Mission Mission

My pal Chad is really into karaoke. (As am I.) Apparently he says so on his online-dating profiles, and here’s what happens when a nice young lady doesn’t heed his warning:

Done and done. Easy peasy.

Now, before you rip on Chad for being so quick to pass, and before you rip on this nice young lady for not branching out more at karaoke, think about it… Back in the old days, it might take you 10 years of marriage (followed by a bitter divorce) to figure out that it wasn’t going to work because the only song she’d karaoke was “Gangsta’s.” Modern romance cuts right to the chase!

(Also, be sure to check out DJ Purple’s debut at SoMa StrEat Food Park this Saturday night!)

Says Capp Street Crap, who published this pic just now:

Want to believe this all happened and he didn’t need the sign anymore. [link]

Holy cow yeah, oof, this is beautiful. It’s a Lee Hazlewood song just waiting to be written. Let’s rock:

http://youtu.be/g6JPd0G4IJo

Adam Savage, a Mythbuster/Mission resident, recently gave a tour of his workshop and boy is it something else. This is your chance to see it before AE’s Hoarders catches wind of this video and sends in their crew:

His prop replica collection is incredible. He’s built every kind of costume, weapon, and helmet from every movie you can think of. What’s next, vehicles? I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s working on a Millennium Falcon down there.

Also, here’s one thing that you can tell right away: dude has his workflow on lock. He designed and built custom toolboxes, cases, and shelves. His tool racks are on casters, and designed to make sure every tool is immediately accessible without moving anything else. It’s seriously impressive. I can’t even organize the icons on my desktop.

Adam mentions that there’s a virtual tour on Google Maps, but the entrance is hidden as a manhole cover in the Mission, so I dug up the link for you. Let’s just say it’s probably not the actual location of the workshop, so don’t try to go down there in real life. Look how well that worked out for those kids who died looking for Ninja Turtles in the ’80s (ok maybe that was an urban legend):

Google Maps link (spoiler alert!)

Update: Called it. He is building a Millennium Falcon, along with an R2 unit:

Has it been one whole year already???

Andrew McKinley founded Adobe Books on 16th Street 25 years ago this year. A year ago this month Andrew and a group of dedicated volunteers moved the store to 24th Street and formed the Adobe Books and Arts Cooperative. We are now a sustainable worker-owned cooperative dedicated to Andrew’s vision of community, art, books, and good times. Come celebrate our 1 year milestone, and raise a glass to the next 25 years.

Join us for an evening of celebration with the requisite food, drinks and jams. Sponsored by our friends at Bi-Rite Market and Tartine. Music provided by Wam Bam Ashleyanne, Tylawave & Andy Pastalaniec.

Don’t miss the Adobe Books Backroom Gallery fantastic current show, Survival Adaptations, featuring Bill Drips by Merav Tzur (performance).

Please dress in Silver for our Silver Anniversary!

Check it all out here.

Cannnnot wait to see it in person!!! (Church and Day are streets slightly outside of the Mission btw.)

[via Amos Goldbaum on Instagram]

Looks like Clothes Contact is gonna peace out within 60 days:

$14000 / 2000ft² – Great Ground Floor on Valencia (mission district)

Great Frontage on Valencia and 16th. Nice three story building with great potential. Space will vacate approx 60 days… Possible to double space with full basement. Shown by appointment only.

Guess you gotta sell thrift by the ounce, not the pound, in this economy.

[via Craigslist]

Update: The gone-in-60-days figure may be inaccurate, according to current employee Travis:

Alright, I work there right now, and the truth is, it’s gonna be around at the very least until the end of the year. After that, we’ll have to wait and see what happens. But it’s sure as hell not closing in 60 days. Come in, you’ll see.

I got tired of using intersections to specify what corner store you’re talking about: “The 20th and Bryant one is out of Watermelon Wheat, can you check the 23rd and Alabama one?” Etc., etc. So me and some friends started trying to call the ones we frequent by name, and we found that it’s both less time-consuming *and* more fun!

