A very warm day in the middle of a heat wave. I spend much of the day working on my book in a borrowed room, and at the end of the afternoon I go to the Atlas Cafe in the Mission District to have a cappucino and make a few notes.

As I circle to find a parking place, which is difficult in the Mission even on a Saturday afternoon, I notice an unmarked police car with a plainclothes driver keeping an eagle eye out for something. And a couple minutes later I see three cop cars come roaring up the street. They turn the corner by the cafe.

When I reach its front door I see the cops have detained two Latino teenagers dressed in the baggy, neutral uniform of the neighborhood: white t-shirts and black shorts. There are now five cop cars for these two kids, whom I had idly noticed walking quietly along a block away when I was looking for parking.

Inside the cafe, most of the tables are occupied with people studying or working on laptops. A young woman and young man are playing guitars — mostly ragtime and songs from the 1920s. They play a few choruses and then the woman sings one of those old songs in a clear tenor voice. (Their names, I found out when I looked at the CD they had for sale, are Craig Ventresco and Meredith Axelrod, and here’s a YoutTube video of them performing at the Atlas earlier this year.)

The cops let the two kids go and the police cars drive away. Almost no one in the cafe noticed the roust taking place across the street.

After several songs, the woman’s place is taken by a young man, who plays instrumentals while the woman passes a hat. Then a couple in their thirties — the man in a straw fedora, a woman in a sundress — stand up and begin to dance the tango. The guitarists are still playing ragtime but the dancers are good enough to do the tango to ragtime anyway.

No Regret, promotional still

This morning, an interesting-looking film came to my attention: No Regret, by director Leesong Hee-il. The trailer can be viewed here. It first screened at the Frameline Festival earlier this year, and it’s being billed as “the first breakout gay film from Korea.” In addition, it is the director’s first full-length feature film. A whole lotta firsts going on with this one. Here’s the synopsis:

Set in Seoul, South Korea, “No Regret” centers on Sumin (Lee Young-Hoon), who leaves the orphanage where he grew up and heads to the city to study art design. After losing his job at a factory due to layoffs, he finds himself working as a prostitute in a gay bar. Initially Sumin resists the advances of Jaemin (Lee Han), who comes from a rich and conservative family that doesn’t accept his sexual identity. Eventually Sumin succumbs to Jaemin’s advances, after they briefly experience happiness as passionate lovers, Sumin and Jaemin’s relationship falls into heartache and tragedy.

Jaemin’s parents go on to arrange a marriage for him; sounds like a real tear-jerker. However, in a review on SF Gate today, David Wiegand says: “Despite the surface hokum of the plot, there are only a couple of moments when you just don’t believe that Su-Min would do what he’s doing or that Jae-Min would say what he is saying.”

Shows tonight at 7:15 and 9:30; screenings daily thereafter at 2:15, 4:45, 7:15, and 9:30. Tix are the usual $10.50 general.

NOTE: There has been some confusion over where the film is actually screening; I have verified that it will screen at the Lumiere and not the Embarcadero Center Cinema.

The San Francisco influence at the Democratic Convention is apparently everywhere but in the party platform. While National mainstream strategists are at pains to distance themselves from left coast issues like gay marriage and Amnesty for immigrants, S.F’s silver spoon Democratic crowd is of course still making the rounds in Denver. Society Columnist Roger Friedman wrote “the 2008 DNC is like a party given for and by Nancy Pelosi”. Nancy’s super delegate daughter Alexandra is there and apparently telling people about her campaign documentary on, uh, John McCain.

Kamala Harris impressed the Washington Post with her tough talk about public safety over criminal rehabilitation. “What Democrats have to do is understand that Republicans have it right” on crime issues.

Maybe she’s right I pondered, as I was stepping over a bloodstained sidewalk two blocks from City Hall this morning in front of Kamala’s alma matter UC Hastings. Gosh, I hardly noticed how safe we have it here in the land of plea bargain hunters. Gee, with an ongoing presence of illegal immigrant crack dealers controlling the very next corner with “Amnesty”, I guess I should thank everyone involved for keeping me safe. Maybe these thugs work for Kamala, whose apparently a “Hot Shot” according to organizers of her panel that was sponsored by Time magazine.

