Many are familiar with Dio’s snarling, soaring vocal style on the his harder and better known metals hits with Elf, Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Dio and Heaven & Hell. (What, you have a musical career which spans fifty plus years, you’ll have a list, too.)  However, the man could really sing anything, including lovely slow, smooth pieces as well.  So, I’ve chosen such a song here.  Sitting in a Dream is one of three songs he did as a guest singer on a solo album by Roger Glover.  Glover is best known as the bass player for Deep Purple.  This performance is from a concert Deep Purple did in 1999 at London’s Royal Albert Hall.

The album came out in 1974 and was a concept rock opera entitled, The Grasshopper’s Feast and The Butterfly Ball.  Kids of my generation grew up seeing clips from the accompanying animated film on The Electric Company.  The song Love is All (also featuring Dio) still pops up on Nickelodeon Saturday morning shows and was a minor hit for Dio and Glover.

No politics or Op-Ed piece in this Monday’s Music.  Right now, I would simply like to remember the man and his effortlessly powerful voice.  This Wednesday marks the second anniversary of Ronnie James Dio’s death from stomach cancer.  Here’s a little slice of what was lost.

I’m just passing time before the Ball
Playing my guitar
I don’t have to be where I don’t want to be at all
Maybe I’ll go far
Going nowhere, sitting in a dream…
Ah, in a dream
Sitting in a landscape full of sighs
Dream away the day
Making up a tune about the blueness of the skies
This is where I’ll stay
Going nowhere, sitting in a dream…
Oh, in a dream
Watching as a red and white balloon
Sails across my mind
In between the images that drift along my tune
Smile as they unwind
Going nowhere, sitting in a dream…
Ah, in a dream

Originally recorded in 1974, this version was performed Sept 25th, 1999. A subsequent Deep Purple live album was released on Feb 8th, 2000 and included this performance.

Somewhere in the craziness of my life I realized that this past weekend actually saw the one year anniversary since I began this blog.  This set me to thinking.  What have I learned from fifty-one posts, two hundred and forty-four comments (approved at least) and three hundred and forty tags?

You’d be surprised, actually.  I was.  It wasn’t what I would have thought.

I have learned we largely take from the Internet that which we bring to it.  In my day-to-day life I value family, friends and a sense of community above all else.  So, it comes as no surprise then that the Internet has helped me reconnect with old friends, strengthen relationships with current ones and make new friends, primarily other bloggers.

Blogging requires consistency.  One needs to keep posting or interest fades.  I am not always consistent in all I undertake, so this is good practice for me.

Hostess once had a character named Chauncey the Chocodile.  Who knew?

Another thing I’m finding I need to practice in regards to my blog is restraint.  A couple of my blogs have generated their fair share of controversy (take the piece on Swankville or the one on home schooling) and I have received my quota of blistering comments.  My general rule of thumb is to put up any comment, even if it rips me to shreds, provided it uses relatively clean language and does not contain too vicious a personal attack.  The temptation to reply to some of these is huge, but it serves no one to engage the true believers.  I am not going to change their mind.  No need to fuel the fire.  Let me assure you, this is very un-Erika.  Usually I have to have the last word.

Speaking of true believers, here’s another something I’ve learned, sometimes the delete button is your friend.

As “American as apple pie” started as a Depression era marketing campaign to aid apple farmers.  I’d say it worked.

Don’t give up on people.  Most people will try to do the right thing most of the time.

I’ve learned a few interesting things about myself.  As outspoken as I have been, I’m not as fearless as I would like to think myself to be.   I’ve had a piece on our local schools sitting in my drafts folder for months now, but I haven’t hit the publish button.  I’m not sure how it would impact my kids.  Prudence or cowardice?  Hard to say.

I realized I could never be a vampire.  Will I ever need this knowledge? Likely not, but it’s good to know anyway.

I have found out I am not alone.  Others out there are just as passionate on topics close to my heart.  Of course, I also know there are lots who as equally passionate in the opposite direction.  Somehow, knowing there are people like me outweighs the thought of those who are not.  This isn’t limited to the big things like women’s reproductive rights, teen bullying or civil liberties; it works on the more mundane.  For instance, other people miss Ronnie James Dio and mark May 16th as a sad day, too.

I like jelly donuts, I never knew that before, and I like the “jelly” in my friends even more.

I never want to stop writing.  I never want to stop running.

Sometimes the life we end up with is not the life we dreamed of as children.  Sometimes, it is even better.

I firmly believe that happiness is a choice and this past year has reaffirmed that for me.  Thank you, my friends, for a wonderful year.

