What are your Panhandler Rules?

If you're like me (and there is almost no chance of this, I realize that, it's just an expression), on your daily perambulations through the City, you encounter a variety of panhandlers, homeless and otherwise. As with most things in my life, I'm often perplexed about how to handle this fraught situation and so I'm croudsourcing this issue to find out what it is you do.



As I work in the Civic Center area, which is part of/maybe just immediately adjacent the Tenderloin, I see some of the same panhandlers every day.



There is the oddly well-put-together woman who I've written about before who posts up at the corner of Grove and Larkin during commute hours (she's there roughly 7:30-9 am and then 4 to about 6 pm) silently holding a sheaf of Street Sheets and who doesn't look homeless or even really troubled in any way; in fact, she would not be out of place waiting on you in a diner or something. NOT HOLDING THAT AGAINST HER; I'm just saying, it's kinda weird.



(I wrote that prior post about her in 2009. She's still out there, basically every day. I continue to be really curious about what her deal is but I really don't want to stop and talk to her because I pass her every day, usually twice a day, and I don't want to set up a thing where I have to stop and talk to her every day. It has nothing to do with her being homeless; I don't want to stop and talk to anyone twice a day. I'm not one of those people who hangs around their corner store trading neighborhood gossip or that kind of thing.)



(OH SNAP I just looked at the Google Street View for Grove & Larkin and thought I saw her but it's just some chick with a coffee. Goes to show how normal she looks.)



There's the Bearded Disheveled Guy Who's Always Reading a Paperback Book. He can be found in Civic Center Station pretty much all the time. I've actually given him money before.



There's a whole crowd that hangs out around the Main Library. One of them is a guy who wears Rollerblades all the time and skates around passing a football back and forth with one of his comrades. In all fairness, I've never seen him ask anyone for money, so maybe he just likes to wear Rollerblades and throw the rock around and hang out by the library.



UNRELATED: Check out the cool Street View Dog on the corner of Larkin and Golden Gate! AWWWWW, PUPPY!!!!



And so on. My point is, when you see your Regular Panhandlers, what do you do? Do you give them money?



Or I guess, what are your usual Giving Money to Panhandler Rules? I mean, in SF, you probably get hit up for money 5 to 12 times a day unless you're Richie Rich and live in Pacific Heights and drive your Volvo to work and your secretary brings lunch to you. So what are your giving money rules? When do you toss a buck at a panhandler?



(RELATED STORY - I remember reading somewhere years ago about an invitation to some fancy-ass party in a part of town where there were obviously panhandlers and the invitation asked guests to not give money to the "outdoorsmen." Outdoorsmen! FAVORITE HOMELESS EUPHEMISM.)



Have a nice holiday weekend at Burning Man or whatever it is you do. I guess if you're at Burning Man you're not reading this anyway.



Also, I'm still on jury duty but hopefully only for another week and then everything will be back to normal.



Also, we're trying out Boxing Room tonight and I'll totally tell you if it's good or what. Smoked Chicken & Andouille Gumbo! FUCK YEAH. Speaking of restaurant websites, THANK YOU FOR NOT AUTOPLAYING DIXIELAND JAZZ ON YOUR WEBSITE BOXING ROOM. I KNOW THAT MUST HAVE BEEN NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE TO RESIST.



OK, I'm done now.

This is a partial list of things that unaccountably enrage me and probably shouldn't

1. People who take up 2 parking spaces

2. Perfectly able people who push the handicapped door opener button and then stand there and let the doors majestically swing open like they're the Queen of England

3. Recycling poachers

4. People who yell into their cell phones

5. People who chatter away obliviously on cell phones while they're blocking an aisle in the grocery store or blocking the sidewalk or something

6. Pretty much anyone talking on a cell phone in public, ever. Text, you bastards, text.

7. People who walk more than two abreast on a sidewalk. BONUS: They're walking slowly. DOUBLE BONUS: They're walking four abreast and all talking on cell phones.

8. iTunes

9. "There is a new version of iTunes available. Would you like to download?" Hey Apple, how about saving up the changes and just releasing a new version once every six months, instead of every other day?

10. The bagger at Safeway yesterday who put my bread at the bottom of the bag

11. Fox Sports

Urban etiquette: an occasional series

Today's topic: Neighbors.

Fucking neighbors, am I right?



If you're reading this and you live in a city, you probably either have or have had problems with some annoying fucking neighbors. I have had some bad experiences myself, like:

- When I lived (unfortunately and sadly) in Santa Cruz, I lived in this condo building near the beach and the next door neighbors were this old white couple from Walnut Creek that perfectly summed up and embodied "old white couple from Walnut Creek" with the fucking late-model Caddy and the condescending attitude and the whole 9 and they would come down to their Weekend Place which happened to adjoin my Everyday Place and they would fucking BLAST THEIR TV LIKE THEY WERE TRANSMITTING MATLOCK INTO SPACE and I had to have a talk with the old lady and she couldn't understand what the fuck was wrong. Bitch.

