Author: Eric Kauschen

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Task Rabbit: Git ‘er done!

There’s a new company in town that I’m experimenting with called Task Rabbit that is a new form of employment that’s not exactly employment. At their website you can signup and go through a screening process that included a canned video interview and background check that once you pass gives you the chance to bid on tasks to do and if you’re chosen you get paid to do them.

Many of the tasks are pretty common, someone needs a ride to the airport, pick up and assemble some IKEA furniture [one of the more common tasks] or doing someone’s laundry and cleaning their house on a regular basis. Then you get some weird ones. Yesterday someone needed a person to wear a bear costume at a party and hand out scavenger hunt tasks to party members. The weirdest one yesterday was someone was needed to pick up carrots, wash and peel them, then decorate them with a sharpie marker and bury them near the tennis courts around the east end of Golden Gate Park and you had to provide photographs to prove you did that.

In addition to getting paid by the person who posts the task you earn points and can go up in levels. At various levels you get extra payouts. At level five you get a free Task Rabbit t-shirt, at level 10 you get personalized Task Rabbit business cards. I’m not sure what you get at other levels since I’m still at level 1 and have had all my bids rejected so far.

The trick in all of this is that the person who needs a task done posts the task and lets the bids pour in. You don’t get to see how much the person is willing to pay and you don’t get to see what other people are bidding so it’s kind of a double blind situation. Task Rabbit doesn’t offer any advice on how much to bid either so you really don’t have a clue. There was one guy who needed his car registration renewed so you’d have to meet up with him, get his paper work, go to DMV and get it renewed then return back to him with the finished forms and sticker. He estimated it would take 2-4 hours. I decided to bid $20 figuring that I might be able to sneak it through AAA’s registration service., but if that didn’t work I could probably get it done in two hours at DMV which would put my earning at about minimum wage. If it took longer I would technically be underpaid. My bid was declined. Someone else needed a ride to the airport at a specific time. I bid $20…declined. While SuperShuttle is less you’re at their mercy and cab fare would be even more. I once gave a friend a ride to the airport and she filled up my gas tank which cost WAY more than $20.

This started me thinking that since Task Rabbit in their terms of service agreement says that you will not call them an employer that they aren’t held to standard work laws like, you know minimum wage, so they can do whatever they want. Some people are very successful and there is a 58 year old retired guy in the Sunset who is at level 25 and supposedly earns $5000/month. Not bad if it’s true, but I don’t have any proof of that.

They have a mobile app in the Apple store that was just released yesterday that shows you all the tasks around San Francisco and I can say if you live near the Castro, Mission, SOMA or Financial District you could easily run most of the errands on your feet. The West side of town is a little dry on Task Masters. I did see a few in the haight. I even offered to pick up eight bags of stuff to drop off at the GoodWill for $10…denied.

While it’s a good idea, so far my denials for doing work that would cost them more through other routes makes me wonder if there’s a bit of  slave labor involved here.

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Throw Down with the Food Network!

I read an article today that has been on my mind for a long time. Every since the Food Network came to the Bay Area we have yet to see one of the star chef’s open up a restaurant here. Emeril Lagasse, Bobby Flay, Anthony Bourdain [who dislikes San Francisco because of Alice Waters in Berkeley] Mario Batali and the several others don’t want to even bother opening a restaurant here because the competition is too stiff.

Now we do have Wolfgang Puck who opened up Postrio and Roy’s Hawaii Cuisine, but not a single Food Network star has bother with San Francisco. Well I suppose I could include Martin Yan, but he’s no longer a part of the network. I haven’t seen Tyler Florence much lately, but he’s busy with his restaurant here at the moment. Now to me, if you’re going to talk like you’re a world renowned chef you should at least be able to thrown down in Baghdad by the Bay and pull it off. We’ve got some really hefty chefs here already like Michael Mina and Jeremiah Tower who have changed the restaurant industry, but for some reason we scare off the big guns of the media. Had I the money I would travel to one of Bobby Flay’s restaurants with a small camera crew and pull his throw down move with him to get him to come to SF and try his hand in the restaurant business here.

