Wanted

Usually I dread trips to the US Post Office. When I am unfortunate enough to receive the manila colored delivery notice proclaiming I have a waiting package, I have to find time after work to travel to the local station and painstakingly wait in line with other frustrated customers while the lackadaisical and flagrantly aloof […]

Classes At The Main

A friend was handed this manifesto while buying a case of Kirin Ichiban at the corner store. Apparently created at the San Francisco Main Library on a schedule of available classes, the author (or unsung prophet) covers a range of themes seemingly common among the paranoid, such as government corruption, both historical and religious references, […]

Underground Man

It’s summer in SF. The city smells like piss, I’m spending more time than usual in my underwear and the kids with the carabineer key chains are well into their cross town fixie migrations, disappearing nightly into the surf where Pacific currents guide their steel frames and Deep V’s to secret breeding grounds somewhere on […]

Chinese Scientology

This is a poster I have seen numerous times over the years on telephone poles along San Francisco’s Clement Street and the surrounding neighborhoods. I never really spent the time to decipher it’s message, and based on the Mumia Abul Jamal look-alike, always assumed it was some badly executed attempt to promote some sad little […]

Jack of All Trades

Will’s back at it rehashing old themes and testing a few new ones. Not one to make an understatement, Will seems to be taking cues from Phil Spector and his infamous “wall of sound,” plastering entire blocks of street signs and lamp posts with multiple posters butted snug against one another.

While his mini “best of” […]

Honey Tree Evil Eye

I love stories told in brief compelling episodes, each one a new clue to the titillating climax that lies ahead. However, instead of soap operas or the political circus surrounding a presidential candidate’s every misstatement, I favor the narrative of the offbeat, expressed in rants, ramblings and bizarre imagery. The continuing saga of Natalie/Carolina’s Pet […]

Learn German

Ever had one of those days when you’re trapped inside you own head? Today was one of those days. I had just paid a visit to my elderly father, where in his rapidly deteriorating state he’s allowed his house and his personal affairs to unravel into a typhoon of dirty dishes, unopened bills, and various […]

Forcing the Hand, pt. 1

Will’s not much of a people person. I’ve come to this conclusion after the latest in a series of menacing phone messages in which Will has implicated me as a key figure in a city-wide conspiracy to bury his burgeoning dog walking business by collaborating with the Department of Public Works and rival walking services […]

Forcing the Hand, pt. 2

The following Sunday, Charles (who’s always game for crazy) and I show up to Gordon’s pet store with photos of our cats jammed in a manila envelope. As promised, Gordon, the last hippie in the Haight, mans the register in loose tie-dye, his thin ponytail crawling over one shoulder like something expecting to be fed. […]

Forcing the Hand, pt. 3

Several days later another voice mail from Will is waiting on my machine. Clearly unhinged by my bout of self-sabotaging phone calls, he is making it clear that I’ve pressed too hard. “Listen man,” he cautions, “tell your lady friend to stop tearing down my signs all over the place, because that shit’s not cool!” […]