- Oh and as I alluded to last week, my place in North Beach was directly above a Divorced Mom Who Became a Lesbian and her two right-around-teenage kids and Mom used to jet off on the weekends to do lesbian stuff or whatever and leave the kids alone right around the time they discovered metal and you can guess where it went from there. Now, I'm not exactly a go-to-bed-when-the-sun-sets kinda guy, especially on weekends, but when the Metallica starts up at fucking 9 am on a Saturday YOU BET YOUR ASS WE'RE GONNA HAVE A PROBLEM. Little fuckers. I hope they're both in juvie now. GREAT JOB PARENTING ABSENTEE MOM.

We lucked out and have a place now that only has one wall in common with another place and so we don't really have neighbor problems any more except for the Creepy Old Guy whose back stair landing faces our back door. COG looks to be maybe late 60s and is bald and bearded and British, apparently, and typically wears suspenders and a t-shirt and comes out to smoke on his back landing and also FUCKING BLARES music outside to the whole fucking neighborhood, shit like Bob Dylan and Cab Calloway and scratchy old blues records. For the life of me I can't understand why he has to open all his doors and treat the entire neighborhood to his stupid fucking music but he usually turns it off by around 8 so I guess I don't have to kill him and his family YET.

ANYWAY. I don't want to hear this bullshit about "It's a city, if you don't like it move to the suburbs." Fuck you. This is about common courtesy. We all live on top of each other and a little bit of thoughtfulness goes a long way. So here's how to be a good neighbor:

1. When you come home shitfaced at 2 am, don't fucking blast "California Gurls." If you want to rock out to some guilty pleasures, you have headphones. Use them.

2. Do you live above someone? Any time something hits your floor, I guarantee it sounds like a bomb going off through the ceiling to your downstairs neighbor. Watch it with clomping around in your Doc Martens.

3. Why are you hanging pictures at 1 am on a Tuesday? If you're not spun out on meth, you have no excuse. Driving nails is a Daytime Activity.

4. I know "According to Jim" reruns are funnier when you can hear them in every room of your apartment, but give us a break and turn the fucking TV down a little bit.

Life is tough and we all have our own struggles to work through. But we can all get along better and be happier and more productive citizenbots if we just look out for each other. Take 30 fucking seconds and think about someone besides yourself, OK?

I'm going to randomly put money in parking meters today. Random acts of kindness, you dig?

Important tipping-related issue to give you a break from constant updates on the Big Thing

[Let me preface this by saying that I don't really have a lot to say about the Big Thing that would be anything you haven't already heard, i.e., the world is better off without that guy but I still found the frat-boy celebration outside the White House a bit unseemly.]

Instead, let's talk about tipping, since I haven't brought this up since December 2, 2008. This story now has me kind of confused:

If you're ordering in tonight and you live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, watch out: Some vigilante bicycle delivery guy has set up a blog posting the names and addresses of people who give him crappy tips.

The Tumblr "≤15%: a bunch of shitty tips" is dedicated to outing bad tippers. One entry:

No tip [redacted address] last night, in middle of third monsoon of evening. elevator opens, i drip on floor, he laughs at me. i say 20 dollars, he says here's 20 dollars. [full name redacted]

This seems to be the art project of some dude named Larry Fox. Fox, a "20 year old designer and developer" told Gothamist that "I just got tired of all these big companies, these TV shows and movie sets giving us two or three dollar tips on a $90 order. The excuse is that 'we can't tip because that's what corporate says' is wrong. I find it disrespectful. And I wanted to make people aware of that." Sure, one entry is about Fox getting stiffed by the wardrobe department of the Good Wife, but a lot of these just seem to be like individual cheapskates.

Wait a minute. You're supposed to tip delivery people 15% or above? Fuck, have I been shorting delivery people for years now? I'm a solid 20-percenter in restaurants, but I've always operated under the assumption that you tip delivery people around 10% or so. Is that wrong? Delivery people are supposed to get 15% or more? And isn't it a lot less work to deliver something than to wait on a table for an hour?

Also, I really need an answer to this: How much do you tip when you pick up at the restaurant? I do this a fair amount and I'm always unsure. I usually end up tipping about 10% when I pick up. Sound good?

[OK, you can go back to reading about OBL now.]

What Would You Do?: Muni Edition

Let's play ABC Primetime's "What Would You Do?" for a second.

(Incidentally, ABC, what's up with the "go.com" domain names? ESPN, too. Stuck in 1997, are we?)

OK, so let's say you're on the, oh, I don't know, 48 Quintara at around 5:30 yesterday (or the L Taraval or, fuck, the 6 train to the Bronx for all I care) and you take a seat near the back and then realize you're sitting in the middle of a group of baggy-white-t-shirted skateboard-holding kids. Like 4 or 5 of them, maybe 13 years old, maybe 14. The first thing you notice is the heartwarming (for a San Franciscan) multicultiness of this group - there's a white kid, and a vaguely Hispanic kid, and a black kid, and man, it's like MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech brought to life.

Then the next thing you notice is that the Bieber-haired white kid is very slowly and deliberately carving something into the seat with some kind of implement. Like, obviously defacing the bus seat with whatever kind of graffiti 13-year-old white kids are motivated to write these days.

Or let's take another (also actually true) example that also happened on the 48 Quintara on another day with a different Pack O'Yoots (though older, maybe mid to late teens) and one of them is using a fat black magic marker or whatever to mark one of the windows with a big, looping tag.

What do you do?

