The holidays in pictures

I didn't want to end this fabulous year (note the sarcasm) without sharing some of our best holiday moments. Sadly, I am not anywhere near my camera so all I have for you is cell phone pictures. I don't appear in the pictures. I am fat and avoid cameras (I'm sure there's a whole post or series of them there) but I promise to wax my lip and eyebrows and trim my bangs and take a couple of shots for you... soon... before the year is out.

This pretty little lady refuses to wear her mittens at all so this is the only proof I have that she does have a pair and that I do try to keep her warm. The hat is actually too small for her head so cousin Ramona will inherit that. See that cute little smile? She's looking at a group of homeless persons that were gathered at that corner smoking some fine tobacco... One of the saddest things about San Francisco is the amount of homeless people that live here and how many of them are families with children. Of course that's yet another story for another time.

This picture is a small sample of a new habit my precious little lady has developed: as soon as she sees a camera she becomes very serious or looks the other way or will not sit still. On purpose. To drive me insane. More than I already am, which if you ask those who know me seems like an impossibility, and yet...

This is Big T, all dressed up on Xmas Day. We did not celebrate but did treat ourselves to some delicious food at Miller's East Coast, West Coast Deli on Polk Street. We had asked our good friend Anya to come with us but she says *cough* that her phone was on silent *cough* so we took this picture and sent it to her. We didn't hear back from her until maybe two or three hours later, after I had already succumbed to all sorts of hysterical thoughts about her and her s.o. being dead in their apartment or something, so much so that we even drove there but had no way to call up and so we instead took Lu to the park.

And this very crappy picture is all I could manage to take with my cell phone yesterday at the War Memorial Opera House were we went to see the Nutcracker ballet, courtesy of auntie Anya. Unfortunaltely auntie didn't know that 2 year olds don't really know how to sit still and can't last the whole performance without melting into a puddle of whiiiiine. But it was wonderful and memorable and I am so grateful to my friend for beign so sweet. I am so happy that Lu has such a wonderful auntie. So, I leave you with a semi-smiling Anya:

Happy Chanukah auntie Anya!

I love the gays

Several people from my office, including myself, went to San Francisco City Hall to see our friends Mali and Elizabeth get married again. The first time was 4 years ago and they had no time to plan for anything (and I didn't know them yet so I wasn't there that time around.) This time they had a week to choose flowers, a lovely cake, and send out an evite. It was a beautiful ceremony, short but everything was just right. Elizabeth's mother flew in for the ceremony, she read from the court decision and wished the couple well, it was very moving.

Big T was able to pick up Little Lu from daycare with enough time to see the end of the ceremony. Mali is Persian so while two people held a shawl over their heads, friends and family took turns rubbing two sugar cones together and wishing them a sweet life together.

I am so honored to have been there and that my daughter was there. She doesn't know it yet, but she was present at an incredibly important time in our history. Acceptance takes a while and this is just a small step in that direction. [I will post pictures of the whole event tonight. Done.] Yay San Francisco! Yay love! Yay marriage for all!

Gripe, gripe, gripe

So gas prices have steadily gone up for the past month or so. I think this progression is better appreciated through pictures:



This was at the beginning of March. Granted, this is one of the most expensive gas stations around because it sits right at the bottom of an off-ramp so it gets most of its business from desperate people who are running out of gas and have no choice but to go there. And from really rich people who don't even look at the sign, right? It's across the street from Hotel Utah at Fourth and Bryant.


Just a few days later, they were at $4.11. I unfortunately missed my chance to take a picture of the $4.19 gas, which was considered so high that this very gas station was featured in the local news.


That was probably a couple of weeks ago, sometime in mid-April. These days it's all the way up to $4.29. And most other stations I've seen are at $3.99.






So, "why don't you take public transit?", you say. "Or ride your bike?" "Or walk to work? San Francisco is not that big a city."

To which I say: bite me. Muni takes so long and is so unreliable that it takes the same amount of time to go from where I live to where I work as it takes to cross the freaking Bay Bridge. That is just not right people! I have tried to ride my bike and I am just too scared of drivers here, you wouldn't believe how aggressive they are and how running red lights is pretty much the norm for everyone. In a perfect world I would walk. I am quite overweight and dearly need the exercise. Unfortunately it doesn't work with our current domestic circumstances. Trust me. This situation is so frustrating I wish I were a drinker. I'm sure a nice round of tequila shots would help me see the humor in all of this (but only if it is Herradura.)

Alas, I'll just have to make do with the lorazepam...

Insult to injury: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/05/02/financial/f054757D63.DTL&tsp=1

The Middle Class Trap

Here in San Francisco making twenty dollars an hour, or even thirty, will not get you very far. Everything is overpriced. Everything. Parking meters, depending on the area, will give you 5 or 6 minutes for one quarter. Food, both at the supermarket and at restaurants, unless you are willing to eat some really bad crap, will likely be anywhere from $8 to $15 per person without drinks. Movie tickets are $10.50. Gas prices are some of the highest in the nation, averaging $3.90 a gallon as of today. Rentals -don't get me started! In my building a one bedroom apartment goes for $1,895 a month, and that is actually not that bad compared to the rest of the city.

Now, before you begin asking yourself, "then why does she live there?" let me say that you are asking the wrong question. I live here because in spite of all the financial difficulties we face, we want to live in a place where you can be who you want to be and not be afraid of it. It's that simple. When I moved here and saw queer people, inter racial couples, just all kinds of different people all over the city holding hands, kissing, laughing, living their lives, it was the most profoundly beautiful thing to me. So it is not a matter of "if you don't like it, or can't afford it, get out". WHY SHOULD IT BE THAT WAY? Why are people who earn less money less worthy of living happy, productive lives in a city of their choosing? Especially when those people are either a) working for non- profit organizations providing a range of much needed services (like homeless outreach, AIDS/HIV support, health care, legal advice and representation, and much more), or b) the people who need those services the most since they clean, cook, and serve all of the rest of us, whether rich or poor, and without whom the city would collapse into a heap of garbage (and here I am thinking of servers, dishwashers, cashiers, cooks, delivery people, etc.) WHY?

Our friends started to leave the city years ago because they wanted to *gasp* own a house or they had a kid or they were just priced out. That tends to happend when you are a bike messenger making 10 bucks an hour. And I remember thinking that I wouldn't let that happen to us. I also remember wondering why the heck would anyone want to have kids in such a non-kid friendly city. What a dope I was. What was thought process? That only people without kids should live here? Right. Instead, what I want to know is why shouldn't we be allowed to be parents? Now that I have a kid I have seen how this has become a whole industry, a very expensive one that charges you as much as possible for services that everyone should have access to like child care. It costs anywhere from $1, 000 to $2, 000 a month and whether you have the money or not you have to be on a waiting list for a year or two. I am not making this up, in San Francisco, it is easier to get into law school than nursery school.

What makes all of this even harder to cope with is that we do not qualify for any sort of help from anyone. We "make too much." To which I say, are you fucking kidding? But it is true, there are no city services that can help us out, so we are too rich for help but too poor to make ends meet on our own. Welcome to the middle-class trap.