Insert quote from Jack Nicholson movie here

Today's Chinatown Economic Forum, the eighth such neighborhood business pow-wow hosted by Our Gav (but first in the land of dim sum) was not unlike the 30-Stockton -- it was crowded, it was stuffy, I didn't understand a word and small old women kept trying to knock me over.

Maybe some of that is because two-thirds of Chinatown residents do not speak English, or because they're one of the 55 percent of households in C-town that earn less than $25,000 a year -- households, mind you, not people -- sobering facts in the city with 33 percent Asian population and the biggest Chinatown outside of Asia.

I understood that much, as Gavin himself provided some of the dirty nitty gritty, and the rest of it was pasted up on the walls. What else happened? Well, city planner Bill Lee ran around the room shushing people too intent on chit chatting in between plates of duck to listen to speakers, Carmen Chu said a whole lot of nothing in English (but may have revealed the meaning of life in Mandarin or Cantonese, damned if I'll ever know), and I met a ton of candidates for Aaron Peskin's supe seat, most of whom I'll probably never meet again.

The consensus was 1. Chinatown is crowded 2. Chinatown is dirty and 3. Chinatown has no parking. That's all that stops Chinatown from becoming more than a glorified outdoor cafeteria and deadly tourist trap. That's all. So get at it... right?

Your Monday-night downer

San Diego surf bum, Zen meditater and yoga practitioner Barry Zito was demoted from the San Francisco Giants' starting rotation to its bullpen on Monday night.

Zito, in a word, sucks: he's 0-6 with an ERA over 7.00. A little over a year ago, the onetime Cy Young Award winner (who jobbed Pedro Martinez for said award, might I add) signed a 7-year, $126 million contract, at the time the richest for a pitcher in baseball history. For the Giants and their fans, that really sucks.

In their infinite wisdom, the Chron decided to make his misery our misery, whether or not you're a Giants fan. They published a Web app that lets you figure out how long it'd take you to earn Zito's $14.5 million annual salary.

Give it a go. Here's how I did:



382 years, huh? 2390, here we come! Year of the Me!



Fuck.

Could it happen here?

Of late I'm doing my utmost to practice proper phone etiquette, which for me boils down to not answering it very often. (An aside, do a google search for cell phone etiquette and be absolutely astounded by the pages upon pages of MSM coverage on this hot topic). This meant I had 12 messages to wade through this evening, one of which was a very excited one, from a man who witnessed this shooting.

A boy waiting for the K-Ingleside Muni Metro line at Ocean and Faxon Avenues in San Francisco's Ingleside neighborhood was shot tonight.

He was taken to San Francisco General Hospital, where he was listed in critical condition, police said.

The shooting occurred at 6:10 p.m. There were reportedly two gunmen involved, and they ran from the scene, police said.

Many witnesses were at the scene, but gave police conflicting information about who the gunmen were and which way they fled, police said. Nobody has been taken into custody.

This means Randy is a shitty witness for not leading the po-po to the perps, but his "I was leaving the gym and gave first aid to a kid with a hole in his neck" experience will be good for several years' worth of anecdotes.

What else does this mean? Well, it was in Ingleside -- TNB, one Chron commenter commented -- and it's the first death in said neighborhood this year. The kid went to SF General, meaning he is/was in tough shape, and it's highly unlikely whoemever shot him will be found and/or prosecuted.

This happened a day after New York police detectives involved in the killing of an unarmed man received full acquittals; it's interesting to note the tenor of reactions in New York over the situation, which seems open-and-shut by my judgment: man is unarmed, man is shot 50 times by police, including one who, according to news reports, emptied a full clip before reloading and emptying the second one, man is wrongly dead.

I would venture to say SF is more racially-divided than New York; I would wager blacks here have less faith in the establishment than they do in New York; I would surmise that if that happened here, there'd be a full-on riot. Maybe?

Can't even do more less

A frequent alibi for infrequent posting is laziness. I think I'm procrastination champion; I think again.

I'm beaten by an old friend.

open google chat

he: haha! i was just thinking about emailing you

me: no kiddin

So we except the pleasantries, and say how we both is (terrible) and then why.

me: but i might have been in a bit of a stew for a while, letting myself go, as it were

he: no way?

me: i'd say, i'd give that a hesitant yes

yeah you should look at my room

he: are you balding? or fattened?

me: totally letting myself go

a little pudgy but mostly just really messy

he: we should compare rooms

he: you start with the stuff on your floor

we'll trade off

me: ok, floor. boxes i havent unpacked yet, some i have, includes cds and bathroom stuff, books, laundry basket, big pile of clothes, tons of books, letters, some bags

some more books in a box

books

bed

envelopes, and some trash

i took away the plates

he: hahaha

not bad

for an amateur

Sent at 11:51 PM on Monday

me: ok, lay it on me

what've you got that's so messy

Sent at 11:52 PM on Monday

he: my floor: frank's red hot sauce, a bowl of 2day old macaroni and tuna, netflix cases without dvd's, cd's, headphones, amp, guitar, trash, pennies, cigarette ash, cigarette packs, clothes, used napkins, 2 cups of cereal with spoon (all dried), 2 arizona ice t cans filled with used cigarettes, numerous cups, and a few plastic bottles filled with my urine. also socks with a strange "goo" caked on them

me: "a few plastic bottles filled with my urine. "?

he: and that's after i cleaned my room

yup, i'm very lazy at times

me: i think about peeing in the trash sometimes

or out the window

he: hahahaha!

me: but never have i ever actually i think

that i can think of anyway

he: how about in the sink?

i like that you said, "i think about peeing in the trash sometimes"

me: well if i had a sink in my room...

it'd be all over

he: no, the dumb thing is i have a toilet in my room

You are no longer signed in to chat.