San Francisco, while being seven by seven miles has the largest number of restaurants than any other city in the United States. I was walking around the Embarcadero yesterday and found that there were more places to eat than I remembered. One block alone had six restaurants on one side of the street and these were Subways or McDonalds, but real white linen, sit down restaurants [I’ll still count the Tadich Grill since it’s so good, but no white linen table clothes.]

I like the Food Network and consider myself a bit of a foodie, but not a food blogger. I’ve got more to write about than Mom’s great recipes or the great dishes you can get around town. I watch it at least a couple of nights a week and do have a fondness for Guy Fieri’s Diner’s Drive-in’s and Dives, probably because he’s not afraid of San Francisco. I would love to see some of those Iron Chefs give it a shot in San Francisco, but apparently we scare them off. Could they even handle going up against one of our great food trucks at Off the Grid on a Friday night at Fort Mason? I don’t think so. Could they stand up against the falafel at Sunrise Deli or a shawarma at Yumma’s? I don’t think so.

Bobby Flay, I challenge you and your East Coast Food Network crew to a throw down to open restaurants in San Francisco and see how you fare in our Kitchen Stadium.

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Run Ed Run!

Well today I read that something everyone has been talking about finally pushed itself closer to a possibility. Interim Mayor Ed Lee is now considering running for Mayor of San Francisco after repeatedly denying that he wouldn’t run.

I’m not sure if when he said this that the Iron Queen, Rose Pak was behind him and had him in a half nelson or not, but it does change things a bit for the Mayoral race. First off, it makes all the current candidates make a Scooby-Doo face of shock followed by a rut da fuk? Then it makes them think about how they’re going to deal with this.

Jim Stearns of Stearns Consulting was the first out the gate to put together a video showing how many times Mayor Lee mentioned that he had no intentions what so ever to run for Mayor and that he was only going to be the interim Mayor. As some of you may know, Stearns Consulting is the group that is marketing Senator Leland Yee for Mayor and helped President of the Board of Supervisors David O’Chiu [see my piece on the Mayoral Debate for why he’s Irish.] to get where he is.

I haven’t heard of any of the other candidates response to this yet, but the Leland Yee camp was first out of the gate. Now I’ve taken a bit of flack for talking about Chinese politicians as being for the Chinese first and the rest of the people second. I have to say in Mayor Lee case, he is the opposite. Ed Lee is for the people, not just a growing majority of the people, or a growing majority of the people first, but he is for all the people. Besides, he’s one of the few Asians that can grow a full mustache. Maybe that’s why he’s for all of us. He’s been doing a great job and I hope he continues to do so until his term ends.

That being said, would he be a good choice? I’m not so sure. Being an interim Mayor, he doesn’t have to be a politician, he just needs to get the job done without any further agenda to fuel his career. If Mayor Lee runs for the position he already holds he will have to become a politician and I’m not sure  he’s ready to swim in those shark infested waters. Politicians are like diplomats, they can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you look forward to the trip. I don’t think Lee has that at the moment. When asked about shark fin soup, he’s said that he’s had it but never orders it because it’s too expensive. If it’s too expensive for someone on a government salary who is currently earning a Mayor of San Francisco’s salary then practically no one can afford it. We know the opposite to be true, contrary to what Senator Yee and Assemblywoman Ma would tell you.

Overall, I think Ed Lee is a great Mayor and that he was a the perfect choice to serve as an interim Mayor after Gavin Newsom left for Sacramento, but I also feel that his image will start to deteriorate if he runs for Mayor as a politician and wins. It will tarnish his image and probably cause him to go down in history with a less than favorable image. If he runs, Rose Pak will steal all the glory and be seen as a puppet master pulling the strings of politics in San Francisco which she is already seen as doing, but this would just make it worse.

Ed, seriously, you’re doing a great job. Please don’t screw it up by listening to Rose Pak.

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Rose Pak: If it’s not Chinese it’s crap! Unless you’re talking about Leland Yee

Rose Pak, the power house iron Queen of Chinese politics in San Francisco has had a few things to say about our State Senator and Mayoral candidate Leland Yee today.

