April 27, 2014
TIE A YELLOW RIBBON
This week's image comes from Carol, a resident at the Lunatic
Asylum of St. Charles. It is a last reminder of old Winter as we segue
into another Season. It is also a reminder that Alameda is a Spanish word
for a tree-lined promenade.
LIKE THE WEATHER
Latest report from the weather Dweebers is that La Nina is now done with
this latest storm, which moved from here along the coast to pound the
Mammoth Lakes area with tremendous ferocity, dumping 3.00 inches of rain
in less than 24 hours.
We will have a short, sharp, hot summer followed by the consequences
of the El Nino from hell. Starting in the Fall we may be seeing storm
after storm of pelting rain around here and down the coast. Some of you
may remember what happened in the 80's when the heavens cut loose and
sent much of Los Angeles sliding down in mud and debris. It is a bit early
to say, but it is very likely to be kind of like that again, so we enjoin
all of you to stock up NOW on sand bags, clean gutters, PVC pipe and waterproofing.
The Dweeb report forecast the last Pineapple Express and the one before
that with 100% accuracy several months in advance, so we have faith he
is right about things this time. This is his latest on the anticipated
El Nino:
"EL Nino:
I want to make a comment about the Hype of the Big Kelvin Wave that has
moved across the tropical pacific near the Equator and has successfully
brought warmer then normal SSTs to a large region of the ENSO basin. This
is just one of hopefully more Kelvin Waves through out the Summer and
Fall. . . .
As far as predicting a big winter for the west coast due to El Nino,
I am not at this time buying into that scenario.
Why?
Because for one, It is too early. Two, We are still in a long term cycle
of the negative phase of the PDO . . . . Yes you could make the Argument
that the PDO has been positive for the past three month. But only weakly
positive. It would not take much for the sign to change back to negative
this year.
So what could happen next Fall? We may end up with the Modoki El Nino.
A sort of hybrid where by SSTAs are warmer than normal over the
central pacific but colder than normal over the tropical eastern pacific.
IE Sort of like an El Nino and a La Nina combined all in one. I am not
saying that this will happen, but it is too soon to say that it wont."
- See more at: mammothweather.com
By a "Mokoki El Nino", Howard Schecter (The Dweeb) means that
it is possible that a very cold, relatively dry El Nino could occur.
Oh, and we are likely to see a bit more rain around the end of May.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
A return to the Pernicious Peripatetic Perambulations of Pusillanimous
Three-dotulism . . .
The Future of the local Coast Guard is leaving us, but for a better Future
for America. The German word for Future is Zukunft, and it's Vice Admiral
Paul Zukunft who is departing neighboring Coast Guard Island, where he
has served as Commander, Coast Guard Pacific Area since April 2012.
President Obama has presented Zukunft to the Senate for confirmation
as the 25th Commandant over the entire Coast Guard.
His replacement, Vice Admiral Charles Ray, was officially handed the
station vacated by Zukunft on Tuesday.
As the new Pacific commander, Ray's responsibilities will cover more
than 74 million square miles of ocean that stretches from the Western
United States to Asia and from the Arctic to Antarctica. It involves 13,000
Coast Guard personnel.
The Island Citizen's Task Force will meet this Wednesday, 4/30/14 at
7 p.m. in Conference Room A at the Hospital on Clinton. Topic is "Responsible
School Board Governance" . . .
On that subject, plans for comprehensive plans (you have to know this
is all about government right?) for the AUSD got knocked around Monday
and Wednesday among a few dozen parents, school staff, and other interested
parties. At the heart of a series of three meetings is the desire to arrive
at a Facilities Master Plan that encompasses all schools in the District.
Besides the basic nitty gritty involving fixing the Kofman auditorium
and the Encinal gym, two explosive topics arose: where to put the District
Administrative offices once its controversial lease expires, and whether
to consolidate the two high schools into a single mega-school of 3,000
kids.
Um, yeah. You heard that right. Such a school consolidation would probably
cost the District upwards of $180 million dollars. Can you say "another
Parcel Tax"? I knew you could.
Best get over to Donald Lum on 4/30 for another discussion about these
subjects. The consolidated school is unlikely to fly far, but you may
want to make sure sufficient rationality is at least involved in some
of the plans.
The PUC approved our AMP request for a 5-year rate increase, to start
digging into Islander's wallets July 1. Increase will come to about $2.25
per household . . .
An interesting observation made at the recent volunteer project to refurbish
the Least Tern Nest area at the Point with protective material for the
young chicks. "The nesting site was chosen by the terns, not the
Navy or the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service . . .".
RIPPLE
So anyway, Larry Larch had a big problem with the cell phone he got from
MegaTel, and he was having a devil of a time dealing with tech support
over the phone.
Hello, this is Jake. How can I help you today?
It's about the phone that got delivered today. . . .
(Impatiently) Of course it's about your phone. You are calling MegaTel
where Phones are Us. What is the problem with your phone?
I can't use it. . . .
(Interrupting) Are you calling from your phone now?
Of course not. I cannot use the phone you sent . . .
Then how on earth are you talking to me now?
This phone belongs to my, uh, colleague Ms. Light.
All right then. You are using a competitor's product to call me. Is your
own phone inoperable?
I am not sure. . . .
Mr. Larch, I see by the code you entered that you are Larry Larch. Is
this correct?
Yes.
Is the phone turned on?
I think so.
You just think the phone is turned on. Is the battery installed and fully
charged?
I am not sure.
Are you calling from a construction zone?
Am I what? No, I am at home. If it is about signal interference this
is not . . .
I say that because I am hearing a lot of crashing noises coming over
the line. And it sounds like you are moving around. Can you see the main
screen of your device?
Um that is hard to do right now . . . .
Orient the phone so that the glass faces you. Mr. Larch hold it upright
and find the on/off switch. Do it now.
I cannot do it now.
Is the phone in the house where you are now? You say it was delivered.
It was delivered. That is the problem.
That is not a problem -- that is a MegaTel success. Is the phone in your
possession?
Not exactly. . . .
Well if the phone was lost or stolen why did you not say so at the beginning?
No, the phone is in the house. It is right here. But I am not able to
see the main screen right now . . .
Are you blind?
Beg pardon?
Are you disabled? Can you physically hold the phone? If not, we can activate
voice command mode remotely for you.
I am not disabled! I can hold the phone because I am holding Ms. Light's
phone right now! I just cannot get the phone!
Mr. Larch please tell me why you cannot get the phone and why this is
a problem I need to resolve.
Please don't interrupt me again.
(Sigh) Are you calling from California? Nevermind. What is the problem?
Be specific.
There is a bear attached.
Did you say you have a bear attached to your phone?
Specifically a Panda bear.
How did this happen, Mr. Larch?
The UPS showed up with a forklift and unloaded this box. Inside the box
was the phone and the bear. They are chained together.
It's clear to me you called the wrong department, Mr. Larch.
What!? You are tech support are you not?
Mr. Larch, I am tech support, but tech support cannot resolve all the
world's problems. I fix broken and malfunctioning equipment and weird
configuration stuff. I cannot fix animals or mend broken marriages. The
department you want is Sales.
Sales? Why sales?
Did you buy a bear Mr. Larch?
No I bought a phone . . . .
Then you must arrange for an RMA and ship it back.
(Distressed) How on earth am I going to get a 500 pound bear back into
a box and return it? Can't you help me?
Look I was born and raised in Brooklyn. I know nothing about wildlife.
I will transfer you to Sales. Thank you for choosing MegaTel, where Phones
are Us. One moment . . .
(Ring, ring. If you are calling to purchase a new phone or add one
to your existing line, press 1. If you are calling about billing or want
to pay your bill, press 2. If you are calling about changes to your account,
press 3. For all other inquiries, press 4 or wait on the line and an agent
will be with you shortly. Due to high call volumes you may experience
extended hold times. To hear these instructions in Spanish, press 5. To
hear these instructions in Tagalog, press 6. To hear these instructions
in Arabic, Swahili, or Canadian French, press 7. All other languages,
press 9.)
(Northeast Indian accent) This is Soraya. How may I help you today?
I have a problem with my MegaTel phone. I have to have it returned with
everything that is attached.
I am so sorry to hear that you are unhappy with your phone and I will
be happy to assist you in any way you wish. With whom do I have the pleasure
of speaking today?
I am Larry Larch.
Very good. And do you have your account number?
Here is the telephone number . . . . (reads the number)
I am so sorry I did not hear that last number. Are you calling from a
construction site?
Ah no. From home. It is rather chaotic right now. The refrigerator is
tipped over.
That does sound unpleasant. Was that a 9 or a 5 you said as the last
number?
Five.
OK I see you have purchased the Gumlung Link Line model 500S. What precisely
displeases you about this phone, Mr. Larch? Is it the color?
No the color is fine. There is a bear attached.
Come again? Could you repeat that?
The phone arrived chained to a Panda bear.
I see. You do not want the bear.
He is now getting into the cabinets, by the sound of it. Heck, I think
he found the five cases of Twinkies. I do not think he will leave a single
one of them for me. No I do not want the bear. I never want to see another
Panda ever again.
You sound sad about your Twinkies. This is an American food item?
Yes.
They must be delicious. I think I would like to enjoy one myself.
They are not delicious. They taste wretched.
Mr. Larch, why on earth do you possess five cases of Twinkies if you
detest them?
Listen honey . . .
My name is Soraya.
Soraya. Sweetie. The company that used to make them closed the factory.
I bought them to resell on eBay. But listen, Soraya, I am more concerned
that I have a bear in the house. Can you like use your computer to get
this bear out of here?
I see by your contract you are not supposed to get the Panda. That one
comes with the Ling Ling Plan, not the Link Line. The Ling Ling plan is
designed for public organizations like the San Diego Zoo. That explains
everything! Someone made a mistake!
Well I am glad that is all cleared up. Geez, and it had to be me.
Just be glad you didn't get the Leaping Leo Plan. I am so sorry. It looks
like someone made a typo. This is not good.
More than a typo, ma'am. My place is a mess and . . . oh no! No, no,
no, no! (Sounds of anguish)
What is it Mr. Larch! What has happened!
Soraya no living creature ever should eat five cases of Twinkies in one
sitting, not even a Panda.
I am given to understand that they prefer fresh bamboo.
Yeah, well, he is still a bear. And five cases of twinkies along with
the pot roast, all the potatoes, the bread and the oatmeal gotta go in
one of two directions, up or down.
I am afraid to ask. Which way did it go?
Mother's ottoman. It's ruined! What have you people done to me?!
I am so very sorry Mr. Larch, but you must return that bear quickly or
you are going to be charged a lot of money.
Can't you come get it yourself?
I cannot, Mr. Larch.
Why not? Why cannot you come to get your bear out of my house?
I cannot come to you Mr. Larch, although I feel your pain. There is nothing
more I would wish than to be there in America to stand beside you and
maybe hold your hand, for I sense you are distraught.
O please, Soraya! Help me!
I cannot come to you Mr. Larch because you are calling me in the Republic
of Basura Maru which is about five thousand miles away from your location
in California. We are not far from the Philippines. Besides, I am only
a woman who stands about five three weighing no more than 90 pounds. I
simply do not have the skillset to move 500 pound bears. Although I really
would love to visit the United States and enjoy one of your Twinkies.
I was kinda hoping you could get someone from your company to do it.
After all it was your mistake.
I am just working the call desk for Sales, Mr. Larch. I had nothing to
do with this serious error . . . .
No, no, no, I don't mean you personally, Soraya. I meant your company,
MegaTel. I really apologize. I am sorry. I am just upset about the bear.
Apology accepted. You sound like a nice man, Larry. What do you do for
a living?
Well, I own a business . . .
A business owner! And what kind of business is that you own?
We provide service animals to people with, uh, certain kinds of problems.
And therapy.
You sound like an intelligent man. Do you do this alone?
Ah, no the therapist is Ms. Light. And there are the dog trainers. .
. .
This Ms. Light is your wife?
Ah, no. I do not think she is so interested in men per se.
Are you married?
Uh, no . . .
You should think about it. You own a business. I see your age here from
the credit check . . . . You know I am not married either and people tell
me that I am not so bad looking even after I cut my hair short because
that shipping clerk Amir kept doing things to my locks. He is probably
the one who sent you the bear. You know I am about your age. Younger of
course.
Amir? Soraya? Where did you say you are located?
Ah! You are perceptive. We obtained independence from India in 1984.
We were annexed by India when they got their own independence from Great
Britain.
But that was many years before 1984. I did not know India had any colonies.
Oh heck there goes the lamp . . .
Neither did India. It all came out when Hammi Rajaput, our tax collector
and Minister of Revenue got sent to prison. He had been taking all the
money that was supposed to go to New Delhi and squirreling it away in
a private Swiss bank account. India was embarrassed it owned a colony
of any kind, so they granted us independence without a fight.
There can't be that much revenue there.
There is fishing -- mostly codfish. We ship a lot of salt cod to Minnesota
for some reason. And tourism. You should come visit sometime. I is very
very very quiet. I could arrange for you a place to stay . . . .
Uh, thanks for the offer, but I need to deal with this bear. I am very
upset about this.
May I suggest Ambien?
Actually I take Trazadone . . . .
No, not for you, Larry. Give it to the bear. Stuff a twinkie with half
a bottle. When he's asleep, shove him out the door. We do need to get
the phone back though.
I don't have to pay for the bear?
Larry, my darling, for you I will arrange the paperwork so that this
thing will look like it never happened. Only because you sound like a
nice man and I so much want to make this MegaTel customer happy. You will
not have to worry about a thing. As for the bear, if the Ambien does not
work, dear Larry, call the police. Just do not mention MegaTel.
Soraya, thank you so much!
My pleasure. And my extension when you wish to speak to me next is 395.
Well I don't know how to express my gratitude.
O I can think of a few things. We'll be in touch.
O really?
After all, I have your number and I know where you live. Bye bye and
thank you for choosing MegaTel to be your partner for life . . . .
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old Cannery with its
leaf-scattered loading docks, its ghosts and its weedy railbed, moaned
between the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked
past the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
APRIL 20, 2014
CHERRY CHERRY!
The "cherry" referenced here is the Cherry Blossom Festival
in Japantown where this gal performed some acrobatics. A full shot of
the sign appears below.
James Hargis is a talented artist living now in San Francisco where he
has been trolling about with a camera taking quick shots of things quirky
in the City. He has what is believed the largest photo collection of the
"Mar Squid", which now appears just about everywhere on every
corner in Babylon across the water. He has not exhibited his work for
a while, so if you want to view the various incarnations of this odd graffito,
which appears to be the work of one single person, then you must Facebook
friend him.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
Got a couple distressing items about long-term business residents packing
up shop and leaving. Most people who care about wine know that Rosenblum
Cellars moved its wine production facillity to Beaulieu Vineyards in Napa
Valley in 2010, after the sale by the Rosenblum family to mega-corporation
Diageo in 2008.
Founded in Oakland in 1978, Rosenblum moved into its Alameda facility
in 1987. While the winery produces a diverse portfolio of wines, it was
considered a leading producer of Zinfandel and Rhône varietals in
California. Over the years it cultivated a devoted group of customers,
who traditionally flocked to its quarterly parties at the winery. "The
open houses were truly nuts," said former Rosenblum winemaker Jeff
Cohn.
London-based Diageo, which owns liquor brands such as Smirnoff, José
Cuervo and Tanqueray, has struggled in the global economic downturn but
recently reported that third-quarter 2009 sales rose 12 percent. The company
has been slashing overhead at Rosenblum for some time, eliminating single-vineyard-designated
wines from its once formidable list.
Now we hear from Bizjournal that Rosenblum Cellars is relocating its
Alameda tasting room and visitors center to Jack London Square in Oakland,
due possibly to the decline in attendance to the special tasting events
on the Island.
The new location is three miles from its current tasting room in Alameda,
and is much more easily accessible by public transit and freeway, officials
said.
The new tasting center is slated to open in July, after an existing lease
in Alameda expires in June.
The founder and former owner, Kent Rosenblum didn't think much of the
move at the time, saying, "this is what happens when you let bean
counters run a company." His daughter, Shauna Rosenblum, remains
active in winemaking and has a hand in the Island-based Rockwall winery.
Also distressing is the scuttlebutt that the family which operates the
Party Warehouse on Park Street is planning on retiring soon, which will
involve shuttering the store filled with luau decorations, matching paper
plates and tablecloths, helium and regular balloons and specialized cake
pans as well as seasonal festivity items.
OD YAVO SHALOM ALEINU
So anyway, first off, lets just say strange things happen in Spring.
Furthermore Easter is, of course, when the Magic Bunny of Fertility got
schlockered in a bar and wound up feeling crucified for days afterward
with a terrible hangover. It was only when the Enchanted Chicken of Galilee
dropped by with nice warm Mexican hot chocolate that the Magic Bunny revived
himself. One thing led to another in that place which was dark as a tomb
where somebody had forgotten to lock the door and pretty soon that chicken
was laying eggs everywhere, which goes to show you, if you want to be
a good Samaritan, better take precautions, like a basket of condoms.
There were some Apostles and some Hindus and somehow Mary of Magdalen
got tangled up in this to create what would become the French Meringovian
dynasty, but that is all very confusing for the Pharoah smote the First
borns, which may be an allusion to abstract jazz. Pharoah Sanders is a
nice man and we really do not think he would actually hit anybody. It
may have something to do with walls of sound rising like the tidal waves
of Galilee or the Suez or whatever.
the wine helps forget your troubles
There was a plague of toads and then of locusts and then it rained for
40 days and 40 nights while all the Second Borns got together for a really
nice lamb dinner after escaping slavery. Which is why they all eat library
paste and drink wine. The library paste is supposed to remind you of bricks
and the wine helps forget your troubles and take away the taste of bitter
herbs, which is not a bad idea, really. God knows why you would want to
stick something bitter in your mouth and chew on it, but people do it
anyway.
Over at Marlene and Andre's, everyone settled in for a feast. Marlene
and Andre celebrated Pesach at the Household on Otis in the usual haphazard
manner. A table got laid out, actually it was the coffee table in the
main room, with the usual condiments of horseradish and walnut mush and
salad from the dollar store. Marlene had saved up her pennies and gotten
a donation from Suan to get a lamb shank from the Encinal Market, so they
had the meat and the bone at once. All the parsley was doing well, so
they had the dipping greens from the ironmongery garden out back. Occasional
Quentin, as the obvious childish one, got to ask all the questions, even
though Adam really was younger in age.
A visitor named Baba kept insisting on her needs. "I need to have
clean and kosher napkins. So give me yours," Baba said to Quentin.
Given that the household was normally chaotic, so went the Seder once
again this year as per Tradition. Island-life Tradition.
Instead of asking the proper questions from the Haggadah, Quentin came
up with his own. "Why did G-d let Hitler kill all the Jews?"
Quentin asked, and naturally it was all at the wrong moment. Martini came
in then and drank up the glass of wine left out for the Prophet on the
edge of the table, which caused Andre much grief and severely put out
Marlene who put her head in her hands.
"I need to sit where it is warm on account of my condition,"
Baba said. "Since you have the comfy chair, i am doing to take the
divan and the settee for my feet."
"Is anybody going to eat that egg?" Tipitina said. She had
given up on her own Catholic upbringing to attend this dinner and all
of it was confusing to her.
"Where's the damn cracker I saw around here earlier?" said
Marsha. "I wanna get into that sweet stuff there with the walnuts
and raisins."
"That's the afikomen," said Marlene. "You gotta go find
it now. It's hidden. What are you doing with the effing prophet's wine
you dimshit!" This last part was screamed at the hapless Martini.
"Because there is no god and he hated the Jews," shouted Andre
at Quentin. "Now read the questions we gave you on the list!"
"How can I find any damn thing in this effing s***hole of a place!
It's an effing s***storm here!" Marsha said. She was a woman with
a tongue on her, so to speak.
"Gimmee some more of that wine," Snuffles said, for the bum
had also been invited in as the token foreigner, or maybe the prophet,
although there was a lot of doubt about that last part.
The new kid, Adam, also was there. "Yo dude. Don't bogart that bottle
man!"
Why is this night different from any other
"Why are we doing all this crap," Quentin asked. "Why
is this night different from any other." Adam was younger in physical
age but all agreed that Quentin was much more childlike, so to him were
given the questions.
"I need water," Baba said. "You have the napkins already
over there. So the water jug should be over here by me."
"There you go," said Andre approvingly. "You finally got
it right. We basically doing this to commemorate our delivery from slavery."
"I dunno about that. We be free? I think we be pretty effed up."
Adam said.
"Dude," said Arthur, who had returned from far off Minnesotta
and his failed attempt to hook up with a gospel singer there. "You
don't know nothing about slavery. Lemmee tell you about my man Malcolm
X . . .".
"Adam, I am watching you on the alcohol, buddy! You gotta go to
school Monday!" Andre said. "I mean it!"
"Yuck! This stuff is bitter!" Adam had a mouthful of green
silage from the odd plate in the center with its four divisions and he
spat the mess into a napkin.
"Dat odder stuff is schweet," Snuffles said, and he ploughed
a matzo into the haroset then shoveled the pile into his toothless mouth
with only a moderate amount of flying crumbs, dripping wine sauce and
spittle trajectories.
Adam got shut off from the wine and after that things went a bit smoother.
And Marsha told her story of escaping across the wide country from the
servitude of Jersey, her beating by her husband there and her shame and
her battle with the booze, and Javier talked about crossing the vast Sonora
Desert and then the Border at the Rio Grande and working in the fields
with los Migras and sleeping under the trucks to get away from the sun,
and so it was learned that each of us had been slaves in some form, either
in Egypt or some other place and had crossed the vast ocean on dry feet
and soaked straw and clay bricks with the hot salt of tears and sweat.
All knew exile and wandering and the pain thereof.
this year in fear and shame, next year in virtue and justice
The matzo bread was found by Adam after a great deal of clambering under
Andre's shirt and so the proscribed was allowed now and with each glass
of wine the far off hills began to skip like rams and old stories were
told and so, although it was not a perfect Tradition, it was a Tradition
of that household, this year in fear and shame, next year in virtue and
justice, with the next year always getting postponed until the next and
this sort of delay had been going on since the time of Moses when they
refused him a Visa to Palestine.
"Hey I led the people through the desert for 40 years and kicked
serious ass over that golden calf idol thing, I deserve entry to the Promised
Land."
"Sorry dude. Go back to the desert and do not pass Go, do not collect
200 shekels. You should'na busted up those tablets I gave you. Talk about
a law breaker! Your papers are not in order."
"Oy, I knew it; G-d is a German. Vey iss mir!" Wailing, sackcloth,
ashes. The whole bit.
"When I invent Germany, then you really will be sorry. You stiff-necked
people I parted the Red Sea for you and got you out of that Egypt where
the cockroaches are as big as housecats. I have no idea why I chose you."
"I am not so sure it is to advantage to always be Chosen. 40 years
in the desert without even a decent map."
"Okay so I relent a little bit. I give you a peak on what the place
looks like. The place your family gets to settle -- maybe with some quibbles
with the neighbors -- every neighborhood has got to have neighbors. So
there! See that . . . !"
"Oy, mein Gott, mein Gott! Is beautiful!"
"Hey what did I say about taking my name in vain? There you go again,
Moses. You always get yourself into trouble."
"All right you said that, but you never wrote it down . . . ".
"Yes I did!"
"Like where?"
"On those effing tablets you broke in a rage, you imbecile! Moses,
Moses, Moses! In you I have entrusted the patriarchy for five thousand
years worth of generations and this is the way you act."
"I don't get to go in for just, like a little bit?"
"No."
"Not even a short vacation?"
"No."
"Maybe some fruit from a tree there . . . ".
"Don't go there Moses. I am still sore about the last time fruit
was involved."
"How about like one of those house-swap deals like they do . . ."
"NO!" Voice of thunder. Mountains cracking. Skies clouding
over.
Jesus Contreras, in order to avoid that terrible dream in which he became
the actual original Jesus, who suffered all kinds of mean, nasty, cruel
things like scourging and thorns and piercings and crucifragem and heaps
of insults on top of that even, and Jesus, our Jesus (pronounced hay-zoos),
went through all that in his dream last year, so he made the effort to
stay up all night. So Jesus went to hang with his buds at Silvio's place
and they all sat around watching Incredibly Strange Wrestling and drinking
beer. Naturally, this sort of thing petered out for most of his homies
in the early hours of the morning, precisely the most dangerous time for
dreams.
In terror, Jesus snapped abruptly awake amid all his snoozing mates and
made a beeline in the dim light of the DVR screen to the bathroom where
he ran into Maggie, the Irish girl who had fled her hometown of Wicklow
so as to escape getting sent to the Magdalene Launderies on account of
getting pregnant out of wedlock. The boy absconded and the child died.
In any case Maggie stood there in her nightshirt, woozy from Trazadone,
and Jesus stood there, unsteady from beer and lack of sleep and anxiety.
"Whats your problem," Maggie said.
"I can't sleep," said Jesus. "And I gotta piss."
"Don't let me stop you," Maggie said. She was an Irish girl
with red hair and could be short.
