UPDATE: A SHORT REQUIEM FOR CAPP’S CORNER The evening of Tuesday, March 31, I sat in the bar at Original Joe’s in North Beach with my friend, San Francisco Chronicle columnist ... Read More
This is the second of a three-part series. Here’s an overview of Part 1: San Francisco narrowly missed becoming the film capital of the world. Perhaps it’s just as well... Read More
This month I have some good news and I have some bad news. Let’s get right to it. Here are some of the most important things that have happened (or not happened) recently in ... Read More
When I first met Rod McKuen, the renowned poet-songwriter who died in January, I had to ask him, “What was it like to have Sinatra record one of your songs?” McKuen spu... Read More
This is the first of a three-part series. San Francisco narrowly missed becoming the film capital of the world. Perhaps it’s just as well. The city has enough narcissism and ... Read More
January was an interesting month for your rambling Sketches columnist. Word came that Grizzly Peak Press in Berkeley will publish my book “Sketches From a North Beach Journal... Read More
Sometimes I wonder where we would be without a crisis to manage. Nothing but trouble comes the easy way,” said the great Chicago poet, Oscar Brown Jr. Some people look for tr... Read More
If you run across a restaurant where you often see priests eating with priests, or sporting girls with sporting girls, you may be confident that it is good.” I am indebted fo... Read More
Recently I had lunch with Carl Nolte, who writes the Native Son column for the San Francisco Chronicle. Carl is a young whippersnapper compared to me, but we find common ground whe... Read More
Here come the year-end holidays, and not a moment too soon. Winking lights have been strung up along Upper Grant Avenue in North Beach since early November. Shops like Schein &... Read More
Boom and bust is not unknown to San Franciscans. The bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000 was a shock to me. I suppose it shouldn’t have been. Remember those Super Bowl ads... Read More
There’s a sign over the bar at Original Joe’s in North Beach: “It’s better to live rich than to die rich.” I concur with that sentiment, and here are ... Read More
Print the news and raise hell. — Bruce Brugmann, founder, editor and publisher, The San Francisco Bay Guardian... Read More
A POET’S DREAM REALIZED? Recently, I received an invitation from Angela Alioto, international director of the Knights of St. Francis (an unofficial Catholic lay organization ... Read More
“When Goodell allowed Michael Vick back into the NFL, he once again wimped out … Vick’s next victim will likely not be a dog. That won’t matter to Goodell, ... Read More