Monday afternoon observation

Number one, I'm quickly un-learning how to spell. I struggled with 'observation' there for a split-second. Me lose brain? Uh-oh! Computer make dumb.

Two, it's impossible to be a successful journalist in this city if you are mono-lingual. You will always miss something unless you speak Mandarin, Spanish, English as well as Russian and maybe some Portuguese, and don't feel out of place on Hunters Point Blvd, but to only speak one language while pretending to chronicle SF is a lot like... oh, I don't know, a metaphor, let's see let's see... using a unicycle to try and win a bike race? Although the hipsters would LOVE that.

Three, I went to a bar in Russian Hill on Saturday for a sporting event. I had forgotten how much I hated sports bars. Thank you, vortex of humanity.

Four, it's hard enough to be a journalist without speaking anyone else's language save white, middle class and a little afraid of the world at large... but it's even more difficult when you cannot secure a press pass after weeks (weeks!) of trying and explaining to increasingly irate bosses why you need one, and when you have to duck into Bernal Heights Internet cafes to receive important documents, only to find you can't log in remotely for some inane whateverthefuck reason.

And I work for a corporation.

I, like you, didn't get to see any damn torch

What a day. What a waste. Think of it, San Francisco -- you could have been washing your hair.

Everyone who showed up on foot to catch a glimpse of the Beijing 2008 Olympic torch was, in the word of one spectator, "hosed." Unlike those crackheads who emerged from the TL onto Van Ness Avenue between 2 and 2:30 p.m., who must have figured they were getting D.Ts.

Anyway, there's nothing I can say hasn't been said already. So here are some photos.



Lot of flags out today. Lot, lot of flags. A bit of arguing, too. And some signs.


The only real excitement today came near the end. Some dude, who may have been planning this all along, took off his clothes! What a nutso! But man, did he give the SFPD an eyeful.



So, yeah: a naked dude. That's what we contributed to Western Civilization today.

I can't believe they ran this #1

Here's another soon-to-be regular feature: the ones that somehow slipped through.

We're a conservative rag in this here liberal city, so even I was shocked to see we ran this shot of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.



But what the hey? It's SF.

Stuff you can get away with at a big daily, #1: making shit up

Last week's Nevius had some News To Me: that "chronic alcohol abuse is a major problem in the Outer Mission District."

He cites no sources, statistics, or any information whatsoever supporting the claim, which is a lot like saying there are no drunks in any other part of town, or that chronic tardiness is a major problem in the Marina. It's just a facetiously baseless claim. I lived in the Excelsior, and not once was I bothered by the mob of drunks roaming the streets in search of Manischewitz. It just ain't there.

I'm not offering any wit or savvy insight here, maybe cos it's late, or maybe cos I'm just completely baffled how the Chron's columnist can just make shit up.

Unfit for Publication #1

In an effort to make posting a little more regular -- even if I'm at a baseball game, burned out from writing multiple stories during the day or drunk, as I was on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of this week, respectively -- we at The Spectator are kicking off what we hope is one of several weekly departments.

This, the first, is called "Unfit for Publication," whatever it is that didn't quite make the cut for our print outlet.

There are dozens of pix from the protest of two weeks ago I have yet to throw up on Flickr, and those all count. Today's, however, is a tribute.



Kinda looks like him, don't it?

What Gavin told me

Back to the census story, briefly. I made up for being slighted by pissing off everybody -- the Mayor's staff, a Supervisor, and the Mayor himself -- on Tuesday morning. Or at least trying real hard to do that.

"No other Mayor has done more for the black community."

I got that nugget after I read to the Mayor a quote from the publisher of SF's only black newspaper, after the Mayor's Office scheduled a press conference in the Fillmore District, talking about black people, without -- so they all said, anyway -- telling people in the Fillmore District. Which means, without telling black people.

The publisher said something along the lines of, "Gavin Newsom doesn't care about us. Gavin Newsom only cares about money. His interests are big interests."

So the conference ends and it's quote time. While the other press hacks are swarming around and asking Gavin about the Olympic torch, I snake over to Sup. Ross and give him the quote. He gives me a one-sentence answer and then we have the eye-lock silence for 10-15 seconds. I prod a little more and I get some good stuff out of him.

"(The census) won't do a damn thing about black flight," he said. "This (the press conference) is just sugarcoating it." Ok, now we're talking.

So finally everyone else is done with Gavin, and I have my moment. I don't open my mouth before Nathan Ballard swoops in to eavesdrop, but I read it, Gavin asks who said it, I tell him and he laughs. Puts a hand on my shoulder, tries to dismiss it. He's good, that one. Gavin goes off to list all of the things done recently that "disproportionately" aided SF's black community.

Gavin Newsom: SF's first black mayor? (Sorry, Willie).