Jeff Stone, a supervisor from Riverside County is calling for 12 counties to join his own in seceding from the state of California. According to CBS Los Angeles, Stone wants San Diego county, Orange County and much of the Central Valley to band together to form "South California". The new state, he says, would allow lawmakers like himself to focus on issues important to the Southerns. Things like securing the borders, lowering taxes, and loosening the stranglehold of special interest groups on the Legislature. Unfortunately, Stone's proposal would still leave us San Franciscans stuck with the Angelenos in the remaining state of California. more ›

A moderate earthquake rattled greater Los Angeles for 10 to 15 seconds last evening around 8:40 p.m., and it was felt as far south as San Diego. No major damage has been reported, but at least one person went to the hospital. Our bros at LAist registered a few aftershocks and link to a pic of some broken glass at a Starbucks. more ›

Surely looking to turn us all into latter-career, Catalina-vacationing Natalie Woods, it looks like the rain will fall down (and wake our dreams) and won't stop until god knows when. Flooding, high winds, high tides, airport delays, glacial weather, and mass hysteria are all expected to bring us some mid-winter cheer. more ›

Serialized gem / siren song Tales of the City drew many folks to SF. Well, it brought us here, anyway. And the character of Mary Ann Singleton acted as a temporary stand-in until many of us arrived. To wit: more ›

We're not sure if we should be scared or skeptical here, folks -- first, the alleged terror cell in Lodi (terror cell! Terror! But the administration's record? Skeptical!) and now, Amtrak service and the Richmond-SF BART line have been shut down. So a man of Middle Eastern descent got on the Amtrak this morning in Sacto, going to Martinez. When he missed his stop, the conductor came by at the Richmond stop to let him know, and found him disoriented, distracted, and chanting in a foreign language. He became angry, identified himself as a Muslim and said, "The train is going to fall into the sea, the train is going to go away." The conductors did a search of the train and found four mysterious packages, one by the angry man's seat. The man was taken away by the Richmond PD, and the Walnut Creek bomb squad is "assessing its options" with the packages. Amtrak found that the man had another ticket going all the way to So Cal. So -- scared or skeptical? We're just going to rock back and forth in a liberal-who's-been-mugged dither of self-doubt now, thanks for asking. Picture of the Richmond Amtrak station from The Bus Stops Here more ›