I’m gonna be going back home for a week’s visit in either July or August, and after reading this note from a Bay Area friend, I kinda can’t wait for the reverse culture shock:
You’re still new here, but after a while you forget what life outside of CA is like. You go back home and visit fam & friends and wonder WHY everyone there is wearing chinos & polo shirts and why isn’t it appropriate to talk about dildos and butt plugs in a coffee shop? Hey, how come talking about the girl who has two mommies is a conversation-ender? And hey, how come I can’t buy booze on Sunday? It creeps up on you.
Like I said, can’t wait. I imagine going back will be almost as weird as coming out here in the first place.
Today I awoke to the sound of a pair of parrots. Their voices have become distinct to me, and I recognize them from the other birds who fly near here. Their squawks fill the air with a near demand to be heard. They are wild, so they say no words.
They have become a comfort. When the parrots are around I am reminded of all that is wonderful here. And different. Over time the differences have become little rafts to which I cling. Wild parrots, boys making out in the park, people openly smoking pot on the streets, the wind whipping through alleyways, skyscrapers that pierce through blue, the consistency of car horns, taxiing to and fro, sidewalks that turn into staircases, water on all three sides, walking everywhere I go, bike messengers, slides in the middle of hilly neighborhoods–these are all tiny salvations, reminders that I’m right where I want to be.
I’ve discovered, after five months, a dozen bizarre conversations and a stinky kiss on the face by a homeless stranger, that walking around San Francisco with earbuds in or headphones on is necessary to successfully avoid the crazy. Or, in my case, being asked for directions. (I haven’t been here long enough to tell anyone anything about how to get anywhere, it’s best they don’t waste their time asking me.) I used to think it was because every one couldn’t get by without music in their ears, and that may be true, but I’m willing to bet most of these headphone listening pedestrians and public transit riders are also trying to prevent conversations like the one I had late one night with a spectacularly inebriated man on BART that mostly consisted of grunts and giggles.
And I’ve also discovered, just as was predicted, that my crush on BART has moved beyond the flirty stage and into that stage where you start to get annoyed by stuff that never bothered you before. When I first moved here I was always very cautious to know the etiquette, but I had to be making some new girl mistakes. So, I was always patient with others. Somehow, that patience wore right the fuck out. Because I was pressing down pretty hard on that clueless lass who was talking on her cell phone, dragging two suitcases and putting her ticket in the wrong way. Then I cut her off at the escalator.
Now when someone doesn’t Stand Right, Walk Left I get all pissy and antsy. I’ve actually now gotten the courage to say “Excuse Me,” to indicate that myself and about 20 other people are trying to come through. They typically figure it out, move right, and then I make it to work 45 seconds sooner than I would have.
More BART pet peeves:
Beeping video games. I kid you not, this woman played a noisy game of digital Sudoku on her Blackberry so loud that she got hairy eyeballs from at least five people that I counted. She played from the Embarcadero station all the way to Downtown Berkeley with loudass bloops and bleeps every five seconds. It easily penetrated the music coming out of my iPod. I wanted to beat her with the thing by the time she got off.
Pole huggers. I’m not that short, but I’m not that tall either. If I have to stand on BART, I can’t exactly hold on to the overhead bars for balance without getting up on my tiptoes, which is not the optimal way to ride for 35 minutes. So, I try very hard when standing to get a handled seat to hold on to or one of the vertical rails. At least three people can hold on to a vertical rail, maybe more. And yet, dumb motherfuckers hug the poll like it’s the only friend they have got in the world. When they do that no one else gets to hold onto the poll that can be easily reached by those 5′4″ and under. This drives me crazy, especially when the pole hugger can handily reach the overhead bars. Don’t be a pole hugger.
Hearing your shitty music. Not only are you damaging your ears, I can promise you that you are the only person loving Anal Thunder at 8 a.m., brother. There is no need to have it so loud. I sometimes wonder if the people who play their music so loudly that the existence of headphones is mere pretense do so because they are feeling that shit so hard that they can’t help but share it with the train. All I know is, people who play music loud enough for other people to hear it play some crappy ass music.
Staring. This is rude just about anywhere you go. No excuses, people, your mama taught you better.
Not getting up to let people in or out. If you can’t be arsed to slide to the inside of an empty seat for two, at least get up when a commuter goes to sit down. Swinging your legs to the outside doesn’t cut it. Don’t make me climb all over you, lady. I will do it, and I will win.
