September, 2004

The September Roundup: Life in San Francisco

It's now June of 2005 and I'm finally getting around to posting pics from my short-lived stay out in San Francisco. (I took a job with a start-up that didn't work out and ended up moving back to NYC a mere four months later!). Keep in mind, when I first got out there, I hardly knew anyone and (besides Meredith's visit, which is a separate entry) didn't do all that much.

Upon landing, I hit the rental center and spent almost an hour trying to figure out what kind of car I wanted to rent. (I decided to rent one for a month while I decided whether or not to buy one). I came super close to getting this Dodge Magnum because it looks like the kind of station wagon that Darth Vader would drive if he had to make a grocery run. But in the end, it's piss poor gas mileage scared the crap out of me (Gas is like $2 a gallon? Last time I had a car shit was like $1.05!) and I ended up getting a no frills Nissan Sentra because it got awesome mileage and the stereo had a 1/8" input jack so I could plug in my iPod directly. Sold!

Here's me crossing the Bay Bridge for the very first time on my way into town. I decided to move here on super-short notice and I'd heard so many nice things about the town that I didn't bother to read up on it too much. The first sign of trouble occurred when I noticed a sign on this bridge that said "Welcome to San Francisco. Population: 750,000." Less than a million people? Uh-oh.

Whatever nervousness I was feeling after learning that SF was a lot smaller than I'd previously thought was quickly washed away when I arrived at my temporary home. Check this place out! My good friends Alysha (who I met working at ModemMedia back in '98) and her awesome boyfriend Brian were in Paris for a month and graciously invited me to crash at their place while I apartment hunted.

Their street is only a block long and is one of those crazy-ass 45 degree angled streets that the city is famous for. Here's the pic I took from their porch while daydreaming about the buns of steel I'd soon be developing by walking around their neighborhood.

The view down their block. So it was around this time that my "not feeling too well" turned into a full-on 102 degree fever. Between all the late nights and my nervousness about moving I'd literally made myself sick. I decided to try to find a bodega nearby where I could buy some Advil and juice and ended up wandering around aimlessly for a half an hour before I found a place. (My search was further complicated by the fact that everybody looked at me like I was a crazyperson when I asked about the nearest "bodega." They were like "Oh, you mean liquor store?" I was like "No, like a corner store. Like a place that sells bread and milk and cigarettes." They were all, "Yeah, a liquor store." Me (okay, not saying it but thinking it) "Yeah, whatever you fruity San Franciscan. Nice fanny pack." After securing juice, a sandwich and some med-i-cide, I got silly with Alysha's TiVO and spent some q-time with my buddy Tylenol PM.

Monday, August 30th

On Monday morning I still had a pretty bad fever but managed to pull myself up off the couch and into my hot rental (seriously, you know my Sentra makes all you girls mad wet, yo) to explore the city a bit. Here's the obligatory shot of the Golden Gate bridge.

This is the only Beaver within a square mile of where Alysha lives. The Castro is like Chelsea in NYC is except more-so. It's like gayness cubed. Or for you mathematically inclined folks out there (Castro = gayness3). Or as Grant put it "Gayer than Nathan lane in a rainbow visor eating a banana while rollerskating." Hahaha.

Tuesday, August 31st

On Tuesday morning my fever finally broke and I decided to go car shopping. I still wasn't sure if I actually wanted to buy a car out there, but considering the only two people I knew in the entire Bay Area were still in Paris, car shopping was better than "sitting on the couch more." I went to the BMW/Mini Cooper dealer to look into what a Mini'd cost. Turns out these cars are so in demand in SF that the dealership adds a $5k cost to the sticker price. I was like "Why?" The guy looked at me and laughed: "Uh....because we can." Thanks for clarifying that for me....DICK!

Later that afternoon, I did some apartment hunting in the Mission. (The neighborhood that reminded me most of NYC).

Friday, September 3rd

I woke up fully recovered on Wednesday just in time for my first day of work. Here's me on my very first commute down to our company's temporary offices at the VC firm that funded us.

My office, day one. (See, I told you these pics weren't going to be exciting. After work each night I'd spend most of my time apartment hunting and trying to be homesick).

Wednesday, September 1st

gidon, pud — Me with my company's co-founders Philip and Gidon.

My office whiteboard filled with incredibly complex thoughts.

Sunset drive home.

On Friday night, I finally ventured out for my first "social experience" in California when Tara put me in touch with her friend Adrianna who throws a party at a place called Rickshaw Stop.

Some band from LA. The were "meh." Different city, same haircuts.

Saturday, September 4th

On Saturday I walked down to Mission Delores park and decided to enjoy the sunshine and read a book. Then this noisy truck pulled up into the clearing in the middle of the park and when I read the side of it, I almost got on the phone to book a one-way back to NYC.

Mime Troupe? Oh, fuck no!

