Happy New Year 2009

House with Christmas decoration

The house is famous for it's decoration on Christmas and Halloween and I believe Easter. People walk or drive by to look at it and take pictures. When I came today a crowd of at least 20 to 30 people passed by, alone, in pairs, in groups and with or without children. Popular place and one of it's kind, at least here in the neighborhood.

German store front view

Again a picture of the German store in SF, the store is on Church Street in Noe Valley.

J-line trails Church Street

The J-line Muni (one of San Francisco's transportation systems) trails on Church and 22nd. The trails are separating from Church street, running parallel for a while, because the street is getting to steep for the Muni cars.

Cable Car on California ...

... stopping at Grant in Chinatown. The picture was taken three years ago, as you may see on the "de Young" ad, announcing the re-opening in october 2005.

Christmas decoration and palm tree

"Milk" at Castro Theater

Milk is the movie/biography about Harvey Milk, California's first openly gay man in public office. He was assassinated, November 1978 along with Mayor George Moscone by another Supervisor Dan White.
Castro Theater is the 100th SF Landmark. In the picture you see part of it's beautiful ornate interior and at the bottom an impressive organ that is played before a movie.

Ikea - Emeryville

Ikea, the worlds largest furniture manufacture with retail stores worldwide has also stores close to SF. One in Emeryville and one in Palo Alto. Whenever I tell visitors from Germany that "we" have a store here in SF, people are always surprised. So here's the proof, yes there is an Ikea.

Downtown zoo

I hope you can see the two cats in the picture. It's a shop window of Macy's a Department Store at Union Square. They decorated everything Christmas like, looking like a house or home and put little cats or a little dog in the windows. It did not only get my attention.

Fire alarm box

It is a device used to notify the fire department. Some see them as outdated since everyone uses a cell phone these days. However in case of a disaster, power might be out, phone services might be broken and then such alarm box is quite useful.
Interestingly enough such boxes don't seem to be in every city of the US. I just found a online list of cities with operating box alarm systems. The list is not that long and San Francisco is one of them.

El Rio - a neighborhood bar

with parties in the patio. The picture was taken a month ago, it's not that nice and warm outside anymore.

Holiday Ice Rink

Today I came across an Ice skating rink at Union Square. It seems a bit weired to me to ice skate while the temperature is still high enough to wear a t-shirt but hey it's November and only one month to Christmas.

Historic Streetcar

This one, the streetcar from Milan, Italy, built in 1928 is my favorite historic streetcar. It's fun to ride in it and also fun to see them passing by. The history of these streetcars can be read at the Muni website.

Tower Theater tower

Here's a picture of the Tower, where I posted the poster board last time. Sorry for all this inconsistent alignments, but I liked the pigeon, so I choose this one over another picture with straight lines.

Poster wall on Mission Street

The wall is not meant for posters but it's perfect to put them on. It's a screen of boards to close the entry of the old Tower Theater which is up for sale. The 10 posters draw a lot of attention and I thought I share the remains.

In the countryside: Napa Valley

Approximately 67 miles north of SF is Napa Valley with it's winery's. One of them is Rutherford Hill and from their picnic ground you have a view of the Valley.

Protest march ...

...against passing of Prop 8.
One of the answers to the pro Proposition 8 votes on Tuesday was a protest march tonight.
Tuesday 52.5% voted "yes" on Proposition 8, and want to ban same sex marriage in California, whereas 47.5% voted in favor. So that's more than a half million who don't want those legal rights for citizens and it's written in the Constitution to define marriage as only between a man and a woman. It overrides a state Supreme Court ruling that briefly gave same-sex couples the right to wed.

First signs of Christmas

It's the beginning of November, warm outside and the city starts with Christmas decoration. However I like this time of the year with so many extra lights.

Festival of Altars ...

or Dia de los Muertos, Day of the Death.
Every year there's a procession ending in the Garfield Park at 26th and Harrison. I am always impressed by these altars, build to remember the death of someone's loved one.

City College building

Science Hall at the Ocean Campus/City College of SF. This month theme are books, but I'm taking an online class at CCSF, so no books involved. I'm kidding and I'm not participating in the theme day. However I thought I share a building where learning takes place and of course, books are part of learning.

Valencia Street: once Levi's plant

The building was one of Levi Strauss' & Co's US plant, Levi, the Jeansmaker. The building had been open since 1906, but was closed 2002. Now it's a school.

SanFrancisco JazzFestival

Friday, Archie Shepp played at the Herbst Theater. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures of the artist, so I took the picture during the intermission. Unfortunately not much to see but I wanted to let people know that we have great artists playing in the city.

Fingerspelling

On a school in the Mission is a Mural with paintings of the fingerspelled alphabet. The picture shows the letters "X,Y,Z". The last letter looks like the "F", but doesn't make sense at the end of this sequence, so I suppose it's indicating the end of the alphabet.

Muni buses lined up

On a grey autumn sunday today, I took the picture of these buses all lined up, parked and awaiting their next service.