That one sunflower seed eating lady. Every time. She eats them every time. Get a new snack!
Children making out. I don’t want to see your tongue meet someone else’s on BART. And get your hand out of her skirt. This goes double if you still go to something called “homeroom.”
The 600-pound gorilla in the newsroom where I write right now is that 14 people have been terminated from KPIX due to drastic budget cuts. No, this isn’t a twisted April Fools Day prank, since the involuntary cuts happened yesterday. It’s a reality; seasoned, veteran reporters who have decades upon decades of Emmy-winning experience have been shown the door because advertising revenues are way down in this election year (when they were projected to be much higher). And it wasn’t just on-air individuals who lost their jobs, but those behind the scenes as well. Every single department in the station was subject to cuts.
Word of cuts left the newsroom in near solemn silence, which is a departure from the lively chatter that typically permeates the building. It was (and is) a day of mourning at CBS 5–for those who had to leave, for those whose dear friends are no longer their colleagues and for those who were put in the difficult position of making such hard decisions. Manny Ramos, Bill Schechner, Tony Russomano and John Lobertini are class acts and have brought 60+ years of top-notch journalism to the Bay Area. Their contributions cannot be overlooked. The outrage from SFGate readers is palpable (and suprisingly coherent for newspaper web comments, frankly). Many in the community are feeling a sense of loss today, and not just sadness for good newsmen who lost their jobs, but cynicism about what kind of news they’ll get going forward. These journalists have been a foundation of ace television reporting for decades. Their absence will be noticeable for a long time to come.
I can’t quite describe how strange it is to be writing about this situation from where I sit. I have only been employed at KPIX since mid-November when I was hired to do a job that didn’t exist before. Full-time blogger at a news station is not a common position, in fact, it’s pretty rare (though becoming more and more common). Having a newsroom staffer monitor and produce blog(s) as their sole responsibility is not something even I, a blogger since 1999, would have imagined five years ago. Now stations across the country are making new media, social networking and online publishing a priority as advertising dollars are moving from the silver screen to the computer screen. They are hiring up bloggers who are well-versed in internet news and culture to manage those web properties. Some would debate that a position like this is superfluous, and frankly, they’d have a lot of good arguments, no doubt. Other still would say that the landscape of news dissemination is morphing so quickly that to ignore new media innovations like blogging is a death knell. Those people, too, have many valid points.
It is undeniable that, despite current economic trends that do not bode well, the t.v. news and newspaper business is struggling. They are struggling to catch up to the power of the web which has, in many ways, robbed them of many of their most valuable assets. News gets made online and broken online before traditional media types can even react. Not their fault, exactly, the machine is just too huge and cumbersome. Mainstream media organizations simply aren’t as nimble as independent online newsmakers. However, what the machine lacks in dexterity, it makes up for in spades with exclusive contacts, years of knowledge and hard-won reputation. It’s a morphing industry, no doubt about it. These cuts are an illustration of that inevitable fact.
Here is what other bloggers are saying about the unfortunate KPIX layoffs:
Yesterday was a sad one at KPIX-Channel 5, where the downsizing trend that has had the newspaper industry in its grips came to the local television station…In the case of KPIX, the station is losing plenty of valuable experience. Ramos and Schechner have five Emmys between them and decades of on-air experience. Schechner has been on TV in the Bay Area since 1972.
Lobertini is a solid reporter, one of the best of putting the inner workings of state government into laymen’s terms. He also isn’t shy about putting state leaders on the spot with tough questions, as Gov. Schwarzenegger (and Gov. Davis) found out the hard way on several occasions. I’m sure he’ll land a spot somewhere, but it’s sad to be reporting nearly weekly on the further decline of veteran Sacramento reporters.
norcalguy101 wrote:Who watches news on tv anymore. I’ve cancelled my cable. If I want to watch baseball, basketball, or live video coverage, or read the news….it’s all online….plus you get what interests you rather than have to sit their and get stuffed with what a producer thinks I need to know….which based upon the three leading Bay Area news programs is not much…
<WeatherGuy wrote:I don’t know any of these fired reporters. I stopped watching the news when the internet came around in the middle 90s and I could find my own information at my leisure. Local news is just depressing anyway
hoecakes wrote:That’s a shame. Those fired reporters were really good and credible. I worry that they’re going to turn into KRON with idiots like Ysabel Duron (laughs inappropriately and cuts everyone off with her inane driver) and Henry Tannenbaum (complete idiot blowhard). KTVU’s new male morning anchor sucks too with his yukking delivery. Man, local news used to be so good, and now?
