there's an orange in my monday

Yesterday I forgot to give you the link to the Legion of
Honor, let's do that now.

I am working the 8 to 5 shift today, so I will miss the
Grand Deathly Ball that starts at 9:30 tonight. Thankfully
there are many fine people on our staff who really love all
this HFP stuff, so they will cover the party shift tonight.
They will wear costumes and have as much fun as the customers.
I am not one of those and I do not have a Ball Gown.
My rough day will be tomorrow when folks will already be
lined up for our 8am opening. But it's only one day...

The Round Robin writing group starts today and our first
prompt is Orange. For some reason it's easy to write for 10
minutes about a color, any color. Maybe because like smell,
a color brings up many memories. The trick is to zero in on
one of those, set the timer and type away.

from wiley to thiebaud

We wanted to get to the Legion of Honor this morning for
the opening bell because the tourists love this place,
as do we locals, and it gets impossible by about 11am
most days. We were driving up 34th Avenue and strolling
across the street, on his way to play golf, was this
thin brown coyote. Nonchalant as could be.

It is another unbelievably beautiful and clear day here, so
we stopped to admire the view from the empty (!) parking lot
before being thoroughly impressed with the Rembrandt to Thiebaud
exhibit of more than 250 works by Hopper, Picasso, Arp, and
so on and on. Also some photography from Diane Arbus and
Imogen Cunningham, to name just two. We practically had the
place to ourselves, it was heaven! Feeling pleased and smug,
we had coffee outdoors at the museum and waved at the happy
golfers walking by. For locals only ~ it opens at 9:30am,
please don't tell the tourists.

nostalgia in black and white

After lunch today we visited RayKo Photo Center at 428-3rd St.
to see the free photography exhibit by Jimo Perini:
From Jimo's Vault
San Francisco Politics, Places and People
1960's & 1970's

There were close to 80 photos to enjoy, some famous and some not-so
people and about a dozen cable car shots that made me appreciate
that tourist phenomenon that I see (and hear) every single day.

My favorite was called Wall ~ taken down at the ocean near Fort
Point. Waves splashing on our familiar sea wall with SF in the
background. Alas it is a little pricey for this retail worker,
but it's one I won't forget for a long time.

Some celebs: George Moscone, every Alioto, Jack Ertola, Diane
Feinstein and Harry Belafonte.

Dessert was 3 photos taken in Italy ~ funny, I knew exactly what
country he was in the moment I saw them.

Street parking (meter) on Harrison ~ approx. $17 for 43 minutes.

seafood lunch on a granite counter

"I'll take you to lunch", said Husbando, generously, "I read about a
new old-style San Francisco Restaurant where oysters only cost $1 each."
So off we went to Sotto Mare (Under the Sea, for my few readers who
don't speak Italian as well as I do) at 552 Green Street, near Grant.

Oh yes, I do recommend this place! The clam chowder (white) is glorious
and my fresh petrale grilled cleanly (no butter) and perfectly.
My lunch companion had the other daily fresh fish special, sand dabs, and
he too was impressed. The restaurant is small (only seats 37), packed
with memorabilia from the owners' past ~ even Seals Stadium photos.

The oysters were yummy, I had been avoiding them after a bad
experience at some point in my oyster laden past, but today I couldn't
resist. I'm so glad I tried them again. Perfection.

I took the North Beach photo to make certain people (who had the
AUDACITY to move out of SF) question that decision. We were walking
down Green Street, or Filbert? The sun had just broken through the fog.
Lovely. Free parking in a 2 hour spot, if you must know...

scheduling ~ yours, theirs, mine

I'm working a split shift today and when I googled the term, about a
million strange articles and images appeared. I selected this Excel
schedule to let you know that this will be a boring post.

Our schedule supervisor is off on a l-o-n-g vacation so I have been
trying to do his job as well as my own. I have made a few (more) enemies
because it's hard to cover all the work and still adhere to some people's
very specific needs and desires. "I don't want lunch this early or this
late or blah, blah" is common. I give them a look and print the schedule
the way that works best for the store. I know, I'm a meanie.