Jesus stumbled to the loo and managed to get most of the stream into
the pot, splashing a bit, and all was fine until he reached for a paper
towel with his pants still down and fell over into the tub, taking a towel
rack and a shampoo shelf with him in his wooziness. In a tangle there
he freed himself from his pants and the towel rack and that is when Maggie
came in wondering what the hell as the entire house was then asleep save
for those two.
"What the hell are you doing?" Maggie said.
"I am taking a piss if you mind," Jesus said.
"It looks like you are trying to bathe with the laundry." Maggie
said. "Are you all right?"
"I fell," Jesus said. "So is the nature of man."
"Let me help you, you sodding fool," Maggie said.
So that is when Maggie disentangled Jesus, but without finding his pants
and when they went back to find where Jesus was to sleep, Jorge had already
taken the cot in a drunken stupor, so Maggie offered her bed and so that
is how Jesus got through the final hours of the terrible Easter time --
by sleeping with Maggie in her bed without his pants and when both of
them awoke the following morning there was a resurrection of a kind that
was handled in the usual way as is the nature of man.
The Editor strolled the aisles of the Island-Life newsroom, shutting
off this and that desklamp with a feeling a great change was coming. Soon
there would be another parting of the Red Sea, another passage across
the desert. The moon was waning, but still glowed with three-quarter force
from that red eclipse of last week.
Something may have arisen, but there remains more to save
We may have evaded disaster but yet more is to come. Something may have
arisen, but there remains more to save. Spring erupts as it always has
with tremendous force, scattering seed pods hither and yon. And the girl
on the ferry with the dancer's tights and short skirt still haunts the
dreams of Denby as he trolls for another gig to take him out of this place,
this broken place of dying dreams that always smells of cheap wine and
cigarettes.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old Cannery with its
leaf-scattered loading docks, its ghosts and its weedy railbed, moaned
between the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked
past the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
APRIL 13, 2014
SOUTHERN CROSS
This week's photo comes from Tammy and is of a floating wharf at one
of the marinas. This is just to remind you folks that we do indeed live
on an island.
NEW TIMES NEW TIMES NEW NEW NEW TIMES!
This week we dropped in to a sparsely attended meeting in which CALTRANS
representatives presented the plans that involved the next stage of the
Nimitz overhaul. It is now our turn for the massive project, which this
time will handle the 29th and 23rd Street access ramps with associated
overpasses and pedestrian as well as bicycle thoroughfares, which directly
affects Islanders seeking something so mundane as commuting to work.
The project still needs to go to bid for a contractor to actually do
the work, but the way things look the process has already developed a
juggernaut momentum in all its phases.
The construction begins this summer on CALTRANS Project 717.0, perhaps
as soon as June, but that is overly optimistic. Time frame features major
work going on from August of this year to 2018. That's right, the main
access to the Island will be under construction for five years or more,
so you better get used to it.
Phase I begins with a soundwall on 880 between 29th and 23rd Avenues,
northbound direction.
The representatives there solumnly assured us that no access services
will be hindered -- which is frankly preposterous -- so we have to consider
that going forward will involve more of the same. If you recall the onset
at High Street with its infamous piledriver, some of the same stuff will
be happening here again.
You can go to AlamedaCTC.org to learn more about funding for this fellow.
There is a facebook page called i880corridor but no one has updated that
page since last year. The actual website, www.i880corridor.com appears
to have been hacked -- the page displays only what appears to be Chinese.
The city website has only its general EIR about the Point development,
which references the 2009 proposal document you find at Caltrans. Go look
at the EIR at http://alamedaca.gov/sites/default/files/department-files/2013-09-03/4c_traffic.pdf
The City of Oakland has a document that outlines zoning and proposals
all along the estuary, referencing this project as well as the Tidelands
protection emphasis, which ought to put a serious kink in those people
who want to build 25 story highrises on the water. Have a look at OAKLAND
ESTUARY ZONING PDF and pay attention to the way the different sections
are divvied up for land use.
There is a website devoted to this project alone and it is published
nowhere, nohow and to nobody but right here, so write it down people!
Go to http://www.dot.ca.gov/dist4/projects/88023rd29thovercrossing.
Otherwise, your GoTo Goddess on this project shall be Roquel Johnson,
Branch Chief, at 286-6445. She'll be happy to answer the easy questions
and give you all the documentation in alternative formats you need.
Last year the Sun wrote a piece on this proposed work. According to the
January 27, 2012 article, Local Traffic Changes on Tap, by Eric Sagata,
"Currently, two freeway overpasses at 23rd Avenue provide drivers
with four lanes in addition to a direct onramp onto northbound I-880.
The proposed project would replace these overpasses with a single three-lane
bridge equipped with a traffic signal that would allow drivers access
to a new northbound I-880 onramp. At 29th Avenue, the MTC proposes that
the current two-lane overpass be demolished and replaced with a four-lane
bridge.
The plans would divert traffic onto 29th Avenue and off 23rd Avenue.
Additionally, the new northbound I-880 exit at 29th Avenue would eliminate
the need for drivers to make a U-turn at the 23rd Avenue off ramp signal
in order to reach the Park Street Bridge."
Perhaps because of the midweek timing for the meeting, or perhaps due
to general Island "Developer Burnout" with regard to the many
projects that seem to be part of a general "land rush" few attended
the meeting this week and of those, most public comments complained about
graffiti problems more than construction inconvenience, or the fact that
even the project proposal notes, "the impact on eastbound Alameda
traffic knowingly will increase a backlog along Park Street and feeder
streets in Alameda by 10 to 20 percent." Additionally, by eliminating
one of two bridges, "Instead of a free flowing entrance onto the
I-880 for nonrush hour traffic, vehicles will have to wait at a new traffic
signal on the Park Street bridge. Traffic models show that the redesign
can back up traffic all the way into Alameda.
So why in Sam Hill is Caltrans doing things this way? A gander at the
proposed finished project shows extensive greenscaping around 23rd, which
no longer will be an accessway to the Island by design of the project.
Now the extensive estuary development plans by independent parties start
to make sense, for with all traffic bottled up on the Island, that entire
area becomes much more desireable for upscale property development.
A major landholder of parcels on the estuary did show up at the meeting
in the form of Jim Connolly, who has his own plans for a 25 story highrise
or two, albeit he did say privately "I'll never see that one realized
in my lifetime."
Mr. Connolly pooh-poohed the nervous concerns about graffitti as much
ado about nothing, suggesting local artists get hired to muralize the
walls, which has proven effective in other areas. Only one visitor presented
a question, besides us, concerning traffic impact during construction.
The official answer is that there will be backups, but no access services
will be inhibited. That and a sack of salt grains will take you far in
this world.
NOCTURNE
So anyway, why on earth would anyone convert from Lutheranism to Catholicism?
That is like changing your suit from formal tux with a nice boutonniere
to a gaudy harlequin's outfit that seems fun at first, but which features
a barbed wire chastity belt and explosive dingle-balls.
So anyway again. People always think it is going to be somehow better
over there on the other side of the fence. The high population of California
has this sentiment for which to thank.
The high fogs have rolled in, which is for the Bay Area the sure signal
that things are about to change. The box elders have sprouted out, and
now the clouds of midges that will become the swarms under your deck are
circling about. Fat squirrels lumber along the fence. Cherry blossoms
are erupting in all the strip mall parking lots and bunches of golden
poppies now glow at every corner. The Calla lilies, the Calla lilies are
in blewm again.
Denby had to get over to The City to handle some business at the Federal
Building there and he elected, because it was a light day of Spring air
to take the Blue and Gold Ferry from the old Landing where the new floating
wharf sits guarded by chainlink fences and an automatic gate at the pierhead,
which was not there some ten years ago. The old landing pier juts out
dangerously with fallen timbers and rotting piles to the left. Naturally
kids love to scamper all over the thing despite the most strict warnings
about something bad sure to happen as punishment. As it was a windy, chill
day, despite the sun, he put on his dustcoat and his travelling hat from
Ireland.
The ferry, a trifoil, scudded over the waves to Babylon where Denby debarked
and entered the vast swirl of humanity that is now the Golden Gate, a
teeming metropolis that still bursts with extraordinary energy, despite
all the degredations. It was late as he boarded with a throng of the initial
rush hours crowd the return ferry , which turned out to be the older,
sturdy three tier ship called the Encinal. He made his way to the aft
cabin area and found a place to stand while ernest dot-commers and Google
employees and traders from the PSE remained riveted to their laptop screens.
It being a Friday, some people were sipping glasses of wine from the bar,
chatting among themselves. As was the custom on this ferry, a band of
musicians had collected to play jazz, each performer remained on the boat
through a roundtrip as another bandmate got off work to join them. On
this trip, after the group had done something Coltrane, the keyboardist
performed a Chopin Nocturne with the sun setting behind the hump of San
Bruno and the lights coming up all down the peninsula as they steamed
toward the estuary mouth lighting up to left and right now with the arc
lamps of the port and the old Navy Base.
A woman stood there, dressed in black tights and a short skirt, Her black
hair was cut short the way artists do so as to avoid the fuss and she
looked to Denby to be starkly beautiful there leaning against the rail,
and when she turned her head her eyes caught Denby staring at her and
she stared back, then looked away. There are rules about staring in public.
He moved his eyes and studied the tattoos that covered her right arm.
He imagined that she was listening to the music and hearing the same
things he heard, because even though he was a trained musician, it was
clear she was a trained dancer of some kind. Yet again, most long term
relationships and marriages are packed with such imaginings.
Does she hear what I am hearing? In that is all the heartbreak of men
and women throughout time.
"I like your hat," she said.
He nodded. "A gentleman never goes out without his hat. Someday
I hope to become a gentleman."
Something made him go to the bar and buy a couple roses there, but the
commotion of the landing arrival enveloped him in a sea of faces.
At that moment the horn sounded and the rush for the exits began and
she was lost in the swirl of humanity seeking the warmth of home and sanctuary.
And he was left there, a man in a dustcoat, waiting upon the landing,
a seed feeling the ache of Spring's longing to become something.
In the Offices of the Island-Life Newsroom, the Editor relit his cigar.
His advice to Denby would be this: Do not fall in Love for it will stick
to your face.
Outside the Blakean clouds scudded past the face of the waxing moon,
the moon who surveys all at all hours with an impassive watch.
A bunch of roses floated down the estuary where someone had flung them
in frustration or despair. The Iranian spy submarine, El Chadoor, lowered
its all-seeing periscope after the men had breathed the scent of lemon
verbena, and recalled each to his own, the distant and longed-for gardens
of Qom, not seen or felt for many years during this strange, long, perhaps
forgotten mission.
Many years ago the men had been sent out on this spy submarine to keep
an eye on the activities of one of the world's busiest shipping ports,
but as time had passed, the sensation that their mission had been administratively
lost, shuffled into the wrong folder, misfiled and miscategorized so that
all they did counted for nothing any more save the chunk of the bureaucrat's
official stamp upon papers authorizing resupplies that were provided only
because nobody ever had thought to issue an official order to terminate
the mission which had long since lost focus.
Nevertheless Commander Abram remained steadfast in his duty and adherance
to original orders and he would pursue his mission until High Command
or God should command otherwise. The periscope descended and his men and
his sub with all of its terrible longings for home and the the rites of
Spring ran silent, ran deep, beneath the great arch of the Golden Gate
out to the ocean.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old Cannery with its
leaf-scattered loading docks, its ghosts and its weedy railbed, moaned
between the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked
past the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
APRIL 6, 2014
RIDERS ON THE STORM
This week's foto comes from Cindy Manit, who is a businesswoman, yoga
guru, entrepreneur based in Babylon across the water. She calls this one
"After the Rain."
WHAT'S THE BUZZ
Here are some PSA announcements from BART about some goings on with the
transit agency. You probably already know the Hegenberger approach to
the airport is under construction so expect some delays that way on getting
to your flight.
AC Transit Board To Hold Its Meeting In The Community
Directors Take Policy Discussions To El Cerrito Riders/Public
In an effort to increase public input and make its meeting more accessible,
the AC Transit Board of Directors will convene its regularly scheduled
meeting next week in El Cerrito.
On Wednesday, April 9, 2014, the directors will meet in the El Cerrito
City Council Chambers instead of its usual meeting place at the AC Transit
headquarters in downtown Oakland. The meeting will start at 5:00 p.m.
in the Council Chambers, located at 10890 San Pablo Avenue.
The change of venue will give bus riders and the general public in west
Contra Costa County an opportunity to more easily attend and participate
in a board meeting.
Among other things, the board is expected to consider:
" Planning for implementation of fare changes effective July 1, 2014
" Regional planning process for the next generation of the Clipper
fare-payment system
" Procurement of ten small transit vehicles
" Assessment of route performance by service category
" Proposed revisions to policies related to Title VI (Civil Rights
Act) compliance
" Solar power installations at District facilities
The full meeting agenda and materials will be posted on Friday, April
4 (click on "Board Meetings" from the (homepage).
Also from ACTransit, there is news regarding the upcoming line 51 changes,
which were discussed here in public meetings. Here is the scoop from Cynthia
Vincent.
A Go-Ahead for AC Transit Bus Improvement Plan
Berkeley City Council approves "Line 51A&B Corridor Delay Reduction/Sustainability
Project"
AC Transit has won approval from the Berkeley City Council to proceed
with a construction project to improve traffic flow along one of the East
Bay's busiest and most congested transit corridors.
The Council approval means AC Transit can now complete construction of
"Line 51A&B Corridor Delay Reduction/Sustainability Project"
which includes nearly $3 million in traffic and street improvements from
the Berkeley Marina to the Rockridge BART station, via University, Shattuck
and College avenues.
The improvements include bus stop relocations, traffic signal coordination,
priority and upgrades, queue jumps, bus bulbs and more.
The project's primary objective is to increase the speed and reliability
of the service. But it will also improve the pedestrian experience and
the streetscape with bus bulbs that add public space and shorten street
crossings for pedestrians. It does all this without impacting other users
of the street, whether in cars, on bikes or on foot.
As two of the most heavily used bus routes in the East Bay, Lines 51A
and 51B combined carry 19,000 passengers a day to Berkeley, Oakland, and
Alameda. At times, service along the entire 15-mile stretch has been unreliable
due to bus bunching, late vehicle arrivals and overcrowded buses.
AC Transit has received a $10.5 million grant to design and implement
infrastructure modifications along the route that would increase reliability
and on-time performance, decrease travel time, and improve safety for
AC Transit riders and pedestrians.
Construction of the project is due to begin in June, pending final approvals
from the cities of Oakland and Alameda. For more information about the
proposed improvements, go online at http://www.actransit.org/line51.
One of the main impacts here will be fewer stops for the line along its
main route (editorial).
We are gearing up the Calendar again for the Spring and Summer seasons,
so look to that for events. Please pay attention to two major changes
in annual East Bay Events. Note that the Vallejo Pirate Festival now charges
admission for their two day extravaganza. Still cheaper and more entertaining
than a Brittany Spears concert -- and probably more wholesome in an ironic
way.
Also note that the annual Juneteenth Celebration has shifted to the 21st
in Vallejo, probably to avoid crossover traffic from the Pirate festival,
which has a very different orientation as well as level of seriousness.
LIKE THE WEATHER
Got the seasonal rainfall report from Mike Rettie who has been keeping
track of rainfall since 1998. The recent dockwallopers might persuade
people to be cavalier about the rain, but looking at the historical record
we see the miserable performance of 2013, which totted up no more than
5.21 inches of rain for the entire year (as compared to a 15 year average
of 18.x inches) we see we are still well under what we need. The seasonal
total, including the miserly January that added a scant .04 inches, we
have 8.41 inches, which sometimes has been a single monthly addition in
past years. We now move into the dry season which typically adds less
than 1 inch of rain from May to the end of September. To meet the 15 year
average we would have to get 8 inches of rain from October through December.
That is highly unlikely to happen. In the unusual year of 2002 we had
10.58 inches of rain in December, which caused widespread destruction
and havoc.
IF IT WERE NOT FOR BAD LUCK (I'D HAVE NO LUCK AT ALL)
So anyway, a dockwalloper set in, perhaps the last one of the year until
Fall, leaving the entire place drenched in cold water and putting off
that Endless Summer everybody talks about. All the residents at Marlene
and Andre's Household have been fussing and fighting in the cramped quarters
of bunkbeds and people sleeping on floors and Occasional Quentin sleeping
under the coffee table and for everybody it has been a long, hard winter,
a time of privation and denial and annoyance.
Larry took a walk out on the mudflats during the lowtide to dig for geoduck
with his dog Incontinence. The mudflats are a good place to go walk a
dog, especially one with a name like that. Larry did not bring a scooper
or a plastic bag and his dog, a basic schnauzer, ran happily about chasing
sand crabs and plashing through the tidepools.
The island hard-pack mudflats extend a good two hundred yards out into
the Bay when its low tide. Beyond the shelf there the water drops abruptly.
They are caused by currents slowed coming around the point and by a sense
of general indolence in this part of the world where so much settles due
to inertia and lack of impulse.
Larry was out there a good while, filling his bucket with the evasive
long-necked clams as the light began to fade and after a good hour of
chasing one difficult fellow with his shovel he looked up to find himself
on a sandbar as the tide came in. Incontinence was nowhere to be found.
"Hey!" He called out. "Hey! You Pisser, where you got
off to?"
He looked about for his dog and switched on his pocket torch, but the
animal had vanished. He went out a bit further and saw the incoming water
and then went back to see that a strip of water now separated himself
from the rest of the mudflats. There was nothing for it but to get wet
-- he was all soiled from the digging anyway, and so he marched into the
water with his bucket and his shovel. Of course he sunk right down in
the softened sand and spilled his bucket and lost his shovel and fell
right over besides. Now geoduck, lacking arms, legs and any other appendages,
tend not to move fast, but each clam represented a few hours of work digging
and so Larry was much put out as he scrambled to recover what he could
in the fading light, snagging those long-necked critters who flailed away
with no desire to be eaten by Larry or anybody else for that matter.
By the time he had recovered his damn shovel and his bucket of clams,
the water was coming in fast and he still stood a good 150 yards from
shore, separate by decreasing islands of packed sand and broad bands of
dark salt water.
He scrambled out of there and moved along a sand bar to the next passage
of water, through which he bulled his way onto another sandbar that seemed
to arc out away from shore, but get close to another one which stood a
better chance of getting back in. He could angle in along this one, but
the pool there shone black with reflections of the shorelights and this
way did not look so good as the first.
So he ambled out the far way and when he got there, this way did not
look promising at all, for the incoming water made a foam by its rush
there and the shore lights shone bright on the water with no sign of depth
and so he decided to head back the first way. Naturally by the time he
had zigzagged back the way he had come and found the narrowest spot, the
strait had widened. He stood looking at this problem and at the half dozen
problems that lay beyond it and as he stood there the water came up and
filled his shoes.
He sloshed through this with the water coming up to his waist, his bucket
and shovel held high and climbed up onto another sandbar. He went out
far to the left where it got dark and he could not see the end of the
bar or where the crossing would be, then returned to the right, where
he again stood for a moment regarding the crossing with his shovel and
his bucket and the thought occurred to him, perhaps he should just drop
the bucket and the shovel right now for the situation was getting quite
serious. He was still 80 yards from shore and the water was making the
little sandbars disappear all around him.
It accord to him that he might die there as the tide came in, just like
those people in Maylasian Flight 370, and just like them with no more
say in the matter. It's all like that. One day you are out digging for
clams and the next you are nowhere to be found and there are people sitting
in some church basement sipping really bad coffee with execrable bunt
cake to have with it and they are talking about you. "Well who do
you think got the dog?" O that dog? I suppose they took it to the
pound. Well what about his truck? I think the family sold that. No they
gave that to the Immanuel Church for Reverend Bauer. Is he the Minister
who rides a motorcycle? I think a truck is more appropriate if you ask
my opinion. Well I don't know. He was a queer sort of fellow, if you want
my opinion. He was not queer -- wasn't he together with that Linda Light?
You know -- the one with the hair? O don't know anything about that --
I think they were just business partners, if you know what I mean. What
happened to the curtains I want to know. Who brought in the sandwiches,
I would like to know. Was that Looney's BBQ?
They did not talk about his mountain climbing or the time he had survived
that plane crash in the jungles of Ecuador. They did not talk about his
years of dedicated work at the the firm of Crimson Assurance, LTD. They
did not talk about any of that.
And that is the way it is when you die. People don't care about you or
your feelings or all the things you did. As if they ever. They care about
what you own and whether they stand to get any of it and all about the
ham and cheese sandwiches in the next room.
This so distressed Larry that he gave a mighty cry and thrust forward
across the sandbars with his shovel held before him like a lance barging
through the incoming water until he got to the beach and there found Incontinence
waiting patiently with a look that said, "Ok, now we go home and
I get something to eat and I will sleep at the foot of the bed as usual.
The terrible thing about near death is that nothing really changes. Nobody
really gives a flat flying damn and life goes on as usual, indifferently
as if you were not there ever to begin with. The tide comes in, the sandbars
vanish as usual, the lights reflect upon the water. The dog barks.
On the way back, instead of a case of beer, Larry bought a bottle of
Old Bushmills and, the first thing he did on entering his apartment was
pour himself a glass, much to the distress of his dog, who whined in front
of his supper dish.
The glass of liquid in his hand looked golden by the light of the kitchen
lamp and the aroma of smoky peat bogs wafted from there -- or his salt-sodden
clothes. There is good reason they call it the "Water of Life",
for the sure fire that descends reminds us that Life is no cakewalk and
desire comes with a burning that destroys all that came before. One is
alive for now in this moment -- there is not another moment to waste.
He made a mental note to talk about this with Padraic at the first opportunity.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old Cannery with its
its leaf-scattered loading docks, its ghosts and its weedy railbed, moaned
between the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked
past the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
MARCH 30, 2014
SAKURA SAKURA
Nothing says it quite like the annual effusion of those randy cherry
blossom trees, which bloom all over the island. This pair is part of a
dozen or so that enliven the Mariner Square parkinglot.
The song, Sakura Sakura is not an ancient folksong but a relatively modern
one dating from the Edo period. It was as adopted as a piece for beginning
koto students in the Tokyo Academy of Music Collection of Japanese Koto
Music issued in 1888 (in English) by the Department of Education. The
song has been popular since the Meiji period, and the lyrics in their
present form were attached then. It is often sung in international settings
as a song representative of Japan.
Cherry Blossoms, Cherry Blossoms
(English Translation)
Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms,
Blanketing the countryside,
As far as you can see.
Is it a mist, or clouds?
Fragrant in the morning sun.
Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms,
Flowers in full bloom.
Cherry blossoms, cherry blossoms,
Across the Spring sky,
As far as you can see.
Is it a mist, or clouds?
Fragrant in the air.
Come now, come,
Lets look, at last!
THIS ISLAND LIFE
Right off we have a PSA for you regarding impending CALTRANS work that
almost certainly will effect YOUR work, or at least getting there on time.
As we wrote a while ago CALTRANS plans to demolish the 23rd Street overpass
and turn that two lane into a single lane passway. They also will be working
on the 29th Street overpass.
So some of you sit there and ponder what this means for your commute
for months upon months, as access to the Fruitvale, 880 on and off ramps,
and the Nimitz structure itself will be altered.
What it means will be discussed Tuesday, April 8 from 6:00pm to 8:00pm
at the Free Library on 155o Oak Street. Estimated costs for this project
start at approximately $75 million dollars.
For more info and alternative format documentation contact CALTRANS District
4 Public Affairs at 286-6445.
About the meeting contact RocQuel Johnson at 286-4948.
For the Official proposal in PDF see the website at
Proposed Overpass Project
Please note that the hyperlink listed in the public handout from CALTRANS
is not valid.
Now that your Monday has been thoroughly ruined, let it be known that
the last Amber alert centered here at Madison Street turned out to be
a false alarm after the girl confessed she made up her story. Brian Rourock,
also an islander, was released from jail with no charges pressing after
a few days of harrowing anxiety under threat of kidnapping and child molestation
charges in Santa Rita.
If you come across Brian, stand the poor fellow a beer, at the very least.
A brief gander across the water indicates the Warfield will be hosting
Ms. Lauryn HIll -- we do hope you pay suitable respect to the lady on
May 12. And another lady about whom you may have heard, Emmylou Harris,
will show up with Daniel Lanois on April 5. Something is happening there
May 6 with a buncha bands, headlined by David Byrne.
Here on the Island, the High Street Cafe has finally decided to commit
itself to being a venue - sort of. They now have an online calendar which
looks a bit sparse at the moment, but has the hopeful number of the booking
agent, Lynda Kretlow at 510-995-8049. Hey, you could be the next Lwellyn
Davis.
First Fridays looks like it will be well into April, but the savvy gallery
owners will be having their openings and receptions on Thursday before
and Saturday after, far from the madding crowd.
ANY STARS IN MY CROWN?
So anyway we had a grand dockwalloper set in this past week, leaving
everything gloriously sodden and sending those DPW trucks everywhere to
pump things out. Another one is slated to arrive Monday, preserving the
old adage, in like a roaring lion and out like a Liberal -- or something
like that.
We have never done well with success -- Liberals and Democrats (not at
all the same thing) -- are way used to being kicked around on the schoolyard
by arrogant bullies, so when it comes around to actually running things,
we tend to screw up badly by picking low-grade trailer park types like
Monica Lewinsky with whom to have affairs, distribute selfies of personal
private parts on the web and kowtow on important legislation to the point
that it perfectly satisfies all our enemies, like the medical insurance
industry, in the name of bipartisanship.
