A few new pics are hanging on Larry's walls.  Firstly I have one of a house I saw in my Mom's hometown of Chestertown, MD:

Being a small town far from any sort of city I'm sure it has its share of people with both the time and the anger to protest this kind of thing vigorously, so I'm surprised it hasn't received the kind of flak that a similar family got out here in the east bay town of Lafayette.

There's also a few pics of the salt flats that are by the bike path to work just north of campus:

They look really cool, but they suck as far as the health of the bay is concerned and that's why they're going away.  Apparently you can't just open up the sloughs and turn the flats into marsh overnight without shocking the bay with the salinity, so it's a process that will take years.  It will be interesting to monitor the progress as I ride by on my bike (and plane -- they look beautiful on the approach to SFO) over the years.  I, for one, will welcome birds and frogs in place of rusty shock absorbers. :^)

Last month renowned jazz institution Yoshi's opened a new club in San Francisco's Fillmore district.  There's been a lot of hype (and badmouthing from the anti-gentrification crowd), so I made sure to pay it a visit during Chick Corea's week long residency.  I gotta say, although it's very visually appealing I'm not fully diggin' on the overall experience.  My main issue is with the acoustics. I learned in my college acoustics classes that a larger room will usually sound worse than a small one for amplified music.  The new Yoshi's unfortunately follows this heuristic; the high ceilings mean that sound takes a longer and more circuitous path to get to your ears which reduces clarity.  There's also a fairly prominent slapback echo from the rear wall which was obvious when the drummer was playing a solo hi-hat fill.  To compensate for these problems PA is turned up louder which further muddies the sound.  This often means that the musicians play with less vibe because they can't hear themselves as well (improv and communication is key in jazz) so the overall result is increased lameness.  But there are definitely clubs with worse sound, so overall I give the new Yoshi's high marks.  The restaurant looks awesome.  Karsty's final word: Yoshi's Oakland gets 5 stars out of 5 and Yoshi's SF gets 4.

Yoshi's Oakland (View from the last row)

Yoshi's San Francisco (View from about 2/3 of the way back)

After the Chick Corea Freedom Band show in SF last week I returned to Oakland for the Chick Corea Elektric Band, which reinforces its 5-star rating.  The Elektric Band was on fire.  The sound was clear as a bell (except for the times when freight trains pass by). My quick review of the show: unbelievable.  While Chick's superhuman musical abilities are dumbfounding, in my opinion it was Dave Weckl that was the commanding presence in the room.  Here's a quick visual aid to illustrate where I think he is in the metaphysical and intellectual plane:

Even though Chick Corea recently transmogrified from human to Scientologist his new music is as good as ever.  Apparently the part of your brain that gets destroyed by that cult is independent to the musical part.  Perhaps the surviving part of a Scientologist's brain gets even stronger as hijacked areas devotedly wither away into Xenu's devastating control.  Check out his albums To the Stars and The Ultimate Adventure.  Good stuff.

Man... it's been an exciting few weeks.  Not all of it has been fun, but at the very least it's been very educational and character-building.  Here's the medium-length story.

For about a year I've been in contract on a condo at a condo in Hayes Valley called, appropriately enough, The Hayes.   But about a month ago I decided I wanted to back out because I was seeing better value elsewhere, among other reasons.  I had been keeping a keen eye on the market by going to open houses and reading SocketSite and checking Redfin daily.  Most resale properties I found  that were cheaper than The Hayes all had problems such as being on a major road or being too old.  But at the last possible second I checked out a previously overlooked upper level flat in a 2-unit Tenancy In Common (TIC) in the heart of Hayes Valley.  It was a to-the-studs remodel that immediately made my condo fall out of favor: every interior surface, fixture, appliance and window was nicer.  It's about 50 square feet bigger.  South-facing.  Skylights.  Wine (or PBR and Chelda) cooler.  Storage.  Parking for bicycles only. ;^)  And here's the kicker: it was much cheaper.

No

YES

Pretty quickly I decided that walking from my condo reservation was well worth it.  So, I've got a new home -- pics are here.

Ole!  Check out this concert I saw at the Warfield last week:

The band is Cafe Tacuba and they were a total blast!  Partly this was due to them fully rocking, but a large part of the credit goes to the crowd which seemed to be almost entirely from the band's home town of Mexico City.  There was certainly a similar amount of English being spoken at the Warfield as south of the border (i.e. none).  Anyway, American audiences should take careful notes from the video on how to be less lame.  Note: crowd surfing to songs of any tempo, flag waving, vigorous display of knowledge of all the band's lyrics, and inflated condom ballooning.

So what possessed us to see the show?  In China last spring Mike realized he needed a hat when we were cruising Yongshuo, not far from Vietnam.  He found a cool one in the street market with the phrase "Su choya viva de chochos" emblazoned on the front near a skull, and although none of us had a clue what it meant he bought it anyway.  Turns out it's a phrase from the song Chilanga Banda by the aforementioned band, something we didn't find out until much scouring of the web when we got home.  As far as what it all means that's still slightly unclear because the entire song's lyrics are such hardcore Mexico City slang that online translators just laugh at you and tell you to come back when you can paste some Spanish in their "translate" window.  People who have studied Spanish in school are similarly ineffective in decoding the lyrics.  Luckily my friend Iti grew up in Mexico City and was gracious enough to provide me with this translation:

Mi ñero mata la bacha y canta la cucaracha su choya vive de chochos de chemo, churro y garnachas

My buddy finishes his doobie, and sings "La Cucaracha" his head lives on pills, glue (chemical solvents) joints and street food.

Hmm so did the Chinese hat manufacturer have a clue what the phrase meant?  Is the skull even a Cafe Tacuba logo?  How come nobody at the concert recognized Mike's hat?  All we know is it's an awesome souvenir and Mike's head lives on pills. :^)