Sivan Wilensky, founder of the dangerously tasty Suite Foods Belgian wafflery in 331 Cortland, invites all of Bernal to help stuff the online ballot box [like, now], because Suite Foods Baking is a finalist to receive a business development grant from the Whole Foods supermarket chain:
We were selected as a finalist to receive a local foodmaker grant from Whole Foods. The winner of the grant will be decided by voting on the Redwood City Whole Foods FB page. We’re going up against some impressive-looking businesses so I’m hoping you can help us gather support from the Bernal community. Here’s the page where the voting is happening, and I believe the deadline is Wednesday. The grant amount will be equal to 5% of the store sales on July 2nd.
Neighbor Rebekah is searching for the owner of this wayward doggie:
On the full-moon evening of Friday the 13th, a dog was found roaming Precita Park. She looks like a Manchester Terrier or Min-Pin and appears to be about 9-18 months old, approx 25 lbs. Sweet and very scared with no microchip or collar. For now she is being fostered by Precita Park’s dogwalker-whisperer, Luke. If anyone recognizes this cutie, could they call Animal Care and Control or (415) 518-3984?
If the owner is not located, the dog will likely become available for adoption.
Tonight on KALW public radio 91.7, your Bernalwood editor will be on the air for the City Visions show along with several other glamorous San Francisco neighborhood bloggers to talk about What It All Means:
Is hyperlocal journalism here to stay? [Bernal neighbor] David Onek speaks with some of San Francisco’s citizen journalists about the stories they’re breaking, the financial challenges they face, and life on the neighborhood beat. Join the conversation by calling 415.841.4134 during the show, email us at cityvisions@kalw.org or post a comment here anytime. Monday at 7 pm.
Guests:
-Todd Lappin, founder and editor, Bernalwood
-Rose Garrett, managing editor, Hoodline
-Kevin Montgomery, founder and editor, Uptown Almanac
-Roy McKenzie, founder and managing editor, The Castro Biscuit
Listen in, and if you decide to join the conversation, please do reveal yourself as a Citizen of Bernalwood! Extra credit to any and all who identify themselves on-air as the Bikini Jogger.
UPDATE, 9 pm, 16 June
Well, that was fun.
Your Bernalwood editor snapped this glamorous photo of KALW City Visions host (and celebrity Bernal Neighbor) David Onek during our on-air conversation earlier tonight. The whole thing is now online, so you can listen as we discussed how the sausage gets made at Bernalwood and several of the City’s other esteemed neighborhood blogs. Crazy bonus thanks to Neighbor Margaret, for the terrific phone call.
Bernal neighbors and celebrity filmmakers Beth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle have created a new film that’s starting to hit the festival circuit. It’s called “Goodbye Gauley Mountain: An Ecosexual Love Story,” and it’s coming home to San Francisco this weekend.
Neighbor Beth says, “The film is about stopping mountain top removal by engaging our deep love for the Earth. We’ve invented a new sexuality, Ecosexuality, to express this love and to help make the environmental movement a little more “sexy, fun, and diverse.”
Goodbye Gauley Mountain: An Ecosexual Love Story is the autobiographical documentary of ecosexual lovers Beth Stephens’ and Annie Sprinkle’s journey from San Francisco to West Virginia to visit Beth’s family and join the fight against a devastating new coal mining technique, mountain top removal. While we all use the electricity generated by coal, mountain top removal (MTR) is little known outside of West Virginia and this film exposes its social and environmental injustices in one of the most poverty-stricken regions of the United States. It also explores the devastating global consequences to us all, even those living far beyond the destruction of the endangered, bio-diverse Appalachian Mountains. By juxtaposing sadness and humor, love and greed, beauty and devastation, it braids Beth’s West Virginia coalfield hillbilly past, with the promise of ecosexuality in order to deploy new strategies of resistance and make the fight against environmental destruction more sexy, fun, hopeful and diverse. It asks, what would happen if we changed our relationship from Earth as mother, to Earth as lover? It encourages gay, lesbian, bi, trans, inter, fairy, and eventually ecosexual communities to find creative ways to engage environmental justice. This is how Stephens and Sprinkle come to marry the Appalachian Mountains and join the fight to abolish MTR. It’s a compelling story of small communities facing annihilation for short-term corporate gain, but it’s also a story about hope, love-and how, finding strength together, we can resist, and fight for justice in our own queer loving ways.
Get ready to say goodbye to the venerable Liberty Cafe. Neighbor Juliana noticed this rather dramatic bit of news that was just posted on the Liberty Cafe Facebook page:
Last Hoorah – Liberty will be closing it’s doors on Monday, 6/16 and reopening after a slight remodel on Thursday 6/19 as a new restaurant! Please stop by between now and Sunday to say goodbye to Liberty…
InsideScoop says the new place will focus on burgers and beer (per countless Bernalwood commenter requests). Watch that space.