wakeupalive wrote:You will all be missed. Just another reason not to watch local news anymore. They are putting on people that can barely read and definitely aren’t news reporters. PBS or nothing else at this point. Sad.
spidra wrote:I’m sorry to hear about these folks joining the host of others in the Bay Area who were laid off or will be laid off this year. It would be great if the experienced reporters, the ones who are truly journalists, could take advantage of not having to please a corporate boss anymore and produce their own blogs and podcasts. It would be interesting to see what they’d come up with if they no longer had to worry about sponsors and shareholders.
leake wrote:Local news is not news - it’s advertising dollars. So what if they move the props around a little, or give the anchors new haircuts every now and then - it’s all about the packaging, not the content. Let’s face it, from a business perspective KPIX and its local news programming is not and will never be “60 Minutes”… And older TV news reporters are not about to start blogging their way to success anytime soon.
I’ve invited some staffers here at CBS 5 to contribute their words on what is a great loss this has been to them both personally and professionally. I hope they do so. I watched yesterday as those who have seen one another most mornings for many, many recent years shed tears for those who were affected. Those wrapped in embraces were then called into manager offices to get the same news that had just stricken their friend. It was hard to watch. I can’t imagine how hard it was for those sent home after 20 or 30 years. The level of distress was at a fever pitch. Employees talked in tiny puddles, wondering aloud if they’d be next. They wondered to their comrades how this news organization would change in the days and weeks to come. Would there be enough of them to get it all done? Their work is done at break-neck pace as is.
Friends are gone. They aren’t coming back. It’s been hard around here, and I imagine it won’t get easier, at least on an emotional level, for a long while.
Readers, you are welcomed to comment on these unfortunate turn of events in our comment section below. Leave well wishes for those who are gone or express your displeasure. You have the floor.
So, some shit went down. You probably gathered that from the cryptic post and change in tone around here. (However, if you are following me on Twitter you are probably catching on to plenty.) Things, to categorize the situation sloppily, are different around here. And they are continuing to change.
My job is the same (and I’m very happy there), but my personal life is in transition in many facets. I may be moving soon, away from Berkeley and into the city of San Francisco. If not soon, it will be as soon as the lease is up. I will live alone. The very, very short of it is I fucked up, made some hard decisions, hurt some people, got some courage and went out on all sorts of tiny, fragile limbs.
Despite all that, and in part because of it, I’m flying where I have always wanted to go, on to fulfilling lifelong imaginings. Oh, the things I would do differently, but I’ve never been more primed and ready to steer this singular life I’ve been given into one that is fully realized. Whatever that means. I’m going to fucking find out.
There are some people whom I love dearly who may never speak to me again. Meanwhile I’m meeting some of the most fascinating and generous people I’ve ever encountered, people who make me feel more alive than I have felt in recent memory. Everything is a blur. Almost all of it. Since moving I experience air, food, faces so intensely and fully that I can’t make heads or tails of anything.
It’s been four months since I left Tennessee for the Bay Area, and this crazy parrot-having place I landed in could not be more different than where I lived for the entirety of three decades. When I think of trying to put down into words how it makes me feel to be walking the dogs in the morning just as the sun is pulling itself over the crests of the Berkeley Hills, to see a palm tree in my peripheral vision, I go numb. Which is insane, it’s just a palm tree. What could be so fabulous and compelling about it that I cannot manage to convey its impact in writing? The issue isn’t the tree itself, it’s the unexpectedness of it. It’s purely foreign to me. A palm tree, to a girl who always lived in Tennessee, is an exotic thing. It is a large, looming figure of otherness; an iconic beast that exists in postcards and at the movies and on vacation. Never when you are walking the dog. So, when I see it out of the corner of one eye my chest brims with the thrill of not just something new, but a regular something new. Something different from what always was, and I can see it whenever I want. I just walk outside.
I am still experiencing culture shock a third of a year later. Today as I rounded the corner to take the stairs down at the Embarcadero BART I got stuck behind two older gentlemen, one of which walked with the aid of a cane. They slowly ambled forward at a pace just quick enough to prevent me from easily slipping around them. Side by side they walked down each step at an exceedingly slow pace making it impossible for me, or anyone, to pass.
