San Francisco and what to do in it

I miss SF bars. NYC bars are more like carefully engineered and over decorated "fun zones" and in brooklyn they're all like ex-auto shops filled with wacky furniture and pinball machines etc.
:(

phone booth not lez bar! but speaking of, wild wild west is a great lez bar! I mean, all are welcome there of course (in bernal heights)

I can't vouch for lez effectiveness tho

Verdugo Bar in my current hood (NE LA) reminds me of a Mission bar

am i thinking of another tiny corner bar in the mission?

I like Verdugo Bar too! I also miss LA bars.
:( :( :( :/

Actually, just went to sweater funk at elbo last Saturday night, late great!
And thanks for the tip on haceteria, will definitely be hitting that up.

admrl, did you ever go to Ye Coach and Horses in LA?

Pop's on 24th is enjoyably dive-y, a few blocks from my friends' rad record store.

wait - is this that record explorist shop or whatever it's called? some good stuff in there

cool, some friends of mine are involved in sweater funk and it's a pretty good night! never been to haceteria, but I can't imagine it being anything but cool.

yes, michael. I saw England vs. Poland there

the soul thing i am thinking of is like mod 60s soul, never been to sweater funk, hope you enjoyed it though

re: corner lez bars in the mission i realize now i was thinking of lexington club

is the soul thing night beat?

I like the Lex

no, i think it's just called "saturday soul", and it looks like its happening this saturday night

http://player.vimeo.com/video/20307099?title=0&byline=0&portrait=0

when i went it was nowhere near as corny as it looks in the video (only the DJs were dressed up) but the soundtrack for the video should give you an idea of the music

also iirc one of the DJs is markedly better than the other two

when i used to go (5+ years ago, it's a very long-running event) it was $5 apiece, looks like now it's $10 apiece but $5 if you show up in mod / swing / steampunk attire

all those corner places in the mission look exactly the same!

I still like the Arrow Bar haha

assuming it's still there and still "The Arrow Bar" and not some wine bar or something

xp shakey - yeah Explororist Int'l and I think we recently met irl at a party last weekend iirc?

wait waht

your daughter was climbing a tree, and we were talking about the weird Asian lady who managed the Portlite Club in Oakland

hahaha hoooooly shit I totally did not put 2 and 2 together!

nice to meet you!

i thought you were trying to be incognito!

nah I'm just stupid

I'm coming next week! Don't know how much time I'll have for bars, but pls places to eat dinner that are not ridiculously $$$?

*pls recommend

That soul night looks cheesy but kind of awesome.

like i said, the video sort of gives a skewed impression - when i went only a few people were wearing swinger / mod clothes and doing the bunny hop so it didn't have the corny vibe of the video

tehresa, in what part of town are you staying and for how long?

Near union square, this sat to next sat. I'll be in mission area quite a bit.

Pity, there's no good food in the Mission.

what about el farolito and cha-ya?

i ate at schmidt's, mission chinese, and la taqueria when i was in town 2 weeks ago, and enjoyed all of them, though schmidt's was not quite as good as the last time i went there. but the pea pancake with salmon appetizer there was really great.

Steve Shasta Legendary Foodie thread has some good recommendations from SFers. This is my updated list--prices have all gone up too hah (it focuses mostly on Richmond District--where I live now--and the Tenderloin--where I used to work.) Folks who live in Mission or SOMA can give better recs since I barely make it out of "suburbs" now that I have a babby.

$4 Saigon Sandwiches
$5 Cinderella Bakery
$6 One of the taco trucks (Compadres or Tonyanese)
$10 Mangosteen
$15 Halu
$20 Burma Super Star
$25 Suppenkuche

I ate at Schmidt's a couple of weeks ago (there is a 50% Scoutmob coupon) and I quite liked it. Pretzel was great, as was the Wild Boar Sausage platter. That said if I was in the neighborhood and didn't have the coupon, I would go to Limon Rotisserie instead.

I need to go to Burma Super Star sometime!
Range and Foreign Cinema in Mission might be worth a look at but they aren't exactly 'cheap eats'. I have been to both a few times for a more special occasion type thing, they're on the pricier side but not 'tasting menu' expensive. You can't really go hungry in the mission though.
I've just realised I never go out to eat around Union Sq. But for an easy lunch downtown, the Bistro restaurant in Nordstroms (in the Westfield centre) is actually surprisingly good (I went to another great one in LA so maybe it's a thing that Nordstroms does good food - I always assumed it'd be rubbish because it's in a mall). They have white chocolate bread pudding!

Schmidt's is good but for German(ic) food, I prefer Leopold's.

there are many overrated places in the mission, two that i particularly hate are pakwan and ti couz, get terrible stomach issues every time i eat at either of those

I think Ti Couz is closed now? But yeah it's overrated as is Pakwan.

does The Zam-Zam Room still exist?

I liked Pakwan when I ate there but when I got delivery it wasn't great.

Union Square is generally not great for food although you are very close to Tu Lan which is pretty good/cheap Vietnamese.

i'm not saying pakwan's not tasty and cheap, just that it always gives me el mierdas

Not terribly far from Union Square and not exactly cheap but definitely good value is http://www.sahasf.com/menus.html

I go here before shows at the Great American sometimes and if you were going to Polk Street or the Tenderloin, it would be convenient.

la mierda, tlg

sorry i did german in high school and college

but duh, the endings usually match, right?

la mano

But yes, usually