I went in from 6am until 10 this morning, then I will go back at 3pm to
do another event tonight. It makes for a long day, but this home break
is so pleasant. Tempers are a little short at the big box ~ must be the
excitement of HFP. I know I am all a twitter...

chris cooper and ryan phillippe

Breach is based on a scary true story about the FBI double agent
who was finally arrested back in 2001 and is now serving a life
sentence. We both thought this was worth seeing on a Saturday
night when there is absolutely nothing on TV. Chris Cooper is
perfect as the brooding, double-crossing agent who goes to church
every day and is a loving husband and grandfather. Life truly
is stranger than fiction, but we all knew that years ago...

successful big box event!

Paul Madonna was delightful and we sold a bunch of his books today.
I bought one myself, how could I resist? Here is his drawing of our very
own Bernal Hill and the caption reads, Everything in its own time.

Paul is having an exhibition from July 19 ~ August 18:
Electric Works
130 - 8th Street, SF
(415)626-5496

it's not an easy film, not at all

I liked watching the young Scottish doctor grow up and start taking
responsibility for his part in the massacre of the citizens of
Uganda. Of course Forest Whitaker is beyond description and the
music and costumes outstanding. But several scenes stuck in my
mind and haunted me during the night, mostly because I knew they
were true and not some Hollywood tricks. If you haven't seen it, The
Last King of Scotland is fabulous ~ maybe watch it during the day,
not right before bedtime.

Another beautiful SF day, quite unusual for July when our fog usually
resembles a thick vichyssoise. So nice that we had lunch out on our
deck today ~ that's twice for 2007, maybe a record?

good morning, good night

What can be lovelier than a bookstore completely devoid of customers?
That part was nice, but about 4am I started getting blurred vision
and when the shelving crew came in at 6 and turned on some LOUD
music, I was less than my usual genteel self.

But now I'm home, soon to have a cup of Sleepy Tea and my second
Plotnik macaroon. Sounds like a good breakfast to me. As luck would
have it, "they" are working on our street ~ grinding and paving,
according to the No Parking signs. Making deep rumbling noises
designed to bother Day Sleepers like me.

But I'm OK, glad to have that finished. Computers and lights all
seem to working fine, I'm happy to report. The big box can open
and make big bucks today.

way more scalpers than celebrities

Lord, what I do for my blog. Yes, I did walk down here because I had
to have this photo of the ballpark clock just when the whole thing
started yesterday. It was exciting and I could hear the crowd and
the singing of the Canadian National Anthem. Today I see the photo
in the Chronny and can sort of match things up in my mind. You can see
a whole bunch of people milling around, just like me, waiting for a
generous fan to give us his/her spare ticket. The photo with the
palm trees gives you an idea of the outdoor BUNTING ~ so there.

After I stood and stared and people-watched for awhile, I went over
to the little big box where an ex-comrade of mine now works as
manager of that store. It is kitty corner to the ballpark and is
quiet and refined compared to our never-a-dull moment zoo. Very
relaxing, but of course now, after 7 years in the big box, I would
be bored to death. Then I took the 27 Bryant home and was pleased
(truly!) that my readers forced me down to the Mission Bay festivities.

Tonight I work an overnight in the big box. They are redoing the
main computer, very scary stuff. Also some guys (I assume) are
coming in to change lights above the escalators and that requires
lots of industrial size ladders, etc. I will be out of there at 6am
tomorrow for a day off of sleeping and grumbling. I'm also off on
Friday, so don't start getting all "poor, poor woman" on me...

two walking weekends

My friend Dancing Jen is getting ready for the Aids walk next
Sunday, and you'll be delighted to know that Loren finished her
Avon Walk for Breast Cancer last weekend. I have been checking
her blog frantically since yesterday morning, and here she is
writing about her experience. She is a fabulous writer and you
will enjoy this recap.