But when I wandered down for a closer look (hoping I could pick a fight and kick some fucking mime ass) I noticed the tiny writing underneath the logo. Haha.

emma, me — Later that night I met up with Emma! Who was in SF from NYC with her new fiance to attend a friend's wedding.

Tuesday, September 7th

In the kitchen at work, I found myself in awe of Michael Moritz's soup. He's the partner on Google's board. (Why in awe? Well, if you go here, you'll see he owns 23,893,800 shares of Google stock. And if you figure that presently, GOOG is trading at $289.71 per share that means his share in the company is worth, ummmm, about $6.92 Billion).

candy — A figure which made my head spin so fast that only the soothing magic of the FREE CANDY DRAWER could re-center me.

Oh, did I mention the free drinks too? Woo!

My office, getting more filled up.

pud — Hahahaha. Philip needed a haircut before a date and made the mistake of going to some barbershop he found near our work in Menlo Park. The lady that cut his hair did fine up until the end when she busted out the trimmers.

Philip explained: "So she takes them out to do the usual neatening thing they do. You know, even up the neckline...bzz! Then around your ear...bzz! bzz! Then the lady brings the clippers up to my forehead and suddenly I'm confronted by this horribly loud and sustained BZZZZZZZZZZZZ! as she uses the clippers to completely shave off my hairline's natural widow's peak." Hahahahaha. I almost pissed myself laughing. He was like "I went from looking Jewish to looking Puerto Rican in one swift swoop of the clippers!" The laughs continued well into the following weeks as we charted the progress of his "forehead stubble."

Tuesday, September 7th

On Wednesday I went and saw a band. But I totally don't remember who it was. Doh.

I don't even recognize the guy on stage. Huh.

Thursday, September 9th

So I ended up finding a huge room in a 6,000 sq ft loft in the Mission and decided to take it. The guy who owned the place was a film archivist and most of the other 6,000 sq feet were filled floor to ceiling with film canisters. It was crazy!

So on Friday, I got my bed delivered there and decided to spend my first night! (But then it turned out that directly below was an furniture upholsterer workshop and I was awoke at 6am by sounds of four men conversing loudly while using staple guns. The floor was so thin that it literally sounded like they were making furniture in the room with me. When I told my really cool totally nutty, fifty-something year old, ex-hippy, almost-roommate that the noise was waaaay too loud and that I was pretty sure I'd be unable to work there he said "Awww man, I've been trying to find a groovy roommate for months and you're like it, man. Don't you think you could just like, start getting up earlier?" Doh. As cool as the place would've been, it was unfortunately back to apartment hunting for me. (nooooooo!)

Saturday, September 11th

alysha — Hey look! Alysha's back in town! And she got a new car! Here she is taking us kids out for a spin in her fancy new Audi wagon that she found on eBay. (Who buys a car on the national interweb? We are living IN THE FUTURE!)

The kids in the back.

alysha — Later that night we had a Thai takeout feast back at Alysha and Brian's house.

Sunday, September 12th

Here I was, sitting in a restaurant on Monday evening, reading the paper, minding my own business and then this guy walks in.

White man dreads, burlap shirt, flowing hemp pants and some sort of hemp-rope utility belt with all sorts of satchels (that like contain "powder or ground unicorn horn") hanging from it. To all of the people that sent me email complaining about the "dirty hippy gifts" that my friends in NYC gave me at my going away party...we rest our case.

Tuesday, September 14th

pud — Putting labels that read "do not disassemble" is pretty much the dumbest thing you can do in an office full of nerds. No one would have even considered disassembling the wifi hub, until we all saw the big sticker that instructed us not to. Only because it begs the question "Huh, why shouldn't I disassemble it?" (PS - Note how Philip's hand is strategically placed to obscure the forehead stubble. Hahah).

pud — The sticker even goes as far to imply that if you did decide to disassemble the hub, you wouldn't be able to put it back together in working order. Then suddenly, it's like the thing is insulting you and then....it's on.

A rarely seen Brian (Alysha's boyfriend) helping me hook my laptop into the wifi network at their house. (PCs and Macs hate each other!)

Tuesday, September 14th

After another solid week of apartment hunting, I finally managed to find an awesome apartment. I was the master bedroom in a two-story, four bedroom townhouse on the corner of Market and Sanchez Streets. My three roommates were all in their mid-twenties and all worked together at the nearby Cheesecake Factory.

Here's the other half of the room. I had my own bathroom and we had a whole roof deck all to ourselves as well.

I brought over my recently purchased mattress from the warehouse apartment in the Mission that I'd almost moved into and then stopped at the ATM to get cash to pay the movers that I'd scheduled to deliver all my stuff the next day. Then I went to sleep in my MONEYBED, Scrooge McDuck style.

Wednesday, September 15th

On Wednesday afternoon I cut out of work a little early to meet the movers! Woo! Things went smoothly except for one...

...little mishap. Doh.

