Starting sometime in April, library books will be available at Contra Costa County BART stations via "ATM style lending machines." A new program called Library-a-Go-Go, along with the Contra Costa County Library, will allow BART riders to simply swipe a card, select a book, wait for said book choice to drop, and then return the book after the rider is finished reading their literary gem. The machines will "hold around 400 popular and best-selling......

Oh shit. After an alert system SNAFU failed to notify workers at a Marin County treatment facility about a sewage overflow on Thursday night, the San Francisco Bay is now the proud recipient of 2.7 million gallons of both "raw and treated" sewage. Lovely. Although sunbathers are few and far between this time of year, signs are posted all over Crissy Field, Baker Beach, Aquatic Park, and China Beach to keep people from swimming......

On Friday night at around 11:30 p.m., the intersection of Leavenworth and O'Farrell played host to a shooting. It seems that shots were fired from one car into another, leaving two males seriously injured. No deaths, no arrests. Not to be outdone, Hyde and Turk set the stage for a stabbing on Sunday, 2:20 a.m. The victim was rushed to SFGH. Again: no death, no arrests.San Mateo saw its first homicide since 2006. A......

Starting today, eight Bay Area shelters are offering free spaying/neutering to pit bull owners. Although a few shelters, such as the East Bay SPCA offer the free service year-round, the organizers of Bay Area Pit Fix Week are hoping that by offering spaying/neutering this week, the lives of thousands of pit bulls (and the people they otherwise might maul if not for being fixed) will be spared. Thousands of pit bulls are euthanized in the......

Because you can't go home. One of our guilty pleasures during storms is sitting around and looking at live traffic updates to keep track of the mayhem. We snapped this screenshot just now. Accidents and incidents literally every minute? We'd be glad we're taking MUNI except that it's closed at Market at 3rd... Anyway, as far as we can tell, if you live in Marin and work in Contra Costa, or vice versa, you can't......

While not on par with Christmas Day tsunamis, this storm is pretty nifty, huh? Golden Gate transit buses have stopped, power has been knocked out to hundreds -- yes, hundreds! - of thousands of people, and surely snow is falling really hard atop a mountain somewhere. But what must actually suck is this morning's nightmare traffic caused by the raindrops falling on our heads. Ahem: Marin/Contra Costa County: E-580, Richmond-San Rafael Bridge closed due......

Here's todays sports news...

According to CBS 5 (interrupting us right in the middle of The People's Court, no less!) "East Contra Costa County residents are being evacuated from an area near the unincorporated town of Knightsen because of a possible explosive device found inside of a residential motor home." Motor homes and explosive devices? Who could've imagined!? Anyway, that's all the info posted so far. We'll update as soon as more info becomes available. Update: Taken (again!)......

Why, we've been so preoccupied with murder right down the street from SFist, we forgot that the rest of the Bay Area is also littered with shootings and bloody tomfoolery. Forgive us, won't you? Ahem: Two employees of Bill's Friendly were shot last night during a botched robbery attempt. One of the store's employees was killed, the other taken to a nearby hospital. (At right: the lone gunman's fierce image.) Another shooting in the......

A manhunt is underway right now at Contra Costa College, searching for a man who shot a Contra Costa College student police cadet three times at close range a little before 1 p.m. today. "The victim was in critical condition when he was taken to John Muir Medical Center...[and] has since been stabilized and has gone into surgery," according to CBS 5. As of now, a whopping 50 police officers from five different police......

Harry Ramsay, a former Contra Costa County sheriff who served in the mid 1970s, went missing the other day after leaving his house on foot, and no one has heard back from the 85-year-old man. According to the the Chronicle, he has "mild dementia and vision problem" -- just like us....

-- The jarring, devastating, Lohanesque Midgen-behind-the-wheel 911 tapes will shock you. Only not so much. [Chron] -- Randy Shaw has it that the glowing, science fiction-y Transbay Terminal choices aren't nominees at all, but simply glowing, science fiction-y lies. A tissues of lies. [Beyond Chron] -- Media-hungry Daly decides not to run. For now, anyway. [SFBG, Chris Daly] -- Truck kills cyclist in Oakland. [Indy Bay] -- Motorcycle race turns deadly. No kidding. [Chron]......

The Denver Biz Times is reporting that Denver-based MediaNews Group -- the owner of the Alameda Newspaper Group (which includes the Oakland Tribune) and the Contra Costa Times, will be reducing staff in its NoCal operations....

-- Temporary victory is ours: Giants 8, Brewers 0. [Chron, Examiner] -- Four people -- Contra Costa County Fire Protection Captain Matt Burton, Fire Engineer Scott Desmond, Delbert Moore, and Gayle Moore -- die in early morning San Pablo fire. [Chron] -- Farewell, Pete. [KGO] -- Bizarre staging of Taming of the Shrew gets lots of love from Chloe Veltmen. [ASD] -- Scott Beale snaps shots from today's blogger-littered WordCamp 2007. [Laughing Squid] Image: Michael......

--One person is dead after a Caltrain hit a car in Palo Alto this afternoon. [CBS 5, Merc News.] --The Lauryn Hill show sucked. [The Chron, All Shook Down, the Inside Bay Area Buzz blog.] --What's Berkeley going to do after this Supreme Court ruling? [The Trib.] --Blogging from the iPhone line in Walnut Creek. [Contra Costa Times.] --A fight over a local grad student's blog post about racial and class divisions on MySpace and......

