Tag: san francisco

  • Full Queer Wrestling at Folsom Street Fair

    Aye lads and lassies, let me tell ye a tale o’ the wild land of leather, rope, and displays of depravity I encountered while sailing… oh, sorry. I went to the 2026 Folsom Street Fair dressed as a pirate this year. As one does. It’s been years since I’d been to Folsom, and the tone…

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  • Immersive art…?

    Why or why not? I know I sound like a broken record on immersive art sometimes, questioning what the term means when it’s been stretched so thin as to become meaningless. So imagine my surprise when I came across the above. What started as a Mission Street ad has succumbed to a type of (accidental?)…

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  • Castro Trinket Trade

    On a quiet residential street not far from the center of the historic Castro District is a decorated box attached to a post. At first glance it appears to be one of those familiar Little Free Library boxes or the similar Little Free Pantry boxes — but this is something different. This is a trinket…

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  • Flower Bathroom

    For all the uniquely decorated bathrooms in San Francisco, this mural of oversized flowers is in an unexpected place: Roxie Theater’s small-screen “Little Roxie” theater. This mural has a way of jumping out at you as you use the restroom on your way out of the theater; not only have you gone from a dark…

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  • Carnaval San Francisco 2026 parade

      This year’s theme for San Francisco Carnaval was “La Copa del Pueblo,” celebrating soccer, as a sort of prelude to the upcoming World Cup. Needless to say, soccer is a big deal in the Latin American communities that throw the annual Carnaval events and grand parade. After a week of chilly temperatures it was…

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  • Empire Park

    Just off to the side of the 600 block of Commercial Street, a small alley in the Financial District near Jackson Square, is a plaza with seating, gardens, and a water feature. This privately-owned, public open space (or POPOS) is named Empire Park and features a stone plaque dedicated to Emperor Norton. Muddying the waters…

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  • Chiharu Shiota: Two Home Countries at the Asian Art Museum

    My most recent museum visit was to see “Two Home Countries” from Japanese/German artist Chiharu Shiota at the Asian Art Museum. This large scale multimedia installation takes up the back half of the museum’s lower floor. The first piece in her exhibit, Diary, is a passageway through a hall of an intricate mesh of red…

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  • Exploratorium After Dark, 2026 edition

    Returning to the Exploratorium for the first time in several years (before the pandemic!) was like coming home to a familiar place. It was long overdue. One of my favorite aspects of the Exploratorium is the series of exhibits on perception: persistence of vision, optical illusions, differences between sight and motion, etc. To that end,…

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  • The Bay Lights, version 3

    It seems like just yesterday that The Bay Lights first illuminated San Francisco’s Bay Bridge. But it wasn’t yesterday; it was thirteen years ago. Crazy, right? Since the original temporary installation was first switched on, it was removed and replaced with a more permanent version that lasted about a decade. As of Friday evening the…

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  • The Nintendo Store in San Francisco

      Until recently Nintendo didn’t operate their own stores — at least, not in the US — but now they have two: one in New York City and one in San Francisco. After the initial opening crowds died down a little, I went to check out the SF store on a weekday afternoon. Directly across…

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