I'm serious. I never know how to react in these situations. I know that Muni Belongs To All Of Us and that We As Citizens must stand up to protect out property, but I also know that people get killed trying to stop this kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, I know, it's rare for that to happen and blah blah blah but IT ONLY TAKES ONCE when it's happening to you.

So what's the call here? What do you do? Say, "Hey, you damn kids, stop messing up my bus!" or whip out the cell and call 911 or go up and talk to the driver or what? Furthermore, what's most likely to avoid me getting hit in the back of the skull with a skateboard?

Cause I'll tell you what actually happened: nothing. I didn't do anything. The lady next to me didn't do anything. The semi-yuppie guy reading The Economist didn't do anything. Now I feel vaguely bad about it! I don't know.

The Incredibly Common Muni Chicken Story Reappears

Soon after I moved to SF years ago, I heard a story that went something like this:

My friend's brother was on the 30 Stockton one time near Chinatown when this little Chinese lady tried to get on board with a live chicken. The driver says, "Hey, you can't bring a live chicken on the bus!" So she snapped its neck and just walked on.

Quite a tale, huh? Over the years, I've heard it at least 4 or 5 more times, each time recounted as having happened to a friend of a friend of the narrator. (In the universe of urban legends, this person is called a "FOAF," an acronym for "friend of a friend.") It surfaced on Muni Diaries not too long ago.

So yesterday, on one of SFGate's super-duper-look-Ma-I'm-doing-New-Media blogs, a variant of the story appeared yesterday. In this one, thankfully, the chicken escapes its premature transit-occasioned demise:

Muni buses may be getting less crowded when service cuts are partially rolled back in September, but there still won't be room for loose chickens on board.

That's what a guy tried to do today on the 30-Stockton bus line in North Beach. He hoped to hop onboard at the corner of Union Street and Columbus Avenue with a fully grown, brown-feathered chicken tucked under one arm.

The driver shook his head, saying, "You can't bring that bird on here."

After a futile moment of pleading, the birdmaster, looking a little scruffy and sporting a baseball cap turned backwards, replied with a curse.

The morning commute continued.

First off, note the completely unsourced nature of the story. Did the author, "John Cote," witness this event personally? Did he hear about it from someone else? A FOAF, perhaps? It's suspicious from the get-go. Imagine if real journalism could get away with shit like this!

The three guys at your corner store are actually Al-Qaeda members.

When they say they are going in the back to get more Yoo-Hoo, they are actually working on a bomb to blow up Cha Cha Cha.

Anyway, nevermind that the wretched fowl escaped unscathed in the SFGate blog version. Unleash the SFGate commenters, eager to recount the urban legend again and again and again!

joeyjess 2:40 PM on July 7, 2010

This happened many years ago on the same line, when I was a little kid....when the bus driver told the lady she couldn't bring a live chicken on the bus, the chicken's owner promptly broke its neck and tried to re-board.

sockmonkey 2:44 PM on July 7, 2010

Years ago I was riding the 30 Stockton when the driver pulled up to a stop and an old Chinese woman started climbing the steps to board. That's when the driver noticed the bag she was carrying was moving and squawking. "Lady!" he said, "You can't bring a live chicken on this bus!" She quietly stepped off the bus, reached in the bag, snapped the chicken's neck, climbed back on and that was that.

phreakshow 2:51 PM on July 7, 2010

my sister saw this happen once with a little old chinese lady on the 30 Stockton. She was told she could not board with a live animal. She broke the chicken's neck and boarded the bus.

capdragon 3:03 PM on July 7, 2010

True Story.......

A couple of years ago my wife was riding on a bus headed towards the Haight. A Chinese woman got on around Powell. She was carrying a live duck. The driver told her she couldn't bring the duck on board. So in front of everyone she proceeded to twist the duck's neck until it cracked. There was a collective gasp from the passengers, but the driver then let her on with the dead duck.

Wouldn't it be nice if immigrants who come to America had enough respect for our values that they learn, not only English,but some of our cultural values as well, like common courtesy.

Vampirella 3:37 PM on July 7, 2010

About 10 years ago I was on the 30 Stockton when this same thing happened. Only is was a little old Chinese lady who promptly wrung the chicken's neck and then got on the bus.

sandiegopete 4:04 PM on July 7, 2010

I was riding a Muni bus years ago when an Asian woman started to board the bus with a live duck in a bag. The driver told her no pets were allowed on the bus. She said it wasn't a pet it was dinner. He still wouldn't let her on so she reached into the back and snapped the duck's neck and said to the driver, "Now its food". He let her board.

scientific 4:44 PM on July 7, 2010

There is an old, old story going around about a lady in Chinatown (probably on the 30 Stockton) trying to get on the bus with a live chicken. When the driver told her she couldn't bring a live chicken on board, she simply wrung its neck. Problem solved!

That's a lot of dead chickens! Let's see here. Joeyjess, Sockmonkey and Vampirella all say it happened to them - always "years ago." Capdragon doesn't go all the way to FOAF, but goes with the more conventional "happened to someone I know." Maybe it's easier to just skip the FOAF when you're an anonymous Internet commenter.

You also have to love the fact that Capdragon, being an SFGate commenter, can't resist a little side of xenophobia with his entree of urban legend. Yeah, why can't the fake people in my made-up story stop acting so, y'know, foreign?

