San Francisco and what to do in it

ryan seacrest is going to be on tv

I don't have tv

Love Unlimited NYE Party at Paradise lounge www.paradiseloungesf.com

Then Free Blood at the DNA Lounge Jan 9th http://www.gunclub.dj/events.html

that is, www.paradisesf.com

goddamn links... http://www.paradisesf.com/

How freaking boring is Tiburon? yes, it's beautiful. I could watch the fog roll in forever. In fact, that's all I'm going to do for the rest of the holiday because there is NOTHING ELSE.

I might go take the ferry into town today and go look for Amoeba if it stops bloody raining. Sigh.

Tiburon is particularly grim in winter.

xpost I went to that Love Unlimited NYE party- had fun dancing upstairs to Bus Station John, but didn't hold out until 4 am for the 'free breakfast'- did any ilxors make it across the 6 am finishline?

Sorry, I didn't manage to get in touch, Michael, I didn't get to take the ferry, as I was abducted by my brother and taken to the DeYoung. Which is, quite possibly, the ugliest art museum I've ever set foot in. Today my father and I are driving up into wine country.

I don't actually mind the winterness of Tiburon - I like seaside towns better in the winter, because the only thing worse than this would be this place filled with HORRIBLE PEOPLE. Are you around next week at all? Wait, I should email you off board probably.

Who advised you to visit SF in the winter?

It was neither my choice of destination, nor of time of year.

I was summonsed by my family, who live in Tiburon, for the holidays. Neither Feast nor family are moveable.

My 'summonsed' and 'abducted' on luxury holiday ordeal...

One person's heaven is another person's hell. If I could have given this trip to someone else, or donated the money to charity in its plaec, I would have. But I guess it just makes me a bad person for even being here.

No, but the self-sanctimonious whining about it is kinda tiresome.

Feb 10-17, finally I get a vacation. Staying in the Hotel Carlton on Union Square - supposedly $125+tax usually, down to $75/night with tax thanks to an Orbitz coupon.

Wow that's cheap. Woo hoo for desperate hotel rates!

Hopefully the weather will still be nice when you get here.

Well it's ridiculously nice right now. If I was visiting I'd settle for half this good.

Protest against police violence @ Civic Center BART at 5pm tonight... could get rowdy.

Oops thanks for the heads up.

oh great

76F... right now... 4pm PST...

San Franciscans! This is almost two weeks late, but you've got a wonderful city wow. I'm still not sure how they built a city there, what with the actually insane hills and being wedged between a bay and an ocean. I had a great time, despite being stuck for four days at a pretty weird conference that was unfortunately downtown. (Downtown was the only part of SF that I didn't like, like really didn't like. That juxtaposition of loads and loads of white tourists and posh shops with totally dilapidated blocks filled with an alarming amount of the mentally ill (presumably) homeless right there...whoa.)

But the rest of the city/area! Loved the mission (where my brother lives), the castro, even sort of liked the haight! Had one day of just walking and touristing, and we rented a car for an hour to drive across the GG Bridge and up the vista or whatever, which was, to sound like a total obvious tourist, absolutely spectacular. The whole city's just so beautiful.

Had great meals at Bar Tartine (small plates better than big) and the cafe at Chez Panisse (pretty much perfect), some great banh mi in the tenderloin, excellent tacos and buritto at El Farolito, and pretty good szechuan at some place called Szechuan Trenz(?). Ferry Building farmer's market's pretty great, though I do understand it's mostly for tourists and people with more money than sense--the produce everywhere (even at shitty little grocers) looked awesome, even in late December. My one sob story was taking the bus all the way out west one night to PPQ Dungeness to meet my brother only to find out that they were OUT OF CRAB. Me and my bro went in to eat anyway (where else were we going to go?) and I almost cried staring at the whole full restaurant, every other table chowing down on huge dungeness crabs ;_;

That juxtaposition of loads and loads of white tourists and posh shops with totally dilapidated blocks filled with an alarming amount of the mentally ill (presumably) homeless right there...whoa.

thats a very british observation

"totally dilapidated blocks filled with an alarming amount of the mentally ill (presumably) homeless"

Thanks, Reagan!