Ms. Pak being the head of the Chinese Chamber of Congress has never held a political office, but her voice carries weight even though she herself has a bit of a colorful past. If you are Chinese, she is THE force to be reckoned  with. I mention Chinese because she doesn’t really focus on much else.  She has stated that her goal is to put more Chinese into political power and works on bringing more Chinese to the San Francisco Bay Area. She is the voice of the Chinese, but unfortunately, being a political power she is not the voice of the people. As you well know, I want our next mayor to ignore color and race and speak for all the people of San Francisco, not one group that is fastly  growing to be the largest majority in the San Francisco Bay Area.

That being said…

She voices concerns over Senator Leland Yee who also speaks for the Chinese people of the San Francisco Bay Area as well as the state. This is kind of a who do you cheer for fight in my book. Ms. Pak is behind the Run Ed Run campaign to get Mayor Ed Lee to join in the campaign [I like Mayor Lee by the way and think he’s been doing a pretty good job] and she isn’t a politician so I’m going to have to give a nod to her.

I have spent a lot of time in Chinatown and it does indeed need help. Someone like Rose Pak has done a huge amount to help out the Chinese who live there. Rose, hats off to you. Now what exactly is her problem with Senator Yee?…and I quote:

Leland Yee is one of the most morally corrupt politicians I’ve ever encountered in 40 years. From the first day he stepped in as the school board member, lying to get his children to the preferred assigned school using a phony address, selling his services to Chinese-American parents who would cut an arm or leg to get their kid to the right schools … he did all of that.

So I don’t think he stood for anything decent in our community except to come and take money and then claiming to be the first Asian this and Asian that, but he doesn’t impress me. He doesn’t stand for anything except corruption and bribery.

OUCH! She has been quoted that if politics are a blood sport then she is going to play them as a blood sport. That sounds more like a decapitation than a first blood blow. I do have to agree with her. If I remember correctly a long, long time ago a man named Gordon Lau came and talked to my High School class. He was the first Chinese politician in San Francisco and he got some serious heat.

I have never paid much attention to what Ms. Pak has had to say, but now I think I will turn an ear towards her. I might get my face slapped for what I just wrote, but if it comes from Rose Pak I think it will be an honor. Just as long as any swearing is in Cantonese since I don’t understand swearing in Mandarin.

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I Have No Need For Glow In The Dark Pee Or Poop!

As many of you are aware, we have a daughter who is autistic so things move a bit slower. She’s coming along quite well with many things, but potty training is the last step. We’ve gotten into serious mode with potty training. There are lots of schools of thought with this from the free elimination parents who watch and then notice what’s going on and hold their kids over a bucket to eliminate and never allow diapers. That’s a bit extreme for us, so we’re taking a bit safer, albeit more expensive route.

With our therapists we have gotten her to learn to sit on the toilet for five minutes straight and moved onto five minutes straight with her pants pulled down. Now we’ve switched over to panties instead of diapers for most of the day and every 30 minutes go through the potty training routine. We’ve had only a few accidents and have managed to only get one stained chair out of it, but I think I can handle that.

A friend of ours suggested that perhaps she would get the idea more if we had a Betsey Wetsey type doll. My wife and has been looking left and right for one and they’re in the $25-$30 range. This seems a bit much for something we don’t even know if it will work. None of these dolls by the way come with a toilet to sit on. That of course, costs extra.

So wife, daughter and I are at target today and we discover a doll that even when you’re potty training a kid and are used to getting vile human produced substances all over your body this was a bit too much for either of us. It’s not really a potty training doll, but it’s a doll to teach your little girl how to change diapers because of course, it’s their job to do it right? [ducks quickly, I’M NOT SELLING IT!] This is a doll that comes with a little somewhat hard plastic diaper that is somehow control by artificial intelligence by the doll to tell the diaper to show that it has peed, pooped, or both. How does this happen? Well, I don’t know the code someone had to write to make this happen, but the end result is that the diaper has a yellow and a brown led in it that glows to indicate whether you have a number one or number two.

Yes, you ready that write. This is a doll who’s poop and pee are so nuclear that it makes the diaper glow with light. Luckily the lights will go off after a certain time and you can put the diaper back on your atomic baby doll which would add to the mix of having to explain to your daughter why the poop and pee just disappeared and why that doesn’t happen with normal babies. My comment which wouldn’t go over very well would be, because Mommy and Daddy bought you a radioactive doll who’s poop and pee glows to wake you up in the middle of the night from it’s flashing diaper so that you know to change the diaper that the poop and pee actually just disappear from which means you can ignore it because it will go away all by itself. Wow, that was a bit of a mouthful.