Five reasons to be so happy- the four of them and all of you!

Mitt Romney owes Ann Romney a nice, big “Honey, I’m sorry I screwed up” bouquet of flowers.   Let me explain why.

Unless you live under a rock,  it’s possible you might have caught a word or two on the whole “Hilary Rosen attacks stay-at-home moms” extravaganza.  Basically,  as I understand it, during part of Mitt Romney’s stump speech he includes a reference to the role his wife plays in helping him stay in touch with the concerns of women in this country.  To paraphrase Governor Romney when he wants to know what is most on the mind of American women, he asks his wife.

When discussing this choice of women’s issues/economic advisor on the campaign trail  Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen made an observation.  “His wife has actually never worked a day in her life,” Rosen said on Anderson Cooper’s “AC360” show. “She’s never really dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of the women in this country are facing in terms of how do we feed our kids, how do we send them to school and how do we — why we worry about their future.”

This whole bruhaha illustrates some of what I find most irritating about the relationship between politicians and the so-called pundits:

1.)  The ability, or sheer crass stupidity, of both parties to be able to willfully misconstrue any statement.

2.)  The rapidity by which a candidate can deplore a position he or she backed only weeks before, despite videos and voting records to the contrary.  Do they think we’re so dense that we’d forget???

3.) The condescending brass balls on these yokels towards me as a woman and as a stay-at-home-mom.  Do they think I’m so brain-damaged… scratch that, yes, clearly, they do.

Let’s start with my first point.  Eric and I were on a cruise went this story broke and as we watched CNN, we both looked at each other and said, “You’ve GOT to be kidding?”  Mind you, Eric is Mr. Republican and I (duh) am Ms. Democrat and we BOTH agreed on this one.  Ms. Rosen was not guilty of saying stay at home moms don’t work.  The inference was clear.   What Hilary Rosen meant to say was Mrs. Romney had never worked a day in her life OUTSIDE THE HOME.  Which is true.  Ms. Rosen was guilty of forgetting one thing… every word is examined and then deliberately misunderstood by today’s media.  This goes equally on both sides of the aisle.

Moving on the my second pet peeve, and frankly, Romney has been guilty of this even more than most politicians, changing his story.  Suddenly, now being home with your children is sacred and above reproach when just weeks ago Candidate Romney urged the parents of young children to return to the work force so that they might enjoy the “dignity of work”.  In a town hall address in Massachusetts this past January (2012), he had this to say,  “While I was governor,” Romney said, “85 percent of the people on a form of welfare assistance in my state had no work requirement. I wanted to increase the work requirement. I said, for instance, that even if you have a child two years of age, you need to go to work.”

Furthermore, while Governor Romney made it clear on the Massachusetts state assistance to low-income families (TANF= Temporary Assistance For needy Families) that raising a child did not count as work towards the law’s mandated work requirement to qualify for said assistance.  Mind you, I’m not knocking this particular piece of legislation. (I haven’t done the research to do so.) However, I am knocking the hypocrisy of Romney jumping on the lynch mob bandwagon by going after an accidental “moms don’t work” comment by Rosen when he himself has clearly, and with purpose, planning and public crowing of it, held the position for years that being a stay-at-home parent is not defined as work under the law.  (See this link for more on the specifics.)  Hey buddy, no fair getting all whiny now, you can’t have it both ways.

Though Lord knows, you keep trying.

Make up your mind, sir.

This brings us to point three: the cajones on behalf of the Right Wing of the GOP.  In the past six months they’ve attacked my access to contraception, my right to a safe and legal abortion (not to mention questioning my ability to discern whether I want one), my pride in my own sexuality (unless it coincides with a socialital demand to squeeze out as many children as God decides to send), my privacy to make all these decisions with my doctor or my husband as needed, even my rights as an individual to fight employment discrimination.  (And that’s just off the top of my head, I’m sure there’s more, but I get so mad when I think about it I have to be careful or someone could get hurt.)  However, now, suddenly they’re running to my “defense” with a condescending pat on the head because I am a SAHM.  Save it, folks.  I didn’t feel attacked and I sure don’t need your platitudes. You want to help us moms out?  Help make our family planning choices affordable and accessible.  Quit second guessing our ability to make decisions regarding our own bodies just because it makes you feel uncomfortable.  Or, hey, make sure our kids have access to open and honest sex education, to health care and the ability to make informed choices.

