Ours was. And how. It would neither send nor receive email for hours. The horror. Hitting all carriers, it turns out the BlackBerry outage afflicted enterprise users across the United States and Canada today. And the "company has no estimate for when service will be restored." Read more about it here. (Our service seems to be working fine as of 5 p.m., btw.) You win, iPhone. You...you win.......

You have, well, two entire days to fill out and return your application to become a torchbearer for the San Francisco leg of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Torch Relay. The San Francisco relay -- which is entitled, dear Christ, "A Sustainable Journey" -- is the only North American stop on the Olympic Torch Relay, which will make the sporty flame's U.S. visit that more special to us in the Bay Area. Or not. In......

Though this may amuse a smattering of transplants who neither want this city to grow nor evolve into the world-class city it secretly is, a new global Monopoly board is coming and San Francisco is not a part of it. You see, people of the earth get to vote to see which of the 68 world cities will make the final 22 on the global board game. San Francisco, it seems, is not on......

This past Thursday while we were en route from Denver to SFO, we were thoroughly enjoying the in-flight movie when screams suddenly broke out from the rear kitchen. Since we happened to be sitting in the very last row of the plane, we were especially caught off guard by the commotion and were forced to break focus from No Reservations (which was actually quite charming) to see what was going on. Not three feet from......

Nice package. -- Of Montreal: Someone was talking of this art-rock outfit the other night -- quite controversially, in fact -- and we thought that they were talking about the city in Canada. Because we're old. Of Montreal goes on tonight with Grand Buffet and MGMT at 9 p.m. at Great American Music Hall; $18. (They also perform tomorrow night and on Wednesday; the kids just love them that much, you see.) -- Donuts:......

We got word today from an anonymous source that two residents of Bernal Heights -- including a former President of Golden Gate Audubon Society -- spotted a burrowing owl a block from their house on the southeastern side of the hill. The (sub?)species was confirmed by another Audubon-er. So, why does this matter? Because at the moment there is construction going on in the same area (i.e., landscaping improvements such as steps, etcetera) where......

On the twenty-ninth of October two thousand and seven in Cowansville, Quebec, Canada's third same-sex wedding ceremony in a federal jail will take place. David Bedard, 22, serving a 10-year sentence for involuntary manslaughter and his partner Sony Martin, 26, serving a life sentence for second-degree murder, will join in holy matrimony. (Oh, my God, you guys. We're so gonna start crying!) This begs the question: which one is the bitch? Like most gay......

Photo of the new Smart Car...

Earlier this morning, Forensics Analytical Lab in Hayward called the fire department for help because they'd spilled a bunch of picric acid. Dry picric acid is apparently very sensitive to shock and friction, and can explode like dynamite. This one article we found says it blows up when you drop a 2 kg weight on it, from just 36 cm above. (Metric units because the article is Canadian.) Yikes! So all the other businesses in......

-- Wing: With album titles like Wing Sings Elvis, Wing Sings AC/DC, Dancing Queen by Wing, and Beatles Classics by Wing, it's easy to see why she shot to cult-icon status and became a favorite of Trey Parker and Matt Stone, who ended up using her in South Park. See her tonight along with comedian Lisa Geduling at 8:30 p.m. at Cafe Du Nord, Market and Sanchez Streets; $12. -- Urban Capture the Flag:......

What with Paris Hilton's release earlier this week and the upcoming celebration of American Independence (sorry, Londonist!), we've been thinking a lot about freedom. Freedom to vote, freedom to choose, and most importantly, freedom to blog. Here are a few things we're happy we've been free to blog about this week. Being the nation's capital, DCist felt especially proud to let freedom ring this week by exposing the really important issues, like how sad they......

Who needs the Sopranos when there’s the San Francisco Craft Mafia? That’s right, we said craft mafia. You got a problem with that? We hope not, because this group is taking over the city, organizing crafters of all stripes, helping to build up a community and a movement that’s showing no signs of slowing down. The first Craft Mafia was formed by three crafty business owners in Austin, Texas in 2003. The women came......

The City Attorney's gone through all the residency documents that beleaguered Burlingame boy and erstwhile supposed San Francisco Supervisor Ed Jew provided last week, and ---- baaaaaaaaahmp -- (that's supposed to be a buzzer sound like when you guess something that's not on the board on Family Feud): the City Attorney has concluded that the documents currently on file are insufficient to demonstrate that Ed Jew lives in San Francisco. Oh no, Ed Jew! Namely,......

Week Around The -Ists...

As we were just telling SFist Mihi, everything is better with an emu in it! It's easy to make a heroic character lovable and the bad guy despicable, but it's much more of an accomplishment to turn a fallible, sweaty, chubby guy with real flaws, including a seriously questionable moral compass, into a sympathetic character. Congorama, a charmer of a movie directed by Philippe Falardeau manages to do just that. Congorama is a lovely tale......