Today I hope to walk over to the phone service ballpark ~ public
transportation will be impossible. At least I have my camera,
even though this is my Friday and I usually don't have tons of
energy after a week of pre-Potter hype and a some retail issues.
One customer did want to know where to buy tickets to the All
Star Game ~ a little late to be looking for these, perhaps?

The weather has cooperated and the skies are blue, the city looks
fabulous on the TV cameras ~ we did watch the Home Run Derby last
night just to see the bunting and Dusty Baker in his baby blue
suit. More faves from the past too: Kevin Mitchell, Matt Williams,
etc. Tons of tourists here and I had to snarl at a gob of them
in front of the St. Francis Hotel, "this is supposed to be a
sidewalk", I said. Of course they didn't pay attention to me as
they were either on their cell phones or telling each other how
friendly the SF natives are...

Congratulations Loren ~ great job!

two hours in paris

This is one of those understated French movies without explosions
or back ground music warning us when danger (or false danger) looms.
It is a little like Prime Suspect in that the lead detective is a
woman with an alcohol problem and we get to go to AA meetings in
Paris.

The murder is a routine one, the outcome isn't. I always love
walking around Paris, with or without cops and/or bad guys. Our
Sunday nights are free now that Tony, Carm, et. al. are still
sitting in the diner eating onion rings and listening to music.

Le Petit Lieutenant is available on Netflix®, of course.

i really like him

If you've forgotten, today's headline is sung by Sancho to Dulcinea,
explaining why he is so devoted to Don Quixote...a slightly deranged
yet inspiring hero.

We knew we would love this after The Great Plotnik's review, and
indeed we did. Such energy and some unexpectedly beautiful voices
in the cast. Of course I welled up at the end, but the man next to
me was sobbing! I couldn't have enjoyed it more...

It was standing room only at the SF Playhouse yesterday, I'm so glad this brave little theatre company
is finally getting the recognition and the audience it deserves. Talk
about your impossible dream in a city so filled (thank goodness) with
theatre. Nothing like NYC, of course, but still pretty damn impressive.

sinking my teeth into intrigue

Even though I have two stacks of books waiting on my bed stand for
me to read, I couldn't resist bringing this home for a book loan.
I like the way Carter presents his upper class African American
characters and he certainly held my attention in his first book,
The Emperor of Ocean Park.

The fog has returned and I bet it will stay for the All Star
festivities. Tourists who shiver in shorts and thongs are saying
to each other, "how do they stand it here?" We have been lucky
this year, however, and I won't complain about a few cool days,
especially when I read about those horribly hot places, or the
rain and floods of the south and midwest.

warning: this is harsh

This ran in the Chronny on July 4th. Fitting, no? We discussed
it over flags and fireworks...

By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

So there you have it. Bush shrugs and smirks and then commutes the easy
soft-focus sit-on-your-ass-all-day-and-knit white-collar prison sentence
of a hollow political lackey who, in turn, took a bullet for his sneering
mafia thug of a boss, Dick Cheney, who in turn was complicit (along with
lead flying monkey Karl Rove) in the appallingly illegal outing of a CIA
operative, which itself was a tiny but particularly nasty link in the
giant chain of lies and deceptions undertaken to lead our wary and
tattered nation into an unwinnable impossible costly brutally violent war
that will now last, if current estimates are correct, until the goddamn
sun explodes.

You have to laugh. You have to laugh because if you do not laugh you will
likely be overcome by a mad desire to stab yourself in the eye with a
sharp feral cat and/or shoot yourself in the toe with a high-powered
staple gun, over and over again, all while tearing out pages of the United
States Constitution and crumpling them into tiny little balls and hurling
them into the smoldering firepit of who-the-hell-cares as you shiver in
the corner and swig from a bottle of Knob Creek and wail at the moon. Or
maybe that's just me.

