Eye on Blogs

Okay, now back on hiatus.

To boil this whole pompous wave theory down, a few years ago Ms. Skeie postulated that coffee consumption and preparation was progressing through three distinct transformations.

The First Wave is consumption — marked by America’s early preoccupation with poor quality coffee, often instant or freeze dried, that was more a caffeine and heat delivery mechanism than anything with an enjoyable flavor. The Second Wave is about enjoyment and defining specialty coffee — characterized by the selection of arabica beans over robusta, Colombian coffee’s Juan Valdez marketing campaign, and the proliferation of espresso and Starbucks.

So where are we now? Supposedly, this Third Wave is all about letting the coffee speak for itself — or enjoying coffee for coffee’s sake. Confused yet? You should be, because here are the problems with this logic and how people in the industry are misusing and abusing it…

"For most people, Friday's just the day before the weekend. But after this Friday, the neighborhood'll never be the same." -Craig, "Friday"

A large group doing a choreographed dance to Bjork's "It's Oh So Quiet" in the streets around Union Square:

The kid in this video is amazing:

Little better than break dancing:

The girl in this video tries to "get hyphy," but fails. She's cute as a button though, and she makes me laugh:

Disco Dancing Taxi Driver:

An older gentleman straight up getting it on a pair of roller blades:

Anonymous, the masked Scientology protesters, have a dance off:

It is starting to become a tradition here in San Francisco that whenever there's a major festival and this is their first one, they never notify the residents affected by the event about street closures.

Well here comes the new Outside Lands festival (concert) event that is consuming a huge part of Golden Gate Park. So this billionaire thinks of this great idea and gets the necessary permits to do it, I say, well a good idea there.

Then the residents don't get told about how this will hurt them. For this event, people who live in the Sunset, Richmond, and Panhandle areas will be greatly affected, especially if you take the bus or drive.

The festival's website DOES NOT have any information about street closures in the park. I noticed one sign saying that Chain of Lakes will be closed, but I noticed that when I was driving home last week Friday.

I checked the SFMTA's website about closures, and there is barely any information.

I checked the 511 website about closures, and they just tell you to expect heavy traffic and take the bus.

Then there's the folks at 311.

We’re excited to have hundreds of Twitter users following us and want to show our appreciation for all the tweets about things they hear, see and do on BART. Their tweets about BART help us better understand what’s important to riders and give us ideas for destinations and activities we can recommend to others. Some of the best are like tiny little stories (140 characters or fewer!) about personal experiences, or the sense of being part of a community. They’ve made us think and made us smile.

We’ll occasionally reward some of our favorite tweets with a $25 BART promotional ticket. There’s not a lot of fine print to that, but here's the basic FAQ.

There’s good beer - real local west coast ales and well-crafted brews - all over the Bay Area, and we are lucky enough that there is no paucity of good beer within walking distance of public transit. Get out of your car, get onto rapid transit and into slow, delicious pints. Oh yeah: BART closes (station by station) starting at midnight. Uncivilized, but important to know.

A growing list of great beer places near BART for your reference (One shoe is up to one Quarter Mile walking, one way).

Give Paul Hogarth, Joe Eskenazi, and Sweet Melissa a little too much beer and they'll tell you what they really think: sanctuary city policies ROCK!

They think Gavin Newsom isn't saying so because only by making migrant workers suffer can he redeem himself in the eyes of the state and national media. And he will.

It wasn't that long ago that, at this time, I would be in my classroom, unpaid time, cleaning  the summer grime off desktops until they shined, dusting the inner cubicle, arranging textbooks, supplies that I had bought over the summer, so that first day would be thrilling to those new faces. There would be fresh paper (at least until I discovered the fadeless paper that lasts forever) and posters on the walls. The first few week's lessons had been planned, introductions, rules, getting acquainted, reviewing procedures and rewards and consequences, and making certain that the students knew each would be enforced.

As a teacher, it is that moment of calm before the waves of obligations crash in - a moment to not feel that driving sense of urgency brought on by the cramming of standards and benchmarks paced out by someone who had only planned the process in theory and not in practice. A politat, perhaps.