This is Anucha Kongthavorn, and he preparing to set up shop in the fabulous 331 Cortland marketplace. His business will be called Mae Krua, and he will serve up Thai food like grandma used to make. Anucha tells Bernalwood:
My name is Anucha Kongthavorn and I’m originally from Thailand. I’ve loved to cook since I was a child. I spent a lot of my early years watching her cook. She always consistently cooked the most delicious food and I strive to be like her. Every weekend, my mother left me with her and I always helped her to prepare. I fell in love with the joy of cooking watching my grandmother work long hours in a traditional Thai restaurant. That is where I learned how to cook authentic Thai food.
To me America is the land for opportunity, coming from a poor family, I independently moved to San Francisco to make my dream come true. I went to City College of San Francisco (CCSF) and worked ay the same time to earn experience and know what’s it’s like to cook for Americans and adapt to the culture. I always keep my eye on this dream. I worked at Thaistick in San Francisco and Millbrae for 6.5 years. I have never had a business of my own, but it is still part of my dream.
In Thai, Mae Krua means a women who cooks to serve for her family. This is the name I’d choose for my business. Mae means mother. Kua means kitchen.
I love to present my food to people to people who live here so they can try authentic Thai food that is different and unique to what I’ve learned from my Grandmother and what I’ve learned here in America. My kiosk is going to serve only unique food which is adapted from my own experiences and my Grandmother’s recipes. They will love to have this food and bring it home for their loved ones.
I make a Curry Rice Balls stuffed with fine cheeses. These will be a delight for people who are vegetarian. Some will also be made with Tofu and Bean Cake. I will serve salad with my own dressing such as Curry Dressing and Sesame Dressing. The community will love to try my food because it will both be healthy and delicious.
I will be very happy if you decide to give me a chance to start my own business with you, even though I have never had a business here. I think you would be very pleased to have me as an addition as well.
Last year around this time, Hollywood came to Bernalwood to shoot a new TV show. It finally premiered Monday night on TNT, and it’s called Murder in the First. It’s produced by Steven Bochco (Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue, Murder One, Brooklyn South, City of Angels, LA Law, Philly, and of course, Cop Rock), so of course it’s about cops.
The pilot opens in Bernal Heights, where SFPD inspector Hildy Mulligan (Kathleen Robertson) lives in a cute little house near the top of Alabama St. with her adorable moppet of a daughter. Robertson has been in a ton of things, going back to the original Beverly Hills 90210 and earlier as a child star in Canada. Bonus Canadian content for Burrito Justice: she played Mrs. Hockey (Colleen Howe) in 2013’s “Mr. Hockey: The Gordie Howe Story.”
Neighbor Hildy, the hot blonde cop/mom (try saying it; it’s fun), is partnered with Terry (Taye Diggs), whose wife is dying from cancer. It’s pretty heavy. They’re called to a crime scene that’s meant to be a Tenderloin SRO hotel, but if you zoom and enhance, the place turns out to be regularly and frequently patrolled by the Los Angeles Police Department. Watch:
The pair do visit some real San Francisco locations as they run down leads on who killed the unsavory character in the hotel. Erich Blunt, a cartoonishly evil tech zillionaire played by Draco Malfoy with an American accent, quickly emerges as a person of interest. He is the CEO of “<APPLSN>,” which has a big campus right next to AT&T Park, and he says things like “Our apps are more than games. They are destinations where users go to get lost in alternate utopian realities.”
He also has enough money to hire one of the pilots from Wings to fly his entourage around on his private jet. But he’s probably too young to get that reference.
Meanwhile, the SFPD office where Hildy and Terry work looks like it hasn’t been painted since Harry Callahan worked there. Damn those tech company tax-break giveaways!
I won’t spoil the plot; it’s a police procedural at heart, though apparently they’re going to be spending the whole season solving one murder. (Or two, I guess. Another body does turn up by the end of the first show.) I wasn’t blown away by Murder In the First, but I’ll give it another chance next week. The ratings were pretty good, no doubt because of all the Bernal Heights cameos.
The pilot airs a few more times this week if you want to catch it on the DVR, and it’s free on iTunes. I’ll leave you with one more glimpse of the lovely view from Alabama at Ripley. Enjoy.
Of course, real Bernal Heights moms are more savvy about their footwear:
Neighbor Travis just got his July 2014 issue of Runner’s World, and — wouldn’t you know it! — the cover shot shows some buff-looking dude standing astride our very own scenic-looking Bernal Hill.
Run Strong! Stay Cool! Avoid Dog Poop!
Meanwhile, if you want to know what a homegrown Bernal Hill running superstar looks like, ignore the guy shown above, and instead look for this fleet-footed guy cruising around the neighborhood.