Because ultimately choices, or the lack thereof, is what Hilary Rosen was trying to talk about.  Eric and I chose to have one parent stay home.  In the beginning, we weren’t sure it would necessarily be the wife.  Ann Romney also chose to stay home.  She chose to have a housekeeper, to live in what I would call your basic mansion and to drive two Cadillacs.  An incredibly small number of parents have such choices in their lives.

I don’t think Ann Romney or Hilary Rosen deserve any censure, either for not working or for any remarks they’ve made.  I think the one who screwed up here was Mitt.  He made his wife his de facto expert on women’s issues, a role she is simply not qualified for.   Like anyone else, she can only speak to what she knows.  So, if she’d like to talk about her husband’s wonderful personal qualities, his faith, his performance as a husband or father, she’s your go-to-girl.  I can’t tell you the concerns of the uber rich woman and she can’t attest the worries of a mom in the burbs like me.  Frankly, neither of us can attest to the worries of most working mothers and fathers because we have something they do not.  We have choices.   While my job as a SAHM has been and continues to be hard work on many fronts, after fifteen years in the actual work force I can say it is not as hard as many jobs outside the home which many women (and men) shoulder in addition to their job as parent.  Most of these parents didn’t leave their children and go to work because they CHOSE to, they went because they HAD to.  To say that Ann Romney can understand the worries of those parents for their children’s futures, education, health care, even putting a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs and food in their mouth is ludicrous.  That’s what Mitt Romney did when he used his wife as a source of information she clearly does not possess, he cited the ludicrous and Rosen was right to call him on it.

Governor Romney, you made yourself look out of touch, again, worse yet, you made your wife look vacuous.  Go buy that pretty lady some flowers.

Who me? What'd I say?

Now, when do we get to talk about those idiot Secret Service Agents in Colombia?  Who’s cheap enough to try to not pay the poor hooker her $47?  I mean, really???

Happy May Day

A Time to Talk

That being said, as wonderful as things currently are at present, one still has regrets and this week’s song represents one of mine.  I’ve found myself  in one of those situations where, completely through my own actions, I think I screwed up a relationship.  Now, I’m not sure, thanks to a situation of radio silence between we two, although I have the sneaking suspicion that trying to apologize and have a conversation designed to fix things would likely drive the person further away.  Perhaps time will help mend the rift? Perhaps there is no rift, just something all in my head?  I don’t know, but I do think, in the words of this song, “I really f***ed it up this time.”

Right now the  people reading my blog are saying, what song, Erika?  Oops, sorry, sort of skipped that part.  The song is Little Lion Man by Mumford and Sons:

Such a catchy, fun, folky song.  One simply has to sing along (radio edits usually substitute the word “messed” for the f-word).  This is a song that can mean different things to different people.  Front man Marcus Mumford said of Little Lion Man, “It’s a very personal story, so I won’t elaborate upon too much. Suffice to say, it was a situation in my life I wasn’t very happy with or proud of… and sometimes when you can’t describe a feeling with your own words, it’s almost easier to express in a song. .. the song should stand on its own and people draw their own interpretation from the words.”

For me, I see the Little Lion Man of the song as the brash, impulsive, slightly naive child still living inside each of us.  I see the singer talking to that inner child and explaining, I (the adult me) blew it.  I should have kept a tighter leash on that child (actual complete honesty is rarely allowed between grown-ups) and now we both feel very badly about things.  I think the song is also about one of those really, profoundly uncomfortable moments when there is simply no escaping the fact that this time, the blame lies squarely on our shoulders.  We chose this course of action and now it’s time to pay the piper.

Just wish I knew what currency the piper accepted.

Wow, there’s a whole, huge lesson for our politicians on accountability for one’s actions there, but I shall refrain.

Here are the lyrics… so that you may draw your own meaning from them as Mr. Mumford would have you do.

Lyrics to Little Lion Man :
Weep for yourself, my man,
You’ll never be what is in your heart
Weep Little Lion Man,
You’re not as brave as you were at the start
Rate yourself and rake yourself,
Take all the courage you have left
Wasted on fixing all the problems
That you made in your own head

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn’t I, my dear?
Didn’t I, my…

Tremble for yourself, my man,
You know that you have seen this all before
Tremble Little Lion Man,
You’ll never settle any of your scores
Your grace is wasted in your face,
Your boldness stands alone among the wreck
Now learn from your mother or else spend your days Biting your own neck

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn’t I, my dear? (x2)

Didn’t I, my dear?

Ahhhhh……

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn’t I, my dear? (x2)

Released August 11th, 2009

Didn’t I, my dear?