Anyway, I think the story persists for a couple of reasons. At the root of it, it's kinda funny, and shows a clever way to solve a vexing problem. It's got that surprise twist ending that all good urban legends have. Plus, it plays on the general unease white people have about foreigners in general and Chinatown residents in particular. My kids'll probably hear this story one day.

Some SFGate commenters have it figured out!

bridgeofbardo 6:07 PM on July 7, 2010

There must have been, like, a million people on that 30-Stockton bus "years ago" when that "old Chinese woman" got on with a live chicken and the driver said et cetera, and then she et cetera. You guys who re-posted that ancient urban myth here today (that everybody has heard) just lost all credibility. Ha ha ha!

Who knows? Like many urban legends, there's probably a grain of truth in there somewhere. The fact that people bring live chickens on Muni has been pretty well-documented:

My slate of ballot propositions

Film Commission? School Facilities Tax? BOR-ING. Wake me up when these are on the ballot:

PROP 5.2% ABV: Requires that the Giants offer at least one regular-sized beer priced at 5 dollars at AT&T Park. Can be Black Label, PBR, or Red White & Blue, if they still make that. Appropriates funds for a committee to investigate whether Red White & Blue is still being made.

PROP F: Makes it a misdemeanor to remove footwear on Muni or BART, punishable by fines of up to $500 and a requirement that the violator wear penny loafers the rest of the week. Flip-flops restricted to the Marina and Cow Hollow. Those found wearing flip-flops outside of those areas are issued visors and returned to Balboa Cafe.

PROP S: Each resident receives a free shot of their choice on their birthday. If he or she does not drink the shot, he or she must buy shots for everyone else within a 10-foot radius.

PROP W: No whining.

PROP B: All panhandlers must have a skill, such as singing or doing a magic trick. Having a clever sign is not a "skill." If a panhandler chooses to sing, they have to mix up the songs and not sing the same one every time, like those 3 guys in the BART stations who have been singing the exact same song for like 8 years now. No juggling.

PROP E: No small talk on elevators.

PROP E-2: For the LAST FUCKING TIME, it is STAND RIGHT, WALK LEFT on the fucking escalator. First offense results in being thrown down the escalator. Second offense is death. If the offender isn't dead already from being thrown down the escalator the first time. This includes you, grandma, so heads up and look alive. If you're too grizzled to hoof it up to 24th Street, stand on the fucking right side. Seriously people.

PROP F: Every other Friday off.

Tell me what you think about this parking situation

I need to get your opinion on something.

The curb in front of my house is big enough to park 2 cars between the garages on either side of me. A little while ago, some chick rented the garage next door. She's using it as an art studio or something. Anyway, since she rented it, she has pretty much taken over ownership of the 2 street spaces. Her car and 2 scooters are always fucking parked there. ALWAYS. There's street cleaning every 2 weeks and she moves them temporarily for that and then BOOM right back. Like she owns the fucking spaces or something.

I think it's just a dick move. I mean, yeah, of course, I'm not entitled to the parking space in front of my house, but it would still be nice to have a crack at it once in a while. Plus, it's technically illegal to leave your car parked in the same spot for 2 weeks, but I'm not gonna rat her out to DPT or anything.

So what do you think? Is she cool or is she being a dick?

I would say "at least it's not Duluth," but then I'd get angry emails from Duluthians about how great Duluth is.

You know one thing San Franciscans like? Talking about San Francisco. And I recently read two blog posts about San Francisco, one by a guy who really seems to dislike SF, and one by a guy who seems to really like it.

Alex Payne works for Twitter and doesn't like it here much. He says SF is

"dirty. No, filthy. No, disgusting. Whenever I travel outside of San Francisco, I’m amazed at what a disastrous anomaly it is. Sidewalks are routinely covered in broken glass, trash, old food, and human excrement. The smell of urine is not uncommon, nor is the sight of homeless persons in varying states of dishevelment."

I'm not sure where Alex Payne lives, but my sidewalk has never been covered in broken glass, trash, old food, or human excrement. Maybe trash sometimes. But seriously, dude, if you live in the Tenderloin and base your entire view of the city on the way the sidewalk looks at Hyde and Ellis, you're not getting a fair representation of the whole city.

He goes on from there, pretty much bitching about everything in SF. I guess I could respond point by point, but really, what's the point? If one of your specific complaints is that there isn't much to do in SF, yeah, you're going to be happier somewhere else. I'm sure that Payne is a decent guy and whatever, but it's clear that this isn't the place for him. Anyway, more coverage at Valleywag, if you're interested.

Meanwhile, Matt Honan likes SF a lot. He's got some specific suggestions for how to enjoy living in SF that make sense, like getting a bike and making friends outside the tech industry (since his post obvs. aimed at people who move here to work in tech).

I mean, obviously I like it here (after 19 years, I better) and fall way more in the Honan camp than the Payne camp. Sure, there are a lot of problems in SF, but the good so far outweighs the bad that it's not even funny. It is what you make of it, anyway, in the end, and some people make themselves happy and some people make themselves unhappy.

ANYWAY. Mad Men post tomorrow.

Did Taylor Swift really lie about illegal immigrants? Or something?