The Other Side fails in more spectacular fashion by adhering to wildly
improbable financial dogma that just does not work in real life, hiring
vastly incompetent fools to do important work just because of family loyalties,
and spending tax money like sailors on shoreleave while accusing the Democrats
of doing just that.
It is now nigh on to April, and two significant events have the boys
in the Old Same Place Bar up in arms. April 16th is a sort of National
Day of Nastiness, and then we have the Primaries of June. Consequently
Papoon and Babar have been spending a fair amount of time in the Local,
gauging the temperature, feeling out the hoi polloi, sounding the vox
popli.
With this weather, people chose places like the Old Same Place Bar to
have their gatherings while the cold rain patters the tiles and the outdoor
tabletops. Each week the parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden West
down by the marina holds the Thursday Mixed Coterie, which features both
men and women volunteers getting together to talk about how to raise money
for the Cleft Palat Foundation. This tends to segue most evenings into
far ranging discussions well fueled by the Old Man Box Wine. Friday nights,
the parlor hosts the weekly poker game with Doyle, the Navaho Wiz, David,
and Wally, with Paul or Ruth's boyfriend Marty and Kitson, and then the
boys get into harder stuff. They have tried various stakes, with Doyle,
a landlord, suggesting entire building units, and Wiz, a cowboy actor,
proposing women.
"I lay you down a Valerie and those two girls we met in Cabo,"
Wiz said. "I still got their numbers and they are up for anything."
This latter suggestion got a vigorous thumbs-down from Ruth, much to
Marty's chagrin.
Eventually it came down to matches and, on one memorable occasion, cans
of beer.
At Marlene and Andre's Household, things are feeling a bit compressed.
With the recent rains, everyone has been huddling inside the cottage,
which at first was fine for all the warmth in the confined space. As the
weeks have dragged on, dank smoldering hose and coats and sweaters trying
desperately to dry out in the submarine closets have yielded to a constant
state of peckishness among the inhabitants.
Sunday brought a respite of gorgeous cold sunshine streaming down, and
all the citizens there spread out into the ironmongery garden and the
porch to soak up the rays the way Californian's are reputed to do. Life
is hard and savage and cruel and unfair. But for now, the sun shone down
to restore vitamin D and sooth the souls of the Household. Out back the
scraggly orange tree which had fought the depredations of squirrels and
rats and basic urban living hung with several oranges the way those trees
will do. The lemon tree fared not so well in this time, for three massive
warty fruits hung from its branches, looking a bit brownish and inclined
to kiwi's in color.
Oranges are significant in California history for it was the growers
who sent out circulars to the East during the Dust Bowl to attract farmers
to the Central Valley, promising "scads of oranges hanging from the
boughs, free to pick for one and all".
Like many California promises, this one turned out to be thoroughly savage
in its retraction. There were oranges to pick enough, all right, so long
as you signed up to be a picker for ten cents on the quarter ton as payment.
For them oranges you had to work, you damned Okie, and be damned as an
Okie for all of that.
And just like their instructors down Dixie way, sack cost you extra for
use. Yes, oranges have a long and complex history here in the Golden State.
Nothing here is so simple as reach up and grab one from the tree. Everything
comes with a consequence, a cost, another extraction.
Pahrump reached up and pulled down a navel orb about to drop, peeled
it and bit into the succulent, bursting fruit. Mankind may be packed with
lies and deceptions and all kinds of nonsense but Nature does not play
games. The odor of orange and sweetness of juice filled Pahrump's senses,
for in that orange was all the knowledge and joy of life. At the end of
the day, all the struggle erodes before what is really important.
In the effulgence of orange-ness, Pahrump had an epiphany.
Pahrump got Jose and a sack and together they brought down several dozen
oranges from the tree. Pahrump strapped the bag on the back of his scooter
and drove out to the Friday night poker game at the Native Son's Parlor,
intending to tell them they had it all wrong. Intending to tell them joy
is in the moment, not in the fiction of history. My people, he would say,
burned the hills each year so as to bring the acorns and restore life.
We have seen our world totally destroyed before our eyes. Yet still the
oranges persist, giving life. Something will always evade your savagery.
Spring will still return to the Dead Lands.
As it turned out, Pahrump failed to signal on turning left off of Grand
Street which caused Officer O'Madhauen to pull him over and then cite
him for contempt and traffiking produce without a license and being suspicion
of DUI. So Pahrump got sent to the jail and his scooter with the oranges
got sent to impound.
In the Offices of the Island-Life news agency, the Editor began to close
down the operation close to midnight. He went along the aisles turning
off the errant desklamp after the housekeeper had left and all the news
desks had gone silent. Now was come the witching hour when all was silent
and still. Lately the issues had been rather perfunctory, glossing over
the news rather than digging into the meat of it, and the Editor had to
think that Denby's preoccupations with his day job had something to do
with it. Everyone's dayjob was a means to an end, a way to pay for getting
the real job done.
If you think about it, this is the truth for everybody. Nobody is really
the definition of what they do anymore.
Out on the deck, the clouds scudded across the waning moon high above
the box elder branches and the budding apple tree, which no one on his
staff had determined convincingly was either a crab apple or a demented
fuji-apple exponent.
He breathed the night air and felt the rising winds and felt also the
small tremors that have been occuring every few hours lately, the incipient
reminder that not even the earth upon which we build and walk can be relied
upon to remain stable.
A great change was coming and he hoped that all were ready for what came,
be it life of Spring or destruction. Time would tell. Drifting on the
heavy air, came the scent of cherry blossoms.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, moaned between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
Sakura Sakura
Sakura sakura
Noyama mo sato mo
Miwatasu kagiri
Kasumi ka kumo ka
Asahi ni niou
Sakura sakura
Hana zakari
Sakura sakura
Yayoi no sora wa
Miwatasu kagiri
Kasumi ka kumo ka
Nioi zo izuru
Izaya izaya
Mini yu kan
MARCH 23, 2014
HEADLINE PHOTO: LIKE A BIRD ON A WIRE
This week's headline photo comes from Tammy who has a regular pair of visitors
drop by. One of them has been named "Pepe", and we think this
is the fellow.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
Finally got around to poking into the Silly Hall meeting agendas of late
and the streaming video of the longish meetings that surely are the punishment
for those seeking their fortune via public office. These meetings carry
their own fascination in being a micro-slice of small town business and
municipal government worth attending at least once in your life if you
ever plan to spend a few decades in a place to wonder just why strange
things like the Park Street deforestation and the high school "Berlin
Wall" ever got proposed by supposedly sane individuals.
Most of these kinds of quasi-public meetings consist of fairly small
potatoes stuff that is mandated by set rules, such as approval of the
cut-and-dried finance micro-budgets in which the money has already been
spent, the sales tax report, or the Babe Ruth playground maintenance contract,
along with street paving and resurfacing (anyone driven Lincoln down near
the intersection with Benton lately?) and similar tedia.
Of late we have been having more adjournments for "closed sessions"
due to the legal foo-fraw going on with land swaps, contested development,
and general public dissatisfaction. On Tuesday, the Council adjourned
for four discussions, one of them regarding Alameda Municipal Power and
its labor pool with regard to a negotiated MOU.
There was an interesting item lumping "construction on Park Street"
with the High Street Bridge, which latter part we knew was slated for
some time as all of the bridges have been worked over one after another
to account for new Caltrans specs for earthquake resiliency. As for "construction
on Park Street," well you thought that was all done after the Walgreens
gets finished.
Generally there is reserved one item that squats there like a grinning
Jabba the Hut. This time around it was the collection of land swaps that
include the Encinal Terminals Area and which are allegedly meant to benefit
the AUSD and satisfy State low income housing requirements by way of granting
land to the Island Housing Authority.
Some people have been complaining about this focus upon low income housing,
but the reality is that the City has long been notorious among the ABAG
Five County system of governments for possessing such wretched or non-existent
public services that some agencies feel "dumped on". This has
resulted in a State rebuke and a threat to fine the City unless it does
something about low income housing here, especially as lucrative development
projects ramp up.
Everyone note that across the water a developer has plans to revamp the
estuary front along the entire length of the Island, putting in some 3,000
dwelling units as part of fulfilling former mayor Jerry Brown's "Bring
in the 10,000" initiative, a plan to revitalized downtown by importing
people who drive European cars and wear silk pyjamas.
This development is most assuredly seen as an opportunity to match the
effort on the near shore here, hence the language we have been hearing
about "the Gateway to Alameda". Which of course at present looks
more like an entrance to a cement mixing plant or a prison than the portals
to Oz.
Clearly there is a land rush going on here, so Island residents who plan
to stay would be advised to pay sharp attention to all the little deals
going on.
And above all, trust nobody. That is a given.
Now for the really important stuff.
Our home boys, Zydeco Flames are performing over at Asheknaz this Tuesday.
Do yourself a favor and report to work Wednesday bleary-eyed, inefficiently
sloppy, and happily danced out, still alive from the night before.
Speaking of local boys, we note that Adam and his Counting Crows appears
at the Greek, fronted by none other than Toad the Wet Sprocket (Walk on
the Water). Tix for the August 15th show are now on sale. Personally we
think the noble Greek is a more intimate venue than that Pavilion out
there in Concord or in Mountain View.
You could do a lot worse than wipe out all traces of the week on Friday
and Saturday night at the Fox with Widespread Panic.
Be also aware that Stringcheese Incident owns three days at the end of
April.
In Oaktown Sacto boy Jackie Greene performed this past Friday, but you
do have Fitz and the Tantrums showing up April 3rd.
Do we need to remind you the not-so-aristocratic Lorde is holding both
Wednesday and Thursday at the Fox? Of course not.
Over in Babylon, we ought to let you know about a special benefit titled
Acoustic-4-a-Cure. This one is to raise money for the pediatric cancer
program at the UCSF Benioff Childrens Hospital and the lineup is pretty
awesome as well as highly unusual for an acoustic gig. Artists appearing
are: (Billing order is alphabetical by last name)
Sammy Hagar
James Hetfield (Metallica)
Billie Joe Armstrong (Green Day)
Scott Mathews
Pat Monahan (Train)
Joe Satriani
Nancy Wilson (Heart)
As Scoop used to say, "If you don't like the music, go out and make
some of your own."
BLACK-EYED DOG IS CALLING MY NAME
So anyway, Spring has indeed arrived. And around here let it be known,
Spring is the Most Dangerous Season.
Yes, Spring is the most dangerous season. Maybe it is different in other
places, but here, wise men remain indoors and order pizza for dinner,
hunker down by the TV to watch endless reruns of Monster Truck Destruction
and Terminator I, II, III and IV. It's safer cuddled there in the dark
lit only by the blackout curtain blocked TV set glow.
Bees dive-bombing the clover, hummingbirds bayoneting the jasmine that
keeps throwing out punches this way and that while sending wafts of chemical
weapons of mass disruption. Army ants on the march in great phalanxes
and squirrels conducting reconnaissance forays add to the mayhem, while
raccoons begin nightly raids. The daisy bush bursts with yellow ack-ack
blooms while the poppies erupt with tiny explosions across the fields.
Squadrons of swallows swooping and diving, duck sorties, and Canadian
geese streak overhead and then, worst of all, there are the girls in their
summer dresses.
Meanwhile, somewhere overhead, flying in stealth mode -- that naked,
blindfolded, fat boy keeps firing off at random his erring arrows of wanton
mishap, those IEDs (Improvised Erotic Designs), wreaking chaos in a wide
swath more terrifying that Sherman's March to the Sea. Squadrons of women
and girls swelling with fatal charms stroll on patrol, their smooth lithe
legs flashing beneath their uniforms: thin summer dresses, haltertops,
daisy-dukes, and god knows what else underneath that armor. If anything.
It's all agitprop left to the imagination.
Observe Johnnie, happy and carefree as a lark, striding with ruddy cheeks
and full confidence. But after him comes Jane, armed with those sharpshooter
eyes, that flippy short skirt, and strappy high heels. Now Johnnie is
down! His face wan and his appetite poor, his breath coming out in ragged
gasps as Jane cradles his head among the wildly blooming, victorious daisies.
Right in the heart, poor lad. A goner for sure.
Yes, Spring is the most dangerous Season.
When the fog rolls back and feminine panzer divisions cruise the Uptown
district in search of some likely target holding his pinsel in his hand
at the galleries, when the leggy Joanne strides forth into the night on
six-inch stilleto heels and Danielle puts on that short black dress and
a European accent spoken with a sultry je ne sais quoi wafting
pheromones among the randy artisans, that is when Don Giovanni and Lola
Lola stalk the Salons for luscious prey.
That is also when The Editor, avoiding the leggy Joanne, stocks up on
Redbox flicks (Netflix now passe), and a fridge filled with Michelina's
frozen dinners so as to avoid the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
especially those arrows sent by that obstreperous hoodlum, Cupid. For
the artsbeat he sends his representative, the hapless Jose who safely
has no more a clue about eros than Faber's Euphonia, and Javier, who knows
a good deal more about eros than someone in his position ought to and
nothing at all about Art save for ogling the odalesque.
Spring is also a time when Mother Nature grabs your attention and, be
you the most rigid, retentive personality on earth, try you and vie you,
you shall not be able, for at least one day, to hold attention as the
mind skips the light fantastic to places that, for all we know, are far
better, more productive, more useful than that blasted spreadsheet demanded
by the CIO by noon.
Which demand shall not be met and shall not be disciplined for that same
day the CIO is herself skipping through the sun-dappled buttercups in
the bee-loud glade of her own mind
People who do not apprehend this truth are assholes and so can be disregarded.
Over at Mariner Square Village, Nick and Drake, the mini-mall's live-in
mascots, appeared together along the border hedges.
Eugene walked out into the backyard garden where the large tree hung
down its seeded branches to meditate upon life and love lost. It had been
a number of weeks since he had broken up with Sabine, the Buddhist nun,
and he still felt a bit peckish. People saw him around town and the ladies
at Jacquelines Salon commented that the fellow did not seem to have his
usual springy step. Moping about the place for sure. Must be some kind
of trouble said Jackie. Ja sure, said Maeve.
Pity the fellow who falls out of love just when everyone else is falling
in. But then Eugene has always had a problem with timing.
Eugene gazed up at the waning moon beneath the tree with his head brushing
the tips of the branches, searching for a romantic moment and soon found
himself cursing and swatting, surrounded by a swirl of boxelder bugs.
In the early dawn Pedro's boat bumped and sloshed through the chop, feeling
the differences in the air. Soon the crab and the other shellfish would
be done and then comes the time of mackerel and tuna. All things have
a season, even the featureless sea.
The Xians were all going through their annual rite of stoic preparation
for that gay release called Mardi Gras, but the Wiccans were meeting in
the park and having delightful parties to commemorate the harmonic convergence.
On a clear night this week everyone stepped out of Marlene and Andre's
Household to sniff the air, along with Bonkers and Wickiwup. Although
a sort of chill pervaded the days, cooled the nights, the golden poppies
had erupted in all the flower boxes and the blank tree bones budded with
green salutations. A great change was coming on and everyone could sense
it.
Out on the green diamond of the baseball park below Washington Park the
Island Whipporwills collected to shake of the winter's cobwebs, unkink
old bones and practice with renewed hope that they would improve on last
year's regrettable season against the Oaktown Bears. This rivalry had
been going on for as long as one can remember. Longer even than the bitter
rivalry between the West End Jets and the East Side Destroyers, an eternal
rivalry over a game among games that knows no time.
Other games feature clocks, stopwatches, flags down on the field, and
set limits, but in baseball, every game played evokes thousands upon thousands
of games going back a hundred years or more. There are not nine or 18
players on the field, but millions, because behind every shortstop stands
the ghosts of every shortstop who ever kicked dirt and spat a wad into
the grass. And every game between East and West is a reverberation of
every other game ever played back to when Willie Stargell rounded the
bases in 1926 to leap over Vladimir Humbert at Third in great leap they
still talk about with "the Fitz" on Second and Ernest Papa on
First, loading the bases so that Clemons could smack that ball sailing
into the blue over Dreiser's head, clear over the cane brake -- which
was much higher back then -- clear over the pond to win that famous game
so long ago.
O that rivalry had been intense for many, many years, and had reached
such intensity that an East Ender was forbidden to date, much less marry
( gawd no!) a West Ender. East Enders got good grades, did not steal,
and always went to good colleges, while the West Enders were undoubtably
ill-bred, possessed of dirt under their fingernails and were inclined,
so it was said, to enjoy things like roller derby and pro wrestling. But
out on the green sward that bordered the high cane brake patch which formed
the Island equivalent of the Big Green Wall, the logical and physical
boundary beyond which all hits were declared homeruns, the sun sparkled
on the huffing fellows and their prospects. A promising fellow named Mateo
had joined them and he had a rangy, casual look about him which gave the
fellows some heart. Perhaps this time they would beat the Oaktown Bears
for the first time.
So the Man from Minot posted himself in far left field, Pimenta Strife
in center, Mateo far right with Lionel on First, David Phipps covering
second base, and Arthur on Third. Wally pitched to Lynette and as it so
happened Susan up at bat as each took turns.
It may surprise some people that Pimenta took any sort of interest in
the game of baseball, but there are always some who enjoy gaming in general
and of course there were many who said that Pimenta enjoyed any game that
involved balls and would go hot after a maple tree so long as it had wood.
Wally lobbed a gentle one in to Susan, which turned out to be a mistake,
for Susan, as a chief mechanic at Berkeley's woman-owned garage, The Tender
Cam, was such a one to not take lightly. The crack of her bat echoed across
the Crab Cove and the ball lobbed high into the sun to the right with
such force and altitude, Susan had jogged half past second before the
orb began to descend. Mateo stood right underneath it and it would have
been a fair catch had not the tremendous AAAAHHHHH-OOOOGAHHHH! of Percy
Worthington-Boughsplatt's immaculate two toned 1929 Mandelville-Brot coupe
had not blasted the peace of the park and had not Percy lowered his top
down to enable Madeline, longstanding member of Berkeley's Explicit Players,
to air her assets in a sort of Spring Celebration of the vernals. With
a nod towards the servicepersonnel serving their country she wore a fetching
sailor's cap and a little patriotic red, white and blue choker.
As people cheered Susan's great hit, Madeline stood up in the car and
Percy tooted his horn again. AAAAHHHHH-OOOOGAHHHH!
It was pretty obvious Madeline was not wearing one of Marvin's merkins.
No member of the Explicit Players would be caught dead in such a thing,
for that would be cheating. They can be found on the 'Ave during the summer,
pounding drums and singing lustily and astonishing the freshmen students
and locals with their vigorous sans culottes philosophy.
Mateo, redblooded ball-player that he was, had to pause and look. That
is when the ball struck him upon the noggin with great force, sending
him down into the outfield. Coming in fast from the left, David collided
with Pimenta in something that seemed could have been avoided, especially
as the Man from Minot somehow seemed to get entangled in this pileup that
landed upon the fallen Mateo, and how that happened is anyone's guess.
Occasional Quentin, watching from the sidelines, thought this was part
of the game and so he rush over and jumped on with great joy, turning
the day's practice into something like a good rugger or a Samuel Beckett
play.
"I've got 'em!" Pimenta shouted.
"That's not the ball!" shouted the Man from Minot.
"O for pete's sake," David said.
That night, the Editor removed his Michelina's Chicken Alfredo gingerly
from the oven, but managed to sear the edge of his thumb on the second
tray (it always takes two of those things to make a meal) despite all
his care. He went out to the garden to break off a stalk of aloe plant
to rub on his burn and noticed that a ball from the Los Semillas pre-school
had come over the fence and lay there next to a fallen avocado from the
tree that now was fruiting. A squirrel or a rat had gotten at the avocado
but the ball he tossed back over the fence, where the kids could find
it next day, and play their stickball game once again in the street, despite
the parental admonitions to be careful of the cars.
Yes, Spring is the most dangerous Season. And in baseball, there is no
Time.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, moaned between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
March 16, 2014
BRIDGE OF SIGHS
.
This week's image comes from James Hargis, who is an artist
living in Babylon who likes to frequent the warmer side of the Bay from
time to time.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
Remember we reported on the severe damage done to "Isabelle's Bench"
in Jackson Park, wondering when the Parks & Rec people would get around
to fixing the vintage 1920 memorial? Looks like a number of people in
power want the bench entirely removed, including Police Chief Noonan,
who says the structure allows criminals to hide from police.
Say that again? The bench hides would-be criminals but the massive bandstand
in the park does not? O wait -- The chief would like to raze that one
too.
The Recreation Commission met this past week to discuss options for the
still massive concrete structure that for 94 years has born the inscription
"To All My Dumb Friends". Isabelle Clark's husband had been
a great lover of animals and the bench had featured a watering trough
for dogs and horses. It would be a shame if yet another quirky aspect
of the Island gets removed, turning the place more each day into just
another version of Newark.
Did you think the Point development, the old Boatworks area development
that's getting a couple hundred homes, the disputed McKay Avenue development
with another 200 homes, the development slated for the triangle at the
Tube entrance off Constitution Way, the new low income development just
finished on Santa Clara between Oak and Walnut, the Park Street Walgreens,
the Target/In-n-out Burger complex, the Tidelands property swap (it is
actually called "Fortman Marina"), and just about anything associated
with Ron Cowan was a bit much, up pops another development, but this time
with familiar Tim Lewis, planning to shovel in 414 homes plus shops on
the site of the old Del Monte warehouse. The location is somewhat inaccurately
described as "corner of Buena Vista and Sherman", however that
is the Wind River Campus. The site extends from Sherman easterly along
Buena Vista and does abut the Wind River parkinglot where Sherman becomes
Atlantic Avenue.
Given that property, which served as a small arms munitions depot during
WWII, could not remain idle for long, it sounds like Sacto-based Tim Lewis
has some good ideas for preserving the 1000 foot long brick building with
its long railroad platform and its distinctive windows.
In more development news, you probably know that Safeway has been purchased
and will meld with Albertsons into an even bigger mega corporation, but
it does sound like there may be an unforeseen upside. We never really
liked the conversion of old Safeway from a place that sold groceries into
a hoity toity joint that sold "lifestyles". Prices went through
the roof over there at the flagship concept store, which is located here
in Alameda at Southshore Shopping Mall.
The workers who stocked the shelves and managed the place were all a
collection of personalities, each with unique character. For years there
was a manager who possessed an idiosyncratic nasal form of vocal delivery.
We called him "Mr. Whipple" and we knew he was in the store
by his distinctive voice coming over the PA: "Mr. Richards! Mr. Richards!
I do believe your break is up. We would dearly love to have you up front
in the cashier line! Do grace us with your presence soon! Mr. Richards!"
Staff probably wanted to murder the man nine times a week, but to us
he was a store fixture.
After the conversion to a Lifestyle Store and the higher prices we stopped
going there, save for the odd necessity. Each time we saw Mr. Whipple
he looked a little more diminished, sadder and careworn, his voice no
longer ringing out over the registers. He no longer resembled that prim
advertising shill that loved to squeeze a certain kind of paper towel.
His once ruddy face gone blotchy with gray troubles. Clearly, he suffered
now from ill health.
True, you could go to that Safeway and buy fancy wine and that mysterious
bottle of mysterious ingredients called "garam masala". How
lucky we are, for there was no need to scrounge up any loose garams running
around so as to make our own. That Safeway has fifteen different kinds
of energy drinks, nine varieties of cinnamon, eight kinds of tofu, five
kinds of edam cheese, and enough weird stuff to cobble together tapas
from any country on the map. But we do not shop there any more, save when
given a $20 gift card, which was good for a pound of coffee, a brick of
plain cheddar and one loaf of bread and perhaps a glimpse of the eroding
Mr. Whipple. The place is furiously expensive with no reason to be that
way, especially when Trader Joes next door handles most exotica foods
quite well and at reasonable prices.
Now we hear that the parent corporation is talking about "downsizing"
the Safeway mark, which in the age of zero salary raises, dollar stores
galore, and general hard times for the average American may mean that
the money spent on glitzy presentation will be redirected toward doing
what Safeway used to do: provide groceries.
DARLIN' DUBH DEILISH
So anyway, although Eugene suffered a terrible fright, Mr. Howitzer did
not die when his face met the grill of Eugene's truck. He did go to the
hospital where he spent some time in a room shared with Mr. Cribbage,
who had dislocated a disk while trying to clean the gutters in the middle
of a howling rainstorm.
Both of them had the pleasure of looking out the windows of the seismically
unsound ICU to see the weather finally turn Californian Gold with sunshine.
Their dayshift nurses were named Betty and Gardenia and they were as chipper
as chipmunks.
"Hi, I am Nurse Betty," the one said. "And I am going
to give you a shot. Although I am your nurse this shift, I really am an
aspiring Kansas waitress in disguise. My name is actually Renée
Zellweger and my pal here is named Tia Texada. O, guess you don't think
that is funny."
"Roll over buddy," Gardenia said to Mr. Howitzer. "You
aint gettin' a cath' this time."
"Owwww!" said Mr. Howitzer.
"It may sting a bit, but trust me, you don't want no pipe stuck
up your dingus."
