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......

Just what San Francisco really needs – renovated horse stables in Golden Gate Park! That's right. Proposition G, if passed, would raise $750,000 towards revitalizing the existing dilapidated stables. Proponents of the prop claim that this is all for the youth of San Francisco. Well, they must be thinking about little Spencer and Avery of St. Francis Wood, cuz we're pretty sure that the kids who go to John Muir Elementary in Western Addition......

Well, all of San Francisco politics is trivial, isn't it? Get that confirmed at tonight's 4th Annual Political Trivia Contest, featuring Chris "Whiskers" Daly, Ross Mirkarimi, and Jake McGoldrick, at a benefit for the John Muir PTA, for a spelling bee for the Western Addition. Categories of questions include: "Streets (and Transportation) of San Francisco," "Interesting Characters of San Francisco," and, in a bracing slap of reality, "Only Trivia That A Policy Wonk Would......

--C.W. Nevius informs us that politicians say the darndest things on camera. --Barry Bonds's biggest fan feels like he's getting ripped off. He's now becoming AZ Diamondback Brandon Webb's biggest fan. --They're putting WiFi on AC Transits. --SF Board of Supervisors prez Aaron Peskin is hiking the John Muir Trail. --A blind pedestrian has a run-in with Critical Mass. --A reply-all screwup plunges the Fremont Union school district (for Cupertino, Sunnyvale, and San Jose) into......

Some time ago, we met Steve Ford, who, among other things pulls a great shot of espresso. We met him during his tenure with the stalkerriffic Blue Bottle Coffee Company; since our encounter, he's moved onto another coffee-related venture as a roaster at Ecco Caffe in Santa Rosa. Steve recently had a not-so-pleasant experience--he fell out the third-story window of the Burlington Hotel in Port Costa, Calif. ...

Tonight: We're running just down the street to Borders Books and Music (200 King Street at 3rd) for Making It: Writers on the Verge. Brought to us by our pals at Friends of the SF Public Library this event features Beth Lisick, Michelle Tea, and Stephen Elliott with moderator Oscar Villalon (SF Chronicle book editor) discussing how they started out and how they sustain their work. And it's free! Saturday: We're headed down to......

We are getting very psyched up as the annual Stern Grove festival opens next Sunday. Every city in the world can offer free live entertainment, but only SF can do it with such spectacular backdrops. Fireworks, shmireworks, we say, unless we have the bay in the background. Bike races are boring, they run in circles, unless they follow the course of the Bullit car race. And summer concerts are just not the same when......

Bay Area crime roundup...