Initially this annoyed me. I thought about walking too closely on the heels of the man not assisted by a cane to not-so-subtly imply I wanted to pass on the left, which is standard operating procedure. The thought quickly dissipated, and I decided instead to enjoy the leisurely trip down the stairs while I gave thanks for my youth and my healthy, able legs.
Moments later, over the roar of mp3s in my ears, I heard a hostile voice. “Move it. Move over! You can’t take up the whole fucking staircase!”
My immediate thought was that the loud voice I heard was a friend or acquaintance of the older gentlemen, and that he was teasing the men somehow. It became quickly apparent this wasn’t the case. Music was playing at a substantial volume in my ears - in part so I can avoid these situations, mind you - but I heard one or both of the older men say something in response to the guy yelling. And it wasn’t friendly banter, I can tell you that much. It was then that a man with long hair shoved under a baseball cap pushed past my left shoulder, and the men blocking the stairwell while yelling, “I don’t care how old you are!”
Stunned, I took the opportunity to follow the screaming man into the gap he so forcefully made for us and past the two bewildered men. I let the interaction wash over me as I scrambled down the left side of the escalator, which happened to be clear.
Had the yelling man not forced his way past the amblers I would have missed the Richmond train. My wait would have been another six minutes.
Once on the train car I found a place to hang on since all the seats were taken. I let the previous few minutes run over in my mind and I stood, mouth agape, at how I was in such a different place where the dynamics of daily interactions are played out in ways fully foreign to me. Frankly, I think if people rode mass transit in any significant numbers in Tennessee and that had happened, rude dude might have gotten a beat down, cowboy-boot-in-his-ass style. Or at least the serious threat of one. You just don’t curse seniors like that in public without someone calling your ass on it. At least, I think I’m right about that. It’s been a while since I’ve been home.
Anyway, I want to tell you, favorite reader, about my adventures in this fantastic place where every red cent I pay in rent is worth it because I love my life more than ever. I want to chronicle all the newfound fascinations I find in The Big City at every turn. I’m just too mired in the wonderfulness of it all to know how just yet.
[A] group of four people were eating at Joe’s Crab Shack at 245 Jefferson Street around 10 p.m. on Sunday. Two women in the group got up and left, followed shortly by the man and a 17-year old male. All left without paying.
The SFPD said two female servers followed the two males for several blocks before confronting them in the 600 block of Bay Street. That is when police said 36-year-old Marcel Waldron allegedly turned around, brandished a gun, and shot at the workers.
Two female servers pursued to male customers for several blocks? Then confronted them? Does this seem unequivocally dangerous to anyone?
Please note that these servers worked for a chain restaurant, Joe’s Crab Shack. I point this out because I spent many years working for chain restaurants as I put myself through college. It was a soul-sucking experience in many regards. I felt my spirit crushed when I was working those jobs because, despite being paid $2.13 an hour by the company, servers were expected to do things like clean off the clock on their day off or work for ten hours without a break. I was also told, by more than one chain eatery, that if anyone “dined and dashed” on their tab that I was responsible for the bill.
Restaurants say this for a reason. It would be very easy for any server anywhere to pocket the cash left by a table of four then claim that the diners skated on the tab. The managers informed us that those diners were our resposibility, and that if they managed to take off without paying then we were not in control of our sections and did not deserve to work on the floor. And people did skate. It didn’t happen very often, but sometimes. It was mostly kids. Or the occasional con artist. But every time I saw it happen the server from that table would bolt out the door looking for the cheapskate. Rarely did they catch up to them, but sometimes they did. Personally, I confronted a man who skated on his tab and he acted as though it totally slipped his mind, then he paid up. But he could have reacted any number of ways, which is made obvious by this account.
So, I have to wonder if the managers at Joe’s Crab Shack encouraged those servers to confront the diners who dashed. It was pretty much a mandate at the places I worked. And I can’t help but think that asking servers to take on those people–off the premises–is dangerous. (There was always debate amongst the server staff as to whether making servers pay for meals that went unpaid was even legal.) I thought of calling the restaurant to ask if they ordered those servers to confront the guy who shot at them, but I doubt I would make much headway.
Any of you ever work in restaurants that encouraged this behavior? It’s not something the public at large would know about, but ex-servers are plentiful. Speak up in the comments and let me know your experience with this, if any.