"Do you think we'll meet Morgan Freeman in Kansas?", Nurse
Betty said, taking care of the metal pans under the bed and checking the
IV drips.
"How come you can't put some of that stuff in that shot in that
bag," Mr. Howitzer complained.
"O that man is a doll. I'd do him in a New York minute if he weren't
so old." Nurse Gardenia said.
"How about Chris Rock?"
"Well personally I think these liberal actors are all . . .",
Mr. Cribbage began.
"You hush now. Chris Rock?! He aint nothing like Morgan Freeman.
All you Filipinas think we all look alike. Now Jaime Foxx, he's a hottie."
The two of them walked out together. "I like a man with a sense
of humor," Nurse Betty said. "I miss the old nurse's cap they
used to give at graduation. I think I'd look cute in one of those."
"You gonna wear green tomorra for St. Patrick's Day?"
"Sure thing. I am gonna wear green inside and out. And you?"
"You won't see me wearing no orange, that's for sure."
"Funny, you don't look Irish," Mr. Cribbage said.
"Honey, I am Black Irish," Nurse Gardenia said. "If it
weren't for me, them Irish would have no soul at all. I'll be back for
your enema at five, so don't go away now."
It was a week of many celebrations as the Island slowly dried out from
the monsoons. It being Purim, and Marvin being of the persuasion, offered
a 50% discount to anyone name Esther who should come into his merkin shop
(Marvin's Merkins - Put a merkin in your firkin!). He put a sign out on
Webster so everyone could see his promotion, but Mr. Mianfen, the owner
of the Tchotchkes R Us complained about it. The sign read, "Two for
One in the Bush - All Esthers Welcome!" Bettina and Brunhilde at
the Touch of Wonder Massage thought it was funny.
Along the Strand at Marlene and Andre's Household Marlene put out a basket
of hamentaschen which provided great sport for Jose and Javier as they
tossed them back and forth to tease both Bonkers and Wickiwup, the dogs.
The sport had to shift to the out of doors when the floor lamp became
a sudden casualty. Later they had a little costume party and Martini put
on Suan's stripper outfit which amused some people and not others.
"Man you gotta lose some weight if you gonna dress up like that,"
Pahrump said.
Some people have this idea that all the high holy days are terribly serious
with lots of wailing an gnashing of teeth and putting on the sackcloth
and ashes. Purim is not like that. With some special Deity selecting all
your people for Special Treatment and Final Solutions every few years,
it helps to cultivate a good sense of humor. So they all sat down that
night to a fine faux lamb dinner that consisted of a shank of TVP broiled
in special sauce by Marlene.
Over at the Old Same Place Bar, things were gearing up for St. Paddy's
Day, a peculiar event that is celebrated substantially outside of Ireland
by the Diaspora and even more so by people who have not a particle of
the Old Sod anywhere in their bodies. Still, America is what it is, and
every Cinco de Mayo, flocks of gabachos stumble over their gleanings
of high school Spanish, nosh on fake comida with asada, frijoles,
y tortillas, and swill cervezas like they were all raised by
una abuelta out of Sonora. So you cannot fault people for wanting
to feel a little special for a day.
Padraic and Suzie were slinging the Gaelic Coffees (so called by Padraic
who felt no decent man of Erse would ever come up with a concoction that
would adulterate the Water of Life in the slightest)
Things were going great guns when the door opened a figure strode across
the floor to the bar as all conversation collapse into a quivering heap
of whispers. The Man from Minot quickly got off of his stool and stood
to the side with his drink in hand to allow the newcomer to climb up on
the stool.
"A Guiness." Said the man. "And Power. Arthur Power while
I am waiting. Make it a double."
Indeed, the Wee Man had returned. All three foot two inches of him. What
did he look like? For a start he wore a twill newsboy cap on a head of
bright red hair. Red, too was his full beard and cobalt blue his eyes.
He wore a green checked waistcoat which sported a gold chain that went
into the side pocket and green checked pants. Some say he came from the
Spanish Armada that sank off the coast and others say he was of the legendary
Firbolg that harried the ancient Romans loose from the Emerald Isle thousands
of years before. Some say despite his stature he was related to the mythic
giant Finn ni Cuchulain, Finn McCool, whose body extended the length of
Howth and that his apparent manifest physical size was merely a kind of
trick.
Padraic inquired of this man the reasons for his visit, Padraic being
a doughty man of spirit, and some say more of that than sense for all
his genial good nature.
The Wee Man downed his uisce-que-bah and set down his cruiskeen
luin and smacked his lips and spake as follows unto those who would
listen, and indeed, all that sat there in that snug sat rapt as if enchanted.
"I tell you I have been all around the world, seen many lands and
danced with the fierce cannibals among the cane, I search the planet far
and wide, crossed deserts and fields, seen the cities of man, but nothing
suits a man like a pint of plain. I have studied the philosophers and
all the great thinkers. Roved the university halls of lore and consulted
wise men sitting amid ashes and clinkers, pestered seers and prophets,
gurus and sages, to distribute at least a drop of the wisdom of the ages,
yet still for all that all of those wise men said there was little to
gain, beyond just knowin' all the universe stands in a pint of plain."
Padraic set the Guinness down before the Wee Man, who paused to take
a deep draught and so wet his tonsils to proceed. He licked his lips and
gazed up at the ceiling at some particular corner there where inspiration
nestled like a spider in its homey web. Then he began again.
"I have wooed and wed, romanced many a lass, been married seven
times and more and gone off besides. Over these several hundred years
laid many a beauty to rest with a mighty tear and a world of pain, but
nothing does it quite like a pint of plain. I have builded edifices like
Ozymandias and watched them each fall, started businesses and gained princely
treasures only to lose it all, but I tell you my lads and my lassies here,
nothing stands up like a good glass of beer. So I am come from afar and
from near, offer succor and pleasure to the profitless man, only to tell
you this great and noble truth as best I can, a pint of plain is yer only
man."
And all there sat dumbfounded and awed by this tremendous gift of knowledge
and it seemed there grew a sort of greenish, golden light about the place
and over the heads of each flickered a little green flame. The Wee Man
commanded that each go out and tell the world all about it.
And with that, he drained his glass in a good long swallow, and then
stood up upon the barstool and clapped his hands three times. There was
a bright flash and a bit of smoke and when everyone could see again, the
Wee Man had vanished. But on the heads of each person there perched a
little cap of green and Nurse Betty, who indeed had entered the bar after
work to sit at one of the tables made a loud exclamation.
"Why it's a nurse's cap! An old style nurse's cap! Finally I won
my cap!", Betty said. "O dear! I think he's done something to
my knickers . . . "!
"He's as randy as an Italian gigolo in a cute gondola, that one,"
Padraic said.
And wouldn't you know it but from far across the water where the gantries
of the Port of Oaktown stand glowing with their sentry lights, the long
howl of the throughpassing train ululated across the waves of the estuary,
the riprap embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open
spaces of the former Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the
old abandoned Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, moaned between
the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked
past the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
MARCH 9, 2014
FINE AS A BEE'S WING
Had to ponder a good pond to come up with a lyric that features bees,
but then the inimitable Richard Thompson rescued the day.
This week's Springy headline photo comes from FB friend Gregory Tyesi,
who has besides an excellent macro lens also a good eye for composition.
LOVE IS LIKE A THUNDERSTORM
We look to be free of that Pineapple Express sequence of storms for now.
Forecast is for clear and sunny. The rain is certainly welcome, but snowpack
remains down in the Sierra. Most weather gnomes predict moderate snow
storms continuing through March at elevation, but not enough to forestall
drought conditions in the Valley.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
Now that the McKay Avenue parcel discussion has entered mediation, the
development topics feature a couple land swaps that include AUSD and the
City, and the proposed Shoreline Bikeway. Both issues are producing their
own forms of contention.
Actually people are not waiting for mediation over McKay to produce miracles
of intelligence, given the history of the parties involved. In addition
to the existing Initiative on June's ballot, which seeks the voters to
direct the property to be employed as parkland, some citizens have started
a petition drive to add another initiative to have the property rezoned
to designated open space.
Stepping into the fray -- yes, another country heard from, now that the
Chronicle, a national news media outlet, and the State Attorney General
Kamela Harris have chipped in on this -- we have the Sierra Club coming
out in support of the proposed ballot measure.
The Planning Board meeting scheduled for Monday at 7pm is likely to be
a contentious one.
Another project features addition of a dedicated bikeway along Shoreline,
extending from Broadway to Westline, which would of course eliminate at
least one auto traffic lane and parking in an area already tight for space.
Right now there is a walkway that is shared by bicyclists and pedestrians
and the occasional DPW maintenance truck, the driver of which who enjoys
forcing cyclists into the sand packed with glass-shards.
Its probably not the DPW worker who fueled this biker drive, but the
observation from some residents that the four-lane stretch is used by
out-of-towners trying to bypass slow traffic up on the parallel Nimitz.
Naturally area residents are not enthused about seeing 617 parking spaces
shrink to 431. Bicyclists want fewer cars to be on the road in the first
place. City planners point to a 1974 plan that had already described a
project like this.
On the upside, next time somebody goes nuts down there in an SUV, the
hapless pedestrian will get more flight space to escape.
As for the AUSD land swap, what can we say we have not already said?
O dear. The Sun reports that Tim Lewis Properties is involved with getting
a parcel that is partly underwater. It is not "useless" for
all that, as a Marina sits there now and of course, narrow water stretches
like that are not too difficult to fill. Some folks are concerned not
enough discussion about actual land value has been made public.
Anyone else notice that the former classy Angela's there on the corner
of Central and Oak is up for new ownership? Angela's had tried to parlay
a move from Mariner Square Village to the central spot into a trendy hotspot
for the hoity-toity hip crowd that swills neon buzzers from oversized
martini glasses. That hipness costs bucks, and with the Recession there
aint so much of it around here. Looks like the joint will front a catering
operation affiliated with the nearby movie theater.
HERE COMES THE SUN
So anyway, everybody loses an hour of sleep, of rest, of their lives
due to the DST change thing. Old Gaia sits there on the rickety porch
of the world. Now is the time when Gaia tilts her weathered face creased
with valleys, arroyos, hills, deserts, plains, mesas, continents and the
liquid seas of her deep dark eyes toward a direct gaze at her son, Phoebus
Apollo riding in his bright chariot as she sits and rocks ever so slowly
in the ticking wicker chair, the folds of the quilted Universe draped
across her lap, the rocking becoming the dance of Shiva, the creaking
rails marking the ever ceaseless count of time's advance, ticking each
second, each century, from the first moment of creation until that rocking
chair comes to the moment of that last terrible motionless silence.
Some people confused by Astrological hoodoo believe in this day and age
the season warms as the earth spins closer to the sun -- nothing could
be further from that deception, unless it be the foolish nonsense of Mercury
Retrograde, the classic illusion, for nothing moves with surer purpose
than the planets.
As Gaia turns her face toward the light, her ravined face gradually warms
with measured steps, quickening life from the once barren soil, stirring
dull roots with Spring rain, and everything is precisely where it needs
to be right at this moment while Phoebus Apollo charges across the firmament
like any boy enthralled with hot rods all bedecked with gleaming chrome.
O Phoebus, you scamp!
How this plays out on the Island: the increase of daylight causes the
soil and pavements to steam upward, making the air heavy with moisture.
Tiny creatures emerge, much as the ancients believed, from insensate matter.
Spiders collect in great numbers, ants boil from the floor mouldings,
birds erupt from bony trees and the smaller mammals pad about like middle-aged
men in morning bathrobes, hunting for cups of coffee or nuts.
Because of the recent overcast weather all the trees are still stark,
scratching black limbs against the pearl gray sky.
It being that time of year before Realtors engage in the feeding frenzy
of Spring in an area where modest cottages now go easily for three-quarter
of a million dollars, Mr. Howitzer made his annual trip out to Colma to
visit there the grave of his dear, departed, goddamned mother.
Mr. Howitzer's approach to sentiment of any kind was to kick the wretched
animal to the door if feelings did not depart after suitable hints of
being unwelcome. This had done him well in business, but had not offered
much in the way of family community, and now, after 150 years, the present
occupier of the Howitzer mansion, last of a long line of Howitzers who
first stormed over the Sierra ramparts in 1849 to rob the Californios
and slaughter the Native Americans and in so doing establish a dynasty,
now occupied the family hall as Solus Rex, or so they say in chess, save
for his manservant, the regretfully loyal Dodd, who departed the place
in haste each evening he was allowed, so as to enjoy the warm comforts
and sanity of his home and Mrs. Dodd.
There at Colma, Mr. Howitzer cleared the weeds around the mausoleum with
its curious inscription, "Here Lieth Abigail Howitzer, 1902-1986,
Thank God!" and threw stones at the crows that seemed to delight
in gathering in large murders about that particular spot.
It happened to be on March 5th, which is for the Roman Catholics an Ash
Wednesday, the beginning of a time of fasting, breast beating and gnashing
of teeth before it all cuts loose in a big party called Carnival where
everyone has sex with one another.
Mr. Howitzer was hurling stones with such vigor, after actually knocking
down a very large raven to his great satisfaction, that one rock glanced
off of a pillar that was part of the Eunice Mimblefoot Memorial to Wayward
Endeavor. The ricochet came back and knocked Mr. Howitzer flat on his
back. There he was when Father Richard Danyluk came along with some gravediggers
after officiating the funeral of Senor Gustavo Orellano.
The gravediggers, named Sal and Nick, were uncertain as to whether Mr.
Howitzer was dead or not, as this being a massive graveyard the size of
a small city, dead seemed very likely although the disposition of the
body was not regular. Usually they dropped the stiffs off in some sort
of container.
Colma, although quiet and somewhat restful under the flight path of SFO,
did not present itself as ideal place to take a nap.
They wondered if he had fallen off the wagon on the way to the embalmers,
but Nick had the opinion the man looked fairly well pickled already. In
the end, they decided to let him lay there and let nature or Administrative
procedure take its course.
Father Danyluk decided to administer last rites, and to cover all options,
also did the Ash Wednesday thing, figuring that it couldn't hurt as cremation
had become all the rage now that land was so dear.
The three of them then went on their way and had beer at the local pub
before the priest drove back to the Island, figuring that if the man were
dead, someone would arrive to collect him and pay someone to put him properly
in the ground.
Mr. Howitzer eventually roused himself and drove back across the Dunbarton
to the East Bay where he encountered curious looks and a significant amount
of respect and fear that he had longed for these many years, as wherever
he went he presented a forehead clearly marked with an ashen cross. Those
who knew anything of the staid man, expressed astonishment.
At the corner of Park and Encinal, the Wee Man emerged from the shadows
to take out a conductor's baton, which he used to direct an invisible
orchestra in a stately contredance.
As the notorious landlord walked along Park Street, Lionel, dropping
a dollar into the box of the old Chinese Pie-Pah player, looked up startled
to see the mark of the cross, allowing the dollar to waft away down the
pavement where it attracted the eye of Imbecilla Cupcake, who ran after
it, knocking against the deliveryman carting cases of cola to Javarama.
The deliveryman cursed as several cans rattled loose to spill onto the
pavement and roll across the street.
Mike Goughassian, shouldering a length of lumber, came out of El Tomato
and dodged a rolling can with his lumber swinging a wide arc that nearly
brained Lynette walking along with Susan and their bicycles.
"Hey!" shouted Lynette angrily, which of course made Mike swing
back the other way, neatly clipping Mr. Larch as he walked two of his
service dog charges from his business Pushy People Anonymous. The dogs
tore loose and ran diagonally across the street. This caused Pahrump riding
his scooter to slam on his brakes and skid to a stop. The commotion distracted
Eugene Gallipagus driving his Range Rover, causing him to drop the Styrofoam
cup of coffee into his lap, which meant that he did not see the figure
of Mr. Howitzer bending down to fetch the wayward dollar that had nearly
escaped little Imbecilla, who cursed Mr. Howitzer with such vile sailor's
language that he paused there, two fingers on the dollar bill, looking
up only to see the grill of Eugene's Range Rover just before it struck
his face.
"Tadaaaahhhh!", the Wee Man said, triumphantly.
Father Richard Danyluk came along then with Archbishop Mitty from the
Basilica of St. Pandy beside, and they joined a small crowd looking down
at the figure of Mr. Howitzer. Father Danyluk recognized him immediately
as the man from Colma.
"Dear god," said Father Danyluk. "I keep seeing dead people!"
"I saw that movie too," said the Archbishop. "I did not
think it was very good."
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, moaned between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
MARCH 2, 2014
EXCELLENT BIRDS
Photo is by Carol of the People's Republic of St. Charles.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
The Sun reported that all parties engaged in the squabble over the McKay
Avenue property, which bears the temporary sobriquet of Neptune Pointe
(sic) have agreed to go into a series of mediation meetings to resolve
the fate of the 3,899 acre property.
Since there is a ballot proposition dealing with the issue in favor of
turning the property over to East Bay Regional Park District, it is not
known how binding any decisions will be coming out of this, pending the
election results.
As the Sun indicates, with coverage by New American Media, our little
Island once again aquires a national spotlight of attention. In the article
Federal Land Auction Raises Debate Over Public Benefit, by
Jonah Most, posted: Feb 24, 2014, the article commented, "The controversy
has created a bizarre legal situation where the federal government is
threatening to condemn state property in order to prevent land from going
to the East Bay Regional Park District and instead to sell it to a private
developer, in order to maximize profit from the sale."
NAM reported further down the page, "At the heart of the controversy
is the question of how federal property should be sold, whether for profit
maximization or the more murky aim of public good.
Known as the governments business side, the General
Services Administration (GSA) leans towards business principles rather
than public policy.
The GSA is the wing of the federal government in charge of maximizing
efficiency. The GSA was established in 1949 with the mission of reducing
the inefficiency that often bogs down large, growing bureaucracies, such
as that of the post-war United States. The GSA negotiates contracts with
private venders, manages federal real estate and vehicle fleets and sells
excess government holdings.
In several online auction websites, the GSA has for sale helicopters,
a former naval base and even a lighthouse. One GSA auction website has
a category heading for NASA shuttles. It was through this system that
the Neptune Pointe property was listed in June of 2011 for a starting
bid of one million dollars."
Others have a different view of the shenanigans which featured a suspect
backroom rezoning of the parcel. I think its greed,
said Karin Lucas, a former member of the Alameda City Council, explaining
why the GSA declined the Park Districts lower offer.
To muddy the waters further, the article lists yet another country heard
from in this battle -- homeless and low income activists who see the place
as ideal to stash low income folks away from the sights and sounds of
regular citizenry. Go figure.
In one of the better fotos of the area, one can see just why Tim Lewis's
developer outfit drools at the prospect of securing the property for decidedly
non-low income folks.
The Sun reported on the AUSD and the City consideration of a land swap
deal to benefit rehabilitation of the deteriorating school swimming pools.
The agreement has been made final and announced by the School District.
Here are the details.
The agreement, which includes both sales and exchanges of land, will
be implemented in three steps:
Step 1
The City grants $750,000 to AUSD to pay for renovations to the Encinal
Swim Center.
AUSD rescinds the deed to the six-acre Tidelands parcel, which results
in the City holding the title.
Step 2
The City conveys a 20-acre parcel of Alameda Point property to the Housing
Authority.
AUSD releases the City from an obligation to convey a 12-acre parcel at
Alameda Point that was part of an earlier agreement.
Step 3
The Housing Authority obtains title to the former Island High School
site in exchange for fair market value of approximately $1.2 million,
of which $1.15 million is to be used for the Encinal Swim Center renovation;
the remainder goes to defraying legal and consultant fees related to the
transaction.
AUSD releases restrictions on the $4.6 million Housing Asset Fund so
that the Housing Authority can access it to build affordable housing throughout
the City.
The Housing Authority gives AUSD the 20-acre Alameda Point parcel that
it received from the City, which AUSD could use for school purposes. The
City retains responsibility for general maintenance of the parcel for
a maximum of 10 years.
Lauren Do has some commentary on these provision in her Blogging Bayport.
PSA
As you know we have a Primary Election coming up June 3, 2014. The ROV
is seeking qualified and mature individuals to serve as Precinct Poll
workers. These positions are paid stipends -- not much, but better than
just free pizza. The paid portion for attending the mandatory class is
about $5. But its something of a Democracy and the way these things work
is via elections. Worth doing at least once just to see the machinery
involved in this whole hustings thing.
The Registrar of Voters requires ALL Poll Workers to attend a MANDATORY
Poll Worker Training Class in order to be eligible to serve on Election
Day. Any worker, who attends training class and then cancels on or before
Election Day, will NOT be compensated for attending the training class.
If you have questions, please email us at rov.pollworker@acgov.org
or call our office at (510) 272-6971.
WON'T YOU RIDE, WON'T YOU RIDE WITH ME
So anyway the Island got hit with a series of serious dockwallopers last
week, snarling traffic, clogging the drains and soaking just about everybody's
panties.
The eaves got clogged up with leaves in a suspicious manner which had
Mr. Cribbage out on a ladder trying to fish out soggy plant matter and
god knows what else had died up there even though Mrs. Cribbage had ordered
him to clean the gutters last summer. How on earth did those gutters get
so bad so quickly? I don't know, must be the wind blew stuff in, according
to Mr. Cribbage.
In fact on that day, Mrs. Cribbage had gone off to her regular tinting
at Jaqueline's Salon, leaving Mr. Cribbage to his devices, and his devices
turned out to be less gutter cleaning than practicing putting skills on
the backyard green with Mr. Blather and a quart pitcher of sours that
featured most of a fifth of Bombay gin. After two or three of those no
way either man wanted to get up on the ladder which stood there, somehow
necessary and important to signify the job already done. To keep the missus
away a bit longer, he had Mr. Blather call his wife, also at the salon
to have her hair done. Mr. Blather had Mrs. Blather drop by Pagano's for
some work gloves and on the way drop in on Mrs. Dudgeon to find out what
kind of tea that was served at her brunch.
That was Earl Grey said Mrs. Blather.
No, that was currant. Or maybe white grape with pomegranate. I am not
sure. Might have been Assam . . . .
Ninny, it was Earl Grey.
Well she's on the way to Paganos. Don't forget the gloves. I am helping
out the Cribbages with their gutter.
When he got off the cell phone he settled back in the lawn chair. He
knew she would deliberately forget the gloves for she hated doing anything
for him. But he knew for certain that she would complain to Mrs. Cribbage
all about it and the two of them would drop in on Mrs. Dudgeon and have
themselves a hen party complaining about each one of the husbands for
hours.
"Pour me another one of those, old bean", said Mr. Blather.
Mr. Cribbage fetched two litter-filled garbage bags from his neighbor's
yard, where someone had been raking up leaves and hedge trimmings, and
placed them next to his own cans.
Now here was Cribbage up there in wind and rain digging out what turned
out to be a family of drowned rats with a weed rake. The Island is a typical
island with marinas neighboring one of the largest container ports in
the world and where you have ships, you will have rats, hence the Island
had an abundance of them doing the ratty things rats do -- having kareoke
parties featuring sea chanties, scamper-dancing, and living the high life
in the fruit trees.
Cribbage could, of course, driven to the day laborer spot in front of
Los Marronitas Panaderia and collected one or two guys at the cost of
$30/hour as Mrs. Cribbage suggested, but he was damned if he would support
illegal immigration in any form or fashion.
Mrs. Cribbage opined that she did not think they were illegals, or they
would not be standing in the same place out in the open every day like
that, but Mr. Cribbage stood firm on his principles, which stated that
proper work featured use of starched shirt and tie.
"Ugh!", said Mr. Cribbage as he tossed down another clump of
decay. Wilbur Mills, his dog, sniffed with moderate inquistiveness. joined
by Forbes from across the way.
"Get away from that!" Cribbage shouted. Then he thought about
how his wife let the mongrel lick her face. "Nice doggie! Scrumptious!"
Down went another fetid clump. Then another. This released something
and a great wash of water mixed with the offal of the entire world rushed
over his arms as the dogs were joined by Polk, Jackson, Monroe, and Gingrich
all getting up a fine canine party of sniffing and nosing each other's
butts and the offal on the ground and back again, alternating with bouts
of soggy humping between the ladder legs, pretty much as dogs with names
like these are known to do.
The ladder tipped of course, (You knew that was going to happen) and
Cribbage flailed about at the top of the second story. As the ladder seat
smacked into the window of the girl's bedroom right before the nose of
Pete Wilson, the cat, Cribbage grabbed the gutter for dear life. The gutter
sort of sagged, groaned and peeled away from the roof, sending shingles
sailing into the air, detaching at first slowly, giving time to think
about matters, then accelerating with a brisk pace as bolts popped out
from the frame, sending the bulk of Mr. Cribbage, buccaneer-style on a
swing and still clasping his weed rake like a four-pronged Captain Hook
with some momentum to the ground where he cartwheeled into the back drive
area and sort of lay there groaning with a pain in his ankle and his back
and the sluice of the now waterfalling gutter laving his sodden body liberally
with mucky detritus.
The Lowell kid from across the street came over with his cell phone and
wearing a bright yellow slicker and yellow rainboots. He was talking to
somebody on the phone as he arrived.
"Well, I didn't see him fall exactly, just when his body slung around
the end of the house . . . what's that ? . . . insurance . . . ?"
The kid looked down at Cribbage through rain speckled, thick eyeglasses.
