The Great Shoppening and other things, 2025

I have today off from work, but will work manana and did work through the weekend up to yesterday. The chocolate shop I work in continues to make between15k and 20k daily in the lead-up to Xmas. The title of this post comes from a friendly shopper who visited late in the day on Saturday; I recall her being in a bit of a rush to get her errands done. I think she had meant to say, 'shopping' and, also perhaps, 'happening' and those words came out combined to sound like an almost ominous/comical event. It's the GREAT SHOPPENING, Charlie Brown!  I am also reminded of our dearly departed Sue and her word, I believe it was, 'embiggen', as in: if you're having trouble seeing the image posted, then embiggen it. :)  We miss you and your wonderful contributions to Blogland, Sue! xx

Speaking of ominous events, we here in the city experienced a rather prolonged and far-reaching black-out Saturday. A fire broke out in a PG & E substation at Civic Center and power was out for over 100k residents and businesses. Some folks went without power for approximately 30 hours. We in the Outer Avenues by the zoo did not lose power (for once) and about that fact I am feeling both glad and grateful. I am thinking of the restaurants, hotels and other businesses reliant on visitors boosting their revenues over the December holidays and I really feel for them. Their financial losses must be tremendous. 

Affected areas in red.

What was really freaky for me and so many others was trying to get home Saturday evening on public transit. The fire at Civic Center coincided with police activity at the very tony Palace Hotel on Market Street a few blocks away. Market St., incidentally, is a major east-west thoroughfare for transit downtown and beyond. Police had cordoned off the area of Market where the hotel is located as there was an armed man who had barricaded himself somewhere within the hotel. The cops were attempting to safely extricate him from the building and their efforts took hours. Subway lines were interrupted due to the fire and attendant blackout. Folk were awaiting bus replacement services (we really just guessed at where they might pick us up by standing at an already existing bus stop and hoping for the best) at street level. There was no communication from SFMTA as to what was happening and how one might use public transit to reach their destinations. The Muni subway was simply closed. There were no personnel, no signage, no nada showing folk what to do. A bus driver en route to SE SF pulled up at the stop and we asked her if she knew what was what. She said, 'There's an F (a street car line) right around the corner and the K-L-M bus (bus replacement service) is running every 12 minutes. Dear reader, she lied. The F never arrived. And the bus replacement service showed up an hour after she continued on her route. Most of us stuck it out. Some of us called Lyfts and Ubers and paid $$$$ to get across town. Talking to my fellow travelers, some people were going home, going to work, going to their accommodations, going back to where they had parked their cars earlier in the day. I was out from work and at the bus stop by 6.15p. We were on the bus replacement service and driving through a near pitch black downtown by 7.25p. We had to divert around the hot spot at the Palace Hotel on Market Street. I can only surmise based on movements made by the bus driver that we drove along Mission St. parallel to Market St. for a number of blocks before returning to Market St. east of the Palace Hotel en route to West Portal Station (where the bus terminated). 

Our bus, as one might imagine, was standing room only in a few, short stops. One dude, a vato wearing a cap that read: Outer Avenues, was playing really chill music on his phone and I have to say that that helped keep the mood on the bus rather light. At one point on our literal dark journey, however, the bus jerked to a sudden halt and stayed stopped for a few minutes. Maybe a glitching WAYMO (self-driving car) was blocking an intersection and our man nearly didn't see it? (Learn more about the dipshittery that is WAYMO in an emergency here.) Anyway, at that point, an old duffer at the front of the bus began to curse about needing to get home and couldn't the driver just 'go around?' At the same time, Outer Avenues homie switched the music to: Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer. And I gave him a smile and a nod as it helped to break the tension somewhat. Imagine if we had experienced a natural disaster (Loma Prieta earthquake, anyone?) or a terror attack? SF would have been effed, to put it bluntly. 