Apparently I just read that you actually have to wipe a hard plastic wipe across the diaper and not the baby to make the lights go off which isn’t exactly the right way to change a diaper either, but I guess they really don’t want to teach anyone something they could use later in life. I can tell you from the number of diapers I’ve change that while less than my wonderful and lovely wife, this ain’t how you change a baby.

Hopefully we will find one of these little peeing dolls to show our daughter how the process works because I don’t want her to one day ask me why her poop and pee doesn’t glow like her dolly’s

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Stonestown

It may not be the biggest or the best, but it is the oldest shopping mall in San Francisco. People in the Sunset, Ingelside & Oceanview areas very rarely go downtown to shop, they go to Stonestown which opened up in 1951 to serve the shopping needs of those living away from downtown.

Originally, it was a smaller open air mall anchored by the Emporium. Some of the biggest draws in the old days besides the Emporium were Brooks Brother’s suits, Summer and Kaufmann shoe’s and Blum’s an ice cream shop that sold chocolates and candies. Those were at least the shops my family would frequent and usually in that order. Brooks Brother’s didn’t come into play until I got my first job and then of course in those days, I needed a suit.

All of these stores are gone now, though I still have a couple of plastic sealed candy easter egg diorama’s from Blum’s. that date back to the 60’s. In the early 80’s shopping malls all became upscale by adding the word Galleria to the end and in the early 80’s it became the Stonestown Galleria. Old timers like me still refer to it as Stonestown.

What I didn’t realize was that when it was built the area known as Parkmerced was included so that there would be housing for people who would then frequent the shopping area. These started as apartments and then moved on to townhouses as Stonestown became more popular. When it moved over to the Stonestown Galleria in the 80’s it became an enclosed space with underground parking and gained a second level so that the shopping experience would become denser. The problem was that an upscale shopping district didn’t fit with the blue collar middle class that shopped there. The stores started to leave because they couldn’t afford the rents and were replaced eventually by upscale chain stores. Nordstroms moved in and Brooks Brothers went out. Godiva Chocolates moved in and Blum’s closed and Sees candy downsized [I still like Sees candy better].

You’ll find all of the same stores that you would find in any upscale mall around the country just on a smaller scale now. The Stonestown Galleria seems to still be trying to find it’s niche to fit in with the community. The Apple store is still the one store that no matter what time of day you go in it’s always busy. If someone had a coffee stand outside they would make a mint so people wouldn’t have to go upstairs to the food court to get a sampling of the typical mall food.

Stonestown Galleria is the place we all go when we need something more than what we can get closer to home. San Francisco isn’t really a mall type of city and you’ll notice that when you first drive in and see a sign that lists the Stonestown Galleria Code of Conduct. Really? They’re telling you how to behave at a mall? Apparently they are, but I haven’t seen a guard around to enforce it.

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SFGate gets Internet Radio

I caught a tweet today from Earbits that their deal with SF Gate [the Chronicle] has gone live. I was contacted a couple of weeks ago by them because I’m a San Francisco musician and asked if I’d like to have my music streamed through their website to readers of sfgate.com [hell YES!]

Well, I believe the tweet was a bit premature because if you go to sfgate.com you won’t find any mention of it, but if you go to sfgate.earbits.com you’ll get the station. I’m currently clicking through the songs in various categories and found it odd that for a station that is supposed to be based around the SF Bay Area indie bands that bands from Los Angeles, San Diego and Chicago are popping up. I did find some San Francisco bands though, but I feel there should be more. If any San Francisco bands are out there that read this contact me and I’ll hook you up with earbits so you can get your music heard.

I have my album I’ve Got a Guitar and I’m Not Afraid to Use It! on their playlist as well as my recent single Funk U, but I haven’t heard it yet on the station yet. They definitely need more local talent on there. I’m also a bit surprised at how they classify the music. I currently have the Hard Rock and Metal channel playing and there seems to be a definite lack of hard rock and metal there. I’m hearing a few ska bands and whinny emo-like bands with the occasional metal band thrown in and every other song seems to be from Santa Cruz punks called Seduce the Dead.