In true grade school form…

What I Learned Over Spring Break 2012

Texas is a land of strip malls, churches and porn stores… oh, yes, and wires, lots and lots of wires.  It’s a huge place, so I’m sure there are plenty of gorgeous places, too, I just haven’t seen them yet. (I can’t wait for the “Don’t Mess With Texas” comments.)

Just a lot of wires... a lotta, lotta, lotta wires.

It takes approximately twelve minutes for the caffeine and sugar in a coke to hit the blood sugar of a twelve-year-old boy.

Dolphins are, like, awesome at surfing the wake of cargo ships.  Like, so awesome.

There are very real reasons why there exists a stereotype of an American as a loud, rude, fat jerk.  Like every stereotype it’s wrong, unkind and not true, yet there is a reason it exists.

The Hunger Games Book #1 is worth the hype, so few things are.

Little sisters are still tattletales.

My busy, busy girls... their poor brother!

All I really need for a great vacation are: a cold beer with fresh lime, the whisper of the waves, the laughter of my children catching the wind, soft sand under my toes and, of course, Eric.

“All You Can Eat” is a terrible thing to do to a body.

It just takes ONE Lay’s potato chip to create an angel fish feeding frenzy.

One potato chip=lots of FUN!

Caribbean white sand is magic.  You’ll never get it all out of your swimming suit. Ever.

For word on the anger level of the Texans, how the other two Hunger Games books stack up and whether I ever get all the sand out… well, I’ll let you know.  In the meantime, have a truly wonderful, stellar and otherwise blissful day.

This song is a simple, beautiful tune and it has a double meaning.  It is a typical country theme, one of love lost.  However, it is also the tale of a life ended whilst chasing a dream.  Not being a huge country fan, I happened upon the ballad some time in early 1994.  I caught the video late one night on tv.  The images found me completely off guard as they feature fallen Americans, icons and heroes to many of us.  These include (as detailed by the online site, Wikipedia):

• Lane Frost- World Champion Bull rider, who was killed by a bull after riding it for a full eight seconds in the arena.
• Keith Whitley- Country singer who died young of alcohol poisoning, he’s seen with his then wife Lorrie Morgan (a country star in her own right)
• Martin Luther King, Jr.
• John F. Kennedy
• The crew of the Challenger Space Shuttle which exploded after launch in 1986, with many of us watching it live on tv (I was in Mr. Graf’s AP American History class), killing all seven crew members on board, including teacher, Christa McAuliffe.
• John Wayne

Later Brooks was invited to sing The Dance in 2001 at a NASCAR event honoring racing legend Dale Ernhardt after his untimely death.

What hooked me, besides the haunting melody, was the video itself.  Not simply that these are some of our nation’s heroes, taken too soon, but that the piece featured personal scenes of JFK playing with his children, Dr. King kissing his wife and snuggling his little boy, even Keith Whitley joking with Lorrie Morgan, and all of them happy, vital and so alive.  It reminds us, no one is a monolithic hero, that “icon” truly is a four-letter word and quite simply, people are people.  While they were public figures to so many, their passing becomes much more poignant when you see them as the husbands, wives, parents, and friends they were in their own lives.  Yes, they were a loss to the world, but how much more of a loss were they to their loved ones and how much more did they themselves give up in their early exit from life’s stage?

I really wanted the original video, the one that had stuck so firmly in my mind’s eye.  It was important to me to find the piece which had made such an impression so even now, some eighteen years later, it still exerted a powerful hold on my heart.  Surprisingly, it was difficult to find, even in today’s instant gratification of the Internet Age.  That being said, when you click on the  link below, it will take you away from my site, just hit back to finish reading this piece.  There is also an advertisement, which I  hate doing to you all, but it’s what I found I had to work with.  I did find other sites with the video, but they all had something wrong with it, ie, the voice track wasn’t synched to the visual (most annoying and it undercuts the power of the story).  Also, I wanted you to hear what Garth himself had to say about this song and why he chose to tell the story in this way.

The Dance By Garth Brooks, 1990

Our lives are a miracle and I can only think one of the reasons we are able to blithely ignore our own fragile mortality lies in the joy of not knowing.  So long as we have the luxury of not marking the number of our days, of not seeing the end of our path, we can revel in the moment.  We can enjoy the fantasy of infinity, the endless tomorrows of the road before us.  Put a number, a countdown in the mix and it becomes a vastly different proposition altogether.

