In case you haven’t noticed, the New York Times has a major hard-on for San Francisco style stories. Maybe it’s because the city is on the list of Things White People Like. Or maybe San Francisco is seen as a fresh alternative to Brooklyn  for the newspaper’s inevitably outdated “what the kids are up to” trend pieces. This piece in the Times is a pretty good example of the genre. Written by Guy Trebay, the article professes to explore San Francisco fashion. And by “fashion” it means hipsters in the Mission wearing high-waisted jeans over bathing suits.

Several SF neighborhoods get mentioned in the piece, including Hayes Valley, the Castro, the Haight, and Pacific Heights. Of the Tenderloin or Tendernob? Not a whisper. This is too bad, as Tenderloin certainly has some innovative fashion, whether it comes from Project Runway designer Christopher Collins or the high-heeled trans gals strutting down Polk Street. As a sign of how out of touch Trebay is, he chose to interview an administrator at the Academy of Art’s fashion department. Academy of Art is one of the largest landlords in the city and is perhaps better known in San Francisco for being a diploma mill for starry-eyed, high-paying, international students than a quality educational institute. It’s not even clear if their main fashion program (they offer another fashion degree online) is accredited. The only (maybe) good thing about Trebay mentioning the AoA is that many of their students do live in the Tendernob, but whether they’ll ever work in fashion, or write about it, is anyone’s guess.

Beth Spotswood (whose day job seems to be writing 38% of the blog content in San Francisco) is to be adored. In addition to having a Wikipedia entry and coming to Tendernights, she also allowed herself to descend to the depths of quiz night at Edinburgh Castle despite being at a post quiz night time in her life:

I have a penchant for the 1990′s, all television, medical oddities, long-term kidnappings, local history, current teen interest, celebrities and serial killers.

It’s a good read that includes what I assume to be the dream of any American girl when it comes to a man from Amsterdam:

Les and I enjoyed breaks from the Dutch every time a woman approached the bar to order a drink, because their attention would instantly be diverted to the fresh meat. This whole fiasco would have been entertaining to watch, had we not been their convenient back-up plan.

Being surrounded by AoA dorms, students wearing slippers and pajamas around the neighborhood is a common sight. We even fear that the Diaper Horizon is near.

A few days ago I posted on Twitpic a photo of one of those people, wearing green pj pants with little pink flowers. Judging by the scarf, they were probably flannel, and oh so appropriate for last week’s weather. Or maybe these were not appropriate? What do you think, dear tender readers, is it ok to cruise around the city in sleeping apparel or does it depend on the style, skimpiness, and possibly one’s Body Mass Index? For example, I’m sure tonight many San Franciscans will sleep in nearly nothing, but I’m probably not going to want to see them tomorrow morning going to get their coffee like that…

Just another Sunday morning in the Tenderloin where the street sweepers have no routes…

That was one short night. Must have ended with the nut.

We understand that his fashion was surprisingly not responsible for the hose down in front of New Century.

Sure, shoes are easy to lose… but your underwear, seriously?

Ever notice how they don’t put sizes on condoms? Fascinating.

Just a few minutes ago I heard a loud <POP!> outside my window. People in the building across the street were leaning out of their windows to see what had happened. It took me a minute to see that directly underneath my window was a short white dude with strawberry-blonde dreads stumbling along the Jones Street curb.

After weaving about and taking out and putting away items in his many-pocketed beige puffy jacket, he was gently shooed away by my infinitely patient building manager and ambled toward Sutter. I talked with my manager and turns out the hippie had dropped a small tube of gas which he was using as an inhalant. I was a bit concerned since our building has a lot of young children in it and I don’t want them to be endangered by substance-addled adults wandering outside, but my manager assured me that addicts don’t often come to our building. His advice was that if I see one, to simply tell them they can’t “do that stuff” here and they’ll find someplace else to do it.

For those of you looking for wedding locations, I just stumbled upon a quite interesting one in the Tenderloin. No, I’m not talking about the City Hall (although it is mighty pretty). I’m talking about the streets of the Tenderloin. Naturally, this is not the first scenic spot that you would think of when planning an outdoor wedding in San Francisco, but somehow this couple pulled it off and it actually looks quite cool.

