San Francisco « Towse: views from the hill

January 12, 2009

Walkaround yesterday.

Filed under: books,bookstores,life,San Francisco — Towse @ 6:48 pm

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?

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January 11, 2009

January 5, 2009

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Filed under: photographs,San Francisco — Towse @ 5:57 pm

New Year’s Day. The Gandhi statue at the Ferry Building.

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Traffic Jam

Filed under: photographs,San Francisco — Towse @ 5:56 am

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January 2, 2009

New Year’s meme

Filed under: news,San Francisco — Towse @ 7:07 am

Borrowed from cygnoir

post the first sentence for the first post of each month for 2008:

January2008:
In 2008 may you have warm sunshine to bask in, blue skies overhead and a light heart.

February2008:
Years and years and years ago, I read horse race results at the back of the sports section in the San Jose Mercury News.

March2008:
Packed.

April2008:
Wednesday I knew where my set of keys to the loft was and his nibs’ set as well.

May2008:
Yay, me! I just caught up on eighty back posts at grapes 2.0, dating back to before we left for Jordan/Egypt in March.

June2008:
The gang was over here tonight for dinner and a discussion of Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach.

July2008:
The First Today Show: January 14, 1952 with Dave Garroway

August2008:
The trash police: Gavin Newsom is proposing the nation’s first-ever mandatory recycling and composting law.

Sept2008:
I’ve been having a nice back and forth exchange with Luis Herrera, the guy in charge of the San Francisco Public Library, re the Library’s dumb idea to put the new North Beach Library on top of the Triangle.

Oct2008:
British Battles – analysing and documenting British Battles from the previous centuries

Nov2008:
My enduring thanks this election cycle to Nate Silver.

Dec2008:
Pownce is closing down effective December 15th.

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December 26, 2008

Coming Soon to the Tenderloin: Another Dirty, Poorly Lit Place For Books

Filed under: books,bookstores,San Francisco — Towse @ 9:46 pm

Coming Soon to the Tenderloin: Another Dirty, Poorly Lit Place For Books [SFWeekly - The Snitch]

Oh. Now. How come I never knew this bookstore existed until this morning when I was wandering through old links, one of which told tales of this place?

Now it’s gone (possibly to be phoenix’d … some day …).

The pics remind me of Woodruff & Thush, a used bookstore down by San Jose State, a used bookstore my older brother and I used to love. (And hate … Case had a lovely rant about the time he found a great book at a terrific price and brought it to the cash register only to have Craig Thush tell him that he hadn’t repriced the book in a very long time and he was repricing the book on the spot. Couldn’t argue with Thush. …)

I would’ve bought Woodruff & Thush out lock, stock & barrel when Craig Thush decided to retire in 2003 if I could’ve. I still have plenty of books I bought there in my impoverished young adulthood, including a Difco manual I got for cheaps when I was taking Microbiology 101.

Here’s hoping McDonald’s reopens and I get a crack at browsing the stacks some day soon.

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November 18, 2008

Moonrise Sculptures: December by Ugo Rondinone

Filed under: art,photographs,San Francisco — Towse @ 12:58 am

Public art by Ugo Rondinone. Moonrise Sculptures: March, October and December. Three sculptures at the public plaza at 555 Mission. We’re talking nine feet tall here, folks.

Where are the other nine moonrise sculptures in the series?

Here’s December:

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November 13, 2008

Foggy day in town (and then not …)

Filed under: life,photographs,San Francisco,weather — Towse @ 10:52 pm

The fog had been creeping in since we woke up. The radio said the San Mateo Bridge, south of us, was fogged in, but we didn’t have fog. Then. … The fog from the south showed up at our doorstep.
7:54 a.m.

9:08 a.m.: The fog is hugging the underside of the Bay Bridge. The cars heading west come out of a cloud and into the sun, then head back into a cloud.

9:09 a.m. : Some birds hanging out in the notorious cypress tree down hill from us. Watching the fog that’s crept over the bay.

The cranes over at the Port of Oakland on the east side of the Bay are just barely visible above the fog.

10:06 a.m. An hour later, the fog begins to clear and a sunny, San Francisco fall day appears. Not unexpectedly.

The crows rule the cypress roost. Later they’ll make way for the parrots. There are a variety of bird types that share turns watching from the lofty perch. The only bird that’s unwelcome by all is the hawk.

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This is our moment. This is our time.

Filed under: art,culture,election2008,San Francisco,shopshopshop — Towse @ 9:23 pm

I’m a huge fan of Paul Madonna and his ALL OVER COFFEE work in the Sunday Chronicle.

Got this note from him today (that would be me and the zillion others on his e-mail list):

I’ve had an overwhelming response to this week’s “Obama:Progress” All Over Coffee piece. Since the original sold within the first few hours it was published, (including a backup waitlist) I decided to make a fine art limited edition print of this particular strip to honor this momentous time in history.

The full-color print is 16×22 inches, signed and numbered in a limited edition of 100, at $195 each. Produced by the fabulous printer SF Electric Works, these prints are of the highest quality.

Follow this link to both view and order.

If you missed Sunday’s Madonna, check it out. If you don’t know ALL OVER COFFEE or Paul Madonna, check him out.

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flickr and guesswheresf

Filed under: photographs,San Francisco,web2.0 — Towse @ 1:30 am

I stash photos on flickr — not all the photos I take, obviously, but some. My “pro” account expired today and I need to get around to renewing.

“pro” accounts cost $24.95/yr and a subscription gets you an infinite archive of photos, infinite uploads, infinite … and the free version gets you a far scaled down version, but enough to see why you might want to spend $24.95/yr for the complete deal.

The time I spend roaming around on flickr, looking at other people’s photographs (oooh, look at all the photos labeled ‘Lake Baikal’) is a joy and an education, but most of my time on flickr is spent in one of their interest groups called GuessWhereSF in which the members (1213 at last count) upload photos taken within the city limits and the other members guess where the picture was taken.

I am amazed at the esoteric knowledge of the city and its back alleys some of these folks have. The group also has handy helpful tools like a list of “unfound” photos for those who are looking for the challenge of identifying a photograph that has so far gone unidentified and a comment searcher so you avoid, as much as possible, uploading a picture of somewhere that’s been photographed and uploaded ten times before. (Search for the street name of the place you took a picture of for the best results.)

Pictures that show up again and again and again eventually are nominated for “Hall of Fame” status. Scrolling through the Hall of Fame is a primer into how different photographers can photograph the identical location with widely varied results.

Fun? You betcha.

Like this: Sleepy lion. 3690 Washington @ Spruce, uploaded a day or so ago. (The address was added after the location was identified.) (Identified in like two minutes, I’ll have you know. Sheesh.) Comments follow.

Read the rules before playing!

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