But really, you do have to laugh at the vicious antics this
administration, and perhaps Dick Cheney in particular, that most nefarious
molester of U.S. law and ignorer of all political integrity and deeply
homophobic father of a creepily lesbian daughter and overall gruntingly
guff sneerer at all moral principle, masterful mocker of everything you
somehow still manage to think, even in your most despondent and ethically
disillusioned state, that American politics is somehow supposed to be
about.

For it was Cheney, you well know, who yanked Bush's puppet strings in
order to get Libby off the hook. It was Cheney who whispered sweet, oozing
nothings into Dubya's ear to convince him to screw the goddamn law and
mock the American jury system and further lock down America's standing as
the most corrupt and least accountable nation in the entire developed
world.

What, are you surprised by all this? Of course you're not. It is, of
course, all about the cover-up, all about preventing Libby from revealing
the real criminals in all this, about Cheney's nefarious role in the Plame
case, all about ensuring the cabal remains intact and unassailable and
throbbing with misprision.

It was so cute as to be actually damaging to the soul. Bush actually
ambled forth and said that, while he "respects the jury" in the Libby
case, the 2.5 year sentence was simply "too harsh." Baby, if 30 months in
a comfy well-stocked rape-free Martha Stewart-decorated facility for
compromising national security is too harsh, I've got a draconian little
thing called the Patriot Act to sell you, cheap.

Here's a swell side note: You know who gets harsher sentences than 30
months in white-collar prison, George? Pot dealers. That's right. The
average sentence for a convicted marijuana dealer in California is 3.3
years. In real prison, George, not that namby-pamby Club Fed where Scooter
would've played badminton and sipped tea. Hell, in places like Oklahoma
and Alabama, you can get a life sentence for possessing a single marijuana
bud, which is ironic indeed, given how if you live in Oklahoma or Alabama,
there is nothing that would serve your miserable id better than to be
deeply and thoroughly stoned every single day and twice on Sunday. But
that's another column.

Just a hint of perspective, George. See, we all know you drank like a
monosyllabic fish and were rumored to enjoy your share of premium flake
during all those years you were skipping poli-sci class in college as you
snorted money from the silver spoon you were born with, so maybe you can
appreciate this viewpoint. Or, you know, maybe not.

You know who's now done more jail time that Scooter Libby? Paris Hilton.
Paris Hilton has now accomplished more in the eyes of the law to pay her
debt to society than the VP's former chief of staff ever will for
assisting BushCo in corrupting the soul of the goddamn nation. Isn't that
cute? Cute enough to cause sharp stabbing pain in your abdomen requiring
great amounts of scotch and marijuana to anesthetize? You bet it is.

Lest we forget, Dubya's latest abuse of law follows hot on the heels of
Dick Cheney declaring himself a unique and unassailable branch of
government, free to ignore the law and refuse to hand over detailed
reports of how he's handled classified information to the federal,
Bush-approved oversight agency in charge of making sure people just like
Dick don't take too many liberties with power and ego and dictatorial
megalomania. Whoops, too late.

Just another appalling notch in the belt for Dick, really. To be added to
the collection, right alongside the bit where he endorses torture, or how
he initiated the secret detention of foreigners in brutal Eastern European
prisons, or his love of military tribunals, or the hard-on he gets for
detaining foreigners illegally, for years, at Guantanamo Bay, or the way
he works to derail freedom of the press, or how he abuses environmental
law and rearranges the federal budget as he sees fit all while sucking up
Halliburton kickbacks, and...

Oh my. The list is long indeed. And it is, in its way, far uglier and more
dangerous than that of his bumbling, inept boss. But you already knew
that, right?

All in all, you could say it's much like a very bad episode of "The
Sopranos," all thick-minded thugs and boorish mafia tactics and the
childish calling in of violent favors, all about ruthless loyalty at the
expense of, well, everything else: humanity, integrity, decency, the will
of the people. And there is Bush, the hollow figurehead, the smirking
decider, with Cheney as the henchman, the hangman, the guy at the door
with the black gloves and the baseball bat and the black van waiting
outside.

