church corner of Dolores Park.

45. Ritual Roasters, Blue Bottle, Caffe Trieste, Philz, or any of the other hyperspecialized coffee purveyors you depend on.

44. Making fun of tourists. Giving tourists directions. Rolling your eyes anytime someone says “Fisherman’s Wharf.”

43. 6-hour brunches.

42. The Neptune Society Columbarium. (Seriously, go if you’ve never been. It’s amazing).

41. Fresh focaccia from Liguria Barkery on Stockton.

40. Irish coffee.

39. Walking/biking through Golden Gate Park on Sunday when the streets are all blocked off.

38. Bay to Breakers. In whatever incarnation it currently has.

37. Red’s Java House.

36. Going to the Attic for the first time in 10 years and finding out that the cute bartender looks exactly the same.

35. Finally breaking down and going to Alcatraz and finding out it’s actually pretty cool.

34. When you’re out of town and someone asks you where you’re from and you say “San Francisco.”

33. The endless amusement in bitching about Muni, even though it almost always gets you there. Eventually.

32. The Ferry Building. $6 tomatoes.

31. The Heart of the City Farmer’s Market at U.N. Plaza. 6 tomatoes for $1.

30. Arguing about Critical Mass.

29. It’s-Its. Especially Mint It’s-Its, the obviously most superior It’s-It.

28. Frank Chu.

27. Sunny afternoons in Dolores Park. Cold beer, cold water.

26. The roast chicken at Nopa. The shaking beef at Slanted Door. The salt & pepper crab at R&G Lounge. The cioppino at Caesar’s. The sand dabs at Tadich Grill. A burrito from El Farolito.

25. Burritos in general.

24. Anchor Steam. Speakeasy. Toronado. 21st Amendment. The incredible beer culture and obsessive devotion to, and interest in, beer.

23. Earthquakes. Earthquake stories. Knowing with absolute certainty there is going to be a massive, devastating earthquake and not doing anything to get ready for it. Except putting a battery-operated radio and a pint of vodka in a shoebox and calling that your “earthquake kit.”

22. Taking the ferry to Tiburon and having brunch at Sam’s.

21. Herb Caen. (R.I.P, and kidz, if you don’t know, go read his stuff.)

20. Walking across the Golden Gate Bridge (BONUS: It’s 58 degrees, the wind is 40 mph, and it’s so foggy you can’t see the water).

19. Beach Blanket Babylon, The Marsh, and one-person shows with 6 people in the audience.

18. As bad as they are now, the San Francisco 49ers. Remember 1994? How about ’81, ’84, ’88, and ’89?

17. The Embarcadero Center lights at Christmas. Union Square at Christmas. The fucking puppies and kittens in the windows of Macy's at Christmas.

16. Happy hour at Zeitgeist, the 540 Club, the Royal Exchange, the Hi-Dive, the Ha-Ra, or wherever you happen to be at 5:00. Or 4:00. Or 3:00. Or, fuck it, 2:30.

15. Seeing live music in the basement of Li Po, at Stern Grove, Symphony Hall, the Fillmore, the Independent, or any of the other hundreds of places you can see live music any night.

14. Watching the fog roll in and slowly take over. Fog in general.

13. Santarchy. (I know they have it in other cities, but it started here, so there.)

12. Street food, from the bacon-wrapped hot dog guys on Mission to the Crème Brulee cart to the Korean BBQ truck and on and on and on.

11. Corner stores. Your corner store might have a better wine selection than most American cities. You could walk out with a Watermelon 4 Loko, a wedge of camembert, a Philips head screwdriver, and a jar of olive tapenade.

10. Amoeba Records (and Aquarius too, for that matter).

9. The Pride Parade. The Dyke March. Pride Weekend in general.

8. Your urban family.

7. Street art.

6. Dogs. Dogs everywhere. Fort Funston. Crissy Field. Duboce Park. Dogs in bars. Dogs on barstools next to you. Dogs in cabs. Knowing more dogs personally than children.

5. The neighborhoods. The Lower Haight is less than 2 miles from Cow Hollow, but you could live your whole life in one and never visit the other.

4. YOUR SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS.

3. SF MOMA, the DeYoung, the observation tower in the DeYoung, the Palace of the Legion of Honor, the Cartoon Art Museum, and Specs 12 Adler. All important cultural institutions.