Here are all the ones I now know by name now:

• Norm’s (20th and Bryant)
• Mission Groceteria (23rd and Alabama)
• Serv-U Market (21st and Bryant)
• New Hampshire Market (20th and Hampshire)
• King’s (22nd and Bryant)
• Tony’s (24th and Hampshire)
• Samy’s (24th and Bryant)
• Isaac’s (22nd and Folsom)
• R Image (25th and Folsom)
• Rhea’s (19th and Valencia)

And then of course, there are these two:

• The Nice Lady Store
• Crackistan

What’d I miss?

[Photo by Google Maps]

From local blogger anadromy, who most recently delivered a similarly posi rant about why you shouldn’t necessarily hate on tech bros, some thoughts on the transit situation here in Frisco:

People in San Francisco don’t agree on much, but just about everybody likes to hate on MUNI. The system takes a lot of grief, much of it justified. But I grew up in So-Cal, a place with notoriously rotten public transit, so even when I’m fuming with several hundred other stranded souls as an N Judah languishes between Van Ness and Civic Center, I try to remember that MUNI, for all its faults, is a far sight better than what I had to deal with as a kid. I also try to feel grateful that I get to live in a city where you (usually) can use public transportation to get around, because I believe mass transit creates a better society. It’s a wonderful social equalizer and it brings all kinds of different people into contact with each other. Sometimes this contact can be unwelcome or unpleasant, but so what? That’s kinda the point. Most people in Los Angeles don’t get the privilege of standing on crowded buses or trains with all sorts and sundry of humanity. They seal themselves inside their cars. In my opinion, this mass isolation instead of mass exposure is one of the main reasons LA sucks. It appeals to and caters to a certain kind of personality. Not that everyone in LA is a preening narcissist. (I dig LA in a lot of ways, and the people who live there. It’s a grittier, more diverse city than SF.) But let’s be real. Its preening-narcissists-per-capita quotient is quite high. The same is true for Silicon Valley, which—not coincidentally—also has shitty public transit.

And actually, this is all just a preamble to the real story, so read on.

[Photo by Nikki]

Beautiful day and all, but god damn it’s like Florida out here. (And I don’t mean Florida Street.)

Last night around 6:30pm, I got multiple emails within the space of 5 minutes from neighbors upset that our official review of the new skatepark encouraged skaters to hop the fence at 7am, 2 hours before the skatepark opens.

Apparently, skateboarding is noisy and people need to sleep. I totally get that. (I hucked a metal wash basin high into the tree outside my window yesterday morning at 6am or something to scare off a pair of mockingbirds that would not shut the fuck up.) Here is the most polite of the emails:

Neighbors of the skatepark are unable to sleep at night due to the constant, 24/7 noise coming from the skatepark as people jump the fence at all hours of the night. Never mind the urination on doorsteps, littering, etc.

It would go a long way toward community relations if you could resist the temptation to encourage people to break the law and disrespect neighbors. We would appreciate you removing the line in your article suggesting that people should enter the park illegally before the 9am opening hours.

Others were pushy and threatening, one had a subject line that reads “Irresponsible Journalism,” and several definitely suggest that a coalition of neighbors is possibly prepared to work toward getting the park shut down.

Skateboarding, like most creative endeavors — and most awesome things in this world — is strongly tied to rule-breaking, and I hesitate to call on anyone or any group to not be rule-breakers and creative thinkers. I mean:

But it’s also awesome to be a good neighbor, so I’d say resist the temptation to hop the fence before 9am. Not because it’s unlawful but because your neighbors will really appreciate it and you’ll get good karma. And for goodness’ sake, don’t pee on doorsteps. Go to Rice Paper Scissors and pee, and buy a banh mi.

I’ll update the original post to reflect this new angle.

[Animated GIF via literally everybody on Tumblr]