"It's a good thing Mr. Obama made sure we are all covered by medical
now, isn't it Mr. Cribbage. Yeah, I am sure he's covered . . . what's
that? O think he can afford that. Mr. Cribbage, the man says the ambulance
is gonna cost you three thousand dollars. He wants to know if you are
okay with that."
"Three thousand dollars! It's only two blocks to the hospital here!"
The kid shrugged. "That's the way it is. The Fire Department bought
the city countract."
That is when Mr. Cribbage began moaning in pain.
"I think you better send the truck. He don't look so good."
The kid clapped up his cellphone. "Thank heaven for social services,
aint that right Mr. Cribbage?"
Mr. Cribbage groaned in response.
"I am so glad we live in a Democracy," said the Lowell kid.
"It's a Republic!" Mr. Cribbage shouted.
Mrs. Sanchez stopped in to Mi Pueblo to pickup some groceries for dinner.
She chatted with Lupe there about the weather and what this meant for
their gardens and their backyard livestock projects. Like Mrs. Sanchez,
Lupe maintained a raised and well-defended chickencoop, clean and snug
and dry with straw for the hens.
.
Lupe asked about Mr. Sanchez and Mrs. Sanchez, who used to be Ms. Morales,
said his boss, Ms. Percy always wanted more work out of him even though
he was doing everything he could right now. Lupe nodded. That is the way
with some bosses, they want everything and always more. And more is never
enough.
If only we had enough to live on and move to the Valley, maybe have a
farm or something, Mrs. Sanchez said.
Well what makes you say that? said Lupe. Of course all of us would like
to be gentlefolk farmers.
Ah! Things could have been different. He has a desueno.
You are kidding, your husband has a desueno.
Yes.
A desueno is both everything and nothing in Alta California. A
desueno was a land grant issued by the King of Spain long ago,
even before Mexico was Mexico. Then Mexico also issued these grants, which
consisted as documents as no more than drawings upon cowhide. Each desueno
granted the owner many thousands of acres of land. But of course, this
system was all cast aside after the gringos took over. Landowners spent
an average of 17 years per lawsuit defending their titles after 1836.
Many died before the resolution of the case.
Nowadays, these documents are mere curiosities, indicating that one's
family had lived in California for many generations. They say only that
one is a true Californio. We all know how little this accounts for anything
today. Nevertheless, some people, like Lupe, understand what it means.
Mr. Sanchez's family was here long before the American Revolution.
In the Old Same Place Bar there is some discussion about who won the
Oscars and who won the Olympics in the benighted place that used to be
best known at Stalin's birthplace. A few people talked about how the Iranian
Naval fleet is approaching the edge of International Waters and now the
Russians are within 200 miles of Miami, with only a few people recalling
an incident that took place during the time of JFK.
Ultimately the talk revolved to more important subjects such as the newly
revived salmon run and the prospects for steelhead fishing on the delta.
Soon it will be time for trout. Governments rise and fall, but trout shall
abide, not unlike the walleye in other parts of the world.
Crisis and disaster, but in the swift stream, after all of the horrific
killing is done in the name of whatever national moloch is now popular,
the fins of the still bodies of trout move beneath the surface. Trout
shall abide.
From far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stand
glowing with their sentry lights, the long howl of the throughpassing
train ululated across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, keened through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, moaned between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive click-clacked past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 23, 2014
WALKING ON THE MOON
.
This week's photo comes from Staffer Tammy on a visit to
the new Target out in the midst of the wastelands of the Point. Apparently,
the visit struck our reporters as a bizarre experience in American excess.
Well, big box stores are not for everyone, but it is telling that the
place sits amid a cratered lunar landscape that promises much in the way
of what will come rather than what is.
TROUBLE IN RIVERCITY
Anyone else note that the grand old chestnut of the Great White Way,
The Music Man, is coming to town at Altadena?
Anyway looks like a heck of bother going on in the halls at Silly Hall
and the Unified School District both. What with some imp nearly blowing
up the science lab with a loose gas fitting at Encinal followed by the
grand daddy of all bad Coverup memos in which staff were ordered "no
one is to speak to any reporters". Sprechen ist streng Verboten,
ja!
Sensing the Island is a hotbed for controversy, a sub showed up in class
at Lincoln Middle School, proudly talked about his marijuana dispensary
card and ordered fourth grade students take out their smartphones to browse
to www.shitnobricks.com. Seems the fellow has no plans to continue a career
in pedagogy. He certainly now has no job future with AUSD.
Stewart Chen is getting some flack about an old issue that predated his
election to the Hospital Board and then to City Hall. Seems he got snared
in an insurance fraud scam that resulted in a guilty plea following his
arrest in 1993.
The charges were dismissed as part of a plea bargain and the conviction
dropped from public record after two years, however someone pursued an
LA Times article on the case.
About 10 other people were snared by an investigation into a ring that
staged "auto accidents" so as to generate phony insurance claims.
Chen's role at the time was to allow people to enroll for bogus "treatment"
at his chiropractor's office.
Since the activity took place well before Chen's election to office,
and his medical license remains intact, there are no overt conflicts under
the City Charter or municipal code. Chen is up for reelection in the fall.
On the more joyful side of news, we note with delight that the Bay Area
Radio Museum is moving from Berzerkely to the Island. Reason for the move:
landlord there at Ashby Avenue, Pham Radio Communications, wants more
money.
The Bay Area Radio Historical Society, which runs the museum, has purchased
the property at 2152 Central Avenue and we are quite excited to have such
an ideal tenant come here. Besides, long time Lifers know that we have
a Jones for Old Radio.
The project remains a bit short of the final asking price of $1.1 million
for the 7,410 square foot location, but the nonprofit society is hoping
for radio buffs to pitch in. A bevy of volunteers is already available
to help with the move and the renovation of the former school.
Got the notice from ROV about the primaries on June 3rd. The infamous
"midterm" elections are coming up in January, but there will
be a prelim roadshow for the various parties to select their candidates
before that. Rest assured we will have interesting props to discuss before
that, with the biggie being the measure to lock the McKay Avenue in for
use by the parks as was originally intended, despite governmental squabbles
and GSA hissy fits.
Let the people decide. After all, it is the People's land after all.
Last weekend was dreadful for all of us having to work straight through,
missing all the highlights of P-Day and V-Day, so we have no event reportage
this time around.
LIKE THE WEATHER
Ok then. Rain coming with a vengeance, starting Tuesday evening through
the next soggy weekend. However and furthermore we have great news.
First, Howard Schecter says there is indeed a couple storms looking to
drop snow on the Sierra, with the first laying down about a foot of measly
powder in the north and the second laying down a more substantial load
further south, providing dry Arizona with its first snow of the year.
He does say that reports of 9 feet coming are pure horse pucky (our words).
These storms are likely to be "dry".
Optimistically we hear that deep in the Pacific, where these things start
to happen, an eddy is forming that will likely culminate in something
next Xmastide. Yep, it is that big and will take that long, and because
of when it culminates these things are called "El Nino". The
upcoming El Nino is likely to birth the mother of all storms, if we are
lucky, so somebody better start digging reservoir holes right now.
WE'LL NEVER BE ROYALS
So anyway, Commissioner Dudgeon let Denby out of jail after the weekend
had passed when the woman he had tried to save declined to press charges,
so Denby was turned out on the street with a firm admonition from the
harried jurist with a firm admonition never to be seen inciting riot,
causing public mayhem, or tossing Molotov cocktails into wedding parties,
be there present a swimming pool or not.
Denby thought, given the outcome, he should not mention that it appeared
the Commissioner had grabbed the file to someone else's case and he have
never incited a riot or tossed back so much as a molotov cocktail in his
life for he was a devoted teetotaler and a pacific Buddhist as well.
Then it occurred to him somebody was walking around, setting wedding
dresses and ministers on fire without even a swimming pool in which to
put them out, but Jose and Javier grabbed him away from that bad place
while the Commissioner fumbled to open his child proof bottle of prescription
Protonix, finally getting the thing open with a few deft gavel wacks,
sending pills skittering here and there and with the Bailiff chasing after
them with an envelope.
"What the hell are you still doing there, gawping like some "innocent
offender!" The Commissioner shouted. "Get out of my courtroom
and never come back, neither as witness, nor jury, and certainly not as
some kind of guilty as hell bastard whining for a fair shake! Go!"
Leave the papers," Pahrump said. "Let us eke go!"
Safely outside, Javier, who was a well-read man, mentioned that he had
not considered Pahrump a Joycean.
For answer, Pahrump stepped up upon the round pedestal that was designed
to hold the memorial bust of former Senator Archibald Sniggins, a memorial
that had lapsed in effort due to lack of funding, even as a collection
of citizens coming to dispute their traffic citations with futile writs
of despair approached the glass doors to the lobby. "I hereby intone
the following, Introibo ad altare Lex."
Denby offered mild applause. "Pahrump, you are neither stately nor
plump, as was the original Buck Mulligan, but here, here! Here, here!
Now let's go get drunk."
This show was all due to Denby trying to intervene between a fist-slinging
brute and his target of a girlfriend at the end of the Native Sons of
the Golden West Valentine's Ball fundraiser. As is usually the case, the
woman had taken to punching Denby for getting involved in a private matter
without so much as a by-your-leave and then the boyfriend had done the
same until Jose had clocked him with a solid whack on the noggin with
a broom.
That is not the thing about which you want hear; you want to hear about
the weather. Sudden sunshine has been breaking through to warm the place
during the day after mornings of high, dense fog. Evenings remain chill
and the raccoons have been keeping quiet. The squirrels have ceased their
mad scampering and the night presents only the solitary peeps of the Norway
rats going about their business in the fruit trees.
Pre-Spring is an odd time everywhere. You look out and it is still light
at the end of the day, the air feels somewhat warmer-ish than the bone-chilling
sap of a few weeks ago, but still the ground is soggy, the sky is oystershell
gray, and people walk head down, preoccupied with internal things rather
than the bland slate-colored world around them. All the music is a reiteration
of what was hot a few months ago. Right now the relationship that is doomed
is slowly collecting evidence and reasons for the final blowup.
Eugene broke up with his brief fling, the Buddhist nun. The whole monastery
was going to do a field trip up to Berkeley to see the Dali Lama, or at
least the place they are building for him to stay when he comes to visit
so as to help out with labor of construction, but the bus broke down.
So the Rinpoche said, "We are determined and we are hearty. Let
us meet this challenge as with the difficulties of any chore. We will
walk."
So about fifteen monks and nuns strapped on tennis shoes and, each carrying
a stick and a bundle with their red robes, all began marching up San Pablo
Avenue after crossing under the estuary through the tube and dodging through
Chinatown among a throng of Opas carrying bags and wearing conical hats.
This proved a bit much for Eugene, who parted ways just after the group
crossed West Grand. Sabine looked at him with big round eyes and said,
"There is the Five Fold Way to Enlightenment, but each must find
his own path. I hope you will find at least contentment, for I am afraid
you have a long way to go before becoming enlightened. Good-bye!"
And with that the nun kissed Eugene on the cheek before turning to march
on up the avenue.
Eugene, brokenhearted, entered a sandwich shop and ordered a foot-long
roastbeef sandwich. With all the trimmings. It had been quite a while
since he had eaten meat during his vegetarian experiment for love of Sabine,
but after eating most of the sandwich, he felt better. Soon, it would
be time for trout fishing.
It was dark by the time Eugene had returned to the Island, convinced
he had finally discovered his true nature. By that time, the little group
had no doubt reached Berkeley and been welcomed there to stay in unheated
rooms laid with tatami mats. The man lay down alone, without Sabine there,
of course, but in a nice warm futon with a down comforter and he fell
asleep to dream of lotus blossoms drifting on the black surface of a deep,
impenetrable current while a fat golden man sat on the shore and laughed
and laughed.
Xavier, who among all the Household had fared the best getting through
this past "holiday weekend" by dint of sticking to his core
principles of hard work, diligence, discipline and sturdy Mexican character,
rested easily in a hammock after a long day working for El Gabacho Senor
Howitzer digging a trench. Tipitina woke him to come inside for some of
Marlene's bread soup.
Bread soup is a staple of folks at the Household. We printed a recipe
once but perhaps need to post that in the sidebar for reference. Should
the reader's circumstances ever descend so low as to need bread soup for
sustenance.
The Great Recession sowed its bad seeds in 2001, producing economic Fleurs
de Mal in profusion by 2005, and becoming a thicket of troubles by 2006.
2009 began the long slow process of amelioration of this thing, but it
takes a long time to turn around an economy as big as the United States.
Hence, we are likely to need bread soup recipes for quite a while yet.
In the wee hours, cupid safely tucked away by his mother in a feather
bed, hoopla and store shelves now given over to either foil-wrapped chocolate
eggs, bunny rabbits, and fertility symbols or improbable plastic shamrocks,
bearded dwarves, and green tchotchkes, the Editor emerged from his den,
frowsled and bearing an armload of empty Michelina's frozen dinner trays.
He dumped the entire lot into the trashbin and paused in the garden to
look up at the declining moon's crescent.
In the estuary, the Iranian spy submarine, El Chadoor observed all of
these things, or at least its commander did via the spyglass periscope.
"To think some of them go to such trouble to avoid love," First
Mate Mohammed said. "What a people!"
"Indeed," the captain said. "It should be only necessary
to enlist in the submarine service to forever forswear amorous companionship."
Fortunately, all the men laughed who heard that. This crew had been a
long time at sea and the submarine service has more than a little in common
with the monastic life.
The captain slapped up the handles of the periscope and the sub ran out
the estuary to the starlit Bay where it dived beneath the Golden Gate
to run silent, run deep out to the freedom of the Pacific Ocean.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights, quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors of
the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 16, 2014
WINTER IS THE CURTAIN
According to Richard Shindell "Winter is the curtain, but Spring
takes the bow." It may be cold and rainy out now but the questing
individual will notice slow surprises developing here and there. This
week's photo comes from Carol of the People's Republic of St. Charles.
Right now a vast frigid chill draped with snow and rime and sheets of
ice covers much of the United States. Look beneath the snow and ignore
that dour Easterner Puxatawny Phil. There is something happening underneath
it all.
HEARD IT ON THE GRAPEVINE
Picked up a copy of the once mighty bastion of prize-winning columnists
which battled its rival the SF Comical for nearly one hundred years and
found to our surprise the paper which had fallen from classy to cheesy
within weeks after aquisition a few years ago had much improved. The SF
Exasperator turned from tabloid to newsy -- no more did the front page
carry lurid stories of the bat-faced boy and bloated ex-movie stars.
We were shocked, simply shocked.
Can the once grande dame of newsprint rise again from trailor park birdcage
liner to hold her head high among the media? Will reporters and columnists
once again dare show themselves at Harringtons? Well, we will just see.
February 19, Wednesday, 7:30 pm
ISABEL ALLENDE, Ripper, A Novel
With SF Poet Laureate Alejandro Murgia
First Congregational Church of Oakland, 2501 Harrison St, Oakland
Tickets and more info: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/560643
Finally we have an interesting link to a blog run by a talented 19 year
old comix artist who has a refreshingly jaundiced view of the V-day thing.
http://thisishangingrockcomics.tumblr.com/.
GAMH has its best shows sold out already. David Crosby sails in 2/20
-2/21, clean and sober.
Noise pop Bob Mould is sold out 2/27
But Tommy Castro is coming 3/22 and Zucchero 4/1. We know Tommy for his
crunching, firey stage shows, but Zucchero is an odd dark horse here although
he is wildly famous through-out Europe. The man has performed with just
about everybody, from Placido Domingo to U2 and is likely to present a
memorable evening.
Here in Oaktown's renovated Fox, where the booking agent seems to be
inspired, we see Amos Lee with Langhorne Slim coming Wednesday, followed
by the Pixies on Friday to a show already sold out.
You can, however, catch the jazzy alternative band Umphrey's McGee on
March 8th and the not so jazzy Flogging Molly March 14 to get your wearing
o' the green started.
Sacto's blues wunderkind Jackie Green comes in on March 21st, supported
by the Mother Hips.
The Fox continues on a roll with the suddenly popular pop diva, Lorde
for two dates, March 26 and 27th. Better buy tickets now, people.
Then Widespread Panic rocks a two night spread 28th and 29th.
That oughta do ya until April when the String Cheese Incident cover three
nights with their special brand of indie alternative sound.
PSA
BART invites the public to a series of outreach events to learn more
about the extension to Oakland International Airport and provide comments
on key service changes including:
Replacement of the current AirBART system
Fares
Shorter wait times
Shorter travel times
The dates and locations of these events are listed below. In addition,
if you are unable to attend one of our outreach events, you may still
provide feedback by completing an online comment form, which will be available
by February 24, 2014, at www.bart.gov/oac.
OUTREACH EVENT DATES AND LOCATIONS
MONDAY, MARCH 3, 2014: 7 AM 11 AM; Locations: BART Coliseum Station
Concourse and Oakland International Airport AirBART Pick up/Drop off Area
TUESDAY, MARCH 4, 2014: 4 PM 8 PM; Locations: BART Coliseum Station
Concourse and Oakland International Airport AirBART Pick up/Drop off Area
THURSDAY, MARCH 6, 2014: 7 AM to 11 AM; Locations: BART Coliseum Station
Concourse and Oakland International Airport AirBART Pick up/Drop off Area
FRIDAY, MARCH 7, 2014: 4 PM TO 8 PM; Locations: BART Coliseum Station
Concourse and Oakland International Airport AirBART Pick up/Drop off Area
AC Transit Buses Fitted With New/Better Fare Boxes : Lighted Displays/Audio
Responses/Faster Boardings
As part of its ongoing campaign to give passengers A Better Ride, AC
Transit has refitted all of its buses with a state-of-the art fare collection
system that makes boardings quicker, less confusing and much easier to
tally.
AC Transit is the first bus company in the nation to outfit its entire
fleet569 buses-- with the talking high-tech Fast Fare
boxes that interact with passengers using full-color, lighted displays
and automatic audio responses.
The Fast Fare boxes replace the agencys more bulky, 14-year-old
machines that are now obsolete, prone to malfunction and often require
costly and difficult repairs. With smaller frames, the new fare boxes
leave more room to maneuver, particularly for wheelchairs. They also have:
A low failure rate for improved reliability
Bill and coin validation for more accurate accounting
Faster processing of bills and coins for improved boarding speed
Dispenser for Day Passes, effective on July 1st
Improved, lighted passenger interface with full color display
Audio response that assists passengers in paying fares
Modular component replacement minimizing repair time and maximizing
bus availability
Modern design including advanced features for mobile ticketing
and smart cards, if needed for future fare payment options.
Although the machines will accept all valid U.S. coins and currency--except
for 50-cent pieces the new fare slots are slightly different, so
riders are encouraged to take a good look before inserting their bills,
coins, and transfers.
Also, riders should know that the new fare boxes do not accept transfers
from BART or other transit agencies. Such transfers should be handed to
the bus operator. However, Clipper Card users will still tag their cards
on a separate reader at the front of the bus.
CAN'T WAIT TO GET OFF WORK TO SEE MY BABY
So anyway Eugene went on a zen date with his newfound object of desire.
Jose, seeking to avoid the same sort of problems that occured last year
due to Javier's enthusiastic amorousness, hid himself in the porch hole
with Snuffles the bum, getting the old fellow to keep quiet about it by
means of the bribe of two gallon jugs of Gallows burgundy.
Javier stomped all over, looking this way and that for a companion to
help him get into scrapes. Xavier, a hard working, clean cut boy from
Mexico City refused to have any part of it.
The Editor, knowing full well that the leggy Joanna would be on the prowl,
had secured himself in his offices behind double doors with a supply of
Michelina's frozen dinners and a case of Glenfiddich malt scotch and Netflix
supplied entertainment well in advance, and his redoubt was doubly redoubtable
by way of the terrific dockwalloper that set in to confine sentient beings
to indoors.
Pahrump, Martini, Xavier, and Denby had managed to secure gigs performing
as step'n fetchits for the Native Sons of the Golden West Valentine's
Ball, which after an evening of hauling ice, pouring beer, rousting drunks
would culminate, after everyone had long gone home and the band had been
gypped and underpaid, in a romantic round of carrying out the trash and
sweeping up the leavings of those who had either left disappointed or
in a state of soon to be. Once Jose felt it was safe to come out, he joined
them.
It was harsh but the pay was better than a kick in the face or getting
into some kind of state of erotic dismay worse than chipped beef on toast
for letdown, all aroma and no savor. The band was a Beatles cover band
and they were not very good.
One would think the rain would have helped keep Denby out of trouble
this year. That and the gig shoving a mop at the Native Son's. For most
of the night, it worked. He, like the others, ran about at the bidding
of Marston Umbrage, a genuine five generation scion of the Californio's
who had no problem ordering lesser species than himself all over the place.
About Marston, he would be proud to say of himself -- and he often said
it -- Marston was the one who got things done.
All night it was Denby do this. Denby don't do that. Denby go get the
bucket for Mr. Creosote. By the end of the night the guy was wishing he
was in heaven sittin' down. While he was shoving the mop over by the Hall's
belljar encased Heritage Fantod where someone's internal constitution
had rejected the bar Hurricane he noticed a gal with straight black hair
sitting glumly at a table by herself. She had her purse up there on the
table and she had on her hat and she looked to be waiting for someone.
By then the place had emptied out and the crew was moving back and forth
taking off the covers and folding up the tables and chairs.
Waiting on your ride, Denby asked. We will be closing up soon. He was
tired, sweaty, aching and the Hurricane had been made with sticky sweet
stuff.
The woman sighed, said most of her life was spent waiting. Tired and
bored, ever the genteman, Denby placed one of the decoration roses on
the girl's table and continued mopping up. The guys kept on stripping
the tables and clapping up the chairs and carting them away. Eventually
a big blonde guy appeared at the woman's table, staggering a bit from
too much drink and the woman stood up. I'll drive, she said.
Who gave you the rose? The guy asked with a surly voice.
That guy, said the girl, indicating Denby. Let's go.
Next thing Denby knew he was dodging all around the heritage bric-a-brac
trying to escape the enormous hamfists of an enraged Nordic giant. A wild
roundhouse clipped his right ear and went into the glass-mounted official
charter hung on the wall, sending shards everywhere. The belljar encased
Fantod, a genuine Remington original of the Founder of E Clampus Vitus
mounting a brown bear with his hat flung high, toppled, wobbled and, disastrously,
tipped to fall sideways and roll to the table's edge. The giant kicked
at Denby and so, jostling the table, sent the club's heritage over the
edge to smash on the floor, and there the bronze statue broke into pieces.
Denby stood in horror at the shards of the club's heritage, and in so
standing transfixed would have been slain on the spot had not Jose come
up behind the roaring giant to smash a cafeteria chair down on the man's
blonde poll. And so the jealous man dropped to the floor
Now see what you did, said the girl. How am I going to get this lunkhead
into the car?
The crew was only too happy to band together so as to carry the giant,
now trolling the cyclopean labyrinth cave of dreams out of the place and
into the girl's backseat just as Officer's Popinjay and O'Madhauen arrived.
What's all this then? Officer Popinjay inquired.
Has there been a traffic accident or other vehicle infraction, Officer
O'Madhauen asked hopefully. When learning it was a matter of a bar fight,
he put away his ticket book with great disappointment.
Who is all involved with this? Officer Popinjay asked.
The girl pointed at Denby.
As the gendarmes carted Denby away in "come-a-longs", he protested
that he was innocent of anything.
We'll be the judge of that, Officer Popinjay said. Or the Commissioner.
Right after the holiday is over and court starts up again. Come along
now!
It was a full moon, the advent of the Year of the Horse. As it was a
full moon, Don Guadalupe Erizo sat out upon the sward and regarded the
moon's glory, thinking whatever thoughts an echinoderm could conger on
such a time while Dame Herisson remained inside, cooking up the evening
crepes.
The recent storms had cleared the sky, but the evening high thin fog
had thrown a pale transclucent veil over the goddess of the night, glowing
high up there, enrapt.
"Ah, Mssr. Professeur! Les creps sont prêts, said Dame
Herisson from the burrow. The crepes are ready.
For the life of me, I will never understand why you insist upon the French.
Parce que c'est le langage de l'amour. Because it is the language
of Love.
A la, said the Don. No entiendo por qué me eligió.
I don't understand why you ever chose me.
Of course it must be noted here that most little creatures of the earth
understand all the natural languages, however it is seldom that any one
of them encounter a human being whom they feel is intelligent enough to
understand them, so the myth that they converse only in grunts and peeps
persists. The dolphins, a quite intelligent species, have had great joy
playing with humanity for generations, trying to get people to speak in
the long unrecorded branch dialect of Urdu-inflected Rhaetor-Romanisch.
Parce que, tu êtes tellement intellectuelle, que vous ne pensez
pas à choisi vous-même, Dame Herisson said. "Because
you are so wrapped in your head you would never think to chose yourself.
So someone had to do it for you.
O! Qué suerte la mía. Lucky me.
Que voyez-tu là-bas? What are you looking at up there?
Viens, mon cher.
If you cast your troubles up into the sky they can be the stars in your
eyes, my dear.
Toi chanceux, chanceux moi. Lucky you, lucky me.
Ahhhh . . .
