noe-valley-xmas-house.jpg

Photo: Erik Anderson

  • The crazy annual Christmas display at Tom & Jerry's house in Noe Valley. [Pixel Vision]
  • $1.1 billion settlement reached in suit between disability rights groups and the California Department of Transportation. [NBC Bay Area]
  • Tiburon man gets 3 1/2 years for fake investment scheme. [SF Business Times]
  • Much buzzed about Mission ice creamery, Humphry Slocombe, opens an off-shoot counter inside DeLessio Market on Broderick. [Tablehopper]
  • No lines at the swine flu shot clinic! [SF Appeal]

Newsom Rewards Campaign Staffers with City Hall Jobs

Filling the ranks in the Mayor's Office are several young guys who Mayor Newsom calls "superstars" who were part of the inner circle of his gubernatorial campaign -- hires that are likely to cause some controversy during upcoming budget negotiations with the Board of Supervisors. Newsom defends the hires saying that all these campaign staffers are being paid less than their predecessors and are highly qualified, but they are nonetheless all pretty young with no experience in city government.

Apple Looking to Make TV Deal

Apple is looking for bites on a new television subscription service. According to the Wall Street Journal, CBS and Disney are considering participation. The service would offer television access to channel's programming over the Internet for a monthly fee. Apple hopes to introduce the service in 2010 but it is unclear if any networks have signed on. Hesitancy on the part of the networks stems from worries over the new service cutting holes in its revenue from selling bundled TV packages. The current deal also would not include advertising. We're just a little confused about how this would be better than Hulu... - Amy Crocker

'Operation Chihuahua' Airlift Delayed

The operation to fly San Francisco's overflow of abandoned chihuahuas to New York has been delayed, due to the high demand for space on flights to the East Coast after this weekend's blizzard. SF Animal Care and the New York ASPCA have been trying to negotiate the airlift with Virgin America, but it looks like it will now have to wait until early January. That means that this excess of chihuahua's are hanging out in town over the holidays, and they all (including Freddy, pictured here at right) remain adoptable.

SFist Tonight

by Amy Crocker

Afternoon Palate Cleanser: Big Cat Christmas!

Courtesy of Big Cat Rescue comes this adorable holiday video featuring tigers, lions, and a baby leopard chewing open some Xmas gifts! Let's just try to enjoy these lovely animals and put that ugly incident of two Xmases ago behind us, shall we?

Villains in the Haight Damaged In Fire Last Night

tikkamasala.jpg The SF Fire Department managed to subdue a three-alarm fire on the 1600 block of Haight Street this morning. No injuries were reported, though two apartments were burned and the families living in them have been displaced. Also badly damaged in the fire were Villains shoe store and the perpetually empty Tikka Masala restaurant and hookah lounge. One witness reports that exterior damage appeared slight (limited to broken windows and some slight scorching), though the stench of smoke was still quite strong. Total damage is estimated at $500,000.

Photo du Jour 533

SPUR and La Cocina Look at the Economics of Street Food

It's been a big year for food trucks, nonstaurants, and street food in general. In addition to the buzz around things like the Crème Brûlée Cart and the Chez Spencer truck, this summer saw the birth of two new food festivals that are likely to grow and flourish again next year: The SF Street Food Fest, and the Eat Real Fest in Oakland.

Toilet Torcher Strikes Again!

toilettorcherbb.jpg We're receiving word that the porta-potty arsonist otherwise known as the Toilet Torcher (or a copycat) lit another porta-potty on fire last night around 10:20 p.m. in the Laurel Heights neighborhood, near Presidio Ave. and Clay Street. This is the first we've heard from him/her since mid-November, but consider yourselves warned.

Yahoo! Forcing Vacation on Employees Christmas Week

During the week between Christmas and New Year's, Yahoo! is furloughing most of their 13,000 employees or forcing them to use remaining vacation days, in order to trim costs on their end-of-year balance sheet. Though it's not uncommon for Silicon Valley companies like Apple and Adobe to shut down during this last week of the year, tech expert Rob Enderle notes in the above segment from ABC7 that, as a media company, this shut-down is a little more awkward than it would be at a software or manufacturing company.

WiFi/Cell Service Now Available in Transbay Tube

wireless-transbay-tube.jpg Hallelujah. This Xmas week we're happy to share the news that you can now send texts and surf the web continuously all the way from Balboa Park to West Oakland Station, thanks to a joint agreement between AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint/Nextel, MetroPCS, and Verizon. By next summer, the service will be extended to Lake Merritt Station, and all the way to North Berkeley along the Richmond line. BART is quick to note that they aren't footing the bill for the service -- the wireless carriers are. Unfortunately, if your mom finds out about this, you will no longer be able to use the "going into a tunnel" excuse to get off the phone.

Eater Crowns Hottest Chef in the Bay Area: Aziza's Louis Maldonado

After weeks of heated voting, Eater has awarded Aziza's Louis Maldonado the honor of being the hottest chef in the Bay Area. We can behind that. Or, preferably, in front of it.

Last week, Mayor Gavin Newsom kicked off a new online communication series on YouTube, ingeniously christened "Mayor Newsom's YouTube Update." Yeah. But it's kinda cool, actually, where in each week Newsom sits down in front of a marble fireplace and talks to SF denizens, saying, "What's up, yo? Here's what I've been up to..."

Tips

About SFist

SFist is a website about San Francisco.

Editor: Brock Keeling
Publisher: Gothamist

Contribute

Latest Tip:

http://www.ktvu.com/news/22034031/detail.html Cruddy restaurant burns down in the Haight early this
[more]

Latest Photo:

Recent Comments

Subscribe

Use an RSS reader to stay up to date with the latest news and posts from SFist.

All Our RSS