We are all travelers and, whether we acknowledge it or not, we’re just passing through.  No one gets out alive.  With this in mind, be gentle on your fellow travelers.  No matter how different their views, their beliefs, their decisions may be from your own, no one wakes up in the morning bound and determined to completely mess things up.  In each of our own very different ways, we all strive to do the best we can.  No one knows where the road leads and none knows when their dance ends.  Though life can be cruel, this is the ultimate kindness, the illusion there is always another tomorrow, another chance to do better, to change and continue our dance.

As Ellen DeGeneres would say, “Be kind to one another”.  We’re all in this together.

I do so love to dance.

JEROME P. CRABB

Released April 12th, 1989

It’s by a duo of sisters, Allison and Catherine Pierce, simply called The Pierces.  It has a light, lyrical sort of pop meets adult contemporary vibe.  The harmonies remind me of some of the best things I like about Fleetwood Mac when they had all creative cylinders firing.  There’s a little bit of the Bangles a la Hazy Shade of Winter or the Mamas & Papas (if they’d only been mamas, of course).  If Gotye owes Sting and Peter Gabriel each a nice muffin basket (and he so does), the Pierces should definitely be calling Edible Arrangements for a little something for Lindsay Buckingham, not to mention a spiritual shout out to the late John Phillips.  Just saying.

Their album containing this song is called You & I.  It was produced by Coldplay’s bass player, Guy Berryman.  He and Coldplay’s drummer both play on the album.  I’m intrigued to see where these sisters end up.  Pop music, read here, commercial and mainstream success and acceptance, is such a simplistic and narrow field.  The charts are dominated by the latest Disney star, hiphop and Katy Perry.  Every once in a while, something of quality like an Adele or a Florence and The Machine sneaks in there, but honestly, how often does that happen?  The Pierces on paper seem made for pop.  It’s approachable music; lots of fans from other genres will be able to appreciate it.  Both sisters are distractingly pretty so that works with today’s shallow visual based media.  However, their music is actually good… so, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.  If Adele can make it, maybe there’s room for others as well.

So, right now you’re looking at this blog’s title and waiting for the other shoe to drop… you aren’t wrong.  Though I adore music and it is a huge part of my daily life, I didn’t start doing Musical Mondays just for the catchy hooks.  I usually have a point.

Home schooling is an interesting topic.

I say this because Allison and Catherine come from a very interesting background.  1.) They were home schooled while growing up in Alabama.  2.) They, unlike 75% of today’s home schooled children, are NOT right-wing Conservative Christians.  3.) They are only a few years younger than me and as they describe the music they listened to as children: Simon & Garfunkel, Seals & Croft, Cat Stevens, Carole King and Joni Mitchell.  I know what their house sounded like, a lot like the house my sister and I grew up in once upon a time.  4.)  They come from the tradition that actually invented home schooling, yep, they’re the children of hippies.  Cool, huh?

It shows in the above video, doesn’t it?

At this point I just KNOW my mom would want me to point out that my parents weren’t hippies.  They didn’t have time, what with college, meeting, getting married, having me, my dad holding down three jobs, though they did love the music.

Where was I?  Oh yes, home schooling, not a fan.  I liken it to parents who decide to have their young children on a strict vegan life style.  Can it be done well? Yes.  Is it usually? No.  Most parents simply aren’t qualified or have the time and the patience to be able to make a vegan lifestyle work with the nutritional demands of a young child’s developing brain and body.  Kids need fat and protein.  Likewise, home schooling, can it be done well?  Yes.  Is it usually? No.  I look at the parents I’ve met who home school and I usually see people who are not qualified or do not have the time and patience to be able to make home schooling work with the societal and educational demands of a young child’s development and interaction with people not like themselves.  Kids need exposure to new ideas and the freedom to explore the world.  You remember the world, right, folks?  It’s where we live.

When I was researching this blog, I expected to find lots of negatives to home schooling.  I did find negatives, but I found a few concrete positives as well. Some positives that I can really relate to are an educational setting without bullying or peer pressure.  Also, home schooling offers gifted or special needs children a chance to learn at the pace that suits their needs.  Parents have the option of emphasizing the values they feel are important, or the aspects of history they feel most strongly about.  (Clearly, I would include a women’s studies section!)  On the other hand, the negatives were not what I would expect.  One mentioned was cost.  You’re still paying for public schools through your taxes, yet need to purchase educational materials for your curriculum.  Not to mention, home schooling requires a substantial time commitment, necessitating one parent staying home.  This definitely affects the household earning potential.