Mayor Gavin Newsom , another Democratic “Hot Shot” also appeared at the Denver breakfast, and is the host of a rock concert Wednesday night complete with VIP area that defines which acts one can see. While the general admission area includes bands like Silversun Pickups, DJ Z-Trip and Clap Your Hands And Say Yeah, a more exclusive intimate area features Ben Gibbard of Death Cab For Cutie, and actress Zooey Descanel of She & Him. One cannot just buy their way into the Unconventional “VIP Gallery” to catch Jenny Lewis of Rilo Kiley, you have to be “invited”. Sponsors of the Gavster’s Denver shindig saluting “Young Democrats” include Pacific Gas and Electric, so you’d probably have to be up to date on your electric bill before you can expect to be invited.

Either the bandits who are terrorizing East Bay restaurants finally scraped together bridge fare, or the fad has spread to the West Bay: This morning three men in hoodies robbed a Denny’s in Daly City, taking the contents of the cash register while making everybody lie on the floor.

Being robbed at gunpoint — that’s a good story to tell around the water cooler. But being made to lie on the floor at a Denny’s: yuck.

They got “a very small amount of money,” say the cops, but I have the feeling they just don’t want to encourage them. If they said they got $3000* then you’d have even more robberies. View a Google map of all the restaurant takeover-style holdups this summer.

* A figure I just made up, and not intended to be taken as the actual amount of money stolen.

Chatting with XOX owner Jean-Marc Gorce about how all of the local shops are either closing up or feeling a serious pinch - he laid off 3 workers- because of a rash of ADA suits against them for non-compliance. Written up in June in the Chron, and covered on CBS (though not aired yet), it seems very sad. There’s a slanted step near his doorway that is in question, and he can’t provide a ramp as he can’t touch the sidewalk. North Beach Sushi across the street has the same issue. Their ramp is deemed too steep. I’ve seen the ADA racket threaten businesses in other towns, and they ended up closing. The owner has never gotten a formal complain from a wheelchair-bound person, except for this suit. Every business on the block has issues. It’s sad that we can’t get the city to help mom & pops get in compliance. Anyone from the handicapped community want to chime in on what’s going on? I welcome the viewpoint.

Interesting follow-up articles:
The Price of Access: Part 1: Visionary law’s litigious legacy in the Sacramento Bee
PBS: A Decade With the ADA
ADA Filing Mills: Drive By Lawsuits in the blog OverLawyered

Who’s in town? Former Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis, whose daughter Kara lives in San Francisco. Buried in this pre-convention interview with the 1988 loser is the news that “Dukakis, a railroad buff and former Amtrak board member, and his wife are joining two of their grandkids in San Francisco and riding the California Zephyr train back over the Rockies to the convention city” of Denver.

Anybody see Dukakis around town?

That decaying building on the corner — haven’t you wanted to report it to someone? Those idiots speeding down your block — can you get the city to install a speed bump? How about that gaping hole in the sidewalk outside your neighbor’s house — somebody could get hurt. Why doesn’t someone do something?

If you’ve ever wanted City Hall to work like tech support, your dream has sort of come true. A new website, SeeClickFix, will take your complaint and create a trouble ticket. More than that, in San Francisco they’ll automatically forward the problem to the appropriate SF Supervisor’s office.

more after the jump

Progressive Reading Series organizer and well-known local author Stephen Elliot writes in the Huffington Post of last night’s successful event to raise money for recycling bins for Houston. They raised enough for 276  18-gallon bins, and more importantly raised the profile of the recycling program of the Texas city.

Previously:
Houston to accept donation

Following up on Monday’s post about the folks at SF’s Progressive Reading Series having trouble getting Houston to accept a donation to help the Texas city purchase more recycling bins: the Hairballs blog of the alt-weekly Houston Press reports the Houston mayor’s office will accept the donation, as long as the requisite paperwork is filled out. Whew, glad that’s settled.

The Bay Area is full of tech innovators, and seldom are the achievements of the entrepreneur who operates outside of Software, Internet or Biotech recognized. Ellen Raynor the owner/operator of SF Carpet Recycling is the kind of person I’m talking about. Full disclosure, Ellen is a close family friend, but I think you will agree her efforts are commendable in taking recycling to the next level.

SF Carpet Recycling is a collection site for post consumer carpet and carpet pad for the San Francisco Bay Area. Conveniently located in the 3rd Street corridor in the southeast part of San Francisco, we accept used carpet for the purpose of recycling.

For every 10 million pounds of post-consumer carpet recycled:

• 50,000 cubic yards of landfill space is saved

• 70 million pounds of GHG emissions are avoided (CO2 equivalents)

According to the 2006 CARE Annual Report

Planet Green video and more info