According to CBS 5's Green Beat, today the Gav proposed new building codes that will hopefully win us the title of nation's greenest skyline. Ever. In the world. Which, of course, is a good thing since other cities will follow suit. They always do. ...

No, there was no collision involving a train. However, a garbage truck apparently struck a bridge in San Mateo, holding up all southbound traffic for about 20 minutes. At first, our weary-sounding conductor said that we would have to wait for a track inspection to determine when we could depart from San Francisco -- "if at all," he added ominously. We're now rolling south about 20-30 minutes behind schedule, pulling into Millbrae at the scheduled......

Ah, the perfect San Francisco date. Nothing says love like a sourdough bread bowl filled with New England clam chowder, a few hundred barking, stinky sea lions, and a blue square (aka registered sex offender) escorting an underage girl through the biggest tourist trap in the city. If you thought that buskers jumping out from behind garbage cans were the scariest thing about Fisherman's Wharf, now there's something else to keep you away from the......

Photo of a bird eating plastic...

Currently with six full-time employees on staff (whoa), according to the Chronicle, Wikipedia wants to expand its talent base while increasing its presence in developing countries (i.e., Asia), so it's making the move to hedonistic and wonderful San Francisco. Yay. How exciting. After throwing its junk into garbage bags in its St. Petersburg, Florida HQ (ew), they're sure to find San Francisco the perfect town for finding drunk assholes yammering on about widgets at......

The Tenderloin Housing Clinic's properties may be among the worst places in the city to live -- but hey, at least it's cheap! Jeff, the proprietor of the Bluoz blog, recently posted a slew of eviction notices, going back several years; and man, it ain't pretty. Knives, fistfights, spitting, floods and fires, a cleaver, an abandoned dog, ripped-up smoke alarms, garbage-hoarders, broken limbs, choking with a telephone cable, stabbings, and (most shockingly) hateful comments......

See this picture? Well, it's supposed to be of a grey Ford Taurus taken by our camera phone, but as you can see, it didn't come out. What this picture is supposed to show is the license plate # of a car with two people in it who, while stuck in traffic on 6th street, rolled down the window and dumped off the entire contents of some fast food trash onto the street. Right there. In plain day light. Just like that. Seriously, what the f---? What the hell makes somebody think that's right? Don't they know that Woodsy the Owl says they should give a hoot and don't pollute? ...

We (sort of) hate to say "we told you so," but it looks like our obsession with the Sunnyside Neighborhood Association's focus on trash cans was just the tip of the iceberg on the garbage can tip. At the August 6th meeting of the SNA, which we regretfully were unable to attend due to a prior commitment (sorry, mariconsoy), details were outlined for trash can offenders. Residents across the city, not just in the......

Tonight at City Hall, three men are being honored for 1) attacking an attacker, 2) chasing said attacker, and 3) coming to the aid of the attacked. Remember in May when a teenage girl was randomly attacked with a knife in a bakery by some loser who got out of San Quentin the day before? Well, that happened in our part of the city, where not much usually happens. Have you ever heard of Miraloma......

-- Bill Walsh dies. [Chron, Examiner, KGO] -- Tom Snyder dies. [Chron] -- Matt Gonzalez's chance at becoming SF Mayor dies. [Chron, KGO] -- Dog pimps FlexPetz to open SF brothel. (In related news, pets are neither toys nor furniture.) [Tampa Bay's 10] -- Ed Jew’s trial continues. [Chron] -- Caltrans closes parts of the 101 from midnight to 5 a.m. starting tonight until 8/3. [KRON4] -- East Bay's garbage picked up. [KPIX]......

And now for a little garbage-related news this side of the bridge: While others are pushing their dust-covered garbage cans back out onto the curb east of One Rincon, those of us west of Balboa Park are having our hands slapped for keeping ours out too long. Seems like the folks actually participating in the Sunnyside Neighborhood Association are fed up with the offensive vision of unhidden trash bins on their streets. According to......

-- Ed Jew preliminary. [Chron] -- SFPD station receives a car holding a dead body inside. [Examiner] -- Bring out your garbage cans! [KRON4] -- UN Chief Ban Ki-moon comes to SF. [Washington Post] -- Firefighters mourned. [Chron] -- Copyright fingerprinting at YouTube? [Inside Bay Area] -- Scott Beale's got iFilm's coverage of Comic-Con 2007, Henry Rollins' earnestness. [Laughing Squid] -- Nicole Ritchie gets four days in the clink. Boo. [Chron] -- We're (maybe,......

The Chron, giving you the news from the animal point of view! They settled the Alameda County garbage strike lockout! After a nine-hour mediation, Oakland mayor Ron Dellums announced late yesterday night that all the parties had managed to resolve the four-week dispute. No one can disclose the details, but the union will vote on whether to accept the proposal this Saturday. If the union approves the deal, regular garbage pickup could resume as early......

\ -- Poll: Should MUNI's 15-Third line rise from the dead? (Hint: Yes) [Examiner] -- San Francisco sheriff deputies accuse Sheriff Michael Hennessey of gender discrimination. [BAR] -- Father won't be charged with the death of his 11-month-old son. [Chron] -- Bonds calls out Costas' severe Munchkin-ness. [NFL Scores] -- SFPD officer hurt while directing traffic. Ouch. [KGO, KRON] -- Arf: another coyote dies in Golden Gate Park. [KPIX] -- Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums wishes......

