Filed under: food, rest & relaxation, travel | Tags: Alcatraz, Muir Woods, San Francisco
The weather has been simply spectacular for this time of year. No rain! Highs in the mid-50s. Sunny. Our tour guide today told us that it’s the finest winter weather he can recall in some time. We’ve managed to remain outdoors most of the trip. Matter of fact, outside of the three hours I spent in Amoeba Records, I don’t think we’ve participated in or planned any indoors activities.
Transportation in San Fran is varied, to say the least. There are cabs (yellow & green) and buses, of course. Smart cars. Shared cars. And cable cars. But also trolleys and bike taxis. It seems for every electric bus there is a non-electric tour bus.
The cable cars are an overrated experience, but I did get my shoes clipped by a taxi’s side mirror while holding on.
At the “turnaround” on the wharf. Push.
Trolleys!
Coit Tower continues to beckon me from our hotel room.
Speaking of Coit Tower, San Fran has a thing for all things tall, slender, and uniquely shaped. The financial district …
… and Chinatown.
Not to mention all those nearby trees in Muir Woods.
They’re tall. Real tall.
And big, too.
It was sunny, but damn if it wasn’t chilly in the forest.
I’ve had some great food here, including peppermint-fudge ice cream, fresh crab and clam chowder, and some very tasty burgers (with relish) from a tiny joint in Sausalito. M is just getting over a stomach virus, and you can tell by this photo how happy she was today to consume any food, especially said burger.
There’s plenty to do down at the wharfs. We found this odd place called the Musée Mécanique, a collection of antique, coin-op arcade machines. The Opium Den was a trip, but I forgot to snap a photo of it. Here’s M getting her fortune read, followed by some video of one of several odd (to say the least) “laffing” dolls.
From the “live entertainment” category, I give you this banjo-playing street musician, who has a fondness for propeller beanies and old-timey music. His set list bounced from “Yankee Doodle” to “Proud Mary” to the theme song from The Beverly Hillbillies. He reminded the audience every couple songs that the name of his band was, indeed, Spare Change.
He was popular with the cable car set.
Next, I give you Alcatraz Island. The scary thing is, it’s exactly as I remember it … from Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4.
Here’s a photo of one of the cells from the 1962 break-out, as recreated in the Eastwood flick Escape from Alcatraz. See the hole in the wall under the sink. It’s interesting to note that the prison shut down less than a year later.
It’s hard to imagine a more scenic prison — on the outside.
Note the landmark in the distance …
Most of the windows inside the joint look a little like this —
except for a few tiny widescreens with a view …
I assume the breathtaking views only added to the psychological warfare conducted on the inmates. As the headphone tour pointed out, this was before the belief that prisoners could be rehabilatated.
Still, good prisoners got to pull a book off the bookshelf.
The old water tower.
Supposedly, the prison did pride itself on offering fine meals. Here’s what’s for breakfast.
Other signs.
During the 30 years Alcatraz was a federal prison, they did welcome Indians. But this graffiti is in reference to a fact that I was unaware of prior to my visit: From 1969–1971, several years after the prison had been closed and the island left to fend for itself, a group of Native American activists seized the island and claimed it for all Indians. It was a largely symbolic gesture meant to pressure the government to return native homelands to tribes. It worked.
A few postcard shots taken from the non-prison side of the island, where Alcatraz’s unique ecosystem is in full affect.
I’m not sure what those funky trees are called. Anyone know?
Finally, here’s some man-made, uh, beauty. Check out this signage from a Union Square restuarant, which dates back to the 1950s.
Filed under: films, food, rest & relaxation, travel | Tags: Frost/Nixon, San Francisco
Sorry, but no pics. There wasn’t much of anything worth photographing today. However, here were the highlights:
1) After getting in at about 2 a.m. West Coast, M and I crashed. Hard. We had flown from Pittsburgh to D.C., then across the country on an uncomfortably long flight. We awoke to a gorgeous view of the Bay, Alcatraz Island, and Coit Tower.
2) We walked a few blocks to get a Viatnamese pork sandwich for lunch from a hole-in-the-wall called Saigon Sandwiches in the “Little Saigon” part of town, not too far from Union Square, where our hotel is located. The sandwiches came on a recommendation from Arun, and damn were they tasty. Better than the Viatnamese sandwiches at the market in Columbus, Ohio. Sweeter, but with a bit more kick, too.
3) We ate them in Union Square proper, where it was odd to see people ice skating despite the 52 degree temperature.
4) M is sick with a bad stomach virus that won’t leave her alone, so she mostly kept to herself in the hotel room the rest of the day. We found the nearby hotel where her interviews will be tomorrow, and hiked up one of the city’s many steep hills to get there. M was out of breath after just a block. I blame it on the sickness.
5) Later that night I hurriedly located someplace to eat, settling on a Lori’s Diner, a touristy ’50s recreation with several locations around the bay area. The tuna melt with onion rings was doable. The orange freeze — orange sherbert mixed with Sprite — was delish. Across the street, I spotted a place I’d like to try before I leave: Tad’s Broiled Steaks. From a distance, it looks like a more authentic dining experience, and it has simply the coolest signage I’ve ever seen on a restaurant. I’ll take a picture later.
6) After dinner, with M out of commission and my friend Jonathan, also in town for the conference, taking it easy tonight, I opted for a movie. Frost/Nixon was just okay, far from the great film I thought it may be based upon the subject matter and the trailer. Frank Langella, who plays Nixon, does a commendable job. But I had a hard time buying into Frost’s character. I just didn’t find him, or his struggles for credibility, to be all that compelling. Frost pulled off a near miracle in getting Nixon, who was backed by an army of shrewd politicos and media types and was himself a wise old man, to own up to Watergate. But on the silver screen, Frost seems like a total hack who more or less lucked into Nixon’s confession, based upon a few nights of hard work. His character seems shallow and too transparent, and by film’s end I didn’t believe in his transformation. As for my ambivalence about the film, I blame the screenwriters, who focused too little time on the actual interviews themselves, missing a golden opportunity to follow their own conclusions — that the close-ups of the TV screen revealed more about Nixon’s character than a thousand words — to the logical end of concentrating more heavily on the heat of the moment. Also, for a film whose protagonist continually battles to resist portraying Nixon in a sympathetic light, Frost/Nixon does just that. By the film’s end, I feel sorry for the guy. Overall, I just didn’t find the film to be that believable, which is sad since it’s not a work of fiction.
It should come as no surprise that I enjoy a show titled “Beardo.” I’m new to this Pitchfork comedy thing, but not new to Les Savy Fav frontman Tim Harrington. Check out the “Deep Relaxation” episode.
A few years ago I made M a four-CD mix of Xmas tunes. This is even more impressive. (Thanks for the tip, Jon.)
So I’m re-watching the entirety of Six Feet Under, and the beginning of the Season 3 discs starts off with an HBO promo that reminded me of just how great the channel used to be. At one point not too long ago, they had the following shows going simultaneously: Deadwood, Entourage, The Wire, The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Carnivale. Kind of puts things in perspective now, doesn’t it?
Filed under: books
Writing about books, and reading about books (and on some days even reading books), makes me sad, for obvious reasons. But this is worth the pain. Jake posted a link to the New York Times’ best books of ‘08, which is a byproduct of their 100 best books of ‘08. The only book on the paper’s top 10 list that I want to read is Roberto Bolaño’s 2666, which speaks more to my taste than the strength of the list. But I found the list a bit perplexing, for another reason: Bolaño’s book is the only one on the list that wasn’t published by a Random House subsidiary. Moreover, seven of books on the list were released by Alfred A. Knopf, to which I can only reply … WTF?