2. Never having to grow up if you don’t want to. (Don’t I know it.)

1. You know what? Be as weird as you want. Work on your rock opera about the Boxer Rebellion. Be a barista/dominatrix. Talk almost exclusively about your conspiracy theory linking albinos and aliens. That’s cool. Let’s grab a drink and you can tell me all about it.



(In response to "50 Reasons to Be Pretty Damn Euphoric You Live in New York City," which appeared on the Village Voice's blog last week.)

Here are two activities you should do if you live anywhere near SF

So last night The Wife and I had Grown-Up Night, which means we went to dinner and the theater. They were both great.

Dinner was at The Corner, 18th and Mission. I gotta warn you ahead of time, the menu is somewhat unconventional, but trust me, this is a good thing. Like, there's not the usual beef short rib and flatiron steak and roasted chicken that everyone has. Instead, there's shit like rabbit or sole w/ fennel sausage or chicken thighs, interesting stuff like that. The waitress (who was just as much of a hipster as you'd imagine for a restaurant at 18th and Mission - in fact, the whole staff looked like Vice Magazine) totally tipped us off that the apps were huge, so we just got a couple of those. The Wife had poutine with beef cheeks and some kind of cheese that starts with an "h" like "hourumi" or "hurami" or something like that. It was fucking killer. Poutine's like the national dish of Canada or something and I can see why because it's basically like this thick gravy and meat poured over french fries and it's a good cold weather dish and as you know, it's always about 20 below in Canada.

I got the pork shank over cheesy hashbrowns with some kind of wilted green in the middle and a poached egg on top. THAT'S NOT A LOW FAT FOOD. But man, was it good. Not so good was burping up pork the rest of the night but that's kind of my fault for eating too fast.

Both the apps we got (which were entree-sized, at least for us) were like $11 or $12. 2 glasses of outstanding pinot for $10 each. I almost went for the PBR tallboy for $2 but that's too predictable. 7 out of 10 stars WILL DO BUSINESS AGAIN.

(Confidential to the Corner - do something about your fucking website. The "menu" pages are all blank and it hasn't been updated since May. Seriously, this is SF and your web game has to be on point. Really, I'm not kidding, deal with it.)

Then (after a brief stop at the Latin-American for some whiskey for me and some Stoli for her) we hied ourselves over to The Marsh for Dan Hoyle's show "The Real Americans." The show is based on Hoyle's travels in, for the lack of a better word, the "heartland" and he does a ton of characters based on the people he met. Now, of course you're thinking it's going to be smug and condescending but it's actually not. I mean, I don't think he had to invent the fact that people think Obama is a Muslim or whatever. And people in SF get treated just as badly, or worse, than people everywhere else. As you can tell, it caused a great deal of liberal urban coastal angst in me because we coastal urban liberals worry a lot about this kind of thing. Anyway, it's way more complicated than I can sum up here but we both loved it and it is totally worth seeing.

Then we went home and watched the Giants almost fuck it up in the 9th inning (and shouldn't Bautista be throwing BP or something until he can find the strike zone?). Exhausting.

The Bachelorette: Stop it, you're spilling your crazy all over this brand new dress

You think you know what “excruciating” means? Oh, you’ve had a date quote lines from “Austin Powers” or maybe you’ve even seen a Matt LeBlanc film. But, let me assure you, nothing, and I mean nothing, is as excruciating as Kasey-with-a-K singing his frog-voiced a capella ballads of longing and weird to a visibly disturbed Ali.

Let me back up. We have moved the action to NYC for no particular reason and we see Ali getting made over by a man in a purple shirt. Unfortunately, he doesn’t cut out her increasingly ratty-looking extensions. Then we finally get a solo date with Kasey! His voice doesn’t sound as weird! Maybe they’re coaching him or something. Luckily, he gets so fucking weird that the voice is a distant memory. They take a helicopter ride over the city and Ali shouts “New York!” because she has a habit of always shouting out her geographical location. “Whooooo!! SAFEWAY!!!!!” ANYWAY. Then we have a picnic and that’s when he starts singing! Oh no! It’s terrible! Why would you do something like that? His little song goes like this:

I thought alone through life I’d walk
But you’re the one I want to stalk
I’ll be yours truly ‘til the end
I just need your SSN

Protip to my homies out there: Unless you’re Rhett Miller, don’t ever, ever start singing to a girl on a date. Remember when that girl in high school said you have a “great voice?” What she meant was you have a “car.”