You've heard mythic tales about her heroism told in hushed tones around the campfire, you've read about her, you may very well have dreamed about her. Now see her rampage in all of its technicolor glory! Yesterday, Garbage Lady (AKA Dolly Paez) took matters into her own hands -- lockout be damned! -- as she dragged her and her neighbors' bubbling-over, maggot-y refuse into the street in front of passing garbage trucks. Brava, Dolly. (Thanks......

-- Thousands -- thousands!! -- without power because of small rainfall. Sheesh. [KPIX] -- The Giants are best for bear bottoms: Cubs wipe up with us, 12-1. [the Chron] -- Bay Guardian dislikes big, corporate-chain retail stores? You don't say. [SFBG] -- Matt Stroud's final, fatal post at SF Weekly. [SFist] -- Transbay tube retrofit delayed. [the Chron, KGO] -- Alameda County woman loses her shit over garbage lockout; Darya Folsom excitedly watches on.......

An Alameda County judge has ordered Waste Management to start picking up the garbage again. The City of Oakland, who filed suit, says they're gratified by the ruling, since this means, you know, the garbage will get picked up. Waste Management says this doesn't mean anything because they were picking up the garbage already anyways. This doesn't end the lockout, though (the judge didn't have the authority to do that), so Waste Management says they're......

You mean those train tracks are actually used by real trains? The City of Berkeley is working to implement a quiet zone to prevent the freight trains from sounding their whistles at intersections due to complaints from residents of this traditionally industrial area. While we find train horns romantic, we must admit that we might find them less so if they were not so off-in-the-distance. Though we wonder why the City didn't make the developers......

-- Whole Foods might be in a whole mess of trouble. Federal regulators look over seven years worth of (not-so) anonymous, ethically-questionable financial site postings made by chief executive John Mackey, who apparently has never heard of an IP address. Dumbass. [AP via SF Gate] -- Elderly man shoots garbage truck because of the union lockout. But probably more so because of the sundry of shitty smells, senility. [KTVU] -- Tim Goodman talks about......

Confirming what we heard yesterday, quote-unquote "District 4" Supervisor Ed Jew, along with Michela Alioto-Pier and Jake McGoldrick, showed up for yesterday's committee hearing to find out who exactly took those 300 trash cans off the streets of San Francisco. (Turns out it was DPW, who just went ahead and did it without telling anyone first.) So it turns out part of the reason why they took those 300 trash cans off the street was......

Today's news in refuse: Over in the East Bay, the city of Oakland's filed suit against Waste Management, the garbage company that's locked out the local workers for 11 days now, and is letting trash pile up all over Alameda County. The city wants a 90-day cooldown period where the union workers can work and they can talk about the contract; the company says they've already hired new people and everything is fine. Meanwhile, the......

-- Using the garbage and junk-drawer debris from oh-my-God real-life celebrities (!), crafty artist Jason Mercier creates jaw-dropping portraits of A- through D-list notables, which range from Parker Posey to Heidi Fleiss. Celebrity Junk Drawer opens tonight starting at 9 p.m. at 111 Minna Galley (at Second St.); admission is free. -- Dance, get trashed, shove something up your nose in the bathroom, shove something up, um, somewhere elsewhere in the bathroom, have a......

--East Bay garbage workers still locked out. [The Trib, the Chron, KTVU, CBS 5] --White supremacists keep writing the SF Weekly about popular SFist topic Harmon Leon's story from two years ago. [The Snitch.] --Chris Daly feeds the trolls. [Daly Blog comments] --65-year-old man walking home in North Beach at 11 p.m. shot in a failed robbery. [Chron.] --They arrested someone in the Dolores Park fireworks fiasco -- they don't have enough evidence to......

Just some random news items on the wire: There was a three-alarm fire at Thurgood Marshall Alternative High in the Bayview this afternoon. School's out for the summer, so there weren't any students around, and the authorities think the fire was started by roofers working with tar. Some unscreened yutz snuck into Terminal 1 (the non-Southwest one) at Oakland Airport this morning, necessitating a two-hour search of the entire place as TSA tried in vain......

The Chron has the goods on Mr. Jew's lawyers' 138-page response to City Attorney Dennis Herrera's initiation of proceedings to remove Mr. Jew from his board of supes post. In a nutshell, Tapioca Ed's team is claiming that he kept part-time residence in his Sunset house, and slept there with "increasing frequency." ...

The "!" is because we've been out of town and we're so, so excited to be back. So, it looks like folks are settling nicely into the new comments system. While we appreciate those of you making "guest" comments as well, we especially appreciate those of you that are taking the time to register. The Top 5 for last week were:...

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......

Last week's winner, the Bay Guardian! Oh, Tim Redmond, we're so sorry to hear about your dad. [Moment of silence.] Okay. The Guardian's with Daly on the budget. They got a letter from someone saying Ed Jew is innocent. More info on the layoffs at the Merc News. A man with psychiatric problems gets no help from the city. More people upset with Newsom's proposed budget. They're going to crack down on pot clubs --......

Hey, why is Gavin Newsom's face pasted onto an Oscar the Grouch body in that graphic? Because he's taken over 300 trash cans off the streets. Why? Because they had too much garbage in them. We know! It's nutty! Newsom, in his defense, says that SF has more garbage cans than any other comparable city, and he thinks people are using them to throw away personal or commercial trash instead of signing up for garbage......

Photo of an overwhelmed garbage can with news of fewer cans in S.F. than before. ...