Valentine's Day is only a few days away, and we here across the Gothamist network wanted to express would like to tell you, in the spirit of the holiday, just how much we love you, our readers. Don't let it get to your heads, though. There are plenty of things we love, you included. Just be glad you're not amongst the things we hate. In New York, Gothamist isn't sure whether to love or hate......

We don't know about you, but it seemed like the temperature dropped about ten degrees in an hour or so yesterday. In fact, the day started off rather nicely but then the wind started whipping around and we went from comfortably cold to comfortably numb. The reason for all this is that we are in the midst of a cold spell right now. And it's going to get colder. Like in the 20s colder. ...

It's been a few months since we raved about Ratatat and gave away their CD, so we figure it's time again to extol their greatness. Like we said last time, RATATAT's music is so melodic, varied and compelling that it makes vocals and lyrics seem superfluous. The Brooklyn duo expertly mixes snakey synth lines with sneering guitar, cello, sleigh bells and samples like the appropriately primal roar in "Wildcat". File under: Things That Make......

SFist interviews Matt Costa ...

Just as we were putting away the original Jason Fortuny Seattle Craigslist scandal, a copy-cat comes along and tries to run the same prank again. This time with "better" results (Better only in the sense that he is now getting sued). This story started a few months ago when Jason Fortuny decided to put up a pretty intense women seeking men ad on Craigslist, then proceeded to publish the "results", people's phone numbers, names,......

As fall settles in and another calendar page gets turned, thoughts turn from bbq's and vacations to holidays and the realization that '06 is coming to an end. With all that going on, with change in the air, we wonder what is it that made that makes the -ists ponder? ...

-HP Chairman (Chairwoman?) Patricia Dunn will step down in January for all the craziness HP has been involved in lately. We're sure that with all the scandal swirling about that she's sort of responsible for, HP will give her a package commiserate with the mess, like say only several millions of dollars. ...

Besides the homicide rate, Oakland residents' quality of life continues to be impaired by wasteful immigrants flocking to the shores of Lake Merritt - the Canada geese, also causing trouble in Richmond, as reported recently by the East Bay Express. The Lake Merritt geese population produces an estimated ton of fecal matter a day. The geese have also been sighted exhibiting aggressive pedestrian behavior not unlike that of Oakland's human residents, known for holding up......

SFist interviews Caila Thompson-Hannant from Shapes and Sizes off of the Asthmatic Kitty Label...

Friend of SFist TMPP wrote to tell us about two new blogs in the local 'sphere. First would be his own project, now loosely based on that dude with the red paper clip, but with a deliciously sinful San Francisco twist, called "Take My Porn Please" (needless to say, potentially NSFW, but all nipples have been tastefully removed). From the FAQ:Q: Are you going to be trading up, a la One Red Paperclip? A: I......

Last year a Canadian blogger (Kyle MacDonald) started a quest to turn his one red paper clip into a house using Craigslist and his bartering skills. After completing 14 trades he finished his task and ended up with a house in Kipling (Saskatchewan, Canada). All in all it was a pretty interesting idea and we laud Mr. MacDonald for his trading skills... though we do question the afternoon with Alice Cooper for a Kiss......

If you've been like us, you've been reading all sorts of stories about terrorist plots in a whole bunch of cities that aren't the Bay Area and feeling kind of jealous. Hey, terrorists, what about us? Aren't we good enough to terrorize? Are we not infidel enough? Does our lack of good bagels preclude us from being part of the International Zionist Conspiracy? Luckily, reports have been coming out saying that yes indeed, the Bad Guys have been looking our way and plotting some terror. ...

Many of us were disconcerted by the stories of forced abandonment of animals by their guardians in the wake of disasters, and asked ourselves "How would our dumb-ass cats fare on their own? Maybe if they were forced to fare for themselves, they'd finally appreciate how freakin' good thay have it. Yeah!" It looks like we're getting closer to never having to find out just how well Mr. Sniffy can operate a can opener, as......

San Francisco is proud host of a new reality show called "How to Get the Guy" that's unfortunately not a descendant of Will and Grace, Queer Eye, The L Word, American Idol etc. Also a biodefence lab is coming to the East Bay and SFist teaches wine pairing. Getting on the wrong train sucks. Getting on the wrong train and becoming the victim of what will later be described as a "stabbing spree" really sucks.......

It is customary to start any post about the World Cup by stating that you should care. We won't do that. Y'all know what a big deal it is and how pretty much every part of the world that isn't Canada or the U.S. is effectively shutting itself down for a month to watch. Besides, we have a feeling part of the reason soccer has never really taken off here is because too many people tell you that you have to care. So getting into soccer becomes something like eating broccoli or the metric system or any other things you are told to do because it's good for you. As a result, people here start getting all huffy and get all "nuh-uh, we're 'merican's damnit. We like our sports with non-stop action, lots of beer commercials, and scoreboards telling us when to cheer and when not to cheer, you Euro Weenie One World-ist!" Instead, we're going to try and get you into it by showing you just how much fun the World Cup can be. Picture it not as something you have to do because you have to be like everyone else, but as, well, kind of a way to travel around the world in a month without ever having to leave the city. ...