There were two high-profile, shocking breaches of etiquette in the past week or so, both of which people need to generally chill out about at this point.

The first, of course, was South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson yelling "You lie!" to Obama during The O's speech to Congress on health care. If Wilson was responding to Obama's claim that proposed health care legislation would not apply to illegal immigrants, he was wrong, but that's neither here nor there. The point is that it's generally agreed upon that one does not shout out interruptions at the President during a speech to both houses of Congress.

But here's the thing. The man apologized to the President, and the President accepted his apology. Fair enough! Let's move on. It's a sideshow at best, and Wilson's Democratic opponent has already benefitted. To keep this thing alive, by calling for censure and the like, is counterproductive. In fact, if you're a Democrat, it's probably harmful. Americans like the powerful to get taken down and be forced to grovel, but only to a point. Once you keep going after someone, sympathy starts to build. Can you imagine Joe Wilson as a sympathetic figure? Keep this up and it'll happen.

The second was Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards. It seems that young Taylor had just won the award for Best Female Video, when Kanye took to the stage and expressed his contrary opinion that, no, Beyonce should have been the winner.

(P.S. I saw Taylor Swift in the airport once. She's 8 feet tall and sparkles like rock candy. People went "Ohhhhh, Taylor Swift" when she walked by. I asked my sister who she was.)

Well, people were OUTRAGED. BOOOOOO KANYE!!!!!

Think about what that means. People got upset because one multimillionaire interrupted another multimillionaire during the presentation of a fake award for a music video on a channel that doesn't play music videos. Seriously, if this really upset you, I hope to God you're a 13-year-old girl, because otherwise, you have much better things to get outraged about.

I'm with Gawker. I think the whole thing was staged.

Nevertheless, I'm glad that at least we got this out of it:




UPDATE: Anna Pickard of the Guardian thinks the Kanye thing was staged too. Conspiracy theory gathering steam! Now waiting to learn how ACORN was involved.

Guess what? There's a baseball game happening down there.

I'm sorry in advance if you're not interested in baseball, but this is baseball season and baseball is a metaphor for life and blahhdeddy blah blah it's just what's on my mind today and so that's it.

I know that a baseball game is an outdoor sporting event and I don't expect hushed, reverential, churchlike silence from those in attendance (although that would be pretty awesome), but for the love of God, can you just SHUT THE FUCK UP for two fucking consecutive minutes?

Yesterday The Wife and I are at Ye Olde Ballyarde watching the Giants surprisingly get some hits and beat the Phills 7-3 and it was a great game and nice weather and everything but there are these 2 chicks and 1 guy behind us (along with another guy who might have been a mute because never said a fucking word, God bless him) and they spent the whole game in an endless, loud, criminally boring conversation about the weather in San Jose this time of year and some kind of patent litigation (which is, if you know anything about law, maybe the MOST BORING kind of litigation at all, like basically Paint Drying, Inc. v. Grass Growing Ltd.) and all the LATEST JUICY GOSSIP from their old company, which gossip was not juicy at all but more along the lines of who got who's parking space JESUS just shoot me now.

So this kept up the WHOLE game. With brief pauses to breathe and whenever something exciting happened, which was not nearly enough. Finally some seats opened up a few rows down and we mercifully got the fuck out of there.

Listen, I know that it's a public space and it's nice to catch up with your friends or coworkers or whatever, but seriously, if your voice is loud and grating enough to be heard by everyone in a 10 foot radius, how about shutting your fucking trap once in a while, just in case people around you are maybe more interested in the game they came to see than in your inane musings on what kind of wedding your friend had, including your discomfort at the fact that she had two maids of honor. Personally, two maids of honor sounds a little excessive to me too, but I don't go around forcing other people to hear about it. Shut up.

Also - lots of Phillies fans there yesterday, but no problems between them and Giants fans, as far as I could see. You certainly see a lot more shit at Giants-A's games, mostly because there are people from Oakland there.

Also - How cute! Jon Carroll gets into the recycling poacher debate and shows mad love for the poachers, who he christens with the cutesy-poo title "gleaners" and says "Hey big deal, they're just scrappy underdogs trying to make it in this world. Let's all hold hands with the gleaners and sing songs to the Recycle Goddess and dance off into the meadow." My guess is that around Jon Carroll's house in the Oakland hills, "gleaners" don't show up outside his window at 1 am and start smashing bottles and flattening cans and then leaving the lids open so paper blows up and down the street.

Also - Christ, I sound angry today. I'm fine. Shit just gets to me is all.

Friday (uncat.)

- So here's my new favorite blog: DEALBREAKER. Run right over and check it out RIGHT THIS VERY SECOND I COMMAND YOU. Funny shit.

- Also, Spaceships and Kool-Aid. Funny as hell and so very NSFW so don't say I didn't warn you.

- Maybe it's this pheromone body spray I've been using, but motherfuckers continue to get all up in my shit on any otherwise uncrowded train and it's bugging the fuck out of me. I'm standing there yesterday in the little well across the front door of the train and a guy gets on and like wedges himself into the little space behind me when there's a whole empty train in front of both of us. I mean, WTFF???!!??

Eventually he extricated himself and sat down, but really, man. Come the fuck on.