Except wait a minute; in this endless episode, there's no deeper sense of
existential angst, no smart-tongued therapy sessions full of humor and
revelation, no hint of greatness, no darkly heroic Tony Soprano character
who transcends it all and suspects there is more to life than this world
of blood and violence and war and even craves, somewhere in his soul, to
find it.

OK, check that. It's not "The Sopranos" at all. It's more like a
particularly noxious episode of "Mama's Family," all Neanderthal redneck
inbred imbeciles doing bad accents and idiotic pratfalls and slapping each
other in the face to the tune of an insufferable, forced laugh track, all
centered around a laughably dreadful character who blurts out sarcastic
one-liners so stupid and inept they make your skin crawl.

Except no one's laughing. And tens of thousands of people are dying. And
the country is rotting at its core. And the world, oh the world, the world
knows this degrading, deeply humiliating show cannot be cancelled fast
enough.

it's the smell of mendacity

I could watch any form of Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, suffer through
the worst small town production ever, just to hear Big Daddy bellow
the above line. I have been known to hiss and mumble it too, when a
customer at the big box gets confused about what really happened.

Anyhoo, that wasn't really a photo from our back deck in yesterday's
post. And no, I am not going to sue the Chronny, they have enough
problems currently.

Our 4th was a total delight. Great viewing, excellent food and, best
of all, sharing the evening with good friends who appreciate SF on
a clear night. We sometimes get a little jaded (as well as very fog
bound), but last night was one of the best. Special. I know I'll
always remember it...

we are yankee doodle dandies

Husbando insists on playing this music every year just to make me
irritable. I won't take my blood pressure until tomorrow. After
the last "do or die" he will let us hear the glorious Leontyne Price
singing an assortment of patriotic songs. Yes, I know I'm the last
person you would expect to be impressed with this holiday, but I am.

Mollie and I were out walking at Ocean Beach at 9am. It is clear,
warm and beautiful today and the beach was already busy with surfers,
dogs, runners, picnic supplies and happy/happy people. Too beautiful!

Tonight will be a casual BBQ with TGPs ~ so casual that we are using
the cementware and the grand old everyday flatware. Easy ~ yeah!

Do you like this photo from our deck that I took last year?

back to venice with a vengeance

Well, maybe not a vengeance, but I have had this photo up in
the left hand corner of my desktop here since April ~ saving
it for a day when I have NOTHING whatsoever to say in commano.

Today is that day. My Friday, your Tuesday. I am tired of the
working world. Yesterday was exhausting in many ways, so it
was nice to come home to a big salad, some BBQ wild (never
domestic!) salmon and a Husbando who said, "there's nothing
wrong with going to bed while the sun is still up. Good night."

I will catch up with Big Love on my weekend.

singing madonna's praises on monday

I'm looking out over the city this morning ~ the pink and orange
sunrise never photographs well, but it is something to behold, believe
me. No marine layer which means a warm day and I can wear one of my
three summer outfits. What is so rare as a real summer day here?

My retail wonderland is expecting a huge month: 4th of July, the
All Star Game on the 10th, Harry F. Potter and now we have booked
Paul Madonna for a Saturday afternoon. Here are the particulars ~

Saturday, July 14
2-4 pm
Borders Union Square
Paul Madonna to sign
All Over Coffee

He is extremely pleasant to deal with, by the way, and our talented
merch manager has created a beautiful display on the first floor.

"I am quite aware," she said, "of how oblivious I am." That is
what you probably can't read on Paul's drawing above. Such talent.

here's the iLine from friday!

I did hop over to the Apple store on Stockton to see the
line of people camped out there. This was about noon or
so and the line was about a block long ~ all young people
on blankets with food, music and all the time in the world,
or so they think at this stage in their lives.

Then, standing at the door, ready to go in for their iPhones
were the people with grey hair, money and wisdom. I guess
they paid the young 'uns to wait in line.

Now eBay has a bunch of iPhones for sale, or so I heard on
the news. OK, enough photos of lines for this blogger...