After unpacking a few boxes, I decided to grab some dinner and nose around the stores in my new hood. Remember before when I was talking about how the Castro (which my new apartment is right on the border of) is like the gayest place in the world (not that there's anythingwrongwiththat). You probably thought I was just exaggerating to be funny. Well, check out the #1 selling DVD at Tower Video just down the street from me. That's right it's...

..."Guys Gone WILD." (I'm not going to even get into the signs on the street outside of Gold's Gym "We work up a sweat keeping our MEMBERS HARD!") Aren't puns like that illegal in public? Holy moly!

Saturday, September 18th

paul hanley — On Saturday night I met up with NYC buddy Paul Hanley (the guy all the way on the right) who was in town visiting some friends.

Sunday, September 19th

And then on Sunday, I Paul invited me out again to check out the "Beautiful Losers" art exhibit at one of the local SF museums. I asked him for the address and he was like "Oh, it's on Mission and 3rd St." I was like "Oh, new place is 2 streets over and 13 blocks away - so I'll walk over and see you in like 15 minutes." Yeah, too bad that's an estimate based on the size of city blocks in NYC - turns out that "blocks" in SF are like a 1/4 each and so it ended up taking me just about an hour to get there. Hahaha. Doh.

At the entrance to the gallery, they had a kidney-shaped "swimming pool" made out of wood and plywood. Here's the view underneath. Pretty neato.

Then late on Sunday night, a super-nice girl Jane (who has a friend in NYC who reads my site and told her that I was moving to SF and didn't know anyone out there....so nice!) invited me to garden party. I was wiped out from walking around all day and I had to get up for work, but I decided to swing by and at least say hi and try to meet some people. By the time I got there, things were winding down, but I did manage to see a GIRLFIGHT on the way out! Check out the double-knee shoulder pin in full-effect. (You know that means that she totally has brothers that she had to learn to defend herself against.

Then on the walk home I saw this hearse that somebody had turned into some sort of creepy, gothic cathedral car.

The hood ornament looked like a sculpture that H.R. Geiger would make (if he lost his hands....and all of his talent).

Who the fuck buys a hearse and then is like "Hmmm, it's pretty goth but NOT GOTH ENOUGH FOR ME! I'm gonna need to get me some plywood and some stained glass and build a little evil church on top." If had me that shit I would've totally redid it to look like the Ghostbuster's car. (Although, now that I think about it, I'm not sure if that's more gay or less gay?)

Monday, September 20th

I spent most of Monday driving around San Francisco looking for office space for our company so we could start hiring more people (and stop having to commute down to Menlo Park ever day). Office Space #1: Too expensive.

Office Space #2. Too dreary.

Office Space #3: Too stinky. (Had mildewy carpets or something). The hunt continues!

Later that night I went to the super cool old-school theater down the street from my house in the Castro. Before the movie starts, they have an old guy playing an organ! Then he leaves, the organ goes away and the curtain comes up to reveal the screen. It's pretty awesome.

Tuesday, September 21st

On Tuesday, more office hunting. This time in the South Park area of town (where all the dot com start ups where based back in the day).

Cool exterior.

But too tiny and too expensive.

Wednesday, September 22nd

On Wednesday night, the amazing kind and charming Tracy Broome invited me out to Rickshaw Stop (she books the bands there).

This was one of the first bands I'd seen made up of all hot girls that was decent. Usually if there are more than two girls in a band, the girls' collective hotness is inversely proportionate to their level of musicianship (and they usually have no idea that they suck because every guy that sees them tells them "Wow, you guys are amazing!" because he totally wants to get into one of their panties!.

Tracey and some of her friends.

Thursday, September 23rd

christine, me — So after a week of living together, my new roomies and I decided that we were long overdue to head out and hit the town together. We were in our kitchen trying to figure out where we should go when my new roommate Christine uttered nine magnificent words: "Hey, there's a karaoke bar right down the street!" I was like "Shut the fuck up!" Christine replied "No, I'm serious, it's called The Mint and it's one of the biggest karaoke bars in town. They have karaoke every night. It's like 3 blocks from here! And you gotta hear Kareen sing - she's really good." Talk about fate, huh? (You'd think "Where's the nearest karaoke bar?" would've been one of my standard questions while apartment hunting, but I swear it never even came up!).

My roomie Kareen on the left with two of her friends.

So then Kareen hits the stage. "Good" is an understatement. Turns out the girls a ringer. She blew the doors off the joint singing "Black Velvet" (Black Velvet! Who knew?) by Alana Myles.

After she was finished, I suggested we team up for a "new roomie" duet. She was like "Sure! Do you know "Total Eclipse of the Heart?" I played it cool, "Yeah, I think I might've heard that song once or twice. Let's give it a shot, I can always just wing it." (Hahahah.)

No duet is complete unless I can manage to "back that thang up" a little bit.

Hahaha.

The vein-popping finale.

christine — If you turn the volume up on your speakers you can actually hear the sound of Christine's tiny mind being blown. (Here ends my first 30 days in SF).