As late as 1993, home schooling was still illegal in many states.  While it now legal, and a growing, more accepted phenomena, it is under regulated and its effects are not well-known.  Proponents point to good scores by home schooled students on standardized tests, however, there is no way of knowing if those same children would not have scored just as well, if not better, with traditional schooling methods.  After all, one could argue that home schoolers have more involved parents, so the active parenting, combined with main-stream education could yield an exceptional student.  Impossible to say either way.

Regardless, I respect the right of parents to make this decision for their families.  That being said, I think if you are going teach your children, you should have a teaching credential.  Only ten states currently require home schooling parents to have even a high school diploma, let alone an advanced degree or teaching expertise.  I also believe, despite the bullying that sometimes occurs,  it is critical for children to go through the pain and joy of dealing and bonding with their peers.  I want my children to develop relationships with authority figures other than my husband and myself.  It’s a big, wide world and my children will be better prepared to face it and thrive in it if I let them find their wings, rather than clipping them, keeping them safely caged in the home coop.

Regardless of how you feel on the topic, these sisters are undeniably talented and in this instance, home schooling clearly resulted in two multi-dimensional, creative, individualistic, strong women.  Good for them.  You can learn more about The Pierces on their website.

"You and I" EP by the Pierces Released May 30th, 2011

I love the band Journey.  As a female growing up in the SF Bay Area in the 80′s I think it was a requirement to be a rabid Journey fan. It’s been interesting this last decade or so watching a kind of Journey revival.  The band’s hits have popped up in movies and TV shows, on karaoke, they even regularly show up on the iTunes top singles chart.  I have to say that every time some American Idol wannabe or The Voice hopeful attempts a Journey song, I am just reminded of how good Steve Perry’s voice is.  Listening to those bozos on the singing competition shows slaughter Faithfully or Don’t Stop Believing is deeply painful.

My parents moved around a bit for the first eleven years of my life before settling in Santa Rosa in 1980.  I was half way through fifth grade at the time and came to consider Santa Rosa my home town, but I was born in San Francisco.  I’m sixth generation San Franciscan and I feel very connected to the city, although I haven’t lived there since I was a small child.  For some areas six generations might not sound very impressive, but for California, hey, I’m like, old school.

The lights and the bridges of the city beckon we Bay Area residents to it.  My likes and favorite places in San Francisco have altered over the years as I have changed and grown up.  I began by loving Fisherman’s Wharf, Golden Gate Park and the zoo, then it was dance clubs and bars.  Nowadays, I tend towards the restaurants.  Here are five of my current favorite places.  Should you ever visit, I hope you enjoy them!

1.)  Land’s End- It’s part of Golden Gate Park on the Outer Richmond.  Fabulous views of the Pacific Ocean and the Golden Gate.  If you can hike the trail at sunset, so much the better.  Best to do this on a week day though, when it is virtually empty, weekends can be a bit much.

Land's End Maze- a great place to clear your head

2.)  This one is less a place and more a food.  I had a hard time trying to decide between talking about good SF Cioppino and good SF sourdough.  While I love both, many of you have heard me mention my deep sourdough addiction over the years (it’s why I cannot, will not leave the Bay Area), so I have to go with the bread.  I love Boudin’s, but for a really classic loaf with that pure sourdough bite, you have to try Wedemeyer- YUM.  They do not have any stores, but they do Fed Ex.  You can even call in an order and pick it up the next time you are in the city.  They are at:

Wedemeyer Bakery
314 Harbor Way
South San Fransicso CA 94080
Phone: (650) 873-1000
http://www.wedemeyerbakery.com

I cannot overemphasize the yum factor here, people.

3.)  One of my favorite restaurants is just off Union Square.  It used to be the site of Trader Vic’s (a San Francisco classic) and now is the home the French-Vietnamese menu of Le Colonial.  It’s impossible to put into words how good their food is, I can only make yummy sounds and I do not know how to effectively spell those without this reading like goobly-gook.  I guess you’ll just have to take my word for it.  Their website is:

http://lecolonialsf.com/

Mind you, there are so many good restaurants in San Francisco, there’s no reason to ever have a meal that is not delectable.

4.)  The Fort Mason Community Garden- Established in 1979, the garden is tucked away in the bluffs looking out over the Bay, across from Alcatraz.  There are now one hundred and twenty-five plots in this community park.  It is a beautiful spot with interesting hidden walks and lots of surprises.  You can even walk to the Golden Gate Bridge from there if you are feeling adventurous.

