Started out just after 1P. Stomach still gurgling from too much fish & chips at the Duke the night before at the Mx meetup. And I'd ordered the small portion! Not used to fried fish no more. ...

We decided that on our way to chk out the rental (we're meeting the new tenant there today and didn't want to be surprised by some horrible something) we'd stop at an Open House I was curious about and then wander over to the rental and on to elsewhere.

We set out first to find the Tatiana statue that's been hidden off the Greenwich Steps. Not so "hidden" anymore. Someone's chalked TIGER --> arrows on the Steps to point out the side path where the statue's been placed. Walked back up the steps to verify the location of a GWSF photo. Walked over to Russian Hill and stopped at 1145 Vallejo.

1145 Vallejo
SFH. 3BR 2.5BA sep gdn apt. ("legal" the blurb sheet sez, but only because there's no stove -- only a microwave oven -- so it's considered a guest room with separate entrance, I think. Perhaps the "legal" means that the lower level re-do into guest quarters was done with permits.) Pkg. (Actually, once we saw it, we decided "Pkg" was "parking for two Minis" or "parking for a Mini and "that Smart car I plan to win at the Tel Hi North Beach Citizens raffle")

Only $1.495m (marked down on the blurb sheet from $1.625m).

Deals abound in San Francisco real estate! Nice wood floors. Maple on the staircase w/ a great banister. Oak on the floors. Gas stove. Yard. Spruced up and all. Quiet street. (Street stops at Jones, so there's not much through traffic.) No views. Only!! $1.495m. Kee-ripes. There must still be people these days with cash in their pockets or something. I would not want to be an appraiser in this market. Where are the comps? What is a place worth? (Whatever anyone is willing to pay.) How much should a bank lend?

From Vallejo we walked down to Polk and poked around in antique and cool-stuff shops, Walgreen's. Walked over to the rental to make sure everything was set for the meet with the new tenant today. We walked down Laguna to Fort Mason and stopped by Book Bay, the Friends of the Library Bookstore, to ... um ... browse

We browsed. I browsed through the ($0.50 or 3/$1) tables. His nibs browsed through the Californiana and elsewhere. I browsed elsewhere. We wound up with the following, which include a couple San Francisciana books:

Ruth Newhall San Francisco's Enchanted Palace 1967 HB $30 - his nibs was quite intrigued by this book about the Palace of Fine Arts. The book was dust-jacketed and wrapped in Bro-Dart cello and had ephemera tucked inside dealing with the initial setup and publicity for the Exploratorium. The ephemera really sealed the deal for his nibs, who is a huge Exploratorium fan. The splurge for the day.

Jerry Flamm Good Life in Hard Times: San Francisco's '20s and '30s $5 TPB
Patricia Highsmith Plotting & Writing Suspense Fiction HB $5
1930 Annualog (Sci Am Pub Co) HB $5
Lee G. Miller An Ernie Pyle Album: Indiana to Ie Shima 1st. HB $5

on the 3/$1 tables
Round Up: the stories of Ring W. Lardner (Scribner. c 1924, 26, 29) HB
Jacqueline Winspear Pardonable Lies HB 2005 1st
Lee Child Bad Luck and Trouble BookClub 2007
Joyce C Oates. Beasts Carroll &Graf "copyright TK" (TK???)
Angus McDonald The Five Foot Road: in search of Vanished China SC. 1st ed.
Dunning - Booked to Die PB
William Murray - Tip on a Dead Crab PB
Gallagher Gray - Death of a Dream Maker PB (GG pseud for Katy Munger)
Wm Faulkner - Six mystery stories: Knight's Gambit (who knew Faulkner wrote mystery short stories? I didn't.)

I had my Friends of the Library card, which gives me 10% off, plus my once-a-year coupon for 25% off, so my grand total was $35 or so after the discounts. Not bad for books enough to keep me entertained for quite a while and a couple of good San Francisciana books.

I'd remembered to bring not only the once-a-year coupon but also a cloth shoulder bag, so we piled most of the books in the bag (they didn't all fit), took the rest in a smaller paper bag, and lugged them up and over the hills home.

home-> Vallejo 0.9m
Vallejo -> rental 1.1m
rental -> Book Bay 0.7m
Book Bay -> home 2.0m

for walkaround total of 4.7m.

Today we'll do the walk to rental on a more direct route (1.8m) then to dinner at Isa (0.8m). (We haven't been in what seems like a long while and we'll be so much closer than we usually are!) And then home (2.4m).

5m total. How did that happen?

Labels: books, bookstores, life, San Francisco

   posted by Sal Towse at  10:48 AM|| |