--Who owns the new East Bay Express? [the EBX's 92510] --Oh, now Newsom's all for foot patrols. [KCBS.] --The Bike Coalition and Ross Mirkarimi want lights at Fell and Masonic. [Examiner.] --Wanna pay someone to wait in line for you for an Apple iPhone? [Chron. More Chron iPhone madness here.] --Quit trying to recall people. [Beyond Chron.] --Sim art! (Picture a big green diamond over our head as our Fun bar zooms up.) [All......

And the Bay Area dominates your reality TV scene YET AGAIN!!! Danville's own Evan O'Dorney, sponsored by the proud-as-punch Contra Costa Times, wins this year's spelling bee on the word "serrefine," which is not a brand of drinking water but rather, is a small set of forceps used for clamping blood vessels. O'Dorney is home-schooled (but affiliated with a local charter school, and takes classes at various local community colleges), came in fifth in the......

A truck filled with 60 cows tipped over in Contra Costa County yesterday. Ha! Despite our most diligent efforts, we are unable to find any pictures from the scene, so we're going with the "Cow Crossing" sign you see to your left. One person is dead after a dramatic shooting in the Sunset early Monday morning -- the shots were fired at a moving car, which then flipped over and crashed. The Chron has some......

--It's too darn hot. (SFist expresses no opinion about whether to pitch the woo with your baby tonight.) --Who's got the crappiest computer repair services in the area? CompUSA and Fry's. --SFist Elaine's column launches in Fog City Journal! [NSFW] --Inside the Google kitchen (where they only cook local). --Beth Spotswood admires Gavin Newsom's golf pants. --A Contra Costa Times reporter competing at the fried asparagus eating contest in Stockton. Here's the video. --and......

Students at Cal protest the store Bear Basics for selling shirts they found offensive. The shirts in question said "Rutgers Nappy-Headed Ho Basketball Team." A manager was asked to stop selling the shirt and refused, so the students organized a protest for the next day. The manager's boss intervened and pulled the shirt before the store opened the next day, but when the students came by a few days later, they found two other shirts......

Han Shin showed up in court in Contra Costa County yesterday to plead not guilty to the charges that he tried to run over an ex's roommate with his car in San Ramon. He smiled and wished the judge a good day. Meanwhile, the authorities also arrested an Oakland man who's been stalking Schwarzenegger. Good ol' Dan Noyes! His I-Team's sued MUNI to get access to bus safety records, and they just won an order......

We gobble the various food sections up each Wednesday. These are our favorite tidbits from today's offerings: SF Chronicle: Valentine's feasting with the one you love. We like Marlena Spieler's no fuss, no muss approach. We would totally make the cumin lamb chops with sweet potatoes and tomato-ginger chutney for our sweetie if we weren't catering tonight! If a restaurant outing is more your thang for Valentine's Day, Inside Scoop has dets on happenings around......

-Thanks for coming, Queen Mary 2. -Santa Clara City Council is expected to vote for a study, just a study, on a new stadium for the Niners. ...

So we're reading this morning in the Chronicle about the "Frozen Bun Run" on Bethel Island in Contra Costa County, where fun-loving polar bears go water-skiing on the Sacramento River every New Year's Day. And here's the paragraphs that caught our eye: Take Josh Wolf. With the water at 47 degrees and the air outside at a comparatively balmy 49.2 degrees, Wolf decided he didn't need to wear his shorts while wakeboarding in front of......

Two small plane crashes -- one into a tank of raw sewage in Gilroy, and another onto Highway 4 in Contra Costa County. The Highway 4 crash involved a pilot who misjudged the location of the landing runway in the low cloud cover Thursday, and tied up traffic for miles. They're still investigating the Gilroy crash; investigators got a later start because they had to drain and disinfect the tank before it was safe to......

So what's going on with this whole newspaper lawsuit and injunction thingy we mentioned earlier? Well, sit right back, grab a beer, and listen up because this is super-exciting stuff. ...

-Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata proposes health care for all workers in California. -Da Mayor to host Inauguration party for Da Governor. -Theme of party? "We Belong Together." -In a story we're all going to get sick of, rain screwed up yesterday and this morning's commute. - Mo' bond money to cause mo' problems for Bay Area. This story is one we can pretty much cut and paste in for the next few years.......

You know what hasn't been done yet? Barry Bonds' contract. In fact, while everyone is saying it's a done deal, it's not quite done, meaning that the i's haven't been dotted and the t's haven't been crossed and Barry Lamar's John Henry has not yet been put on a piece of paper. ...

We gobble the various food sections up each Wednesday. These are our favorite tidbits from today's offerings: SF Chronicle Stanford alum and local food writer Janet Fletcher gives three quickie menus--that’s 90 minutes if you have sharp knives and decent kitchen skills--to entertain during the holidays. We may try out Linda Furiya’s Five-Spice Persimmon Cake for a holiday party we’re attending this Sunday. It sounds sweet with a little spice and will feed sixteen......

You know that totally obvious idea of creating some sort of general pass that works on the plethora of public transportation options? And you know how it's so obvious that you want to bang your head against the table that it hasn't happened yet. Well, it's happening, finally. Or at least a trial run of it....