Antenna tree in plant pot

Thanks to some gardeners in the city we got some more green. I've seen this tree somewhere else from far away and was wondering if it's an antenna. I don't know what kind of tree it is, but certainly it's not an antenna.

Fort Mason Center

Part of the Fort Mason Center in the background. Fort Mason Center is a former military base, but houses now about 30 nonprofit organizations and hosts several cultural activities. It's along the bay and part of the Golden Gate Recreation Area.

Fleetweek 2008 's over

today I went to Fort Mason, actually not to watch the flight show, I went to Open Studios to watch photography. But I wanted to post a picture of today's event. Instead of posting a picture of one of these jets (which I'm sure you can see everywhere), I'd rather post a picture of the workers providing food/BBQ at this show.

Good morning sun

One of San Francisco's steep street in the morning sun. In the background the tower of Twin Peaks.

Simulation of a Tornado

Found the simulation on the airport at Gate 87 before my departure.
Fans simulate the airflow in a thunderstorm, creating a miniature tornado.
An overhead fan draws the air upward, imitating the updraft that occurs in the core of a tornado-spawning thunderstorm. Air blowing from the sides of the tubes start the updraft spinning and create the mini tornado. Droplets of water injected by a fog machine make the airflow visible.

San Francisco Airport

Terminal 1, domestic flight with United Airlines from San Francisco to Chicago. While waiting on my plane to get ready, the one in the foreground, there were two others pulled into their positions and ready for departure.

Golden Gate Bridge

driving through the toll at Golden Gate Bridge when coming back to San Francisco.

San Francisco State University

Two buildings of the whole complex.

Steep sidewalks

If streets and sidewalks are too steep, they put little bumps on the sidewalks. They look and feel like stairs, so supposedly it makes it easier to walk. I still prefer the flat surface though.

Sea Lions at Pier 39

Antique Clock Repair

with a huge, working clock in the window.

Baseball

SF Giants playing the Diamondbacks Arizona in the AT&T Park (getting ready for another round).

Bench

In this city also benches adjust to the hills and get in slanting position.

Store in Chinatown

It's a store on Grant Ave. After you pass the gate these kind of stores are to the left and right all the way up. They are packed with all kinds of things and as you can see are really colorful.

"Fixing" the wires

Since most of the electrical wiring is up in the air, they use cranes to get to them and do whatever they have to. Why are these wires in the air, I don't know, maybe it's to prevent them from breaking in an earthquake?

Mural finished

When I started the Photo Blog I uploaded a picture of the mural with the scaffolding in place and from a different angle. The painting on one side of the parking lot was finished, the scaffolding was removed a couple of weeks ago and I am going to show a closer shot of it in this posting. It's such beautiful artwork from Mona Caron.

The Hobart Building

I just learned that this building is considered one of San Francisco's historic landmarks. It was completed 1914 and is an example of classical revival architecture. I always find those old buildings between all the new ones made out of steel and glass, truly outstanding and amazing. The building is located in San Francisco's financial district, at Montgomery and Market Street.

Baggage claim

Sorry for not posting for such a long time. I was out of the city for quite a while and didn't get the chance to update the blog. Now I'm back on track, starting with a picture from SF airport after a 12 hour flight from Frankfurt.

Heart at Union Square

This one is at the corner of Post and Stockton and a red one is at the corner of Geary and Stockton.

Antojitos San Miguel

it's a little cart outside the BART station at 16th and Mission. While on your way somewhere you can grab a bite. I didn't stop to eat, but to take a picture. Whenever I come by, the shiny silver cart, reflecting the sunlight, attracts my attention.

Church (Street) under dark sky

All of a sudden, the sky turned dark grey as if one would expect a thunderstorm. But thunderstorms are so rare in this city, that these dark clouds unfortunately didn't result in thunder and lightning. (View of Church Street in Noe Valley)

Moscone Center North

in front of the Exhibition Hall/ Moscone Center North, where the annual LinuxWorld Conference & Expo was taking place from August 4th - today.

LinuxWorld

/Moscone Center. The skull is part of the Alameda County Computer Resource Center project. They presented it outside the Moscone Center North where LinuxWorld (August 4th - 7th) San Francisco is taking place.

Rainbow Grocery

In the distance you see part of the vegetable and fruit section of the Rainbow Grocery store. According to their website, they "provide natural, organic, vegetarian food and environmentally and health conscious products at an affordable price." One can get all kinds of food and also natural medicine for example.
Furthermore: "Rainbow Grocery Cooperative is an independent, collectively run, worker owned and operated cooperative at which decision making and responsibilities are shared through democratic structures and elected committees."

Oldtimer

Today I saw this Oldtimer on Grant Ave in Chinatown and thought it's a great image for the picture of the day. Not that such a car is typical for this city. But what is typical, is that you will find all kinds of cars and bikes on the streets, even such a rarity from GB.

Bay Bridge and view of the city

Coming back home, driving over the Bay Bridge,you will get a great view of the bay and the city. And it's always stunning how downtown presents itself to the viewer.