It took 2.5 hours to get from the Ferry Building to the Outer Sunset that night. And as of this morning, power has been restored to all businesses and residences here in town. The subway is still not running fully; I'll be taking a replacement bus to work tomorrow. As we brace for impending severe weather--heavy storms are set to touch down here on the 24th according to the news--I do wonder how we will fare. 

Yesterday

I know that what I am about to share is sort of silly, but share it I will. A few years' back I met a local artist at a holiday craft show and somehow found out that she happened to be the daughter of my kindergarten teacher. I had also met her Dad way back when; he was German. I follow this artist's work on Instagram. Recently, I noticed her using a non-Caucasian fist emoji (have I lost you yet?) and wondered why. Her married surname is Spanish. She herself is neither Latina, nor, as we now say, a person of color. So, why, might she be using the beige-colored emoji for self-representation? Is this akin to some sort of brown face? I am over-thinking it? 

After work last night I came out of the Ferry Building to this sight--

'Embiggen' to see DJT and his good buddy, Epstein.

Some dude, armed with a projector and some slides, was bringing the Xmas cheer with this timeless image of these two, nasty men. He then moved on to 'FREE PALESTINE' as I was making my way to the train. 

Fonts, chocolate and yuk-yuks

I prefer Ariel font, to be honest, but no one asked me. Calibri isn't as pleasing to the eye as Times New Roman, but if those who suffer from visual impairments can more easily read Calibri, then 'Lil Marco Rubio' as drumpf once called him, should have left the State Dept. website alone. 

Work has been busy since mid-November, give or take the odd slow day. I'm mentally tired from having to talk all day long about the same subject matter, yet I do like interacting with people, so I'm not totally depleted by the end of shift. It's remarkable to think how costly chocolate confections are; we sold upwards of 15k in product this past Wednesday. I'm listening to Kraftwerk as I write this post, so all I can think of to type regarding that figure is: WAHNSINN.

There were two women in last week to the shop who were like the female version of Statler and Waldorf and I'm so glad that I got to wait on them. They were women who appeared to be in their late 70s (my mother's age, incidentally) and one of them had a guide dog with her. Anyway, they each purchased chocolate confections not having had our product before. I gave them both a 'thank you' truffle as we concluded our transactions. 

The woman with the dog ate her piece first then said something to the effect of: At this stage of my life, this replaces men. Her friend, who appeared to be married as she was wearing a wedding ring, then quipped: You just lack options. She then popped her truffle into her mouth and I said, So would you ditch your husband for this chocolate? The woman with the dog quickly responded: No, he's just gotten good again! (Cue: Har-har-hars a la Statler and Waldorf.)

Compound nouns auf Deutsch

Since February of this year, I have been helping a teen, who has no German language classes at her high school, learn German. We're using an old, but-not-too-dated-textbook once used by a local university's German Dept., grammar books from my collection of German-language fare and a book her parents purchased from the 'Dummies for...' series of skills learning. She has recently completed an exercise in the Dummies for German text regarding compound nouns, how to build them and how to determine their gender. Compared to English, German has a plethora of compound nouns, known in German as: Kompositnomen or Komposita. 

Not only are compound nouns in German rather illustrative of the thing that they are describing, they are often also both very literal and rather funny. 

Let me share with you some examples: 

Komposita                English        literal translation

das Stinktier                skunk                stink animal

das Stachelschwein     porcupine            spike pig

der Strohkopf              dummy                straw head

der Handschuh            glove                   hand shoe

die Nachtschnecke      slug                    naked snail

die Glühbirne               light-bulb            glow pear

Good news!

I had a gander at the news recently and it was, indeed, a pleasure for once in a long while. 