Earbits also includes a social networking aspect linking in with facebook and twitter so that you can share the bands you like with your friends and followers. It has potential, but needs more local bands to make it stand out as significant to the Bay Area. They also have apps available for the iPhone and Android so you can listen on the go.

 

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Devil’s Teeth Baking Company

I like the idea of a new bakery in the Sunset, but they usually have an aim at a French flair or Italian flair, or no flair whatsoever and end up closing quickly. I have to say that my trip to the Devil’s Teeth Baking Company definitely had that funky outer Sunset flair with a dash of techie added to it.

This is a relatively new place that I actually heard about at Squareup.com’s website. When you walk into the place it has a bit of that funky industrialized look that you see on the food network with everything laid out in the case with very little adornment so that you focus on the food first. My first surprise was that most bakery’s focus on just cakes and cookies, the sweet things of life. This place offered dishes of sustenance to balance out your sweet tooth such as lasagna, curried chicken, soup and quiche. My wife and I figured we would just get some cookies and cake and head home, but she chose the lasagna so we’d have lunch covered, a chocolate chip cookie for our daughter and a blondie for me.

Total cost: $10.50. Now here’s were the surprise came in. The $5 lasagna was about eight inches long and five inches high. This was a huge slab that could have fed us for two meals. It probably had about 3 days servings of vegetables in it, so we were eating pretty healthy. It was so big that we had to put the sweets aside until we had more room for them. Lasagna is one of those things that you rarely go wow over. It’s usually good. For Italian Americans it’s kind of a staple. This is was pretty good lasagna and for the price, that made it even better. Later on in the day we got to dive into the cookie and blondie. The cookie was big and my daughter only ate half of it. We ate the rest and it was soft, but not soft like the Mrs. Field’s softened by some chemical type of soft, but a buttery soft. This was one damn fine chocolate chip cookie. Biting into the blondie was a burst of butter and brown sugar topped off with white chocolate and dark chocolate chips finished off by the crunch of the nuts. I know I definitely will be returning this week.

For the techie side of things, the store’s cash register is an iPad running the square software. This is the software I’ve talked about previously that lets small businesses take credit cards without the monthly charge or transaction fee. They swiped my card and I signed on the iPad after which I received a text message that allowed me to hook up with the bakery via the square app. Now when I go in I can just pull out my iPhone or Android and open a tab that makes paying quicker. Because they are only charged a percentage  and no transaction fee you won’t see a sign that says, “Credit Card Minimum $10” or “Cash Only” like you do at other places. This is a pretty slick piece of free software.

Devil’s Teeth Baking Company also boasts Blue Bottle Coffee and Beignet Sundays. Expect to wait in line when you go, not because they are slow, but because they are busy. Check them out. NOW!

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Getting My Irish up at the Mayoral Debate

Last night was the best free entertainment I’ve had in years. After living 48 years in the Sunset District I finally had a chance to step into the United Irish Cultural Center. I have to say it was a real treat and getting to meet most of the mayoral candidates and hear them talk was just icing on the cake.

The Irish American Democratic Club hosted a political debate that was pretty much a gloss over due to the fact that there were eight candidates they only had 2 minutes to introduce themselves and one minute to answer each question. The first humorous part was when they announced the order the candidates were going to speak. Saying they would start from the extreme right drew a roar of laughter. I thought we had passed a law against the extreme right in San Francisco. The second humorous part was the signal they used to notify each speaker that their time was coming to an end — a loud boinging sound. Boing meant wrap it up Boing Boing meant you time was up and Boing, Boing, Boing meant SHUT THE HELL UP AND SIT DOWN!

I suppose now would be a good time to summarize the opening statements. I’ll have to look back to the tweets I was sending out during the debate.