At that moment, looking at that room, you are filled with an incredible sense of potential...

I just moved into this apartment less than two months ago. I am a college student. I am disgusted by my living room. Everything was given to me and looks pretty much like junk, except my one pride and joy - the white and gold end table. I love French Rococo style... Unfortunately, my apartment doesn't allow paint on the walls. Does anyone have cheap ideas on how I could make this ugly place into a cute and inviting living room that actually looks like a young, future designer lives there?! Thanks! -luvr_of_paris

Let’s start with a logic puzzle of sorts.

Q: Where are you if you see four J-Church metro trains, all headed downtown?

A: Gee, probably on Church? Maybe in Glen Park. One thing’s for sure, you can’t possibly be at Carl and Cole, smack-dab in N-Judah territory.

Oh, wait.

What comes next is a laugh-at-her, since-it-didn't-happen-to-me piece about a serious cluster of MUNI fail. Go read the rest at Muni Diaries, which is a new group blog that is really picking up a lot of steam.

While we're at it, here's the Eye on Blogs' List of Mass Transit Bloggers in the Bay Area. This is a great go-to roll of websites that can cure your need to read about public transit:

Muni Diaries

VTA Watch

BART Musings

The Overhead Wire

Muni Manners

Muni Gone Wild

Friends of BRT Blog

Bart Rage

Transbay Blog

N-Judah Chronicles

Rescue MUNI

À Côté in Oakland, California, near the border of Berkeley, is described as being a “small-plates restaurant” (read as: Tapas-style servings and portions, shared in a “family style” manner). Selections on the menu can change almost daily, with many excellent permanent selections as well. They also have a wonderful wine list, assembled bi-weekly, and they offer well-selected flights of wine to accompany your meal.

Wine, that’s OK, but what about the cheese?

I’m getting to that, inner cheese voice… There were six to choose from, any and all to be served with candied walnuts, toasted (and heavily salted) almonds, apple slices, poached figs and an excellent walnut levain bread. The three I choose were the following (pictured starting from left to right):

Majorero [semi-soft, goat milk, from the Canary Islands]

La Tur [three-milk soft cheese from Piemonte, Italy]

Ossau Iraty [semi-firm, raw sheep's milk, from the French Pyrénées]

All three were amazing, and I was most looking forward to the La Tur, which I don’t think I have ever tried...

As my kids ran off to play, I ducked into their classroom to put their lunch boxes into their cubbies. In the classroom, an itty bitty girl was sitting on the ground, shyly fingering a toy. Her parents were hovering over her. Other than myself, they were the only parents still there.

"Oh, first day of drop-off?" I said, smiling.

"Oh, no! She's just two-and-a-half, we're observing today." replied the parents.

"Have you checked out the preschool class next door? The teacher is amazing! This class is for the older pre-K kids, " I suggested.

"Well, she's ready for kindergarten only she's not potty trained yet."

"Oh..." I said, at a loss for words.

From our inbox:

James Walker, a resident of Oakland CA and my brother, has not been seen since Monday evening after suddenly leaving the Cactus Restaurant before dinner was over.  The Cactus is located directly across the street from the Rockridge Bart Station.  He is mentally ill and now has not had his medication since Monday morning.

The medication he takes is used to help control depression.  According to his doctor, without this medication there is a possibility he could become a danger to himself.  

A missing persons report was filed with the Oakland Police Department that Monday evening.  We have heard from them only once to confirm that we filed the report.  Further phone calls to the case officer have not been returned.  Missing person flyers have been posted in numerous locations.  The problem is he could be anywhere in the bay area due to the Bart Station being directly across the street from the Cactus Restaurant.

This afternoon it will be 72 hours since James has gone missing.  He did not have more than $20 in cash with him at the time he disappeared.  He has not used his credit cards or his ATM card during this period.  Checks with all the hospitals not turned up any leads. 

I would greatly appreciate if your station could assist in any way to alert the public to my brothers’ situation.  Please feel free to call me with questions or clarifications that will help in safely finding James.  

Randall Walker

home:  510-531-1533

cell:      510-326-1799

email:   rtonguido@att.net