Via R.G.: "Not that anyone needs an excuse to hate Phillies fans, but I was at a sports bar having dinner with some coworkers in fisherman's wharf today and a group of phillies fans received a dime back as change for their bill. One of the ladies in the group puts the dime in her pocket and pulls out a penny to leave as a tip. YEAH, A PENNY! Real classy lady, real classy." more ›

Nicole Atkins starts this week off strong with some soulful tunes from the Jersey shore over at The Independent, starting at 8pm. She's crazy-cool and has a voice of gold. If you're more of a rocker, than get to Cafe du Nord early to see Cold Hot Crash and Filter play. It looks like the only way you can buy tickets is at the door and there's not too many of them. A Fine Frenzy, an alternative singer-songwriter and pianist headlines at Cafe du Nord on Tuesday night. She'll be supported by the talented Ferras and the English rock band, Ben's Brother. Again, get there early, the only way you'll get tickets is at the door. more ›

href="http://londonist.com/2008/01/6_years_on_amne.php">Amnesty International bringing Guantanamo Bay to the American embassy to raise the profile of the continuing campaign to close the detention center.

• SFist saw Christmas Day turn tragic after a Siberian tiger escaped from her pen at the San Francisco Zoo, killing a visitor and mauling two others.
• Phillyist counted down the top ten items on Philadelphia's New Year's wish list.
• Gothamist looked at the wooden bikes being offered for NYC's first bike share program on Governors Island.

Recently we featured The Kin in the weekly music column, New Tunes Tuesday #4. We did this for a reason - they've recently become one of my favorite bands. Just as we were impressed when we saw them for the first time at World Cafe Live in Philadelphia in June, we were equally impressed with their West Coast debut performance this week at The Independent. Instantly the audience responded positively to the well-blended vocals,... more ›

Happy first weekend of September - and happy Labor Day weekend, too, for our American cities! Let's take a look at what's been happening around the Ist-a-verse. more ›

Hey, all you singles in San Francisco/Oakland, looks like you live in the right place. Our fair city was tops in Forbes 7th Annual Best Cities for Singles Report. more ›

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. more ›

Phillyist Jill (who compiles half of those Week Around The Ists posts for all of us in the Gothamist network) sends along some info about a nationwide memoir contest that they're sponsoring out of Philadelphia -- so those of you frustrated (or successful!) This American Life aspirants, start mining your childhood for poignantly-insightful anecdotes! more ›

And the layoffs begin -- a source tells us the first person to be let go from the Chronicle in their 25% reduction-in-staff campaign is managing editor Robert "Rosey" Rosenthal. We got the news confirmed by Friend of SFist and Chron Blogging/Interactive Editor Eve Batey, who says: more ›

Spring is when we get busy here in the Ist-A-Verse. Very busy. But, after staying bundled-up indoors all winter, it's nice for us to be out, about, and collecting things to write about for you. Here's a glimpse at what's been keeping your favorite citybloggers busily away from home and out of bed. more ›

As a Vans salesman recently told us, "Yo, Sis, this is fresh!" Maybe so. more ›

It seems like, all across the network, folks were up to no good. Maybe it was all the green beer from last weekend... more ›

LA's The Love Movement, an art collective whose members are recent Philadelphia transplants, are changing the world with love and art—not in a hippy way, but in a hip way. They are wise beyond their years but fresh and innocent at the same time. They recently bought a well in West Africa, and Integrity Fashions had a piece of their artwork printed on t-shirts to draw awareness to the genocide in Darfur. Add them on MySpace to be part of the love and to stay updated on their latest projects. The Love Movement are having an art show called "Love Conquers All," a collaboration with the Love Bandits, on Saturday night at the fabulous Space Gallery, and they will be giving away free art. They invite you to come and "share the love." more ›

Not one to be one-upped in the banning department, California is now considering a ban on trans fats just like New York, Philadelphia and Denmark (Yes the entire country. Those Scandinavians are such goody-two-shoes.) Some cities in California have already taken it upon themselves to ban trans fats including –yes- America’s first Trans Fat Free City, our own Tiburon, California. Sure, the annual income of Tiburon residents is probably equal to a small country’s GNP, but at least they’re doing good with all their money and bay view homes. more ›

-A woman's car breaking down caused a huge chain of events leading to her death and three hours worth of traffic on the upper deck of the Bay Bridge. -Where oh where did the snow go? more ›

In our latest episode, we examine the weaknesses that led to the exit of each franchise that was tossed from the playoffs last wknd. Going into last wknd’s action, there were no “complete” teams left – only those who had outweighed their weaknesses enough to advance to the NFL’s Divisional Playoff Round. more ›