I have friends visiting from IL today, so I'll certainly plan to keep them away from the Civic Center around 5. That is, unless they want to gawk, which they won't.

thats a very british observation

haha maybe I've been away from the states too long..

I know loads of cities have a homeless problem, and it's not like London is a bastion of economic equality (nor do I like spending time in the equivalent 'downtown' of London). It just seemed clear that loads of money had been pumped in to 'revitalize' the downtown area for tourists with money who like being able to take the cable car up to Williams Sonoma, while the Tenderloin, which is right there, looks pretty much left to rot.

All of this, of course, is just a shallow observation by a first-time visitor who's got no real knowledge of local politics, city planning, the history of the area, etc. I'm just trying to put into words what turned me off.

"I have friends visiting from IL today, so I'll certainly plan to keep them away from the Civic Center around 5."

Above ground all I saw was a shitload of cops.

geez, the SF Eagle appears to have ceased their annual mud-wrestling tournament. What's supposed to get me out there this summer?

What was the bar you were at before meeting us at the Kilowatt?

I don't remember! 3000 miles is a long way to go for cheap margaritas.

Apparently quite a successful bar if you can't remember it.

I would have to improve my espanol to make it a regular stop.

All of this, of course, is just a shallow observation by a first-time visitor who's got no real knowledge of local politics, city planning, the history of the area, etc. I'm just trying to put into words what turned me off.

This was pretty much the same reaction that I had as a first-time visitor a couple years ago. I was in such a ridiculously shiny, touristy part of town (Union Square area) with such a huge concentration of homeless people. Walk west or south a couple of blocks and it's just totally different.

To be fair, though, it's not like there's lots for the homeless to do in, say, the Richmond or Visitacion Valley and if you think the Tenderloin looks rough, you should have seen it 10 or 15 years ago.

I'm also not sure what people who bemoan the homeless problem in SF expect the city to do.

There's obviously no easy answers to that^^

A lot of what alarmed me was less the number of homeless and more the number of clearly mentally ill homeless. And for that there are surely things the city (or the state) can do, no?

I know I'm sounding pretty Pinefoxian, and I don't want to be naive, but saying 'what do people expect the city to do' seems a lot like saying there's no problem at all.

the number of clearly mentally ill homeless.

This is sadly very true. As schwantz points out above, this is very much Reagan's legacy in this state.

Yeah, I have no suggestions, and it totally makes sense for homeless to gather around the touristy areas - nobody in the Tenderloin is going to give them any money, you know?

And the Tenderloin wasn't anywhere near as bad as I expected it to be - I heard such dire stuff about it and expected some sort of hell on earth when in fact it was really quiet with lots of massage parlors and a pervasive piss smell.

Yeah, I felt the same way, given the warnings I had heard. In the end it wasn't the state of the Tenderloin or feeling in danger walking through there, it was the juxtaposition I noted above, and, yeah, the fact that it seemed like so many needed help from the state.

GOOblar, also note that the homeless problem has been a major issue in mayoral elections for years, now.

After Times Square in the '80s, I find the Tenderloin a picnic.

xpost right, yeah I figured this isn't news to anyone around there..

I know this might sound naif but I find Times Square almost unbearable, now. I like parts of the Tenderloin: some good bars and restaurants and not nearly as sketchy as it used to be. Its ubiquitous bouquet of piss is somewhat of a challenge, though.

Oh, I agree, I prefer sleazy porn and street violence to $120-ticket Disney cartoon adaptations onstage.

I have a kind of self-loathing at my bi-coastal reaction, but it does seem to exemplify everything I abhor about modern America and the bad aspects of a 'cleaned-up' Manhattan.

The Tenderloin has been skid row for oh... about 161 years now.

Oh, I agree, I prefer sleazy porn and street violence to $120-ticket Disney cartoon adaptations onstage.

Morbz OTM

I like all three mixed together.