  • Dennis Herrera: Fast out of the gate trying to get as much in as possible in two minutes that I didn’t really understand what he was saying other than vote for me.
  • David Chiu: Like many San Franciscans he attended private school as a Chinese kid surrounded by many Irish Catholics. I guess he forgot to mention the Roman Catholics that were there as well, but first play of the Irish race card. I guess I’m also not like many San Franciscans because I attended public school and I’m not Chinese. I have been surround by Irish Catholics a few times, but I won’t go into that here.
  • Joanna Rees: Speaks about diversity [always a word you have to use in politics] and entrepreneurial interests. She uses lots of adjectives and not many nouns, so I’m not sure what she was advocating.
  • John Avalos:  Speaks about families and how to keep them in San Francisco as well as bringing businesses to San Francisco. Safe, but smart move.
  • Tony Hall: I’m a Republican talks about corruption in politics, jobs, cutting parking fees. I didn’t get much past the I’m a Republican part. Chances are slim with an opening statement like that.
  • Leland Yee: Gives a nod to Tony Hall and how he grew up poor in a one room dwelling. Pretty good to grow up poor and have the most money invested in this election. Pretty bad that he gives a nod to the Republican in San Francisco.
  • Phil Ting: In his years as assessor, we’ve brought in more money than we’ve been spending. OK, why then is the city in the red?
  • Bevan Dufty: Tells us we have three choices, we know that. Tells us things aren’t working, we know that.
  • Michaela Alioto-Pier: Plays the Irish card heavy telling everyone that she’s fifth generation Irish and even tells us which county in Ireland her family is from.
And there you have it. Now the questions start:
  1. Ranked choice voting: Everyone pretty much glossed over it to cover points on their agenda. The people with the better chance of winning were against it, the underdogs were in favor of it.
  2. Your thoughts on reunification of Ireland: WTF?!? What could the Mayor of SF do to influence the reunification of Ireland? Everyone of course said yes, because you don’t come into the U.I.C.C. and repay their hospitality with insult. The Irish race card was played heavily here to the point that David Chiu answered, I David O’Chiu say YAY! I had to step outside the box this morning and talk with a friend of mine in Dublin, Ireland. When asked the same question he said, Probably not. I would like to think that as members of the European Union we can celebrate nationalism without borders. Besides, violence would increase 10 fold with Irish unification. Sure England are our biggest exporters, actually they are pretty much carrying Ireland lol. OK ’nuff said.
  3. Keeping our neighborhoods safe: OK, would you really expect one of the candidates to say no to this?

I realized that I had been standing for well over an hour after the introductions and three questions were asked so I got a bit distracted and noticed that the rest of the questions were like question three in that you’d be an idiot to say no to them. The Irish card was played very heavy last night forcing @BethSpotswood to tweet: I’m just waiting for one of the candidate to be like, “And another thing. I love potatoes! And U2. And nuns.”

It was fun to hang out with the local bloggers and discover as we were tweeting our impressions from the back that I was standing next to C. W. Nevius of the Chronicle. I have yet to read his take on last nights proceedings though.

Overal, I didn’t get much indication of who TO vote for than I did get more who NOT to vote for. At least that helped me narrow down the playing field.

 

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San Francisco Mayoral Forum

Tonight I’ll be heading over to the United Irish Cultural Center to listen to several of the candidates for mayor tell me why I should vote for them. This is my first time getting involved with anything close to real politics and also my first time stepping into the U.I.C.C.

Scheduled to appear tonight are:  Leland Yee [who’s staff apparently doesn’t like me very much], Phil Ting, John Avalos [a man who took several minutes out of a campaign stop to talk to me personally], David Chiu, Joanna Rees, Bevan Dufty, Michela Alioto-Pier, Dennis Herrera and Tony Hall.

Since I’ll be visiting the United Irish Cultural Center, it seems only fitting that I wear my green suit in honor of Irish heritage even if I’m not Irish myself. It also doesn’t say if there will be drinks or snacks available, but I’ve been told they have an excellent restaurant that I might stop by for some potato leek soup, cod and chips with a slice of Bailey’s cheesecake to finish it all off.

From what I’ve been reading about the political candidates running for mayor, none of them are straying too far from each other for fear of losing a place in the second or third tier of the ranked choice voting. I’m assuming then that many of the candidates tonight will probably be saying the same thing unfortunately, that is unless Rose Pak shows up with the Run Ed Run crew. The only other thing that could get interesting is if I get pulled aside by some of Leland Yee’s crew to have a word about some of my previous posts regarding him.

If I end up spending the night in the bar then at least I’ll have a few friends to sit with me. Slainté!

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