Here are some of the good bits: Andrew, brother of Charles, is to be stripped of his royal titles. HAHAHA. He and his ex-wife, Fergie, if I've understood correctly, must also vacate their manse of many years for digs slightly less dignified. Again I say: HAHAHA. The Democratic response to drumpf's shameless attempt at a power grab (gerrymandering in conservatively-run states to help keep his fat-ass in power) has led to PROP 50 passing. Essentially, we've agreed to a five-year gerrymandering situation here in California to block redistricting attempts by Republicans. Zohran Mamdani, a young New Yorker with South Asian roots, has won the NYC mayoral race. Dick Cheney, the so-called 'shadow president' and the architect of the 'war on terror', who was George W. Bush's VP, has finally died. 

I will leave you with two snaps from Halloween/Trick or Treat events here in town--

Nightmare Before Christmas at the Ferry Building

Apollo, he came dressed as a rainbow, although you can't tell!

                                    Lake St., San Francisco

Federal agents in SF

Government goons were meant to visit the streets of the San Francisco Bay Area this week, but it turns out they'll not be called in to harass us after all. The man in the White House, who would seek to turn our armed forces against us (well seemingly, mostly in liberal-leaning cities) has changed his feeble mind. Did Salesforce billionaire Benioff change the Donald's opinion on the matter? You know, the guy who first said he'd welcome ICE in SF during his annual Dreamforce marketing event due to SF being a crime-ridden, hell-hole, I guess, walked that shit back once he realized that people vocally called him out for being a dick? Benioff, along with Zuck, is too busy buying up huge swaths of Hawaii to really care what goes on in the SF Bay Area, I should think. Anyway, I don't know what changed drumpf's mind, but it could have been our millionaire mayor who changed it or billionaire Benioff. Goodness knows it wouldn't be us plebs who could hold any sway over a person like that. 

In anticipation of ICE being deployed on our streets, I noticed that many of the Latinos whom I know who work in the Ferry Building did not show up for their shifts. In their stead were white workers I had never seen before. There was also an anti-ICE protest march scheduled yesterday at the Ferry Building to begin late afternoon. I joined the protesters after work. The march through downtown SF was passionate yet peaceful. At various points along the way, one could hear folk chanting, playing instruments, singing or just simply walking in silence. It feel good to be out in streets with those who also feel that what is happening across the country is both absurd and deeply fascistic. 

Connections

I had an interesting day yesterday at the memory care center. The director of the facility intercepted me straight away to tell me of the 'game plan' for the day. There was a prospective client, B., visiting and she wanted me to engage with him. Never mind that he seemed to be already involved with others around a table, his attention was pulled to away in order for him to make my acquaintance. I had been given a few stats, if you will, about the person, so went straight in with a question that I've posed to other retired SF firefighters whom I've met. I asked B. from which house he retired. As it turned out, he'd worked at a fire-house very near to the one from which my uncle retired and this man and my uncle had known each other. In the 70s, my uncle founded a running club for firefighters and B. had jogged with my uncle's club for about 7 years. B. and his wife had also raised a family in my hometown. I'd probably have gone to school with his kids had they not been sent to Catholic school here in the city. I very much enjoyed spending time with B. and I do hope he'll return to the facility if it's what he and his wife determine would be good for him. 

*** 

I know I've mentioned the new park-at-the-beach a few times here. The fall-out, as it were, of our local supervisor, Joel Engardio, publicly supporting Sunset Dunes, as the park is now called, is that the residents whose support he may have once had, seemed to en masse want his head on a platter. The vote for recall---the only issue on the ballot---was 65% to 35%. I think what the recall results showed me was that those who felt fueled by anger ( pro-recall folk used words to describe a democratically decided issue like 'betrayal', 'backstabbed', 'cheated' and what-have-you) WILL go to the ballot box and those who aren't bothered one way or the other about a new park WILL NOT vote. It's all so stupid as Engardio was up for re-election come the new year. Money to put on a recall isn't scant and we taxpayers footed the bill. For those who are a tad curious, there was even a write-up about the issue in The Guardian. 

Check it out, if you're so inclined--

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/17/san-francisco-joel-engardio-coastal-park

Bartie and me in the back garden.