We're coming to you live, from Philadelphia as we write this from SFist's Philadelphia bureau. -Aaron Peskin is doing a heckuva job. more ›

Cultural Learnings of Blogosphere for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of -Ist-a-verse more ›

On Tuesday, the American -ists will be celebrating democracy and hitting the polls, letting politicians know what they really think. It just made us wonder: if it were up to the -ist-a-verse, what would we be voting for? more ›

Quick note on todays ALCS game-- the game is scheduled to start around 1:30 PST. The reason MLB is giving is because it's supposed to, yes, snow late Friday night and they'd like to get the game in before winter hits. The not quite said reason is because the Mets/Cardinals have to make up their rained out Game 1 and Fox would rather show the Mets/Cardinals game in prime time than the A's/Tigers game. more ›

It's Week Three of the National Football League's 2006 regular season. Here's what happening with your Niners and Raiders. more ›

Locally, the big news was the second best blog party last Friday thrown by TechCrunch down in Menlo Park. Scott Beale was commissioned to take the photos, including the one above featuring an uneasy handshake between Valleywag's Nick Douglas (left) and his favorite whipping boy, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington. Nick had been bumped off the exclusive invite list, but Michel must have relented. If he had been dis-invited, apparently crashing the party was not an option. more ›

So with the passing of the trade deadline, we have the answer to this weekends' big Giants' question-- wave the white flag or go for it. We're going for it. Unfortunately, we're going for it with the same team that is currently enjoying an eight-game losing streak. So unless Sabaen can somehow pull off a Benitez for A-Rod trade (Sabes?) , the question out there is what if anything can the Giants do to get off the schneid? Well, here's something to ponder, something that for whatever reason isn't really being discussed even though it should, and here it is; Fire Felipe. Like right now before it's too late. more ›

Is everyone sitting down? And yes we realize that's a stupid question considering that you're all reading this at the computer so of course you're sitting down, but run with it. Anyways, we have some big, big news to relate to you: SF has been chosen to represent the U.S. for the 2016 Olympics! Or at least, that's what all the headlines say. The reality is that we're merely still in the running along with LA and Chicago as Houston and Philadelphia were dropped from consideration. Wah...wah...sucks to be you. more ›

This morning while drinking our coffee and surfing the Web, we went to Deadspin and saw this little blurb about Giants' fans treatment of Phillies pitcher Brett Myers. Myers was cited for taking a few swings at his wife and in typical jock-land style, was treated by kid gloves by his employers and the rest of Major League Baseball. Yesterday was Myers first day back from his tiny, tiny suspension and we guess didn't get booed vociferously enough for some people. Thus the Deadspin post, snarking on us Giants. That's followed by the usual snide comments about hippies, overwrought political correctness, and too many lame-ass corporate fans. more ›

Sometimes you need to clean yourself up, get serious, and move in with daddie for a few months before you head to Latin America for a new gig. The District bids Jenna Bush adios. D.C.-based television shows have an elderly audience and DCist has some suggestions to fix that. They're also throwing Butterstick the panda bear a birthday bash. more ›

We're going to talk about something we rarely talk about-- hockey. Why? Because the San Jose Sharks are now up 2-0 against the Edmonton Oilers in the second round of the playoffs, after winning last night 2-1. The Sharks, who have won six playoff games in a row, won on a game winning goal by MVP candidate Joe Thorton (check out the great video of it from a fan in the stands). Then there's how they did it, winning last night's game despite, incredibly, being down two players in a 5-3 matchup, only to have two of those players lose their sticks, and still-- somehow, inexplicably-- kept the Oilers from scoring for over a minute. That's studly. Even better is the fact that in describing the whole thing, Sharks coach Brian Wilson referenced the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. How can you not give some props to a Monty Python quoting coach? more ›

Remember how bummed we all were when it was decided San Francisco would not be the city representing the U.S. for 2012 Olympic bids? Well, cheer up campers 'cause we're on the short list to be the bid city for the 2016 Olympics. Sometime this month, delegates will visit the city to check it out and gauge our interest and ability to host the Olympiad more ›

It looks like Bud Selig's Barry Bonds voodoo doll is working as last night, before the Giants 2-0 victory over the Brewers, Barry was bonked on the head by a foul ball in batting practice. After all, having Barry hit 715 in the Home of Bud would be the worst possible PR debacle, not to mention total karma. The ball was hit by rookie Kevin Fransden, already making a name for himself with his bone-headed base-running blunders and propensity for being hit by pitches, who joked that he was expecting his locker to be cleared out after batting practice was over. The whole thing was so weird and out-of-nowhere that nobody reacted or did anything until Barry went down on the ground and was treated by the Giants' trainers. more ›