Escape your troubles next Sunday while taking in the sights, sounds, and tastes at the 11th annual “How Weird Street Faire”.

It starts at Noon on the 9th of May; which just happens to be Mother’s Day. Leave your donation* of $10, or $5 if in costume, at the main entrance ~ Howard and New Montgomery Streets. The main entrance is near MUNI lines, and only 2 blocks from the Montgomery BART station. Thanks to the SF Bicycle Coalition for providing bike parking.

The How Weird Street Faire takes place on Howard Street between 1st Street and New Montgomery, 2nd Street between Mission and Howard, and all partial blocks of Minna St. and Natoma St. off of 2nd Street. This is Ten blocks of vendors – wares, food & drink, and non-profit organizations will be there to educate.

The Ten music stages: Symbiosis, Muti Music, Rebel Bass Collective, Tantra, Groove Garden, Non Stop Bhangra, Temple Nightclub, Opel, Opulent Temple, Strategik, Space Cowboys, Brass Tax, Le Harem, Ultraviolet Carnival, Team Infinity, Red Marines Festival, Aum Festival, Style/Clash…

How Weird Street Faire ~ Bollyweird the cosmic dance
Howard and New Montgomery Streets
San Francisco, Earth
Sunday May 9th
Noon to 8 PM
All Ages Welcome
Costumes Encouraged

*Donation of $10 or $5 if in costume ~ gets a Magic Sticker
Sticker Benefits Include:
$1 off each drink at the faire bars
$2 off How Weird @ Night
Discounts and special offers from many faire vendors…

At 7:40 PM Set a World Record for the Largest Synchronized Bollywood Dance.

These figures were posted on SF Gate’s weather page this afternoon. I know it rained pretty steadily for the last 36 hours but 40 inches? I think maybe not.

Recently tweeted by @emergency_in_sf

If you have details, I’m sure some of our readers would love this location.

I was perusing the rooms & shares section of SFBay Craigslist and came across this posting. It doesn’t indicate if he is looking for a male or female roomie…but I think he might have more success posting it in “misc romance.”

With the Attorney General’s of 40 states breathing down their necks, the folks at Craigslist have succumbed to pressure and have revised their policies on sexual service adverts. Not only will the ads no longer be free (with proceeds supposedly going to charity), but the once cute and cuddly Cole Valley based website whose pages have become a haven for sex traffickers & pimps have removed much of the anonymity factor from posting. Sex ad posters must now verify a phone number and have valid ID, which has pared down the prurient listings by about 80% so far.

CEO Jim Buckmaster told the NY times some of the ads were “crossing the line,” and that “We resolved to see what we could do to get that stuff off the site.”

Craigslist’s legal travails don’t end there, as the site has lawsuits flying between itself and eBay, who were able to buy a chunk of the biz from a former partner of Craig Newmark’s and they announced plans last week to sue several companies that provide services which help users circumvent the site’s abuse protections. They’ve been involved in blocking and/or prosecuting the offenders by enlisting the aid of ISPs and police.

Brock Keeling just got his wish for a massive hog ride through SF: Papa Guardado’s funeral must be over, because at least five hundred (and up to one thousand) big guys on big bikes just rumbled down Market Street towards the Ferry Building. Wow. I was having lunch at Azteca on Church at the time and almost everybody in the place — staff and patrons alike — abandoned the place to watch the unending stream of motorcycles go by. Even most of the kitchen staff came out for a quick look before running back in. The only exception was one jaded soul, a San Francisco old-timer who has undoubtedly seen everything already, knew what it was, and probably thought “so it’s a bunch of guys on motorcycles, so what.”

It was such an impressive sight I completely forgot to take out my cell phone and shoot video; I forgot that I had a cell phone. I went back in and finished my lunch, and when I came out, the motorcycles were still going past.