- This is so fucking cool:



- Tonight at Chez TK, our film feature will be The Matchmaker (1997) w/ Janeane Garofalo and Denis Leary, courtesy of The Wife's Netflix queue, not mine, so just shut it. Judging from the comments on IMDB, this is some Citizen Kane-level shit, so I'm psyched.

Freddy Sanchez and other controversies of our time

Giants acquire Freddy Sanchez from the Pirates for lauded AA pitcher Tim Alderson. Depending on who you listen to, this is either a canny, smart move or colossal dumbassery. Although I think it's too early to tell, I'm tentatively in the former camp slightly more than the latter. Sure, Alderson is a great prospect, but he could just as easily become Jesse Foppert instead of the next Matt Cain. Sanchez, as long as he stays healthy, is a proven commodity who's an upgrade at 2B over what they had before, which is to say, nothing.

But what irks me, along with most other Giants fans, is that what the team needed more than anything else was a hitter with some power, and Sanchez has, what, like 6 home runs so far this year? Christ on a cracker.

We'll see.

In other news:

- Coke is better than Pepsi. Duh.

- The designated hitter is a scourge upon baseball. If you play, you gotta hit.

- For the first three dates, the guy always pays for everything, even if the girl asked him out. I don't know how this works for the gays, but there's the rule for the straights. No exceptions.

- Put down your fucking phone when you're conducting a transaction with someone selling you something. Saying "Thank you" is common fucking courtesy and unless you're a doctor giving verbal instructions about how to perform an emergency tracheotomy to a guy with a ballpoint pen and a pocketknife, you can put your conversation on hold for 20 fucking seconds to acknowledge the human being in front of you.

We take our show on the road and confuse the natives of the Turks and Caicos

You know what's more boring than listening to someone drone on and on about their vacation? NOTHING. So I'm going to keep this semi-mercifully short. Then on Monday we can get back to baseball and stupidity like normal.

As you may or may not know, after New York my child bride and I departed these friendly shores for the much odder and maybe not as friendly Turks and Caicos Islands. Now, the islands are undeniably beautiful, but customer service in the Caribbean is like sauerkraut or democracy - they've heard of it, but they're not quite sure how to do it.


So just by way of example, after 2 semi-long flights we arrive in T&C and after an odd van/cab ride in which the driver deputized one of the passengers to collect money from all the other passengers, then got mad when people didn't have exact change, then blasted reggae the whole way, making normal conversation impossible, we arrive at the resort and are "greeted" by two women at the front desk who are clearly pissed off to have to be greeting guests at 9:00 p.m. I gathered later from talking to other people that "Caribbean service" is sort of known for being maybe not up to North American standards but still, after coming from New York, where everybody was falling over themselves to be friendly and help out and everything, it was kind of a shock.


Once you get used to it, though, it's not so bad and some people are actually friendly and cheerful. We thought the bartender at the hotel bar hated us, too, until we realized that his knowledge of English was limited to "pina colada" and "make mine a double" and he wasn't an asshole, he just couldn't understand a word we were saying. So that explains the blank stare and the failure to engage in conversation.


I don't want to get into a whole sociological analysis here too, but there is a kinda weird dynamic created when every single employee everywhere you go is black and 99% of the customer base is white.


Now, yeah, I know, count on me to find the cloud in every silver lining, but if I couldn't bitch about it, it didn't happen, you know? In the end, ANYWAY, we had a really great time, which consisted of lying on the beach and then having some drinks and then going out to eat and then drinking some more and then going to bed.


Without further ado, HEY, LOOK AT MY BORING VACATION PICTURES!

You don't have to get married to go on a 2-week vacation, but it's a convenient excuse that no one can make you feel bad about

So yeah, I totally got married.

This is actually a picture from the night of the rehearsal dinner but I sort of love this picture and you get the idea. The tent was in my Dad's backyard.

The rehearsal dinner was notable for the fact that everyone got pretty drunk, especially The Sister's boyfriend and Phil the Irish DJ, who between the two of them polished off about a half a gallon of Jameson. I mean, are you kidding me?

The wedding itself was perfectly nice and Super Hot Irish Girlfriend looked awesome and all that stuff. There was a slight hitch in the proceedings when our officiant, who claimed to have done "thousands" of weddings, started reading someone else's vows in the middle. Really? That's funny, I don't remember writing "Let us pray." Anyway, I guess it's all still legal and stuff.

Now we're in New York and having an awesome time and everything except that SHIG is maybe a little tired from lack of sleep and let me assure you that dragging a tired SHIG through the Metropolitan Museum of Art at 9:30 a.m. on a Tuesday is maybe not the best way to start off a new marriage.

I have a couple of other observations about NYC:

(1) The whole New-Yorkers-are-rude canard is totally false. Everyone is perfectly nice. Maybe even nicer than SF. Is this just Manhattan or is everyone in NY nice?

(2) WHAT THE FUCK is up with the peds walking against red lights? I thought it was bad in SF, but here peeps have taken it to a whole new level by actually walking in front of cars. Carazy. But now I'm doing it too, just to fit in.

(3) Buddakan was really good. It's one of those sceney kind of places where you expect the food to be an afterthought, but every dish we had was awesome. I could have that Chinese sausage fried rice every day. And the lobster and shrimp chow fun? Oh fuck yes.

