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Things I Love This Week

Home today, sitting in one of those thousands of San Francisco apartments with no heat or insulation to speak of. But it never gets cold in SF, you say. Perhaps not, by most standards, but it sure FEELS cold when it gets into the 40’s at night and you’re sitting in a drafty Victorian huddled over a wimpy space heater.

For a change of pace, here are some things I’m loving this week:

  • Reruns of “The Critic” on Comedy Central
  • Minute Maid Lemonade on sale at Safeway
  • Kelley’s Coffee Shop in Oakland (review coming soon)
  • The creepy new decor at My Place on Folsom Street (or is it just out of date Halloween decorations?)
  • My blanket

The Spirit

Only nine shopping days ’til Christmas. I’m not trying to be blatantly commercial or anything, but this seems like a good time to re-visit David Sedaris’ The Santaland Diaries. If I were less pure of spirit, I’d mention that you can buy the book from which these excerpts were taken right here on the site. But mentioning that would be wrong somehow.

Last note for the day: if you do nothing else today, visit this website. Just do it. Trust me.

Ummm, a War

So it would seem we’re at war. And I didn’t hear a damned thing about it until hours after the fact.

Used to be this type of thing would result in an immediate (if brief) interruption of all programming on all commercial TV stations. I was home all day. The TV was on. I didn’t see a bulletin or hear a single word until I watched the 7:00 news.

Ironically, one of the top stories was about the “apathy” many Americans were showing toward the whole thing. Given a reliance on TV news, it’s a fucking miracle most of us even KNEW about it.

I’m sure the “big three” affiliates probably had plenty of live coverage, but who the hell watches ABC, CBS, or NBC anymore? You’d think the beginning of a war might have at least merited a MENTION on the other stations too.

On a related note, check out this bitchin’ TV site. While you’re at it, check out yesterday’s link du jour again too.

Apathy and Other Stuff

The country is going to hell. Wait. Scratch that. It’s the government that’s going to hell. The country is just suffering from the utter ridiculousness of it all.

And vast numbers of Americans just don’t care anymore. If ever there was a textbook example of why voters, particularly younger voters, are apathetic and cynical about the political process, the Republican party provided it today. The Republicans can’t be bothered with actually running the country, not when there are Democrats to be trashed.

Not to suggest that those very same Democrats wouldn’t have done the very same thing had the situation been reversed. Therein lies the problem: a complete moral bankruptcy in both ruling parties. There are no more statesmen. There are merely paid corporate mouthpieces. There is no more concern for issues. There is simply loyalty to the party and complete devotion to re-election.

And there’s not a damned bit of difference between the average Democrat and the average Republican — excpet maybe a slightly different list of corporate sponsors.

Only moderately related: has anyone other than I noticed that, in addition to being the nickname of a Nazi general, “Desert Fox” was also the name of a really bad military-themed gay porn video of the late 80’s? Coincidence?

About That Last Post

Watching the post-impeachment nightmare this morning in my hungover state (never EVER drink beer on top of any kind of cough syrup), I prepared this journal entry about the complete moral bankruptcy of both political parties in the U.S.

Then I re-read it and it sounded incredibly pretentious. I decided I make a lousy political commentator. However, I went ahead and archived it, in case you’re inordinantly interested and still want to read it.

What I’m now concerned with is the fact that I’ve had my crotch and/or ass grabbed in bars more times this weekend than any time in recent memory. By complete strangers. By people I had not so much as looked at. By really drunk nasty trolls.

Is it the Christmas intoxication factor? Or did I just look that available? It can’t be that I looked so enticing, ‘cuz I didn’t. What’s the deal here?

Anyhow, I made it home safely. Now I’m gonna watch “Cannon” and go to bed.

Ah, Watergate

Memories of Watergate…

I was a youngster in that exciting summer of 1974, and my biggest memories of the whole affair were that my favorite TV shows got pre-empted an awful lot. That was a really traumatic year anyway, as I lost both The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family.

That’s me, deeply in the throes of withdrawal…

But I did pick up enough of the Watergate action to realize that impeachment is nothing but a precursor to a Senate trial which might conceivably remove a president from office…an arraignment or an indictment, if you will. I figured this out at age 10. It’s very disturbing to me that full-grown adults are so ignorant of the concept today.

What the hell are they teaching kids in schools these days? I guess “self-esteem” is more important than, say, reading or writing or learning how the country works. It’s no wonder we keep electing such blithering idiots to public office and passing such blatantly unconstitutional ballot initiatives. Most voters haven’t a clue what’s going on!