Fort Mason Community Garden

5.) City Lights Bookstore- now that A Clean Well-Lighted Place For Books has closed, this has to be one of the best independent book stores left on the planet.  They are a book store and a publishing house, super cool.  They can be found at:

261 Columbus Avenue at Broadway
San Francisco, California 94133
Phone 415.362.8193

There’s bonus here in that they are located in one of my favorite neighborhoods in the city, North Beach.  This means you’ll simply HAVE to stop off and eat some really delicious, soul satisfying Italian food.  Incidentally, to visit their website click here.

No blog, travel book or one person can ever hope to hit even a fraction of all the lovely places and things to love about San Francisco, but I hope you’ll check out some of my recommendations.  Also, I would love to hear about yours.  It’s one of those cities that you can never tire of, never see it all.  No wonder Journey missed it so much when they were on the road.

Here are the lyrics to Lights, in case you would like to sing along:

When the lights go down in the city
And the sun shines on the bay
Do I wanna be there in my city?

Oh, oo, oh
Ohh, oo, ohh
Oh, oo, oh

So you think you’re lonely
Well my friend I’m lonely too
I wanna get back to my city by the bay

Ohh, ohh
Oh, oo, oh

It’s sad, oh there’s been mornings
Out on the road without you
Without your charms

Oh, oo, oh
My, my, my
My, my, my
Ohh, ohh
Oh, oo, oh

When the lights go down in the city
And the sun shines on the bay
Do I wanna be there in my city?

(Oh, oo, oh)
Ohh, oo, oh
Oh, oh, oh

When the lights go down in the city
And the sun shines on the bay
Do I wanna be there in my city?

Oh, oo, oh
Ohh, oo, oh
Oh, oh, oh
(Hmm)
Ohh, oo, oh
Oh, oh, oh

Lights by Journey from the album Infinity, released January 20th, 1978

Filed under: Music Tagged: American Idol, City Lights Books, Fort Mason Community Garden, Gregg Rolie, Jonathain Cain, Journey, Land's End, Le Colonial, Lights, music, San Francisco, Steve Perry, The Babys, The Voice, Wedemeyer Bakery ]]> http://erikagardner.com/2012/04/02/musical-mondays-journey-lights-up-sf/feed/ 4 erika6390 Land's End Maze Fort Mason Community Garden Journey_Infinity http://erikagardner.com/2012/03/28/the-legion-of-doom-building-a-better-bacteria/ http://erikagardner.com/2012/03/28/the-legion-of-doom-building-a-better-bacteria/#comments Wed, 28 Mar 2012 15:00:15 +0000 erika6390 http://erikagardner.com/?p=714 ]]> Let me preface here, while this blog post is clearly going to be a complaint, I do not want to come across as the old lady saying, “In my day we walked barefoot in the snow twenty miles to school, uphill, both ways!”  Because, that’s not how I roll.  I do not necessarily believe that things were better in yesteryear.  In fact, most things clearly were NOT.  I’m a progress kind of girl.  That being said, really? So much plastic, and what’s with the desire to create a super bug bacteria?  I mean, honestly.

There are many things about life today that I find decidedly odd.  For instance, when I was a kid and I wanted a drink of water, I went to the cupboard, got a glass and filled it with water from the faucet.  Now people are addicted to those stupid plastic bottles and it’s become an environmental nightmare on several different fronts.  The plastic bottle and the huge amount of plastic bags and other petroleum-based items increasing our dependence on foreign oil combined with a staggering waste disposal problem make me crazy, but that’s not my gripe du jour.

No, I want to talk bacteria.  Sexy, right?

I scratch my head when well-meaning adults offer me and my children hand sanitizer when there is a perfectly functioning sink with soap just yards away.  Are you kidding me?  Why?  The soap and water are being offered to you free of charge.  The hand sanitizer you had to buy.  On top of that, it’s another one of those blasted plastic bottles.  (Even those of you who think you are recycling your water bottles, they’re actually being loaded on barges and shipped to a landfill in China, by the way.) The salient point here is, we’re sanitizing our way back to pre-antibiotic days, folks.

People look at me like I’m a teensy, weensy bit nutty when I bring this up, but it’s simple math.  Hand sanitizers, disinfecting wipes and sprays all claim to kill 99% of bacteria.  Some even go so far as to make the claim of 99.9%… well, color me impressed.  There’s just one problem, the 1% or the .1% left behind.  (That’s if the product actually works as it says it does, most of them do not.)  Let’s take the rosier, cherubs and rainbow-farting-unicorns scenario, shall we, and say the disinfectant knocks out 99.9% of the bacteria.  So, of one thousand organisms, one will survive your cleansing efforts.  The one that’s survived has some sort of a genetic difference to it which makes it resistant to our arsenal of hand sanitizers.  It’s going to reproduce, because that is simply what bacteria do, and all of its progeny will be likewise tougher to kill.  Remember, bacteria reproduce exponentially, so it goes pretty quickly.  Our cleaning efforts simply build a better bacteria.