They closed off the block between Eddy and Turk on Jones street, put a few rows of chairs, flowers and a little stage for the ceremony. Somehow it also appears that they managed to ward off the ever-virulent guys who want to comment on everything they see since there are no, “What you doin’ here?” heard from the sidelined peanut gallery.

Photo by PKB Visions

In case you’re into hardcore wedding porn, there are a few videos documenting it. They are very shaky, so your eyes won’t be happy watching more than a few seconds, although a shot of whiskey may help counter the effects. But at the beginning of this one you can clearly see the mural at the corner of Jones and Eddy. We recommend looking through the pretty photos instead, though. That you can do without the whiskey.

I caught a MSNBC  special on sex trafficking a few days ago that focused on Sunflower Massage on Jones and Ellis. According to the report (which may have originally aired last year) Sunflower has hidden girls in walls and crawl spaces when inspected by police In 2007, SFPD found a crawl space with 12 beds in the parlor, evidence they say of girls living there, indicating possible sex slavery or trafficking.

As a Jones Street resident myself, I have to say I haven’t seen much activity around massage parlors. Empire (O’Farrell Street)  is usually pretty quiet, even at night, and I’ve only once or twice seen anyone coming or going into Les Nuits de Paris (Taylor Street). I realize these places don’t offer the kind of massages I want, but it was still a bit shocking to see them on television in a story on sex trafficking. I guess after seeing them every day, I kind of forget about what’s going on behind the doors. But just a little Googling finds a first-person story of sex trafficking at the Sun Spa on Geary and Hyde and NSFW reviews of other San Francisco massage parlors. I’m all for safe, sane, protected sex work, but this isn’t it.

Citizen, whenever you are to wake up and wonder, “Oh, what a night… but where have my snazzy white pants gone?” the answer shall be, Larkin & Geary. We’ve all tried them on since we were notified and yes, they’re fantastic. You really want them back.

There are no monthly visual archives for our streets yet, so I have no idea how long Space Gallery has been around, but I’ve been meaning to check it out for quite a while without much success. The first time I saw it walking down Polk I thought it looked interesting, but their website didn’t have much information besides this sentence that really made me want to go to one of their events:

Space Gallery combines an art gallery with a beer, wine, champagne and soju cocktail bar to bring you a great atmosphere in a creative environment.

Unfortunately, their Twitter account is not active, their website claims to be “under construction” and thus only lists very few (random) events but not all. And I couldn’t find a Facebook page (only a personal account). Which is too bad because we hear that they have a lot of cool stuff going on besides art shows, of course. Such as movie nights the last Sunday of the month, or a vintage clothing sale last night according to Kayla (aka @kaybythebay) who is obviously much cooler than us. Check out the photos she posted on their blog Glitter for Breakfast.

And apparently she even bought communal, shiny, feathery hat complete with blue netting (pictured above):

Somewhere between the glasses of glorious sangria, epic bar conversations, and her purchasing a pair of to-die-for leather boots, we got the idea to buy a hat together. Like poor, bohemian best friends do. It’s sparkly and feathery and draped with netting. I have custody this month. I loved the art on the walls, the easy music, and the horchata flavored cupcakes I sampled. Just a lovely laid-back event at a fabulous gallery & bar.

So, dear Tender Readers, can convince Space Gallery to start promoting their events a little better so we can all start enjoying them in the not so distant sooness. I mean, I want to find out exactly which award their sangria has received and double check the certifications on that sangria award giving commission!

Oh dear. Mayhaps the rumors of the Tenderloin becoming the Trendyloin are true? According to SF Grubstreet, there’ll be a spiffy lounge with an outdoor terrace (brrr!) coming to 620 Jones Street in September. Yes, the same Jones Street which is plagued by nearly non-stop fire engine sirens. Sounds like fun, eh? I know there’s nothing I like more than paying for overpriced drinks while shivering outside and shouting over street noise. Add in some uncomfortable shoes and you’ve got hell-on-heels.

The chef at the new joint, which will be called Jones, is said to be Ola Fendert of Oola. That’s a little fancy-pants for this part of SF, but apparently Jones co-owners Peter Glikshtern and Jeff Whitemore are going to aim to keep it upscale yet mellow. Glikshtern, in case you didn’t know, has some actual street cred. He was opening businesses in the Mission in the 90s and once knocked out three thugs in a fight. I couldn’t find much on Whitemore but I’m guessing if he gets out of line, Glikshtern can beat him back in.