(4) If you live somewhere like SF, then NYC doesn't seem expensive at all. We had breakfast with my nephew and his wife at Balthazar yesterday and I was all "$14 for an omelette and potatoes? Seems right to me!" I could see this possible surprising someone from, say, Amarillo, Texas.

Off to Turks & Caicos tomorrow. I don't know what the Internet situation will be and I'll be too tired and drunk to type anyway, so I don't know the next time you'll hear from me. It's amazing I even posted this.

ONE FINAL NOTE: SHIG (who shall remain SHIG until further notice, despite our change in status) and I both wrote a little something for San Francisco Love Story and it's up there today, so go check that out for EVEN! MORE! BONUS! CONTENT! You should totally be reading SFLS anyway.

That's it. I've gotta go walk around some more. Last day in NYC. SHIG is out shopping. We agreed it would be better to split up today than to go shopping together, which would consist of me sighing and staring at her REALLY HARD while she holds clothes up.

Urban etiquette: an occasional series

Today's topic: At the movies

So last night Super Hot Irish Girlfriend had Book Club at our house, which is an all-female event and thus not conducive to my easygoing, albeit male, presence. So I hied myself down to the Century 20 Daly City to see "I Love You Man", not because I'm in complete awe of the whole Apatow school of comedy but because basically it was the least offensive thing at around 7:00 p.m. What am I going to see, "The Fast and the Furious"? Or maybe "Hannah Montana". I'd love to have to explain that to the police when they inevitably arrive.

ANYWAY, I get there and it's clearly a younger crowd, maybe average age 25. And there's the usual talking during the previews, but hey, that ship sailed a long time ago. Then the movie starts and the couple behind me (both wearing SFSU sweatshirts, for what it's worth) talk through the whole goddam thing.

Here's the rule, and I can't believe I have to even say this, because it's so basic like "Don't spit in a stranger's mouth" or "Don't stop to chat with the Bay Bridge toll taker," but here it is: When you're at the movies, keep your fucking mouth shut. If you're not having a heart attack or a PCP freakout, there is no fucking thing important enough to share right then.

(Sidenote: Yes, I appreciate the irony of going alone to a movie that's basically about a guy who has no friends. But I actually like going to movies alone every once in a while and there's usually not such a blatant connection to what's going on onscreen.)

You know one thing I liked about Ireland? Well, one of many? I went to a movie there with SHIG's best friend's boyfriend and a couple of other guys and a couple of people whispered during the movie and the WHOLE FUCKING THEATER basically went SHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! really loud and I guess there's some kind of cultural thing where the Irish like complete silence during movies and I wish we had that here.

I don't know what it was about this particular movie, but couples (and yes, it mostly attended by younger couples) all over the theater were chatting it up. Fuck. I blame the parents. From the time they're infants, these kids get taken to the Finding Nemos and the Little Mermaids and the parents probably (I'm guessing here, as I don't see a lot of G-rated films in theaters) let their little brats yap through the whole thing. So they grow up thinking it's ok. It's not OK.

I guess I'll stick to seeing "Depressing Yet Quirky Characters Trade Bon Mots in a Plotless Urban Milieu," 8:15 at the Embarcadero Cinema. Nobody ever talks during the movie there.

Urban etiquette: an occasional series

Today's topic: The mysteries of tipping


Tipping used to be easy. Go to a restaurant, get service, leave tip. Now everywhere I go, some counter jockey with a sense of entitlement wants me to leave money for them doing their job. Confused? Here are the guidelines to follow. Clip 'n save.


Restaurants: This is the easy one. 20% minimum, more if you feel like it or the service was extra good. Going below 20% is only justified if the service was really, really bad or the waitron was totally rude. Luckily, this doesn't happen very often, even in SF.


Hotels: About $5 a day, depending on whether they have to change the sheets every day or it's one of those hotels where they don't change the sheets the whole time you're there. Leave the money on the table with a note that says "Thanks so much!" If you're questioning tipping the hotel maid, remember that she (because it's always a "she") makes about $1.50 an hour and changes 50 beds a day and cleaned up the snotty Kleenex you left on the floor, you fucking slob.


Taxis: Usually a couple of bucks, if it's under $20. I try to round to the nearest 5, if possible. So if it's $12, I give $15, for example. If not, just kick down an extra 3 or 4 bucks on top of the fare. If it's over 20, adjust accordingly. I rarely have fares that high, but I remember giving $30 on a $21 fare once.


Bartenders: Standard rule is a dollar a drink, every time. More if he or she is really good. Word to the wise - if you want to get good service all night, start out with about 2 bucks a drink on that first round. Works like a charm.



Counter jars: This is the toughest one. Seems like everywhere you go now, any place that has a cash register has a cup asking you for tips.


Well, you know what? Fuck that. Here's my basic rule - unless the person behind the counter performed some value-added service above and beyond simply doing their job, no fucking tip. EXAMPLES: (1) Cashier rings up product I selected. Are you fucking kidding? No tip. (2) Barista pours cup of coffee, hand it to me. No tip. BUT (3) Barista makes complicated double half-cap caramel mocchiato. If you're gay enough to drink something like that, yes, you have to tip. (4) Burrito Assembly Tech puts together your super w/ carne asada, hold the guac. Yes, an extra buck in the cup next to the cashier won't kill you.


