MSN writer Diane Vadino suggests in her article "A Great Place to Visit, but …" that San Francisco is, as the title of her post suggests, a fantastic vacation excursion ("[s]hop Hayes Valley and Valencia Street; get brunch at Tartine, lunch at the Dolores Park Café, snacks at Bi-Rite, and dinner at Delfina."), but blows when it comes to setting up camp.

Other neighborhoods, though, reveal images more police-blotter than tourism-brochure: a staggering homeless population, rampant open-air drug use, public parks and buses made intimidating and unsafe by unruly combinations of both. To live in San Francisco is to daily confront these issues -- and probably from under a dense bank of fog. (The climate's as much London as it is L.A.)

While she's confused on some accounts -- rampant open-air drug use? Where are these airy spots and how can we get to them? -- she's correct when it comes to the public parks and homeless issue, and that, yes, living here is hard. Very hard for those of us not making six figures, that is. (Some of us also have trouble identifying snow, it seems.) But in the end, San Francisco is a city. And cities have these kinds of problems.

In a hat tip to Newsomian politics, Vadino ends by saying that after a visit to Baghdad by the Bay you can "go home, safe in the knowledge that San Francisco puts on its best face for its guests ... [leaving] the hard work of citizenship to the locals."

Further proof that San Francisco is one big amusement park? The work of a clueless writer? A little bit of both?

(Added bonus: Vadino also has some leftover love/vitriol for Berkeley. Oh, and thanks, Joel, for the tip!)