Wow, almost everything we've posted today on SFist (except for SFist Tonight) is transportation-themed. Well, we're sorry to have to continue the trend with this news item: there's been a bad accident on 101 near Redwood City, involving a big rig that hit the center divide and burst into flames. What's going on with all these trucks combusting around here these days? One report said that the cab of the big rig exploded with the......

--Civic Center's SFMike reports on a Hayes Valley-themed mini-golf public art installation. That's the eponymous Mr. Hayes (not Rutherford B., but another guy named Thomas) to your right. --Gavin's now all pretending he meant for Theresa Sparks to get on the Police Commission after all. --The Merc News names its top five area Venture Capitalists under 40. --The KFOG KaBoom fest sounded like fun last night. --Pat Murphy shares his tips on keeping maggots out......

Up to eleven people have been seriously injured this afternoon by a man driving around town, deliberately running over pedestrians. At least one person is dead. Among other things: this is not going to help our stats for this year's Walk SF numbers at all. The police caught a driver in a black Honda SUV in Laurel Heights, at Laurel and California Streets, where he'd hit two people (one who died). A child was also......

Shoppers trying to enjoy the a/c at the Oakridge Mall in San Jose on Sunday afternoon got less cool air than they were hoping for when the straining mall transformer outside the movie theater blew up. Witnesses reported seeing the lights flicker, hearing a huge boom, and then seeing sparks. In light of the panic and lack of power for the mall, Oakridge threw up its hands and decided just to close for the rest......

Last week, San Jose newspaper publishing company Knight-Ridder was purchased by another company, McClatchy. McClatchy then decided it didn't want to keep publishing the hometown newspaper of the company it had just purchased, the San Jose Mercury News, and put it up for sale. If the Merc News can't find a buyer, it may be forced to go under. The Merc News is a great paper putting out hard-hitting local journalism, and it would be a shame to see it go under. A couple of buyers have expressed interest, but readers and writers have expressed concerns that the interested parties will kill off the good qualities of the Merc. So the Merc News employees (and employees at other papers being sold off by McClatchy) are banding together -- they may try to buy the papers themselves. Also, the Merc News folks have launched a website, Save The Merc, to encourage a "news-friendly" organization to purchase the paper and keep high-quality journalism alive in the South Bay. It's not the best-designed website in the world, but the sincerity of the effort is totally real. Click here to lend your support to the Merc News journalists. ...

Last week's winner, the San Jose Metro. Phil Angelides made all his money in real estate. The Merc News gets in a screamy match with Baron Davis of the GSWarriors -- literally! Yay. Cover article: Muslim comedians (including this guy). Cirque du Soleil goes South Bay. Picture of Gillian Anderson looking like Madonna. And Straight Dope: can moms really lift cars off their children? Maybe. Next up, the SF Weekly. The editor's note re......