Before last night's much more important Zombie Attack, there was some sort of mayoral debate at some bookish building. A debate consisting of Mayor Gavin Newsom, possible contender Quintin Mecke, and slew of other candidates who, more or less, sold their remaining integrity and ethics for a shot at "local personality" status. Well, congrats: you're all winners, then. more ›

-- Clueless and Mean Girls: Jane Austin's Emma interpreted via a mid-'90s Beverly Hills screens first, starring Paul Rudd (Eee!) and a pre-PETA Alicia Silverstone. Tina Fey's ode to high school bitches follows, starring a pre-coked out Lindsey Lohan. Starts at 7:30 p.m. at the Bridge Theater, 3010 Geary (at Blake); $7. more ›

In a shameless bit of self-reference, we will announce that it's our birthday, and we have therefore been the happy recipient of more than one Amazon gift certificate over the course of the day. We're not the kind of a**hole who complains about a gift (shut up, we're not!), but we did have a moment of crisis: how do we reconcile our sincere and public support of our fine local independent bookstores with the use of these GCs? One option is to duck the book issue and treat ourselves to that ice cream maker we've always wanted, but we know ourselves too well -- despite our best intentions it'll end up on the shelf next to our waffle maker and George Foreman grill. Then, we remembered commenter Karen, who reminded us that independent bookstore purchases can be made by choosing the "Used and New" option. Thanks, Karen, for solving our dilemma! SFist commenters are the best! more ›