Today is a bit of a sad day for San Franciscans. Morrow’s Nut House and it’s crazy owner Jackie Helbert have announced that they will close their doors for good on January 1st.
For those of you who haven’t visited I would suggest you do before the end of the year. Jackie was the loud & crazy woman who ran the place for the past 37 and had taken over from her mother. This is one of those family owned businesses that had just enough odd about it to make it truely a piece of SF history. While our local government is trying to keep all the Wal-marts and large corporate chains out of San Francisco to keep us special we still have those special odd little places like Morrow’s to keep us on our toes. Unfortunately we now only have a few more days to enjoy this little place where they roast their nuts daily. I think I’m going to take a little break from work here and walk over there just to remember the smell and to get some nuts.
As you’ve probably figured out, I love San Francisco a lot. Even though this is one of the top 5 most expensive cities to live in in the world. Becoming a parent wasn’t something I had planned on, but I’m glad I did it. I would assume most people don’t plan on becoming parents especially in this economy, but they do.
There are a lot of things they tell you about when you’re going to become a parent, but unfortunately, there’s a lot more that they don’t. For instance. Wife has the baby takes care of baby until maternity leave is up then goes back to work right? Not exactly. When your wife goes back to work that means that you have to pay someone to take care of the baby unless you have family members to do it for you [we don’t]. So now unless your wife is making more than $20/hour her after taxes paycheck is just handed over to the day care group. Does this sound right?
You can also add to the fact that San Francisco which I’m sure other cities share this has a large number of employers who don’t offer health insurance. I’m lucky in that my employer does offer it, but won’t pay anything into it. I don’t think this is legal, but hell, I’m getting health insurance for us at a less than what it would cost us on our own to get. Unfortunately, at the end of the month my take home pay to keep the three of us fed and healthy is equal to less than my mother’s monthly social security check. Something is not right here. In a city as great as San Francisco the middle class shouldn’t be forced into poverty just because they had a child. The only thing going for us is that we own our house. If we didn’t we’d be on the streets.
Mayor Newsom is helping out by providing health care services which we would qualify for, but the services offered are a bit questionable as they’re clinics not true health care facilities. Something needs to be done, but at this point I’m not sure what. Richard Branson just started following me on Twitter so maybe he’ll make me his new charity. 🙂
OK, this doesn’t really have anything to do with San Francisco other than the fact that I’m a computer geek and there’s lots of us in SF, but I have to share this because it had a pretty big wow factor for me. It’s a program called Boxee. This is a little hack that you load onto your apple TV with a thumb drive and it adds a boxee category to your apple tv that lets you watch streaming video from the internet. Why is this cool? Because now I can watch TV shows and movies for free on demand from hulu.com. I can also view on demand shows from Comedy Central, CNN, CBS, plus Netflix the list goes on and on.
The authors of Boxee also stay on top of things and offer regular updates which you can update from your apple TV. The hitch? It’s in alpha stages right now and you can only get the software by getting an invite from the boxee crew. I found the quickest way was to follow them on Twitter then just send them a direct tweet asking for an invite. It also has companion software for your computer, but currently only works on intel macs and linux machines. Windows is in the works.
The installation now is much easier and doesn’t involve using the terminal interface. There is a third party that wrote a program called the ATV USB Creator. This program downloads and installs on a thumb drive all the software needed to install boxee on your Apple TV. Just run the program then take out your newly created patchstick and plug it into the back of your Apple TV and unplug it then plug it back in. You Apple TV will boot from the stick and load the software at which point you unplug your apple TV again, remove the stick and plug it back in and follow the process of logging into your boxee account. Apparently you can download the software to the patchstick even if you haven’t received an invite, but once you have it loaded you’ll need to log into your account to use boxee so I wouldn’t bother doing this until you have the account.
I just checked in at iTunes today and noticed that my new album has finally made it’s way to iTunes! You can check it out by clicking on the iTunes button.
I’d really appreciate it if you give a 5 star rating just to jump me up a bit in with the big leagues. Besides, at $8.91. It’s a steal!
If you’re not an iTunes type of person you can also get it from Amazon.com for the same price or listen online at emusic! [PS if you go the emusic route click on the link here to get 35 downloads for free! It helps my friends out.]
I have a love of Mexican food. I eat it at least a couple of times a week and I’m lucky enough to have the two best taquerias in San Francisco and they’re both in the Sunset District.
WHAT?!?!?
For Mexican food you have to go to the Mission District right? Wrong. The food out there isn’t up to par with two places in the Sunset District. I used to think you would go to Mission for Mexican, but after I got a burrito with peas and carrots in it or a quesadilla that was so greasy on the inside AND outside I have to give props to El Burrito Express and Beach Burrito. Now for burritos you definitely go to El Burrito Express. They are hands down the best. For tacos and tostadas and all the other stuff, head over to Beach Burrito. We just came back from there and we each got a chili verde chicken super taco. For those of you unfamiliar with it, chili verde is “green chicken” that means it’s been marinated in a green tomatillo salsa. We each got one with chips and a coke and my wife and I got lunch for under $9. The best part is that these are like the “street tacos” you would get in Mexico [and yes I’ve been there and had them]. You get the standard meat and cheese plus salsa, beans [black is my choice] lettuce, guacamole & sour cream. One is enough for me, but my appetite is starting to grow a bit so I might have to start getting two.
Those chilis look like they have weiners.
It’s ironic that the best Mexican food is found in a place with very few hispanics living, but it wasn’t me that gave them the title it was the SF Weekly and Bay Guardian. Two of our local papers that are the alternative publications for the City.
Now I do have to add that Beach Burrito, while it’s good could be better, but it does have something else going for it. The atmosphere of the neighborhood. Beach Burrito is located in SF’s outside lands meaning it’s close to the beach. There’s a little strip on Judah Street just as you pass Sunset Boulevard that you have these little dots of commercial property. When you get down to 44th avenue that’s where the fun starts. This whole strip down to the beach is a great place to be. I used to live just a couple of blocks from here and on the weekends when it’s sunny [and yes, the Sunset does get sun now] it’s a great place to spend a lazy afternoon. Just next door is the Javaholics coffee, smoothie & ice cream shop and on the other side is the Other Avenues health food store then you’ve got the Sea Breeze Cafe [that’s for another post]. These places are all run by locals and it’s fun to walk the streets. Down at the end of Judah is Java Beach. It started as a small coffee shop that’s upgraded to adding a beer & wine bar as well as serving food. This place is packed frequently and the Sunset locals like to come by have a coffee or beer and shoot the shit. They done such a good job that they just opened up another Java Beach out near the zoo.
So in all I’ve had a good day so far. I got me my Mexican food and it was good.