Meanwhilte the Native Son's wrecking crew boys have gone to Denny's off
the Nimitz to get eggs and sausage with their dime pay and hash browns,
o those gorgeous hash browns draped with grease and tabasco and catsup,
but Xavier stays behind to finish up -- hashbrowns, hashbrowns, he'd prefer
tortillas and beans. And of adventures he had had quite enough that night.
The sound of his broom echoes on the hard wooden floor of Parlor 33 1/3
of the Native Sons of the Golden West.
All the Island drifts on the surface of the late night Bay, mutters and
snores, laps of wave and clink of mast. Every sheet a luffing sail after
storm has passed and tossed beds on the calm seas of sleep. The moon gently
strews a serape of diamonds across the lot of unsold and cash promised
SUVs before withdrawing into a descending nimbus behind the new higher
buildings and the metal framework of the new soon-to be Walgreens rising
on Park Street, now tossing a cage of shadows in front of the light reflected
by the departing goddess. Leaving the town in the keeping of the one who
is sweeping up the ghosts of Valentine's night.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights, quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors of
the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to romantic parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
A cab combs the snake,
Tryin' to rake in that last night's fare,
And a solitary sailor
Who spends the facts of his life like small change on strangers...
Paws his inside P-coat pocket for a welcome twenty-five
cents,
And the last bent butt from a package of Kents,
As he dreams of a waitress with Maxwell House eyes
And marmalade thighs with scrambled yellow hair.
Her rhinestone-studded moniker says, "Irene"
As she wipes the wisps of dishwater blonde from her eyes
And the Texaco beacon burns on,
The steel-belted attendant with a 'Ring and Valve Special'...
Cryin' "Fill'er up and check that oil"
"You know it could be a distributor and it could be a coil."
The early mornin' final edition's on the stands,
And that town cryer's cryin' there with nickels in his hands.
Pigs in a blanket sixty-nine cents,
Eggs - roll 'em over and a package of Kents,
Adam and Eve on a log, you can sink 'em damn straight,
Hash browns, hash browns, you know I can't relate.
And the early dawn cracks out a carpet of diamond
Across a cash crop car lot filled with twilight Coupe Devilles,
Leaving the town in a-keeping
Of the one who is sweeping
Up the ghost of Saturday night...
Songwriter: Tom Waits
FEBRUARY 9, 2014
NO LOVE TODAY
If Chris Smither ever comes to your town for a gig, get him to tell the
little vignette about how the farmer in the song "No Love Today"
comes from a figure from his childhood growing up in New Orleans.
This week we have as an image a capture from facebook friend Erika's
homepage. It does echo a common sentiment held around here by the Quirkyalones
and just about anyone not looking forward to February 14th.
Note that the song, as sung by Chris Smither is sung in the past tense.
We expect he has plenty of love in his life today.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
We hear the Island Gerbil soon will cease being a free weekly in favor
of inclusion with any of the CC Times/SJ Mercury paid subscriptions.
Well, the Sun is a warmer paper.
After the message conveyed by the allowed death of Raymond Zack got through
to the right parties and money started flowing obediently to Emergency
Response, the police boat got refitted and relaunched for the water. Now
recently the Fire Department has taken delivery of the Deanna Jo, a slick
32 footer that can pump 2,000 gallons a minute and find still-warm bodies
underneath piers with its heat-sensing apparatus.
Truth is, the island has needed something like this for a while, as the
only other city with a boat of this kind is San Francisco.
Hi-Tech has been in the news recently, what with the IPD getting Automated
License Plate Recognition readers. The purpose of the technology is to
help IPD locate stolen vehicles and vehicles connected with crimes.
The devices, which can record thousands of images per hour, collect the
license plate and context by imaging, log GPS coordinates and date and
time of image capture. Citizens have expressed concerns about privacy,
limits on usage, and potential abuse of collected data.
On the Op-Ed page we have County Supervisor Keith Carson urging expansion
of East Bay broadband infrastructure. What he clearly wants to do is pull
some of that Sunnyvale/West Palo Alto wealth in this direction in a way
that will generate new business and job growth. People can go to www.ebbroadband.org
for more information.
Google started a trial private ferry service from the Harbor Bay Terminal
to cross the Bay to Redwood City Monday. The Internet giant, which now
exceeds Microsoft and the largest auto manufacturer in income, has run
a trial service from San Francisco to Redwood City since January 6th.
Like other tech giants, it has run a bus service in Silicon Valley for
a while. The bus service, which has been using MUNI and BART stops has
drawn the ire of locals who are getting fed up with being pushed out of
their neighborhoods by the skyrocket rise in costs of living.
In the Letters to the Editor we have an unusually well-informed, well-reasoned
set of briefs this week. The first concerns the passing of Poet Laureate
Mary Rudge, whom we all agree was a dear soul. And we are glad that our
island was proud to host a poet laureate, for that indicates a good sense
of values.
One letter writer was responding to someone having a beef against a planned
VA clinic, which we thought was a no-brainer shoo-in. Heck, a medical
facility that unobtrusively takes care of vets is certainly a better tenant
here than another McBurgerChuckeeCheeseIn-and-out-Walgreens. Were any
of the people protesting this living here when the Navy Base was up and
running? We suspect not.
A bright 5th Grader writes about incautious drivers ignoring the crosswalk
and the flashing pedestrian lights at Will and Santa Clara, which we understand
is barely a block from the high school as well as the Los Semillas preschool.
As there were children in the crosswalk as the time of the violation noticed
by the young man, and we have personally witnessed rude drivers violating
the right of way of pedestrians in crosswalks, we feel another stoplight
is not enough -- those folks will just run the red anyway.
There is already a traffic control device there -- the crosswalk with
flashing lights. Violation of pedestrian right of way in the crosswalk
is a violation of CVC 21950 which states
21950. (a) The driver of a vehicle shall yield the right-of-way to a
pedestrian crossing the roadway within any marked crosswalk or within
any unmarked crosswalk at an intersection, except as otherwise provided
in this chapter.
(b) This section does not relieve a pedestrian from the duty of using
due care for his or her safety. No pedestrian may suddenly leave a curb
or other place of safety and walk or run into the path of a vehicle that
is so close as to constitute an immediate hazard. No pedestrian may unnecessarily
stop or delay traffic while in a marked or unmarked crosswalk.
(c) The driver of a vehicle approaching a pedestrian within any marked
or unmarked crosswalk shall exercise all due care and shall reduce the
speed of the vehicle or take any other action relating to the operation
of the vehicle as necessary to safeguard the safety of the pedestrian.
(d) Subdivision (b) does not relieve a driver of a vehicle from the duty
of exercising due care for the safety of any pedestrian within any marked
crosswalk or within any unmarked crosswalk at an intersection.
Notice there is no "got there first" provision. Nor is there
a "left lane, right lane" provision. Legally a pedestrian "owns"
the crosswalk zone once they step off the curb. In practical terms, and
with reference to paragraph (b) if the street is four or more lanes wide,
that is, if the street is so broad that passing through the crosswalk
does not seriously endanger anyone because of distance, then most reasonable
commissioners will give the benefit of the doubt to the driver.
Then again, you hit a child with a car in the State of California, your
life is over, regardless of statute.
As a PSA we refer to the person writing about mysterious recurring charges
on their ACI bill, charges that were supposed to be 1 time per year. This
boondoggle flag was prompted by a distribution of a circular by Stop-Waste
(which is a valid group pursuing the government mandated Benchmark program.)
We have seen a couple other circulars floating about which are most definitely
NOT bona fide entities. They are scams, so be on the lookout for anybody
seeing personal information about your utility bill, or indeed any kind
of personal home information.
Finally, it seems that the McKay Avenue furor continues with Eugenie
Thompson's well presented Commentary in which she reveals that the GSA
failed to follow proper procedures when it set the property on public
auction by accepting a conditional bid based on a zoning status change
which was not in the woodwork at the time.
In addition, the State Parks owns the single street that provides access
to the property, which makes any sort of planned development impossible.
Which makes sense that the EBPRD expected without hesitation the property
would fall to them, especially in light of Measure WW's clear directive
to EBPRD to expand the interpretive center and "acquire surplus federal
property". In response the GSA has threatened to seize the street
via eminent domain so that it can be developed to suit housing usage and
allow easements for utilities necessary for housing.
In checking the 2009 EIR, cited by the city for its 2012 Housing Element
and which itself is being used to push the development project forward
on behalf of purchaser Tim Lewis Communities.
The State's Attorney General has stepped in to indicate the GSA failed
to follow federal guidelines which require in the Code of Federal Regulations
that the GSA is required to first offer surplus property to other public
agencies before turning to public auction.
Finally we learn that the city staff failed to follow State Department
of Housing requirements for a site suitability and availability analysis
for proposed housing sites.
That is a lot of FAIL in this fiasco, and if we were Tim Lewis Communities,
we would recommend backing off, as a plethora of lawsuits seem about to
crash into this party.
BETTER OFF WITHOUT A WIFE
So anyway a mini "Pineapple Express" roared through the Bay
Area this past week. Such weather systems consist of rapid narrow trofs
that barrel through with a series of rainstorms. The condition develops
from a ripple of highs and low pressure spots that congregate near Hawaii.
This is the misery of Winter, such as it is for California. Of course
other places -- even places in California -- suffer somewhat more severe
weather and concomitant attitudes inflexible as ice.
Of course when people come here for the weather, just one wildfire, just
one earthquake and back they go, scurrying to Idaho and Virginia and their
beloved tornadoes.
Cold and ice are bad enough, but losing everything you own, your sense
of gravity, and your sanity along with it, well that is more than a lot
of people want to endure on a regular basis.
With this weather there is one good thing -- all the snow bunnies are
heading up to Tahoe and the Sierra to get in some downhill and spend a
few dollars at overpriced chalets and faux mountain eateries, cavorting
there with the sprung step of youth.
Now is the time of dank, wet advancement, the steady slog when the ease
of Summer feels like an unreal impossibility. The Oakland hills remain
shrouded in mist and every room feels like a box sapping the heat from
your body. Because the assumption is that it never gets cold here, none
of the houses possess wall insulation or double-pane windows.
People look to use the oven as often as possible, looking for ways to
employ that out-of-date cream of mushroom soup and the weird can of cheddar
cheese soup, which nobody seems to have ever heated up within memory save
folded safely within some kind of baked tuna casserole.
Unless you hailed from Wisconsin who on earth would ever eat such a thing
straight up? Even Juanita is trying to see if she can finally get the
Minnesota Hot Dish down right, save with her special infusion of jalapenos
in a spicy nacho can mixed with french cut green beans and Louisiana hot
sauce.
People still find boxes of the first attempt she made as an offering
to the visiting Norwegian Bachelor farmers in search of their wayward
minister. Those fellows, used to food that got no spicier than Matjes
Herring left little boxes of her gifts stowed all over town, and even
today, years later, folks would come across a magically preserved box
of that hot dish in the most unlikely places.
So anyway, the weekend brought on a set of dockwallopers and wharf sizzlers
to gently nudge thoughts away from drought. Drought is a function of snowfall
in the Sierra and has no relation upon the local rainstorms, which barely
wet the arid trough of the reservoirs with their meager additions. A few
inches here and there, even one or two torrential monsoons, cannot possibly
compensate for entire acre-feet of water level loss.
Word has it Mount Tam got 20 inches of rain in that last deluge, which
ought to ease that part of the world some.
A terrible thing had happened to Eugene Gallipagus, one of the worse
fates imaginable to a man like him. But before we get into that, we have
to tell about what happened the night the big storm began.
Because of the impending drought, Eugene got it into his head to set
up rain barrels all around the property. Since a rain barrel cannot catch
more than its mouth, Eugene made himself a dinner of a peanut butter sandwich
washed down with berry-flavored Sports-Ade and so scurried about setting
up plastic-covered plywood sheeting held down with cotton rope and two
by fours to funnel all the water from the roof of the building and the
garage. Since the setup would likely overflow any one container he had,
he setup quite an ingenious system of pulleys and ball-bearing hinges
dependent upon sandbag counterweights hanging from ropes. As one barrel
filled, its weight would push down a board that lifted up a counterweight
which caused an old sailboard pole to shove a notch that activated a spring
and a wheel, thus getting the entire open funnel to shift its "spout"
over the mouth of an empty barrel. He built this setup hurriedly as there
was scant warning of the oncoming Pineapple Express, so the first drops
were already falling when he finished off his work in the yard in the
dark although he worked like mad in a great effort to get something troubling
off of his mind.
The system seemed to work pretty well, at least as far as he could see
by flashlight so he went to bed, waking up to the sound of terrific crashing
out back. He came out in the sleeting rain to see that his entire forty-foot
funnel had upended itself, flinging matchstick two by fours over the fence
into Mrs. Almeida's chicken coop where a noisy sort of disarray prevailed
among the hens who shrieked a hullabaloo at the raccoons which had gathered
to pilfer the eggs. Mrs. Almeida came out and added quite a bit of choice
Portuguese as well.
What had happened. Roof rats, stirred out of their dens by the rains
flooding formerly dry holes, had found the scent of peanut butter on the
ropes holding the counterweights and so had chewed the lines down until
they snapped under the weight of sodden wood and rainwater, flinging the
half-full rain barrels, one after another up into the air, propelled by
the leaf springs from a 1942 Ford pickup truck and sending Eugene's hasty
construction cartwheeling across the yard to Poultry Armageddon.
Of course one could talk about what happened next, however the sad truth
was that Eugene had fallen in love. Now for many this is not such problem
but for Eugene, the captain of doofiness if there ever was one, the event
seriously violated his character. Yet again, anything is possible in this
great wide world and the actor who portrayed Gomer Pyle, a character with
whom Eugene shared many traits, also possessed a great operatic voice.
Its just that nobody remembers Gomer Pyle for opera.
And who should have Eugene's amorous eyes lighted upon immediately after
having been skewered by that puckish puto? A nun from the Tibetan monastery
Garam Masala, named Sabine. The first thing Eugene said to her was, "What
the heck happened to your hair?"
Sabine told him she was with the Buddhist monastery and Eugene blurted
out that he wanted to live with her forever. Subtlety never had infected
Eugene's discourse.
Sabine rocked back on her heels. "Well, you would have to renounce
the world's illusions and practice Zen mindfulness every day."
Of course Eugene was all agog to know what that entailed.
"Well the path to enlightenment is through wisdom and we acquire
wisdom through the abnegation of desire."
That path felt contrary to purpose and so this left Eugene much distressed.
Nevertheless, he started hanging out around the Tibetan temple with guys
in purple robes and he collected some literature and got a book called
"The Five Fold Way". He began taking cold showers and he poured
out all the last of his Fat Tire ale, which drove a stake through his
heart as he did so.
Different churches handle the modern version of the old Roman holiday
of Lupercalia in ways that suited their temperaments.
Buddhists drape their statue of His Paunchy Holiness with roses. The
Baptists either engage in hella joyful shouting or even more severe diatribes
against sin and hellfire and damnation, depending on what sort of Baptist
minister held sway. The Lutherans held a Mac 'n Cheese banquet with pink
lemonade and happy couples walked the labyrinth in the dark with giggles,
holding hands, while Pastor Nyquist sermonized on the differences between
Eros, Caritas and that other one no one can remember the name of. They
also did a fair amount of singing.
The Catholics of course had their priests dressed up in fancy gay robes
with pink pumps -- rather stylish, actually -- and members of Opus Dei
tried to hold a condom burning which did not end well, as Father Danyluk
had to come out into the parking lot with a fire extinguisher to put out
the smoking blaze and berate all of them for acting like fools in spreading
the stink of burnt rubber all over the neighborhood.
The Presbyterians behaved with rectitude and held history panels on the
famous 1950's gangland massacre in Chicago.
Members of the Church of Truffle Delight put on white robes and drank
red wine and ate powdered chocolates.
Jason Arrabiata, CFSM, held a spaghetti dinner. This one seemed to attract
a fair number of Methodists as well.
Reverend Freethought hosted a party for all the Unitarians and everyone
who came had great fun. Four of them, Reverend Lisa Freethought, Denby
Montana, Miles Ni Gopaleen, and Marsha from the Household ended up playing
scrabble until late. The Reverend won the final game with a word coined
by Mencken, "ecdysiast".
They were all amazed and wondered how the Reverend knew of such a word,
but she would not say anything about it. They caught Miles smiling to
himself with secret knowledge and he had to say that the word reminded
him of great lady, someone whom he had never met, but of whose admirable
qualities there was some renown.
In the Old Same Place Bar, Suzie and Dawn and Padraic got busy cleaning
up the place, for the weekend at the old watering hole would be profitable.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights, quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap embankments,
the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces of the former
Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned Cannery
with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices of the
chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors of
the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to romantic parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
FEBRUARY 2, 2014
UNCHAIN MY HEART
This week's headline image is not really a photograph, but a painting
taken of a photograph and done by Islander Carol, present resident of
the People's Republic of St. Charles, a building fraught with all sorts
of talents. These are anchor chains on one of the marina jetties.
WHATS THE BUZZ
A number of folks had a look at the planned OES building, a long awaited
item on the part of people who talk into their lapels and carry badges
and lethal hardware by trade. Most cities in the ABAG region, sometimes
called the "5 Counties" in reference to the counties that cluster
around San Francisco, are very aware that this area is Ground Zero for
earthquakes, fire, flooding, and now terrorist attack. Alameda County
has two facilities to handle potential disasters in its 2.5 million inhabited
spread, with the one out at Santa Rita bunkered three stories underground.
People who are serious take this stuff very seriously. So the folks whose
job it is to be paranoid had planned a 3,640 square foot emergency operations
center at the foot of Grand Street with construction slated to begin this
Spring after funding came through.
But neighbors and Planning Board folks are protesting the the "giant
walled fortress in the middle of a historic residential neighborhood"
(John Knox White). Frank Mataresse, former councilperson also has expressed
serious concerns.
At present our OES sits in the basement of the Island Police Department
and the planned project is tied somehow to the upgrade of Firestation
#3, a 90-year old building with seismic issues preventing full utilization.
Various ideas have been floated about where the funding is coming from,
as somebody is acting like the funds are fait accompli. Probably because
none other than Don Perata has been sent to Sacto to get the money. By
hook or by crook, we expect.
Last chance to have a say on the Point's development with regard to the
disputed EIR will happen during Tuesday's City Council meeting at the
Hall. The Meeting begins at 7pm and the Council is expected to approve
the EIR with no dissent.
She was a modest gal from Los Angeles, born in 1928, but raised for her
early years in Oklahoma and Texas. She raised seven children as a single
parent and founded the Island chapter of the California Federation of
Chaparral Poets, fostering awareness of poetics in the schools and reigned
for many years as the Poet Laureat of the Island. Mary Roberta Rudge passed
away at age 85 last Sunday.
This time tends to be a pre-season period with a few glittering gems
in there for those diligent enough to pry. Basically the kids are back
in school and everything is about buckling down to schoolwork and general
work for band members doing the usual 9-5 to pay for strings and gas for
the touring van.
You did know that Bare Naked Ladies bandmates still hold day jobs don't
you?
Okay it all breaks loose in the Spring. Even the venerable PHC is taking
a "winter break". Look to see Willie Nelson with family at the
Greek and a few familiar names appearing at the Fox in April. By then
all the disappointments suffered on the 14th of February will have lost
their sting.
LIKE THE WEATHER
The recent dockwalloper had us looking forward here to what may be coming
in, as we all know that severe drought conditions are in effect, despite
this light pattering. Seems a series of narrow trofs are rippling in with
some moisture every other front, which ought to make for some schizo temp
behavior as some days shine sunny and others dip into the chills. Not
enough promised to ease the drought seriously, though.
So we do what all serious forecasters do when doubt reigns -- we go to
the Mountain. And there on the far side of the mountain sits Howard Schecter,
dispenser of the Dweeb Report, which has proved to be uncanny in accuracy
for some twenty years or more.
Schecter focuses on what happens in the high Sierra elevations, as he
works out of Mammoth, but what goes for the Sierra goes for the Golden
State as all the water we drink, bathe in, swim in, wash in, irrigate
comes from Sierra snowmelt.
His forecast is unusually reserved, as in "I just don't know."
Which is not often a pronouncement from the good doctor.
According to his latest report,
"We could easily see another 6 to 10 inches more (of snow) by morning
over the crest as there is another feature that will come through late
tonight bringing another 3 to 6 inches or so by Friday AM. That Vort max
will be coming through in colder air so it will be drier with higher snow
to water ratios. That should produce more snow from the system with less
water. Storm totals over the upper elevations will be between 15 and 24
inches by Friday AM. This has been revised upward about 6 inches from
yesterdays discussion.
Mammoth remains on the cyclonic side of the upper jet that will be well
to the south of Mammoth over the weekend. The following system that will
affect Southern Ca will come though about Sunday night or Monday. The
track is a little uncertain with the 12z ECMWF taking it a bit more east.
Should that verify
Mammoth would benefit as we become under the influence
of the deformation zone. The NE quad slips by late Sunday night or Monday
AM. I will update in the morning to see if this is a new trend.
Otherwise, next week still looks pretty dry over all, but there are some
interesting possibilities that weekend that I will be discussing next
week
..
New 12Z Thursday ECMWF as pretty good storm breaking underneath blocking
pattern over Bering Sea. the EC is very wet with this storm bringing in
over 2+ inches of QPF late in the weekend while the GFS is clueless at
the moment
".
- See more at: http://mammothweather.com/#sthash.wglbwnpc.dpuf
The GFS is "clueless at the moment." Not exactly heartening.
Also Howard is talking inches here, when we should be talking 15-20 feet
of accumulation by now.
ONLY A PHASE, THESE DARK CAFE DAYS
So anyway, a dockwalloper set in after a warm spell to drench things
pretty thoroughly for several hours on Sunday. Heavy Blakean clouds had
hung in the chiaroscuro skies all week threatening some kind of godlike
tumult, but everything held off until Sunday and no muscular hand reached
down to toss members of City Council into the Abyss.
The end of January brought about the first day of the next lunar cycle,
and we are not talking monthlies here. Well, a bit, as January 30th was
the dark New Moon. All across Asia, billions of Asians go on the march
in a vast "chunyun" of waves of humanity washing back and forth
across the continent in all kinds of vehicles, from planes, to trains,
autos, motorcycles, rickshaws, ferries, paddleboats, ox carts, perambulators,
bicycles, floating river barrels, busses, flivvers, animatronic mice,
uranium-stoked flip-flops, jet skis, travois, horses of course, mules,
donkeys even, all scampering hither and thither to celebrate the new year
and the vast majority wearing red knickers to ward off the lion-monster
named "Nian".
Nian has sensitive ears, so it is wise to blast obnoxious noise like
firecrackers and the Abba songlist through loudspeakers. The red knickers
help to escape Nian and maybe help with other things as well, especially
if they are lacy.
Jennifer Bao came busting into the Old Same Place Bar with a coterie
of women from the Island Asian Promulgation Enterprise (I-APE). Babylon
had its famous festival with immense parade and the enormous Gum Lung,
Oaktown has its own festival. All the hamlets and towns in the 5 County
Bay Area held official celebrations. Now, seeing as City Hall finally
had broken the yellow barrier tape in getting a true-blue son of FOB parents
into a Council seat Jennifer and her group were lobbying hard for the
Lunar New Year to be celebrated here on the Island with its own festival.
So what if there had been a minor flap over raising the PRC flag at City
Hall on National Day. The Tibetans had raised such a stink over it the
entire ceremony had been ruined. So Beijing was a little bit Communist
and somewhat anti-capitalist to a moderate degree. Hey, we are all Asians
here and time to celebrate our cultures. With a couple billion people
swilling around over there you can't expect everybody to be the same as
you. If its Yellow its mellow and that should be good enough. Those darned
Tibetans. Just because they got invaded and stuff. They gotta dig the
Buddha-man and just chill without messing up the party. Padraic wussup
with all the green here? We got the Year of the Horse coming on!
Padraic shrugged. It's an Irish bar and St. Paddy's is coming up . .
. .
That's not for another month, said Jennifer. C'mon Padraic, loosen up
and do the Gagnam Style! Hey, we got lucky red envelopes and flags and
pictures of horses -- this week everybody can be Asian a little bit. Just
don't put no stereotypes on me -- I sure aint no Lotus Blossom, that's
for sure! She shouted across the Bar at someone taping up a horse's head
in the window - HEY! STRAIGHTEN THAT HORSE'S ASS! HE LOOKS LIKE HE IS
POOPING IN THE DOS EQUIS! Jennifer buttonholed Suzie. Hey you sweetie,
we get you in a silk dress with a slit up to IT and you no need to rent
a boyfriend this year . . . .
I think NOT, Dawn stated emphatically.
Over at the Household of Marlene and Andre, the swing shift sleepers
snoozed in their blankets and sleeping bags, wrapped deep in the Stygian
warmth of dreams, dreams of better times to come, of full bellies and
gentle gestures replacing the hard flint of human intercourse today. Jose
dreamed of flying with the gorgeous multicolored feathers of Quetzalcoatl,
sailing effortless over valleys and rivers, away from all these hard people
and the stones of their minds and their wooden hearts.
Javier dreamed, of course, of being caressed by fabulous nearly naked
women, none of whom ever wanted to kill him or set him on fire.