I know, it's somewhat arbitrary, but you get a feel for it after a while. Anyway, if it's confusing, just listen to the little voice in your heart.



Massages: I have no fucking idea. Do I seem to you like the kind of person who gets massages?



I know this isn't totally comprehensive, but I'm sure once you absorb and internalize these general guidelines, you'll be able to figure out what to do with the valet and your gardener and the gift-wrap girl at Macy's.

PDX, WTF?

- Still in Portland. Leaving today. The wedding was last night (?) at the View Point Inn, which was really nice and everything, but I'm still a little puzzled by the Monday wedding thing.

A couple of observations:

1. There was this couple there at the wedding wearing jeans and fleece pullovers. Really? Is this what we've come to? It's acceptable to just wake up and put on whatever happens to be on the floor and then go "Oh, hey, let's go to that wedding?" Jesus Christ, people, it's a fucking wedding, not a cookout. At least put on a shirt with a fucking collar.

2. Writing your own vows is nice and everything, but there's something to be said for the traditional "Do you take this woman" stuff. It's classic and resonant.

- I gave a $1.00 to a guy busking in downtown Portland because he was playing "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" by Neutral Milk Hotel. How cool is that?

- Super Hot Irish Girlfriend and I got to Portland Saturday night. We immediately got to drinkin'. After a couple of quick ones at the hotel bar, we went to Deschutes Brewery's pub in the Pearl District. Tried a couple of the seasonal ales there, then went to dinner at Henry's Tavern. It was alright. By this point, I'm not sure how much it mattered, because after a few beers with 6 to 7 percent alcohol, food is really kind of an afterthought.

- Sunday, SHIG had a 5-star hangover. But we had to go buy a wedding present, so she pulled herself together and soldiered through Macy's. There is nothing as much fun as shopping the housewares section of Macy's with a girl who's moaning "I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die." I gotta hand it to her, though - she toughed it out.

- She looked great at the wedding, too.

Urban etiquette: an occasional series

Today's topic: Bad Muni behavior

I'm a little hesitant to get into this area, especially since there's another site dedicated specifically to this, but I just gotta say something.

Guys, if you see an older woman standing on the bus or train and you're sitting down, GIVE UP YOUR GODDAM SEAT.

Just today, riding the train, I was standing in front of this guy who was sitting down. Mid-20's, Dockers-clad, fake diving watch, checking emails on his Blackberry, when this woman who looks to be on the far end of 70 and is struggling with a couple of bags gets on the crowded train. The other seats are occupied by similarly-aged oldsters and a blind guy with a dog and another middle-aged woman. Dockers sits there impassively and stares straight ahead.

Finally, the middle-aged woman next to him gets up and offers Granny her seat. Dockers goes back to sending vitally important emails.

Dockers may currently be suffering from a brain tumor-like headache, because I was focusing intense Hate Waves at his balding head. The other people around just stared at him. Dockers better have two artificial legs or Lou Gehrig's disease, or there's no goddam excuse.

OK, here's the rule. If you're a guy, and you have the capability of walking, you give up your seat for any woman who appears older than you*, any woman who's pregnant or holding a small child, and any man who looks like he could have voted for FDR.

Easy, right? Let's try and look out for our fellow hapless Muni travelers, shall we?

*The reason I say "older than you" is because giving up your seat for a younger woman seems kinda flirty. If the chick's cute, use your best judgment.

Urban etiquette: an occasional series

Today's topic: ATM crimes

Misdemeanor: Taking forever to complete your transaction

Hey, Carl Icahn, what are you doing there, executing a leveraged buyout of General Motors through the ATM? Look, you numbskull, it’s PIN – withdrawal –amount - receipt yes or no. Why you’re standing there contemplating each screen like it’s the menu at Le Cirque is beyond me. You’ve used one of these before, right?

Felony: Endorsing your check(s) after stepping up to the ATM

Look, there’s a line here. We’re all waiting to use the ATM. And instead of endorsing his check or whatever ahead of time, this asshole blocks the ATM, starts the transaction, and then endorses the check while everyone behind him is held up. It wasn’t a surprise that you were going to get to the ATM, jackass. Endorse your shit ahead of time.

Death penalty: Talking on cell phone while using ATM

This crime against nature combines two of the biggest land mines on the urban etiquette battlefield – the cell phone and obliviousness. So I’m waiting to use the ATM and this woman is ahead of me and talking on her cell phone. I can already tell this is going to be trouble. So she gets up to the ATM and it goes like this:

Puts in her card

“Blah blah blah excruciating details about my boring life”

Enters PIN slowly, still talking

“So then blah blah blah I can’t believe you’re listening to this fucking minutiae”

Makes selection from menu at ATM. Unbelievably, TURNS AWAY FROM ATM WHILE TALKING

“And so on and so forth here’s what happened second by second today in my life”

And it goes on pretty much like this. Press button. Talk for 30 seconds. Press button.

Now, at this point, I’m surprised that the psychic energy of my loathing and frustration hasn’t caused her head to burst into flames, but I guess I’m not at that Jedi level yet. ANYWAY, cell phones and ATMs. No. Don’t do it.