Neighbor Elyse lives with her girlfriend Olivia in a gen-u-ine 1906-surplus earthquake shack here in Bernal Heights. Their tiny home was recently selected as a nominee in Apartment Therapy’s “Small, Cool” contest:
Name: Olivia Location: San Francisco, CA Square Feet: 250 Division: Teeny-Tiny What I Love About My Small Home: The best part about our converted San Francisco 1906 Earthquake Cottage is easily the vaulted ceilings. Not only do they look beautiful but they make the space look much larger than it really is. We also love how smart our landlords were when renovating this tiny cottage, making sure to put closets and storage areas in every typically unused nook and cranny. This home might be small but it’s just the right amount of space for us and our tiny dog.
If you would like to help stuff the ballot box, you can favorite it here.
There’s yet another Kickstarter campaign underway for a new Cortland restaurant going in to the old Pizza Express space. Formerly known as Kinfolk, the new restaurant will be called 3rd Cousin, and chef (and founder) Greg Lutes brings the details:
Since you have been following Kinfolk on Bernalwood, I’m sending you a link to my Kickstarter campaign. In addition to a new permanent home, Kinfolk is being renamed 3rd Cousin. With the new name, comes lots of community involvement and support, including Windows from A.G. River, local wines from Brian Harrington, video by Steve Sisler and a new logo designed by Bernal Heights own beloved artist, Toby Klayman. I’m very excited to finally be putting down permanent roots in the neighborhood and look forward to continued service to the residents of Bernal Heights and surrounding areas.
My goal is to provide a Michelin quality, fine-dining experience in a relaxed and welcoming family atmosphere. As a chef, my greatest joy is interacting with my customers throughout the meal service, sharing their experiences of the culinary partnership we have created.
I started Kinfolk out of desire to share my passion for creative organic food, and I continue to refine my unique take on New American/Californian cuisine. The concept has really taken off, and people really came out and supported me — and they continue to support me by dining with me and keeping the dream alive.
After 6 months of cooking from the heart — bringing folks together and creating community one plate at a time — I’ve been fortunate enough to find a permanent home for my pop-up Kinfolk, at 919 Cortland Avenue, just a few doors away from where I am currently cooking 903 Cortland. With the move and the new space we decided to give it a new name: 3rd Cousin.
Neighbor Esther recently found this note from the “Bocana Parking Psycho” (her phrase) plastered to the window of a parked car taking up two (2) precious street spaces:
Spotted on tonight’s dog walk. That’s a condom packet taped to the upper left.
All politics is superhyperlocal, however, so what was the tally like for voters from Bernal Heights? And for different parts of Bernal Heights? For this, we turn to Neighbor Adam K., who just scored a truckload of Awesome Points by preparing this tidy package of Bernal Heights election data and analysis. Over to you, Adam:
I looked at just two votes: the Campos/Chiu race and the Prop B ballot initiative (concerning waterfront development). I was interested in the Campos/Chiu totals mainly because of chatter in other posts about how representative of Bernal Heights Campos is or isn’t, and I was interested in the Prop B results because of chatter in other posts regarding development and growth issues.
The results might surprise some readers (or maybe just commenters) of Bernalwood, where the comments appear to skewer against Campos and against Prop B (or pro-development). But as I understand it, these results are pretty indicative of historical Bernal Heights voting patterns. Interesting to me, considering its hot status as the “it” neighborhood, North Bernal skewers more left than South Bernal.
The quick take-away is that in this election, with about 25% of registered Bernalites voting, Campos beat Chiu 55% to 35%. And Prop B won by a bigger margin, 60% to 35%. The vote numbers are very close, with one deviation: it appears that some number of folks who voted for Prop B did not vote for either Campos or Chiu (Campos got less total votes than Prop B did, while Chiu got about the same number of votes as no votes on Prop B).
Here are the details:
Assembly:
Campos Chiu
North Bernal: 1330 (59.5%) 722 (32.3%)
Ballots cast: 2234, or 27.55% of registered voters
South Bernal: 1109 (50.1%) 864 (39%)
Ballots cast: 2212, or 25.31% of registered voters
Bernal Heights total: 2439 (54.85%) 1586 (35.7%)
Prop B:
Yes No
North Bernal: 1359 (60.8%) 772 (34.6%)
Ballots cast: 2234, or 27.55% of registered voters
South Bernal: 1284 (58%) 783 (35.4%)
Ballots cast: 2212, or 25.31% of registered voters
Bernal Heights total: 2643 (59.45%) 1555 (34.9%)
(Numbers in parenthesis are percent of total votes)
PHOTO: 2014 Primary Election Day in Bernal Heights, by Sarah Rogers
Neighbor Ned observed a bizarre invasion by concrete-based life forms on Cortland:
They’re bubbling up out of the sidewalk! Just noticed this cute 3D sidewalk graffiti while walking Cortland yesterday… Keep your eyes peeled & watch your step!
Bernalwood 