In the bedroom, little Adam slept after doing his dutiful homework and
cleaning the dishes, sleeping the sleep of the almost, but not quite innocent.
His lips open, slack, without a hint of his roguery.
In the bed, Marlene sat up going through her papers at the end of the
long day, the thick black reading glasses slipping down to the point of
her upturned nose as she kept accounts. The girl with the ruined womb,
quietly keeping body and soul together in that quiet house of sleepers.
Andre sat on the edge of the bed, quietly finishing up the details of
an outlaw love song on his Washburn dreadnought with a bit of soft Travis-picking.
The boy beaten and abused by a long short life of unfair and callous,
initiated by another stepfather who probably could just as well have enjoyed
a beer in the same tavern as the one who destroyed Marlene.
In the heart of Africa, in the depths of the Congo jungle, there is a
City of Hope where the women walk from house to house, singing. There
they heal the lacunae, the perforations that would obliterate love. The
Household of Marlene and Andre is just such a place. As the silver sliver
above eased slowly to its next incarnation as the First Quarter Moon,
the girlchild woman touched the boychild man's neck and he put away the
guitar to fold her in his thin arms, two bruised and battered hearts beating
together.
Overhead, silent and invisible, a putto torn from some medieval painting
let his bow go slack, let the arrow droop, and the cherub hovered in wonder
for a moment. No need to strike here. And so off the little thing flew
on tiny wings, bobbing above the rooftops, seeking some hapless mortal
to thrust into love's piercing torment with his cruel arrows of chance.
As the mischievous fellow bobbed along who should he see walking a little
unsteady from all the beer, but Eugene Gallipagus. The arrow notched let
fly and hit its mark. ZING! POCK! Down went the sturdy man, hard to the
pavement.
Now who should the hapless poodlehunter Eugene see upon opening his eyes?
Maybe next week we will tell you all about it.
For that is when the long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from
far across the water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing
with their sentry lights, quavered across the waves of the estuary, the
riprap embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open
spaces of the former Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the
old abandoned Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between
the interstices of the chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past
the shuttered doors of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to romantic
parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
JANUARY 25, 2013
WHEN YOU SEE THE SOUTHERN CROSS
This week continues the nautical theme that we have been pursuing of
late and is submitted by Curley on board his sometime boat home.
WHAT'S THE BUZZ
The Island-Life annual Holiday CD is out and shipping across the nation
and around the globe. For those of you out of the distribution loop we
will post the concluding PHC-esque monologue in the side bar and maybe
one of the songs. The usual Staff got involved to a lesser degree on this
one, but we assure you that the production values and musical standards
remain wretchedly abysmal to the highest degree. A critic in Lemon Grove
has said about the work, "That is just awful!"
WHAT'S GOING ON
The newly revived Autobody on Park has beaucoups events going on, including
a live performance by
In a strange twist Autobody lets us know about a tribute to Beatles George
Harrison, presented by The International Society for Krishna Consciousness.
The event is titled A Tribute to George Harrison: His Life, Music and
Spiritual Path and will be held Saturday, February 22nd, 2014, 4 - 8pm
Tickets are $20.00
includes a vegetarian feast (Prasadam), served at 7:00pm
LOCATION: Hare Krishna Temple, Berkeley
2334 Stuart Street, (between Telegraph Ave & Ellsworth St)
FOR INFO
https://www.facebook.com/feb22.2014
510-540-9215
Tickets are available in advance through Brown Paper Tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/561472
This event is open to all ages.
According to the promo material, "The event promises to be an exciting
mix of live music, an introduction to Krishna Consciousness and a rousing
celebration of the life and work of George Harrison.
Although George Harrison is known most often for his pivotal role in the
Beatles he was perhaps one of the most spiritual of popular musicians
of our times. His spiritual quest began in his mid 20s, when he realized
for the first time that "Everything else can wait, but the search
for God cannot..." This search led him to delve deep into the mystical
world of Eastern religions, especially Hinduism, Indian philosophy, culture,
and music. Harrison had a great affinity towards India. In the summer
of 1969, the Beatles produced the single "Hare Krishna Mantra",
performed by Harrison and the devotees of the Radha-Krishna Temple, London
that topped the 10 best-selling record charts throughout UK, Europe, and
Asia. The same year, he and fellow Beatle John Lennon met Swami Prabhupada,
the founder of the global Hare Krishna Movement, at Tittenhurst Park,
England."
We have on word from the good people at KQED, an NPR affiliate station
which hosts the weekly Prairie Home Companion. KQED will host Member Days
at the Exploratorium, Friday, January 31 & Saturday, February 1, 10am
to 5pm.
The Exploratorium is located at San Francisco's Pier 15, on the Embarcadero
at Green Street.
Admission is free to KQED members who present a current KQED MemberCard
and valid ID at the ticketing desk, for up to two tickets total. Tickets
based on availability.
For more information, please visit kqed.org/memberday
*Special Exploratorium membership offer for KQED members now through February
2! Call 415.528.0321 to learn more.
Now are you not glad you supported NPR that last pledge drive? Also for
members are links to listen to content, bypassing the pledge pitch.
This past week Robben Ford crossed the Bridge of Sighs at Yoshi's East
in Oaktown, while the beautiful Sean Colvin caused men (and a few women
as well) to sigh at Yoshi's West in Babylon.
For February we pick out the following hot acts in Oaktown:
Feb 11: Charles Neville with Gent Treadly
Feb 12: David Lindley
Feb 16: Roy Rogers & The DRK with Special Guest Carlos Reyes
Charles Neville needs no intro, while people in-the-know about music
know David Lindley's session work very well, as he has sided with Jackson
Browne, Warren Zevon, Linda Ronstadt, Curtis Mayfield, James Taylor, David
Crosby, Graham Nash, Terry Reid, Dolly Parton, Bob Dylan and Rod Stewart.
He has also collaborated with fellow guitarists Ry Cooder and Henry Kaiser.
Artist Ben Harper has credited Lindley's distinctive slide guitar style
as a major influence on his own playing and in 2006 Lindley sat in on
Harper's album Both Sides of the Gun.
The native Californian (born March 21, 1944, San Marino) has mastered
such a wide variety of instruments that Acoustic Guitar magazine referred
to Lindley, not as a multi-instrumentalist, but instead as a "maxi-instrumentalist"
in a cover story about his career to date in 2005. The majority of the
instruments that Lindley plays are string instruments. They include (but
are not limited to) the acoustic and electric guitar, upright and electric
bass guitar, banjo, lap steel guitar, mandolin, hardingfele, bouzouki,
cittern, baglama, gumbus, charango, cümbüs, oud, weissenborn,
fiddle, and zither.
He is known for use of "cheap" instruments sold at Sears department
stores and intended for amateurs.
Roy Rogers, named after a oater movie star of the 1950's, is known for
incendiary slide work on electric guitar. His shows tend to be quite exciting
and packed with flamboyant, Mississippi Delta-infused flavor, although
he is also a native Californio (1950, Redding).
SITTING ON TOP OF THE WORLD
So anyway, most of the world is embedded deep within the reveries of
snow and ice-time, and even here in California we have had some pretty
nippy mornings. Yet the season advances and still no rain and no word
of snow at elevation in the Sierra, so people have started collecting
bricks for the toilet, checking out drought-proof ground cover, repairing
leaky faucets and getting ready for another hard time with water.
Still, the fog has returned, a bit early, but the early harbinger of
things about to change. The squirrels are running like mad on the fences
and the woodrats have come out in droves.
After the Hollardays had crept safely away and little Adam went back
to school, the House Wrecking crew dragged the decrepit tree from its
washtub out the door and down to the beach, there to make a merry bonfire
in the sand. As Pahrump and Jose and Occasional Quentin scrounged around
for tinder, the careful marsupial who had been living inside the trunk
crept from his hole, peered about, and not liking the incendiary future
fast approaching, scampered down and out across the sands into the underbrush
area between the beach and the low wall that bordered the bicycle path.
Eugene Gallipagus, walking with his date, found in the Craigslist Personals
(Soulful gal with youthful spirit loves cuddling, candlelight, nature,
long walks on the beach. Seeking Life Partner who does not ask too much
. . .".) came across the bonfire just as the Fire Department arrived
to extinguish the blaze. As the men came down with their axes and their
hose, the leaping shadows thrown by the firelight mingled with the dark
fleeing bodies of the Household seeking an escape.
Eugene had perhaps put too much weight on the "loves nature"
part, for his stories of hunting Fifi with his Widowmaker 30 aught six
seemed to put a damper on the evening which started off well enough at
the Sushi House with the big picture windows facing the Bay and the distant
glitter of Babylon across the water.
"So you like to carve up once living things with a knife,"
Sandra said flatly.
"Yep," Eugene said. "Genuine Gil Hibben bowie. Nine inches
a' cold steel."
He probably should not have gone into the business of gutting and cleaning
the kill at dinner.
By the time arrived for the long walk on the beach it seemed pretty clear
even to Eugene, who it must be admitted was not the sharpest tool in the
woodshed, that this one was going to go nowhere fast and he was cheerfully
resigned to make the best of it. There is a world of men like Eugene,
decent enough, hard working, not especially talented or bright, and gifted
with sufficient obtuseness to shield them from lifetimes of otherwise
miserable loneliness. These brothers of a kind meet on occasion to sling
back beers, crowd inside a hunter's shack for poker and stories, greet
distantly across the frozen lake from fishhouses. As long as the AFL and
the NFL persist, these fellows will never lack for conversation.
Sandra, constructed of more delicate material, was feeling the bony finger
of Time's second hand poking her between the ribs at forty-five and after
tonight, she felt sure another dreadful V-Day would growl with tumultuous
stormclouds seeded with scads of "putee" cherubs as it passed
over her with her head kept down, ears plugged into her iPod Nano playing
that Eleanor Rigby song over and over and over again.
As the two stood to watch the firemen do their thing, he to admire the
equipment and professionalism, she to watch the sparks and mourn the embers,
one of the firemen there noticed her and called out her name.
"O hello Sandy. What are you doing here?"
"O walking. How is Susan?"
"O we are not together. She was too much a Taurus, if you know what
I mean."
"You two were really an item at Encinal High," Sandra said.
"Sue and Brad."
"Yeah, well some people grow up." Pause. "And some do
not. You down here by yourself?"
"Well, uh . . ".
"Yes," Eugene said suddenly. "We just met on the beach
and saw the fire. Bye now! Gotta go dust the taxidermy."
With that Eugene turned and walked off into the night, for even among
dull tools, there are those who sometimes can still cut to the heart of
the matter with some understanding.
"You still living at St. Charles?" Brad asked.
"No I outgrew that place. I am over on Park Avenue now," Sandra
replied.
"Hey give you a ride back!"
"On the truck! Isn't that like, against the rules?"
"Ah never mind about that, The guys will love it. You can ring the
bell!"
As the woman climbed up into the firetruck, the escaped opossum observed
all from his new sanctuary of driftwood and high above, floating amid
Michelangelo clouds, a grinning putto renotched his bow with an arrow
and sailed off on tiny wings to locate another victim.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights; it quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap
embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces
of the former Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned
Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices
of the chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to romantic parts unknown.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
JANUARY 19, 2014
FALLING
As we reported a few weeks ago, a palm tree fell on the monument created
several decades ago to honor all domestic animals, wrecking the slogan
which has tickled generations of Islanders, "To All My Dumb Friends".
City workers have cleared away the tree debris and removed dangerous
loose stone, leaving this sad remnant.
We kinda hope somebody finds it in their heart to fund a way to restore
the bench to its former idiosyncratic glory.
LIKE THE WEATHER
As most of you know the Governor announced a Drought State of Emergency.
Rainfall, while notably low this year is not all of the story. We have
from Mike Rettie and his long-running precipitation records the following
stats from initial collection in 1998: 2013 got 5.10 inches of rain vs
average of 18.69 inches with a max of 26.44 in 2010.
A look at the Sierra snowpack, which by virtual of gradual melt produces
our rivers that source our reservoirs and supply the nation's largest
breadbasket for foodstuffs indicates that collected snowpack does not
rise above 15% of normal in many measured areas.
The LA Times reported "The signs arent good when the chief
of Californias snow survey has to walk over bare ground to take
a snowpack measurement in the Sierra Nevada, as Frank Gehrke did Friday
near Echo Summit.
Manual and electronic readings up and down the range placed the statewide
snowpack at 20% of normal for this date, adding to worries that 2014 could
be a bad drought year.
The meager snowpack was not a surprise. Last year was Californias
driest in 119 years of records, according to the Western Regional Climate
Center in Reno." (Meager Sierra snowpack is way below average, Bettina
Boxall,
January 3, 2014)
The Governor's declaration on Friday was not unexpected. From the Sacto
Bee (Capitol Alert: Pass a bond measure for water, California lawmakers
urge at rally, Jeremy B. White, January 16, 2014), we got the following
on Thursday: " Lawmakers representing drought-stricken districts
joined with hundreds of their constituents at the state Capitol on Thursday
to press for a new water bond measure and the declaration of a drought
emergency.
"I see farmers, I see farmworkers; I see people from urban communities
and from rural communities, all here today to send one message: that we
need water," said Assemblyman Henry Perea, D-Fresno."
While Chicken-Little cries of disaster are not new to California, where
the climate has seen steady progression towards aridity since at least
Spanish Colonial times, this time around the Golden State is joined by
10 others facing similar circumstances. Quite often housing development
projects and water diversion projects hinge on how much any one particular
appellant can sway an agency on its particular need for water. Coupled
with that are the historically violent land battles over water diversion
and political maneuverings over water rights in the Golden State. So it
never is so simple as saying the rainfall isn't enough.
AP presented this report (Drought prompts disaster declarations in 11
states, Michelle Rindels, Associated Press, Updated 7:49 pm, Thursday,
January 16, 2014) , "Federal officials have designated portions of
11 drought-ridden western and central states as primary natural disaster
areas, highlighting the financial strain the lack of rain is likely to
bring to farmers in those regions.
The announcement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Wednesday included
counties in Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Kansas, Texas, Utah, Arkansas,
Hawaii, Idaho, Oklahoma and California."
Finally, in a report by USA Today (California governor declares drought
emergency, John Myers, KXTV-TV, Sacramento, Calif. 7:08 p.m. EST January
17, 2014) we have the bleaker picture presented which includes both northern
and southern California water districts. The SoCal report on snowpack
turns out to be relatively optimistic in the LA report, which featured
water basins that -- naturally - served mostly SoCal.
"The situation in most of California and northern Nevada is extremely
dry, according to the most recent report Thursday from the U.S. Drought
Monitor, a federal website that tracks drought nationwide. Almost 99%
of California is considered abnormally dry or worse; almost two-thirds
of the state is in extreme drought.
2013 became the driest year on record in California; San Francisco had
the least rain since record keeping there began during the gold rush of
1849.
For the past few weeks, Golden State lawmakers and California residents
have been urging Brown to make the drought official, a situation made
clear with bleak news from the first Sierra snowpack measurement of the
season Jan. 10.
The northern Sierra has a snowpack that's only 8% of normal for this
date, according to the latest measurements released Thursday from the
California Department of Water Resources. The central Sierra is at 16%
of normal; the southern Sierra at 22%. Last year at this time, snowpack
was normal or exceeded it."
We checked the numbers at http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu
and indeed found drought conditions throughout the West
A quick check on geosat images of the Sierra produced some queasy images
of a narrow band of white where normally a broad swath between 50 and
80 miles wide proceeded for some four hundred miles along the Sierra crest.
So this one is no Chicken Little. Remember, "if its yellow, its
mellow, if its brown, flush it down." Nevertheless 75% of the State's
water is consumed by agribusiness.
UNKIND DIVINE: BAR CHORDS AT THE FIRESIDE
Toddled over to the Fireside here on the Island for some nightlife and
to catch a journeyman band that is attracting a loyal following. Always
a prelude to breakout in some form or other.
This is the twelfth time the Bar Chords have performed at the Fireside
with their special blend of retro 60's - 80's rock. We were pleasantly
surprised to find the bass, guitar, drum singer format band to be far
more accomplished musically than most of the garage bands out there. Despite
some initial technical sound glitches, all musicians entered on the beat
cohesively and remained spot on the dime throughout the set. In sound
they resemble early Potrero Hill Ribltad Vorden Bar San Francisco Sound.
Early Warlocks and Jefferson Airplane come to mind. In fact one of their
covers is a very capable "White Rabbit", with alto soprano Bree
Desmond putting in vocals reminiscent of a husky Bonnie Bramlett or an
unsullied Janice Joplin.
Most of the work performed consisted of originals.
Personnel consist of Jared Selvin, Mike Cooper, Bree Desmond, sister
Kara Desmond, and Dominic Rivelli, with Dominic and Jared trading places
alternatively on lead and bass, both employing solid-body Fender-style
guitars with plectrum and Kantneresque hybrid strumming and picking. All
members currently hold 9-5 forty hour a week jobs, but Bree has stated
their commitment to doing well "in the business".
In scoping the crowd it was clear the high voltage energy produced by
the band gradually infected the people and it was clear the people enjoyed
themselves immensely. We joined a group of rocker cuties (attended by
dad) on their first night escape from raising a seven year-old. Seven-Year
old was on a sleep-over and the cuties were rocking and rollicking like
all get out. And getting really, really drunk. We expect that at least
one of them had some trouble locating her knickers the following morning.
O to be young and adorable and rocking out. Drunk on Life and Rock 'n
Roll. Which is redundant, we know.
As it has been said about 4 Year Bender, another local band with promise,
you know it was a good party when you cannot remember in whose house you
left your pants.
Experience says that the 9-5 will need to give a little and maybe a lot
if that commitment is to hold, and of course their sound will need to
evolve as current tastes in retro sound change. Or maybe not, as long
as Boomers remain willing to get out and rock the old keister in the niche
market and there remain those legions of Gen X and Y for whom the little
Middle Eastern raga in mid solo sounds quite original. If they decide
never to leave the security of the 9-5, at least their fans and the band
are guaranteed to have a rollicking good time while it lasts. Just remember
to keep a spare pair of underpants in your car. It's only Rock 'n Roll,
but we like it.
ONE, IN THE NAME OF LOVE
He would have been 85 as of January 15th had not some "ten cent
white boy" murdered the "million dollar Black man" on the
balcony of the Lorraine Motel, in Memphis, Tennessee, a place where Martin
Luther King, jr. had often stayed during his nationwide trips seeking
social equality. The hotel still stands, a very unpretentious place in
an unpretentious section of Memphis a couple blocks east of the river.
Rev. King was a man not so easily summarized, by detractors and glorifiers
alike, however in all probability he was one of the greatest men, if not
THE greatest man, produced by this United States of America.
He did not want to die and was not obviously courageous in the way movie
stars portray physical courage, but he knew that someone would eventually
kill him if he pursued his chosen path as a servant of his god. He often
foretold his own death in speeches and in private conversation. In public
reference to a bomb threat which had delayed his plane flight to Memphis,
he said, "And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats,
or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from
some of our sick white brothers?
Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days
ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop.
And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity
has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do
God's will."
He was unfailingly modest, unpretentious, unadorned, yet he spearheaded
the most radical social changes this country has ever seen -- and left
it far better off and well on an inexorable path set by him toward bettering
itself by righting numerous wrongs and making real the statement in the
Constitution "All men are created equal," and thereby turn the
Nation away from a condition in which for millions of citizens life was
no better, no more free, no more promising than the harshest Stalinist
regime that had ever existed. A Nation where prior to MLK the phrase "Land
of the Free" was a hideous joke.
He was the subject of intense scrutiny by government intelligence operatives
seeking any sort of negative details and compromising situations quite
in illegal advance of any accusation of wrongdoing. While the FBI did
compile some minor peccadilloes that could be said true of any man of
the world, the truth is surprising in that they found so little, for as
a whole the man was far more incorruptible than the vast majority of gurus,
false religious leaders, mystical pundits, and outright charlatans out
there.
While the truth of conspiracy, government or any other sort of organized
complicity in his death probably will never be known, this Monday we recognize
not the death but the living legacy of a truly great American in a time
which has seen both its own changes as well as its own disappointments
and senseless violence.
We have now a Black President of this Nation, who certainly solidly clinched
the title by overwhelming reelection by a populace that is vastly changed
from 1968. What would King say to our current President today on the subject
of, say, intensive and illegal violations of privacy, so specifically
forbidden by the Constitutional stipulation and originating statements
in the Declaration of Independence stating explicitly "that the people
shall be free from unreasonable search and seizures"? For King himself
was subject to just such illegal wiretapping and searches.
And once again, just as in Vietnam, we find ourselves drawn into foreign
involvements that corrupt the endeavor and lead to heinous crimes and
sordid excuses for detentions without trial, summary executions by robotic
planes, and reprehensible acts of torture.
While there are no more "Colored" waterfountains or whites
only entries and seating on a bus no longer has a race line, there remain
vast oceans of poverty that persist as legacy of 400 years of slavery.
Violent death remains a more vivid likelihood for a Black man than a White
in just about every major city in America.
Clearly some dreamers still need to wake to reality and action in the
21st Century America.
THE DOTTED LINE
So anyway, now the Hollar Days are over, that vigorous time of bustling
and everybody shouting at one another, shouting whether in the store or
seeing an old acquaintance across the street you have not seen for years,
shouting for the sheer exuberance of it whether its necessary or not.
"Hey Steve! Long time no see!
"How are the kids? You get over that bronchitis?"
"What?"
"Bronchitis! Cough! Pneumonia!"
"O bronchitis! That's what I thought you said. O that was a while
back! Better now!"
Of course any two people with sense would cross the street to catch up,
but the Californios are all in a hurry nowadays and the street is no place
for reunions.
"You gotta drop by some time!"
"What?"
"Come visit! Bring Martha!"
"Martha? She's fine! Fine . . "!
As for the families, they are all rebuilding themselves into islands
of stability after the havoc of temporary proximity in which cousins learned
to hate each other all over again in new ways derived by everyone being
another year older. Helen is still in a snit about Uncle Jack getting
so drunk at dinner and plunging both hands into the steaming mashed potatoes.
Those of us who managed to get through the Season living that Waitresses
song with the world's smallest turkey in the oven and no happy ending
now are girding up for the Battle of V-Day in February. Kind friends set
up parties and blind dates with just a touch of sadism so that Karen/Denby
will have some hopeful to cover them up with roses by the dreaded 14th.
"But I don't wanna go out tonight! Whyyyyyyyy?" Karen wails.
"Because," say Chad and Tammy, "We want you to have what
we have."
Karen folds her arms and glares from under sharp black bangs. "Wuzzat?"
"We just want you to be happy," Tammy says. "Don't you
want to be happy?"
"Overrated," Karen says. "I'll settle for cheerfulness.
It's good enough."
A similar conversation happened concerning Denby, with the difference
that Bree, Susan and Kara simply did not include him in any decision making
for they know that men do not understand the complex mathematics of l'amor.
"Men can have only one thought in their head at any one time,"
Susan said. "They are incapable of comprehending binomials."
So they set up something at the Old Same Place Bar, knowing that L. and
S. were cute as the dickens and pour on a little music, a little booze,
why not something happen?
On that night Denby was watching the lead guitarist to figure out the
hybrid picking style on his solid body Fender, three humbuckers, to an
80 watt Marshall Stax and pedals on the floor (that is an Fmaj shape he
is doing there up to the 12th) while L. and S., cute as the dickens, were
bopping along merrily getting drunk. Somehow someway they all wound up
taking pictures of each other with their iPhones and L. wound up sitting
in Denby's lap and when she got up to go to the Ladies he noted, purely
objectively, what a nice bumper there. One of the group returned from
the bar with an armload of tequila shots.
Then he got up to go unload his share of beer and he saw out the window
Frankie Krick, one of the toughs from The Angry Elf Gang. Frankie had
held him down a while ago and had rearranged a couple ribs out of pure
venomous spite.
All the members of the Angry Elf Gang were like that. They wanted to
put the fear into you so that you lived with it for the rest of your life,
so they could use it again.
Denby ducked into the mensroom as the set break arrived and in the stall
took out his phone to see himself there with the two beautiful women and
him looking like he was, a 56 year old Nevermuch, looking a bit paunchy
and unsure of where to put his hands, and his heart sank.
He was old enough to be their father. He turned of the phone, thinking
that this all would not end well. It never ended well. As he came out
of there he saw to his right the figure of S. crouched hugging her knees
on the flagstones in front of the faux fireplace. He had suffered a crush
on S. a while back in the most childish way, but had done nothing about
it until she went away. He shouldered his way to the front and out the
front door and the streetfront where he chatted with one of the musicians
briefly, spouting inanities and realizing he was all wrong that night,
all off kilter, making crazy connections. Abruptly he said good night
and crossed the street to turn left, and as he passed a lighted storefront
window he heard a woman cursing softly under her breath while looking
at the pink and red marketing display for the next unofficial "holiday."
"I HATE V-day!" she said.
"Me too," Denby said.
The woman turned to stare at him from under sharp black bangs.
"Its BS," Denby said. "Try the Michelinas Schema."
An eyebrow rose underneath the bangs. "Michelinas?"
"Stock up on Michelinas frozen. A buck per entree. And Netflix.
No going out, even to the grocery, until the 15th. And practice cheerfulness.