I walked up to the corner of Market and Church, outside the bank there, to get a better look; the procession was followed up by a couple of awesome, low-slung 50’s convertibles, one glossy black and the other candy-apple red — don’t ask me what make or model, I’m not a car guy — and one poor soul in a red minivan who probably didn’t really mean to get ahead of the convertible and was probably just trying to get to Highway 101 before 12:30.

Once the whole procession had passed, I looked back down Church: people were standing outside of every business, still gaping. The people on my corner, mostly bank employees, looked worried; on the corner on the other side of Church stood the manager of Crepevine. In contrast to the bank people, he was smoking a cigarette and grinning the biggest grin I’ve seen on anybody’s face for quite a while.

Well, let’s hope that whatever they do downtown, it stays peaceful. I haven’t heard sirens yet.

[I’ll post video if anybody uploads something to YouTube. Wait, did I say “if?” I meant “when.”]

[Photo by Jeremy Hatch.]

I went down to the beach near Crissy Field to check out the parade of ships I blogged about yesterday; here’s my Flickr set of the event. My main thought when looking at these is: wow do I need a better camera. SFGate has a bunch of interesting stuff about the event, including more photos, at this link.

Special alert for all lovers of sailing ships, Decemberists fans, and people who once wanted to be pirates — oddly enough, I fall into all three categories — today, starting at noon, 32 full-masted ships will begin a 1 1/2-hour parade in the San Francisco Bay. To quote the event webpage:

These majestic marvels of medieval engineering, from ports of call all over the world, will make their way past thousands of spectators lining Crissy Field, Marina Green, Fort Mason, Aquatic Park, and locations all along the Embarcadero. The first vessel will pass under the Golden Gate Bridge at Noon. The Parade will last approximately 1 1/2 hours from start (at the Golden Gate Bridge) until the finish (Bay Bridge). Once the vessels pass under the Bay Bridge they will sail to their respective berths. Vessels will be open for tours beginning Thursday July 24th at 10:00 am.

That’s right, folks: from Thursday you’ll be able to walk the boards, though hopefully not the planks, of these wonderful things. The parade and subsequent events are organized by the San Francisco Maritime National Park Association.

Sorry about the short notice, but I just learned about this event ten minutes ago. I’m going to rush out to Crissy Field right now; photos will be posted later.
[Source: SF Funcheap.com]

Ask yourself:

1) Do I LOVE Zombies?
2) Would I like to support local filmmakers?
3) Do I absolutely NEED to see a movie where a free puke bag is handed out?

IF you answered yes, Yes, YES!!! Then please proceed to the Victoria Theater at 16th and Mission for a limited theater release of RETARDEAD!

Retardead is a sequel to the heart-warming “Monsturd”. This movie has everything: an evil doctor, some mentally and mortally-challenged flesheaters, and the sexy Living Dead Girlz.

As I mentioned, they are handing out a limited amount of puke bags, which you may actually need in a few parts.

Last night they had a question and answer after the show.

When I asked how much blood was used, they said about 15 gallons. Now that’s art!

I saw that occasional SF Metblogs contributor and relentless self promoter and sex book author Violet Blue is the latest recipient of the tempest in a web teapot award. The LA Times website has David Sarno covering a fracas in which any Violet Blue mentions or posts have been deleted from Boing Boing and it’s archives.

Writes Sarno:

“I’ve been wracking my brain thinking of what issues I might’ve come down on the wrong side of,” Blue told me on the phone. “There’s been no argument, there’s been no disagreement, no flame war, none of the usual things.”

Could Boing Boing really be a Stalin era throwback that wants to erase it’s own history, and somehow have the world to believe the widely read SF Gate columnist doesn’t exist?

At AdRants they speculated a possible conflict with blog ad provider Federated Media, which seemed somewhat unlikely to be involved in editorial concerns (IMHO ) since they supply ads for dozens of popular sites including the Metblogs network.

BoingBoing eventually issued it’s own terse comment and explanation after the web “sh*tstorm” lapped up on it’s serenely acerbic shores:

Read the LA times blog, or for a more concise semi ad biz related wrap up read more at AdRants.