It was 65 in Greensboro yesterday, while it snowed in parts of San Francisco. But never fear: they’re predicting freezing rain for my Friday arrival in North Carolina, so I’ll be spared some considerable irony…

Random Stuff

Between all the leftover work I avoided over Christmas and all and the fact that I’ve been sleeping off a really nasty bug all day, I am neither caught up on the website nor the email. I have, at least, managed to upload the first part of the North Carolina trip.

Other things I could be writing about but I’m not (just yet) might include whining about whatever this bug is that I’ve managed to pick up. I could discuss how pissed I am that I can’t get ADSL, even here in San Francisco’s most “wired” neighborhood.

I could include the fact that I got email from Strange de Jim (of Herb Caen fame). I could write about how I’m really starting to get serious about leaving San Francisco. I could tell the story of the disturbing graffiti which appeared on my front door this weekend.

I could even talk about that Leif Garrett documentary from Sunday night.

But I’m not going to get into any of this right now. I’m going back to bed.

28 January 1999

Score one for the SF Weekly. I usually have no patience with this paper as it’s little more than a Guardian wannabe with a badly-designed website. In the past two weeks, though, the Weekly has risked alienating its core yuppie audience with George Cothran’s columns on San Francisco’s loftominum invasion.

Last week’s column focused mostly on the insensitive architecture and scale of the new developments. This week’s report talks about the loss of jobs and institutions thanks to the complaints of yuppie crybabies who get pissed off because they were too fucking stupid to check out what their new neighborhoods were like before shelling out that half a million bucks.

Too bad the battle’s already pretty much been lost in my own neighborhood, although I realize the issues are are a little more complex here.

Intel:

As if I needed another reason not to buy a Wintel machine…

Hands down, the superlative award-winning idiots of the month have to be the fine folks at Intel. What the hell were they thinking? Did someone in the boardroom suddenly get the idea that people would be just silly happy to have a computer which identifies its user all over the web? Did this idiot have some sort of revelation which convinced him (it HAD to be a “him”) that people were just itching to give up their privacy and reveal their identities to anyone with a website?

Of course not. Someone with actual intelligence realized that corporations might pay big bucks for the ability to collect this sort of data on unsuspecting potential customers. The idiot in this scenario is the marketing fool who thought that a positive spin (security, my ass…) would keep anyone from noticing what was going on. They were wrong.

This is the same sort of marketing idiocy that makes banks babble on about how destroying competition through mergers will unltimately benefit customers and bring down fees.

I Just Don’t Understand:

I was talking with someone the other day about the irony of the fact that there’s a Taco Bell right in the middle of San Francisco’s Mission District and that it always looks crowded. Surrounded by some of the cheapest and best Mexican food in the country, I have to wonder just who the fuck eats there? And why?

More collards this weekend. Saw an ex at the supermarket tonight. Life is very busy this week. This and more will come later, if at all. Right now, another link I’ve been promising for two months.

And I’m going to bed.

Super What?

I heard a rumor that today was Super Bowl Sunday. Never having been much of a baseball fan, I wouldn’t know for sure.

I just never “got” professional sports. I can tolerate a little college basketball (which is, of course, a bit of a religion in North Carolina). I can sit through a soccer match if forced. Pro skateboarding has an entertaining aesthetic side. But the excitement of spending three-plus hours watching a good 15-20 minutes of actual activity just eludes me.

I shan’t even start on the politics of team owners who blackmail cities in search of new stadiums while making it damned near impossibe for most citizens to actually attend games. And don’t get me started on the annual salaries which are larger than the economies of some third world countries.

But some people might find some of my obsessions a little odd too. Who knows…

Anyway, I’m off to cook another pot of collards now.

4 February 1999

Crazy week. Busy week. Absolutely friggin’ insane week. And no, that’s not just another “why I’m answering my email so slowly” excuse. OK…maybe it’s sort of an excuse…

Today’s song I’d forgotten I liked: “Bedbugs and Ballyhoo” by Echo and the Bunnymen. There’s something quite wonderful about listening to Australian radio while you work…

Latest from the fascist republic of California : Bay Insider reports that the SFPD is actually helping to enforce the ban on smoking in San Francisco bars. Thank God the crime rate is going down so we can afford cops to handle such important matters. I feel so much more secure already…

Amusing Usenet post du jour: in ba.motss, someone actually referred to Palo Alto as a “funky college town”. For those outside the area, Palo Alto is one ofthe most sterile communities in the Bay Area. I can’t remember ever seeing anyone under 30 (or under $75,000 a year) walking the streets there, except on the actual Stanford campus. I’d hate to think how this poor slob would describe Berkeley…

Why yes, I AM avoiding anything remotely introspective this week (month? year?), thank you…