Easier to explain."
"Sounds like a plan," the girl said thoughtfully. "That
way nobody gets hurt."
"Quirkyalone?"
"Yep. How could you tell?"
Denby motioned at the storefront window with its candy hearts and cupids.
"Me too."
"I gotta go. But thanks, bro."
"No prob. Shake?" he held out his hand.
"Shake," she said and did. "See ya."
And the two people parted and went their separate ways. As Denby walked
he whistled a bluegrass tune, The Dotted Line, by Sara Watkins.
I've got a story
The dotted line
We both got sins
That's nothing special
Aint that fine, aint that fine
You've got a story
The dotted line
We both got sins
That's nothing special
Aint that fine, aint that fine
We both lived long enough
to know a friend's worth taking care of
We both been pushed down in the mud
And know that it feels better standing up
Meanwhile, from behind the bar Suzie the bartender observed all that
happened and the puzzled group with the tequila shots wondering where
the galoot with the hat had gotten off to. He had just vanished like a
ghost. O well. He was kinda stodgy anyway.
Suzie handled the rush and the band returned to play. Towards the end
she found time to return to her anthropology book to read about the Bonobo.
"The Bonobo are a cheery group and remain unfailingly upbeat in the
midst of adversity, recovering quickly from disappointment to habitual
cheerfulness, even when entirely alone in the big forest. . . ".
Its a dark night on the Island that knows how to keep its secrets, but
behind the bar of the Old Same Place sits one bartender still pondering
Life's Persistent Questions. Suzie Maldonado.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights; it quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap
embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces
of the former Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned
Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices
of the chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown in the upcoming
year ahead.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
JANUARY 12, 2014
SAIL AWAY COME SAIL AWAY
This meditative shot is of Babylon's skyline seen from Sausalito and
was taken by Tammy.
WHAT'S THE BUZZ
Now that the new year has lifted anchor and is heading now for the Shoals
of Wretched Circumstance and the the rocks of Corrupted Endeavor, we see
already some corporations behaving like bad citizens of the Commonweal.
Got word from an insider that Staples is cutting hours of part-time employees
so as to skip around new laws for mandatory employer-provided healthcare.
Pretty obvious that Staples is looking to put a bullet in the back of
the Healthcare Reform Act, sometimes called "Obamacare" . It
is also obvious that Staples has already been hiring people at part-time
hours for ages now so as to skirt just that. Which, come to think of it,
is precisely what "Obamacare" is supposed to cure - a legion
of working poor who remained uninsured.
Instead of behaving properly, management at Staples -- not exactly a
25 employee mom-and-pop operation -- has ordered that part- time hours
be cut from existing staff and the slack taken up by hiring even more
part timers.
Informant has been hired at 30-35 hours per week, and all of us know
what that means -- she got paid for 35 hours but really put in 42, with
about 7 per "off the clock".
U-Line, CDW, Office Depot and Office Max remain there to serve your office
supply needs....
BART sends us mixed news. Most of you know by now that the various labor
contracts have been voted and approved and there will be no strike.
Yay!
The AC Transit Board of Directors unanimously approved a new labor agreement
with the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 192, endorsing a three-year deal
that gives the agencys 1,625 bus operators and mechanics a 9.5 percent
wage increase.
The agreement comes after nine months of intense but cordial
negotiations between the union and AC Transit management that included
a stunning and ominous threat of a work stoppage that never happened.
I think the process was a very good one, said AC Transit
Board President Greg Harper, noting that the agency still has a huge
problem in trying to maintain an unsustainable employee
pension plan. Still, he said, this is a good contract and I think
we have accomplished a great deal. Both sides worked hard to make this
happen.
Under terms of the agreement, the 9.5 percent salary increase will be
phased in over the life of the three-year contract. In addition, for the
first time, ATU employees will also make contributions toward their health
care costs with a flat monthly contribution of $120.00 per employee during
the life of the contract.
Last month, ATU members also approved the labor agreement by a vote of
567 to 465, heading off a strike that was twice avertedonce by reaching
a tentative labor agreement and then a second time by a cooling off period
imposed by Governor Jerry Brown.
A walkout by operators would have halted AC Transit bus service for 197,000
daily riders who depend on buses for transportation throughout the East
Bay and to the Peninsula and San Francisco.
Ah, but we have this from Mission Control: "There will be a $0.50
daily parking fee increase at many stations in the month of January, 2014.
All revenue generated from these new fees will be placed into a special
account only to be used for programs for improved station access, including
shuttle and feeder service to stations, and much needed station rehabilitation,
and modernization."
Closer to home we note the pace of 5150 Psychiatric Detentions remains
hovering around seven per week with last week clocking in an astounding
five detentions in one day.
One dog bite and one indecent exposure added to Mayberry's crimeblotter,
plus a rash of auto burgleries. No, people, stashing your laptop under
the seat will not work.
Finally the always entertaining Letters to the Editor indicate concerns
about just how 40,000 gallons of fuel is going to get to the planned WETA
ferry terminal -- as in over city streets in front of your house?
Another person begs us to not "forget the seals" as in the
harbor seals that congregate now in the area planned for that facility.
Another curmudgeon rails against those scofflaw bicyclists, bemoaning
the fact that he cannot pilot his SUV over sidewalks and run stop signs
with impugnity as they seem to do.
It is good that Democracy runs at such a slow pace -- otherwise we would
be making mistakes at twice the speed.
WHAT'S GOING ON
The burgeoning art scene in the East Bay continues to boil with activity.
Photo lets us know that Enrique de la Uz opens his socially conscious
exhibit CUBA ZAFRA January 16 with a Preview Reception: Thursday, January
16, 6:00 - 8:00 followed by the major shindig Reception: Saturday, February
1, 2:00 - 4:00, featuring a talk by Curator Charles Anselmo at 3:00
Enrique de la Uz started working as a photojournalist with other young
photographers and writers in the 1960s. They portrayed the man in the
street, specific to the way that they perceived his life. A photograph
was never a document, but at the very least a personal statement, an opinion.
The work of de la Uz is devoted to the expression of fundamental ideas
through others, through the social landscape. He engages the present,
past, and future of every one of us through the medium of photography.
Photo is at 473 25th Street in Oaktown.
Autobody on Park Street continues to push the boundaries with all kinds
of interesting stuff. This time around we have a performance piece "Playing
My Hand" , a solo show, by Rachel LePell, 30-year veteran of theater,
nationally awarded playwright, Bay Area freelance director and writer,
Chabot College Theater Arts lead faculty, being performed this month.
Premiered at The Marsh in San Francisco in July 2013, this production
of "Playing My Hand" is the third evolution of this new play,
still in development.
Call 510.865.2608 for info and tickets on the shows slated for January
24,25 and 26, 2014.
Autobody also has a gallery located in Hayward and those people also
are doing amazing stuff. Their press release states,
2014 will mark the 25th year of the Annual Children's Book Illustrators
Exhibit held at the Sun Gallery, Hayward.
- WHERE: The Sun Gallery, Hayward Area Forum for the Arts, 1015 E Street,
Hayward, CA 94549
- WHEN: February 7th 0 April 7th, 2014, Reception for the Artists and
Book Signing: March 16th, 1:00pm - 4:00pm
- WHAT: 'Zine making workshop for kids of all ages
- CONTACT: For more information and images please call: Jacqueline Cooper,
Artistic Director 510.865.2608
jacqueline@autobodyfineart.com, www.sungallery.org
Gabriele Bungardt has announced a triple slam of exhibitions of her work,
including Spritzers featuring 11 paintings from the 'American Working
Man' series. January 4 to February 20, Spritzers Cafe and Gallery, 734
Central Ave., Alameda. Open Monday through Friday 6AM to 5PM; Saturday
and Sunday 6AM to 6PM.
She also will be exhibiting at Expressions Gallery in Berkeley January
25 to April 18 with a Reception: Saturday, January 25, 6PM to 8PM. More
information at expressionsgallery.org.
Also ProArts Gallery in Oaktown has accepted two paintings from her "City
Live" series. Reception: First Friday, February 7, 6PM to 8PM. More
information at proartsgallery.org
Vessel, always the venue for fascinating exhibits in an extraordinary
setting on 25th in Oaktown announces "Pareidolia: New Works"
by Donald Fortescue.
- OPENS January 16, 6:30-8PM, Artist Reception.
- EXHIBITS January 16 - February 22, 2014.
- ARTIST TALK February 8, 2-3:30PM. Oakland Art Murmur Celebration on
February 7, 6-9PM - Open to the Public.
- WHERE: Vessel Gallery, 471 25th Street, Oakland, CA 94612,
- CONTACT: 510 893 8800.
"Pareidolia is the psychological phenomenon whereby a vague
or random stimulus (often an image or sound) is perceived as significant
or having recognizable form - classical examples being seeing the man
in the moon, the Shroud of Turin, and the face in the Cydonia
region of Mars.
The ever tasteful and sensually evocative SLATE lets us know Elise Morris:
Paintings; Helen Dannelly: Sculpture ends January 25.
Upcoming there in the 25th Street barn we see Michelle Knox: Perceptions
- an immersive glass sculpture installation
January 30March 8. Opening Reception : Friday Feb 7th, 56pm,
followed by Oakland Art Murmur 69pm
Don't see much happening in the way of concert news, save that Willie
Nelson will be at the Greek with the Drive by Truckers, unfortunately
without Jason Isbell, but still a show worth capturing from beginning
to end. That one is slated for early Spring. Willie has impressed us with
a recent repetoire that has forayed beyond the narrow limits of defined
Country, but we bet the old outlaw still wears his guns on the outside
of his pants for all the world to see.
NOTHING CHANGES ON NEW YEARS DAY
So anyway, Wally's son Joshua is still holed up in the sanctuary of the
Greek Orthodox church up on the hill. Mr. Spline, the CIA undercover operative
assigned to keep tabs on the man who blew the whistle on the illegal wiretapping
of mayor's office phones in the Bay Area and the controversial practice
of "bagel boarding", which featured forcefeeding terrier suspects
with schmier laced with smoked oysters and ham (oy gevalt!), uncovered
the plan to spirit Joshua away to a safe haven country via the secret
network of underground Mormon tunnels and so thwarted our hero's escape
by stationing a platoon of Marines at the Exits of Moroni.
Now that the Hollardays are done for a while, with no more religiousity
to impinge on anyone having a good time until the Vernal Equinox, all
the pastors and ministers have been having a good time socializing with
one another. Even Pastor Nance Haughtboy of the First Methodist Church
has been dropping in for these informal gatherings in the playroom of
the Old Same Place Bar where they play boardgames, snooker, and out back,
mumbly peg (so as to test the solidity of faith). The Hari Krishnas came
and sang and Reverend Jesse Washington of the Second Baptist Church played
the piano, which he had learned during his days as an unrepenetant sinner
in houses of ill-repute, but now that he was saved, it was all good.
Newly joined to them was Reverend Michael Hursey of the Church of Truffles,
who clad entirely in white robes with Sister Tremors brought in a box
of messy powdered chocolates.
ArchBishop Mitty brought in some Everett and Jones BBQ and Reverend Leroi
Howler brought in buckets of fried chicken, which caused all of them to
praise god for the bounty. Naturally, Reverend Rev. Jason Arrabiata, CFSM,
brought buckets of spaghetti and meat sauce and there was all sorts of
praying and eating and praise and a fine ecclesiastical time was had by
all.
The only group which did not show up were La Luz del Mundo de Occupado
Parking Space, for those self-appointed aspostles did not mix well with
others and were fond of holding not one, not two, but three services lasting
each about three hours per day, seven days a week, and so the apostles
of LLDMDOPS were sore fatigued from preaching day in and day ou,t and
from their competition with the Non Compos Mentis chapter of the National
Association of the Directionally Challenged and Traffic Enfeebled.
Indeed Floyd was back in town for the Biannual Meeting Series, which
typically spread itself out over the course of two weeks as it was extremely
difficult to get all attendees in any one spot at any one particularly
arranged time.
Once again the theme for the whitepaper presetation was the arcane art
of the Stealth Turn, a maneuver that seeks to employ the turn signals
in ever more creative ways.
Many claim that NorCal drivers are the worst in the world. That is not
true, for that distinction has been held for nearly half a century by
the Italians who live in and around the vicinity of Milano, where the
fine art of driving backwards on the wrong side of the road has been passed
on from father to son, mother to daughter, for several generations.
Nevertheless, we do practice.
There might be some collusion there between Floyd's group and at least
one of the religious groups for wherever the Directionally challenged
go in an automobile, there is always heard a great deal of calling of,
"O my god! Save us!"
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights; it quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap
embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces
of the former Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned
Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices
of the chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown in the upcoming
year ahead.
That's the way it is on the Island. Have a great week.
January 5, 2014
EXCELLENT BIRDS
This time of year the Eastern ramparts of the Sierra stand dark and forbidding
with cold granite slabs pounded by cold ice rain or snow. The approaches
are iffy in reliability due to the ferocious blizzards that can seal off
passes for days at a time. Hence the area tends to become infrequently
visited save for the ski resorts, Tahoe where the crowds clog the resorts
and the chi chi chalets. Further down, where the mountains get serious
around the Pinnacles and Crowley Lake, the land remains desolate, pristine,
beautifully untenanted.
Which is just fine for Islanders Mike and Agnes, both of whom possess
serious woodcraft skills. Mike was a card-carrying pulaski wielder on
the slopes of fire back in the day and Agnes was a Park Ranger. Hence
their holiday pics tend to be like this one taken by Agnes.
WELCOME BACK MY FRIENDS TO THE SHOW THAT NEVER ENDS
Now that 2013 is finally finished for good, we hope that you liked what
was coming to you this past Xmas. We are off to a new start with that
year's 51 issues split into two sites and tucked away in the Archives.
If you want to relive that special moment or recall the news go the the
back issues section.
We will be tidying up the Stories section to clear space on the server
and generally sprucing up the layout.
Never fear - the obnoxious "floating radio" will not return.
The annual Island Life Holiday CD is back. It's ready and in the can,
with the proviso that we get the Island Hebephrenic Chorus together long
enough and on their meds to perform Deck the Halls. Otherwise we will
have to make do with the St. Charles Lunatic Asylum group Effexor.
WHAT'S THE BUZZ
The venues were packed with unknown fresh talent this Hollarday Season,
with extraordinarily little in the way of starpower driving the concerts.
We suspect sticker-shock was responsible for much of the stay-home behavior.
The NSSN event cost easily over $200 for two people when you factor in
the exhorbitant parking fee, surcharges, snacks and drinks, etc.
General word had it that people with incomes to allow it fled the Bay
Area in droves for places lacking electrical sockets and LED advertising
boards. Mexico, Arizona, even France, according to one reporter. All to
escape the "buy now and save" barrage that swelled to a crescendo
even as retailers across the country reported sale figures so dismal,
they were all comparing the Black Friday results to the wretched year
of 2008 the middle of the Great Recession.
Much of the content in the weeklies and in the EBX touch on the state
of retail outlets. One article ("Bars, restaurants squeezing out
retail", Angela Woodall) bemoaned the loss of long-time retail stores
in Oakland, which is seeing a 5% vacancy rate for commercial space in
the desireable Tgraph and Broadway corridor between 16th and 27th.
On the upside a front page item hopefully states that the City's sales
tax revenue went up last quarter by 5%. So we must be doing something
right even though there are prominent vacancies in all locations which
reported higher sales tax figures.
Ironically, financial planners are forcasting a swell of escapees from
San Francisco's incredibly high rents which are hammering businesses and
slowing the process of recovery from the Recession.
Also very good news comes from the 187 report in Oaktown: "Oakland
sees big drop in homicides."
The toll of the slain has dropped to 91 in 2013 from 131 recorded in
2012. Of this number 88 were classified as murder, with 3 deaths attributed
to "justifiable homicide", generally involving police use of
deadly force.
All regional cities in the ABAG area that encompasses five counties reported
drops in homicide reports.. San Francisco's tally fell from 69 to 48 for
2013.
Various factors for this improvement are listed, with obvious emphasis
placed where agencies want increased funding for projects. A clear standout
was the dismantling of two violent gangs due to the results of long term
investigations. Another seems to be a main function of the bad economy.
There just is not the same amount of money to be earned easily by dealing
drugs and robbing people who have no cash, so many criminals have moved
to softer targets such as identity theft. This comes from self reports
of street criminals convicted of shooting or murder.
Ironically, hard times have put a damper on the kinds of activity that
led to violence.
Remember a couple issues back when we warned property owners to take
care of seemingly insignificant electrical issues because of fire hazard?
Front page Sun article mentions two substantial fires, with the second
fire's cause clearly stated as "electrical in origin".
Once again, get rid of that old two-wire and knob construction. It was
fine back in the day when it did not matter when poles reversed polarity,
but not today. Some of the houses on this island have subpanels that predate
the implementation of TV sets as a popular form of entertainment. Let
alone microwaves, computers and printers, Ipods, multiple chargers for
phones, tablets, cameras, toys, internet devices, grounded COAX, etc.
Talk about a new ferry facility down near the Hornet has reached the
level of projected start dates of this summer for dredging and demolition
of some existing structures. The facility will service the WETA ferry
boats and will also include an extension of the scenic Bay Trail.
The Navy League, one of the last holdover reminders of the big Navy presence
here, will be holding its 4th annual crab feed on Saturday, 1/11/14. The
event is a fundraiser to support the sea services of Navy, Marines, Coast
Guard, Merchant Marines, and the Sea Cadets. Call 749-9175 for info.
COLD RAIN AND SNOW
So anyway, the new year rolled past with only a minor smidgen of hooliganism.
The pavement in front of the house down the block was littered with streamers,
spent Black Cats, fizzled fizzlers, and sparklers which had lost their
luster, indicating somebody stayed up late, but so many people had left
town the homeboys could hardly muster a decent barrage of AK-47 from the
top balconies in Oaktown. In fact it sounded more like a salute to someone
who had passed on than a joyous celebration.
This year is slow ramping up newswise, largely because of two factors:
most of the country beyond the Great Divide is freezing its collective
buns off with minus zero temperatures and truckloads of snow hammering
just about every service, every business, every facility in every state.
Secondly, as pundits have indicated sagaciously, nobody has any money.
Well, not exactly true, in that anyone who can afford to look at the Stock
Market has beaucoups cash. But there are not a lot of those.
Even los migras are packing up to leave, seeing that the American Dream
of work hard to improve your standing and yourself is dead.
Yes friends, once again it is Mourning in America.
As for the Island, change always comes slowly. Now is the time of post-event,
of afterglow from the Hollardays. No more furious running around to find
last-minute gifts, no more frantic driving, no more standing in lines
with hundreds of other people snagging those remaining things for the
kitchen to serve drop-ins, visitors from out-of-town, Company. The holiday
occured midweek but for many, instead of taking the entire thing off,
it was just a brief hiatus as the budget does not allow taking time off.
There were too many chores to accomplish.
Pedro Almeida is already out on his boat taking crab during the height
of the season. Marsha and Tipitina rode the ferry in to the City where
no one can afford to live anymore to report to their McJobs. Suan worked
through the Hollarday, as supposedly convivial times that feature the
mask of assumed happiness become major draws for places like the Crazy
Horse Saloon, with its private booths and pole dancers.
Veriflo enjoys the benefits of a strong union, so the factory remained
shuttered, save for exempt employees and a few earning overtime, leaving
Martini and Pahrump at loose ends.
Little Adam stayed home, as the schools had shut down, so the group of
them went out to the Strand to pitch pebbles and walk out on the mudflats
under the roiling grey sky of the New Year.
Temperatures were not frigid enough to make people want to move back
to New Jersey or Bear Lake, but they remained at the chill level that
sapped the heat out of everything, given enough time.
Out there with the seagulls calling their signals to each other and the
tide way out, leaving bare the broad shelf of packed sand, they looked
across the gelid aqua-green Bay to the City that once promised so much
and now has become so average by way of greed.
Javier, Jose, Martini, Sarah and Pahrump stood there with their hands
deep in their coat pockets watching Adam run on the beach with the dogs
Bonkers and Wickiwup and Johnny Cash. Arthur, of the Soul Brothers Upholstery
Shop, had joined them.
Martini was in an emo state of being since an aunt of his, the last of
his father's house in Antioch, had died in mid December. He knew her and
he had not known her as family, the way it always develops in America.
There had been promises of a "great wish" and the promises withdrawn.
There had been threats and supplications and complexity. Real and imagined
slights. The usual family affair sort of business. Now, all disputation
had ended, leaving just the ashes.
"Things have been bad for so long," Martini said. "Ever
since the Ronny Raygun. And getting worse."
"Don't see much difference in my direction," Pahrump said.
"White men still own Reno."
"Yo." Arthur said, in support of the sentiment.
"My question," Martini said. "Is what next."
The sun was going down beyond the distant undulations of Babylon and
lights in the ticky-tacky boxes on the hillsides began building the ropes
of luminescent pearls as the pale horizon flushed with bright grenadine
and blue anisette striped with creme du menthe colors, indicating the
Sun was hellbent on a sweet bender after work.
Good to think that even Mssr. Soleil can kick back with his feet up and
enjoy some time off, perhaps starting with a bit of Galliano.
Over at the Church of La Luz de Mundo de Occupado Parking Space where
the Minister held forth at length on how to dominate parking spaces for
blocks by means of stealth, guile and forcefulness, the congregation was
going through ecstatic fits of chanting in tongues, writhing on the floor
and doing the busline hokey pokey.
"If they ask you what are we doing here with our three services
from five in the morning until ten o'clock at night seven days a week
(including holidays) tell them you are 'making something'. Yes!"
"Say it brother!"
"Because we are building the New Jerusalem on earth and in Heaven.
Each day we are adding bricks and mortar of Faith for the brand new buildings
to house the Faithful unto the Lawrd! We are building a Metropolis of
the Saints!"
"O sweet Jaysus! O hallalujia! Hallallujia!"
"And everybody knows a Metropolis needs parking spaces. So go out
and seize them brothers and sisters! Other churches meet just for a miserly
one hour on one day for the week. We enjoy 20 hours a day seven days a
week and we need that parking more than the unwashed heathen who live
around here. We come from far distant Antioch and Hercules and Pittsburg
and Dublin and we are on a mission to wrest the parking spaces of this
world from the debbil! For as all of us know, an idle space is debbil
space! So build brothers and sisters! Build! Build! Build! our Heavenly
Metropolis!"
"O hallalujia! Praise Gawd!"
Denby, listening to this from outside the hall shook his head. Those
damned Developers have gotten into everything such that not even your
spirituality was safe from their mantra. And so he walked on from that
busy place of light and noise, thinking, "Religion sure has gotten
wierd these days".
As he passed the Unitarian Church, he saw Reverend Irene Freethought
taking down the holiday lights, which of course featured pan religion
symbols, including but not exclusive to the lotus blossom, star of David,
menorah, crescent of Islam, hari krishna verses, Sheela na Gig, Krampus,
glowing crosses with diagonal stripes, horizontal stripes, no stripes,
hooks to recall sun worship, and scads of others.
She was in a precarious position on the footstool, which had legs that
sank into the soft sod, nearly causing an ecclesiastical contretemps.
Denby stepped forward to assist with thanks, as he stood several inches
taller than the Reverend.
Together, the apostate and the preacher labored to remove the seasonal
hangings draped along the gutters and the announcement board. Denby did
this because that is the way he is and the way things used to be, people
stepped in spontaneously to help out each other, knowing life here on
earth is fraught with difficulty and danger, and good deeds rewarded themselves.
Back in the day of Alta California.
When it was just about done, Reverend Freethought invited Denby in for
tea or brandy.
"Don't mind if I do," Denby said.
It was late in the evening by the time Denby left after talking about
music and politics and island racoons for several hours. Denby had not
thought a minister could have so much knowledge about the world and be
so interesting and . . . the interesting way the kitchen light touched
her face set with blue eyes and framed by its head of short, practical
hair. He thought he might drop in for a visit again some time. A good
way to start the year.
Heading out through the Golden Gate on his crab boat, El Borracho Perdido,
Pedro switched on his radio to listen to his favorite variety show hosted
by the televangelist Pastor Rotschue. This week the Lutheran minister
was broadcasting from Nourse Theatre in San Francisco and he had a lovely
woman on who sang folk and bluegrass. Well, it was radio, and the woman
sounded like she was lovely. Some day he would have to scrape together
the dinero and take Mrs. Almeida over there to see the man in person.
The air smelled fresh, the seas were relatively calm and the woman's
voice lilted out of the bright cabin over the dark chop with an old song
by the Everly Brothers.
Each time we meet love
I find complete love
Without your sweet love what would life be
So never leave me lonely
Tell me you love me only
And that you'll always let it be me
A good way to start the year.
The long howl of the throughpassing train ululated from far across the
water where the gantries of the Port of Oaktown stood glowing with their
sentry lights; it quavered across the waves of the estuary, the riprap
embankments, the grasses of the Buena Vista flats and the open spaces
of the former Beltline, moaned through the cracked brick of the old abandoned
Cannery with its ghosts and weedy railbed, keened between the interstices
of the chainlink fences as the locomotive glided past the shuttered doors
of the Jack London Waterfront, headed off to parts unknown in the upcoming
year ahead.
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