It's been a while since I've written...well, here's some bits of stuff...

Today is election day. The San Francisco mayor race was throw into a bit of chaos a couple weeks ago. It was a three way tie with Willie Brown, the incumbant, slowly pulling ahead of his rivals: a wealthy tyrant (Clint Reilly) who tried to buy the election and an ex-SF Mayor (Frank Jordan) who didn't do a particularly good job the first time around. Brown has done OK for style points but he's basically a crook. Federal officials are currently investigating separate issues with sales of low income housing vouchers & illegal transfer of contracts for work on the airport. Polls said that fully 30% of the voters were undecided.

And then came Tom.

Tom is the president of the Board of Supervisors. He's described himself as the Loyal Opposition to the current mayor. When it became clear that this election was going to be a spending war between Brown & Reilly, Tom Ammiano stepped out. When the mud slinging got deeper & the number of 'undecided' voters continued to grow, Tom stepped in. It was too late to get on the ballot but he filed to run as a write-in candidate. Suddenly, Tom Ammiano was in second place for Mayor. Tonight, it's anyone's guess what's going to happen. I would guess that there will be a run off. To win outright, Brown would need 50% of the votes. The race is for second place, to force the run-off.

If Tom Ammiano wins, he will be the first openly gay mayor of a major city. His night job is a standup comic. I've seen him perform and he's actually funny.

He's also a neighbor. I found out this week that he lives about 5 blocks from me. Two other minor Mayor candidates also live in my neighborhood. I never would have guessed that Bernal Heights is such a political neighborhood.

I'll also be watching the election results tonight to see how Super Booty does. He's also running for mayor. His day (night?) job is a DJ at a downtown dance club. I'm not entirely sure why he's running for mayor but he's on the ballot. Maybe he's in favor of music for everyone. So that's the election news...

Work is pretty much the same. I'm still having to commute between two different buildings which makes for some long walks or short cab rides. Or sometimes long cab rides depending on whether the cab driver has spent much time in San Francisco.

This morning, I walked to the other building and found myself at a crosswalk standing behind a man with an orange vest that said "Pedestrian Ambassador." I guess that's San Franciscan for "crossing guard." When the light changed, he threw himself into traffic in front of the red light runners & everyone else followed once he'd cleared the way.

The men's rugby world cup is going on right now. I went to see one of the semi final games last weekend. Kezar Pub showed it live. So at 7am last Saturday, I was in a standing room only crowd in a bar (ever been in a bar at 7am? they smell.) watching a rugby game, surrounded by some very large rugby players from Australia & South Africa. The South Africans kept chanting something in Afrikaans. I thought it best to not ask for a translation. Then on Sunday, France upset New Zealand in the other semi-final game.

Before a national game, the New Zealand team does the Haka, a dance/chant that sounds quite fierce and intimidating. However, this is one chant where translation helps. I'd thought it was a heroic Maorie warrior song. In fact, the words translate to a story about a man in the New Zealand jungle who sees enemy warriors so he hides in a hole in the ground until they go away. You'd never guess that from the tone or facial expressions from the New Zealand rugby players as they perform the Haka.

Tonight, I went to play rugby with a men's team. I've been trying to pull my old team together and someone told me there were some women coming out to play with a men's team in San Francisco. I went to their practice tonight & ran around for a little bit...but not too much. There was only one other woman out there. However...maybe we can combine efforts to build a new team.

I'm on jury duty this week and last. So far, I've mostly had to just call in every day and then they tell me to call back the next day. There was one day last week where they asked me & several hundred other people to report. I knew it was bad when they started bringing out questionaires and I was right. Turns out that it was a three month trial. Xoom only pays me for 2 weeks of jury duty so I claimed financial hardship & got excused from the trial.

Ron & I went out in the Castro for Halloween. Pix here.

Stacey