Anyway, then we move on to the American Museum of Natural History and, defying all the odds, it gets EVEN WEIRDER. They traipse around and blah blah blah and then have some wine and he says she’s “everything that he’s ever wanted because she makes him happy.” You try saying that to someone you’ve met twice and see what happens. FREAKSHOW. I hope you guys had a drinking game involving the phrase “protect and guard her heart,” because then you might be as drunk as I have to get to watch this. Then he sings again! Oh Jesus. I bet back in Clovis there’s a whole battalion of girls he can’t get within 100 feet of by court order.

Now we have a group date. We’re going to see the Lion King! Fuck, please kill me. Oh wait, we’re auditioning for a part! The Weatherman is thrilled because he’s a Gay Man. He says he’s never sung show tunes before but I bet you a hundred dollars that doesn’t count singing the Original Cast Recording of “Les Miz” in his Kia with the windows rolled up. But Roberto gets the part because he looked at Ali while he sang. Remember that if you ever want to be in a mediocre Broadway show! Anyway, they’re in the show and it’s a good way to fill 20 minutes and who gives a fuck anyway.

It’s still going. She was supposed to have a solo date with Dead Mother but she got “sick” and can’t. She invites him to her suite, though! Maybe he’ll make her feel better. Didn’t work on his Mom! Oh no, too soon? After some chicken soup and thorazine, she feels better and they go to yet another rooftop and see some guy named Joshua Radin playing guitar who requires the services of a multiculti choir in robes to back him up. Whatever.

Meanwhile, the Frog Prince is SLOWLY GOING INSANE. Finally, something interesting on this fucking piece of shit show. He goes and gets a really ugly tattoo with a shield and some bullshit and it has to do with Protecting and Guarding Her Heart and I’m starting to think he stole his catchphrase from Brink’s Home Security or a heartworm medicine for dogs. Anyway, that’s weird! Then there’s some manufactured drama that’s not even worth getting into. There are mutual fund ads more interesting than this.

Time to give out the roses. WAIT, HOLD THE PHONE, WHO THE FUCK IS THIS GUY?


I thought you had to be on the show to get a rose. What did he, wander in from the “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” set next door? And Fivehead gets one too! Oh, she cut the Weatherman. No surprise there. He gives off the scent of “desperate” like the rest of them give off Axe body spray. Kasey never gets to show her his Brand New Tattoo! Awkward! She also cuts Peculiar, so everyone left now is a total dickbag. You get what you deserve in life.

"Wicked," a reinterpretation. That will blow your mind.

Not being a straight woman or a gay man, I normally don't have much interest in musical theater, but I got The Wife and me a couple of Loge seats for "Wicked" at the Orpeum last night. Overall, I'd give it like a B+. Couple of good songs, hell of a lot of stage effects, some talented cast. Could stand to lose about 30 minutes somewhere in there - 2 hours and 45 minutes makes for a long Theater Experience, especially when there are 6 grannies from Walnut Creek cackling behind you.

More interesting to me is the fact that "Wicked" is clearly a Mission vs. Marina allegory. Now, if you're not familiar, the plot essentially concerns the backstory of the witches in "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz." On the one hand, we have Elphaba, our Mission girl, who will grow up (to be labeled by the patriarchy) as the Wicked Witch of the West. She has body art (i.e., she's green) and doesn't get along with her parents. At school, she develops an interest in animal rights and doesn't hang out much with the cool crowd. This should remind you of someone you know by this point.

Glinda is pretty much the prototypical Marina girl. She's blonde and rich and not that smart. She makes fun of Elphaba and doesn't think anything of her right up until the time she suddenly discovers that the stuff Elphaba likes (in the musical, magic; in the real world, LCD Soundsystem and ecstasy) is actually really cool.

I will now magically turn Tecate tallboys into Midori sours!!

They become friends, but then have a falling-out over a boy (the rich guy who moves here from Manhattan). They both go to see the Wizard (the head of a tech company). He wants to exploit Elphaba's knowledge (a totally killer next-gen Web 2.0 app) but Elphaba wants to keep it real and not sell out. The Wizard goes with Glinda's lamer, but more popular app (Farmville) and Elphaba leaves Oz (the company) and goes to live in the wilderness (enrolls in the Iowa Writer's Workshop).

In the end, Elphaba hooks up with the guy and they disappear into the sunset (have kids and move to Burlingame). Glinda takes over the tech company because she can have it all. The Wizard takes a stock buyout and retires to Jackson Hole. Everyone lives happily ever after.

Now, if we could just work a Pains of Being Pure at Heart song into the play somewhere.