For years a few voices of reason have been trying rein in this behavior, thus far, to no avail, I might add.  In 2007 Tufts University, in conjunction with several other well-respected establishments, expounded upon previous studies, some dating back as far as 1980, supporting the use of soap and water over antibacterial products.  (To view this paper, click here.)  Antibacterial products do not work as well as advertised and even if they did the bacteria they leave behind is that which is good at surviving- think of it as the cockroach of the bacterial world.  Soap and warm water works better, guys, I promise, and it doesn’t breed a more resistant bug.

Sadly, hand sanitizer is the least of our problems.  The biggest culprits of spreading antibiotic resistance are misuse and overuse of antibiotics, both in and out of the field of medicine.  For instance, we all know the patient or often, the parent of the patient, who simply insists on a prescription for antibiotics, “just to be on the safe side”. Or you’ll hear someone say they’re going to the doctor, “to get some antibiotics” as though if they don’t get the prescription the physician hasn’t done his or her job.  Part of a doctor’s job isn’t just this illness; it’s your overall health and well-being.  Antibiotics you don’t need do not contribute to your long-term health or, as we’re seeing with the super bugs, society’s health as a whole.  For a great, plain terms explanation read this quick article from the Mayo Clinic.   Don’t try to insist or bully your doctor into a prescription if they think there’s another way to deal with your condition.  American doctors are finally starting to adopt the Europeans’ “wait and see” approach.  It’s worked in other countries for years.  Basically, if it is a virus your body will usually begin to get better on its own as your immune system revs into action.  If you don’t get better, your doctor can call in the prescription at that point.

One third of antibiotic prescriptions in the United States are for the common cold.  The common cold is caused by one of over two hundred viruses, usually a variant of the Rhino virus.  Antibiotics work against bacteria, hence the name, and are useless against viruses.  Actually, they can be worse than useless, as they’ll wipe out all the local flora and fauna a person needs in their body.  By this I mean that in all of us are lots of good strains of bacteria that significantly contribute to our daily well-being.  Send an unnecessary antibiotic through your system and you are actually more vulnerable to a harmful bacterial intrusion.  (Side bar, this is why after a course of antibiotics some doctors recommend eating foods like yogurt, to help bulk up the “good” bacteria again.)

Another abuse of antibiotics is not finishing your prescribed dose.  You’ve got a Strep infection, you start your meds, you start to feel better so you stop taking the drugs.  Bad idea.  You stand a very good chance that by not finishing the treatment you’ve killed off the more vulnerable organisms, but you’ve left the more resistant ones to repopulate once more.  Ever have an infection that kept coming back?  Finish the medicine the first time, that’s all I’m saying.

It’s not just human abuses that are contributing to the new Legion of Doom-esque bacteria.  (Does anyone else suddenly really miss Saturday mornings with the Super Friends versus the nefarious Legion of Doom?)  In the United States the beef, poultry and pork industries routinely use copious amounts of antibiotics for non-medical situations.  Antibiotics are used in the healthy animals’ feed to promote growth and as a “just in case” to ward off disease.  Due to the large doses these antibiotics are excreted in the animals’ waste.  From there the drugs make their way into the soil,  the local water systems and, of course, their presence in the animals’ flesh means they are worked into our food chain as well. (Another great argument for organic and small farm options.)   The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that at this time 70% of our current selection of antibiotic drugs is employed in the meat industry on healthy animals.  That’s 70% of our treatment options in this field being rendered less and less effective for actual sick animals and humans.  More illuminating (read frightening) is that in January of 2011 the Food & Drug Administration found that 80% of the total antibiotics produced in the US went to the farm industry.  That, my friends, is a whole lotta’ drugs.

I think “drugs” is the operative word here.  Antibiotics tend to be thought of as such a good and miraculous thing, and they are, don’t get me wrong, that there is a tendency to forget what they actually are.  They are medicine, not Jelly Bellies.  Like any medicine they should be treated with respect.  They should not be overused, nor should we think we know better than our physicians.  These drugs certainly have an important place in our health care, but, as with all things, moderation is the key here.

Lecture over, gripe done, putting away my soap box now.

Hmmm, of course, we still have all this plastic to deal with.

A nightmare of our own creation, big, bad bacteria- a modern day Legion of Doom.

“Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run.” – Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens)