Hey -- we're not doing our usual light-hearted romp through the Swells society column this weekend, because we've got sad news. The doyenne of Swells, Catherine Bigelow, announced in this week's column that she's been asked to take the Chron's "voluntary buyout package," so this is it for your mathematically-inclined socialite review. Best of luck to you, C.Big, and we know you'll end up on your feet, tripping the light fantastic, and we hope you'll......

--No parking for your bulldozer? Just leave it on the beach. (Thanks to reader Joe, who sent this absolutely gorgeous postcard picture to us. GREETINGS FROM THE BULLDOZER!) --Another reader, Erin, was accosted by Recall Jake McGoldrick people, did some research, and found out the consultant group doing their outreach is based out of the Mission. --This link's for you, commenter Tin Man! (You know Swells By The Numbers always kicks off Sunday mornings!)......

Total number of people pictured in this week's Swells society column: 74. Total number of people pictured whom we recognize: 7 (after some deliberation, we decided not to include Steve Kawa because we didn't recognize him with his new haircut at all.) Minority count: 7 (9.5%). Number of pictures included in the minority count that are of Willie Brown: 4. Hats, capes, tiaras: 9, 0, 0. (SF Giants opening day skewed your hat stats a......

We've learned so much about mayoral communications director Peter Ragone from this article in the Sunday Chron! Since it's a Sunday (and there's no Swells today), we're naturally giving it the SFist By The Numbers treatment. Peter Ragone's generational suffix: III. Other Peter the Thirds we found in history include: a remarkably unpopular Russian tsar and a king of Portugal who married his own niece. Ragone's salary: $118,468. The article didn't say how much sick......

SFiS -- more than just SFist minus the T! We give the new glossy advertorial section of the Chronicle our patented By The Numbers treatment below. (Warning -- SFiS only appears in .pdf form so many, but not all, of the links featured here will require Adobe Acrobat.) Average cost of items promoted in SFiS (not including ads): $399.91. Number of Catherine Bigelow columns: 6. (new recaps of Gordon Getty's birthday party, the Red Tie......

There's no Swells society column today! Sad! So we're doing a Fake Question Time By The Numbers instead. Number of people in attendance: 200. Number of chickens: 6. Number of times Angela Alioto referred to "Bessie," a 94-year-old homeless woman she's befriended: 6. Number of questions Gavin collected: 2 inches of cards (We'd estimate maybe around 100). Number of questions Gavin read: About 10 (grouped into categories, except for our question, which he did not......

It's the annual Best Of post, the one post in the year where I get to use the first person singular! Hooray! From the Starbucks (not really a) bomber in January to the opening of the Daiso in December, it was certainly one heck of a year, wasn't it? There was BUSH TER DOWN; the Chron's series about police brutality getting upstaged by their misidentification of the cop in question; Kimberly Guilfoyle's new boyfriend,......

We got a sneak preview of the Jan. 2007 W Magazine article about the San Francisco social life of the Gettys and the Trainas that's referenced in this week's Swells society column. Of course we're giving it the trademarked SFist Society By The Numbers treatment! The article's not online but you should be able to buy it on the newsstands by next week. The number of ramekins Ann Getty is filling with souffle batter for......

It's the last weekend before.... the District 6 election! This week's episode: Everybody Hates The Final Push. --Bar crawl with Chris Daly and the League of Pissed Off Voters tonight, on a party bus. Show up at 9 p.m. outside Daly HQ on 16th and Mission to decorate the bus (!!!), and the group leaves around 9:30 for a tour of the best drinking holes in District 6. There'll be some leaflet distribution, a fair......

Total number of people pictured in this week's Swells society column: 61. Number of people pictured whose names we recognize: 8 (including 2 mayors (Gavin twice) and Manolo Blahnik). Minority count: 6 (approx. 10%). Hats, capes, tiaras: 2, 0, 0. Getty v. Traina: 3-0 (all Newsoms). Gavin -- gelled vs. non-gelled: 1-1 (plus a non-gelled picture in Matier and Ross). Number of mohawks: 1. Number of trumpets: 1. Number of Wilkes Bashford stores in the......

It's our column about the District 6 election! This week's episode: Everybody Hates The Numbers. The Chron's finally paying attention to the Board of Supes races -- choosing to kick off its "we profile the candidates" series with the "South American country" that we call District 6. (they call the district South American because of the great disparity between poor and rich, and not just because of the tasty Peruvian restaurants on Mission Street.) As......

There are a couple of unusual spikes on this week's live concerts chart, with Sunday and Tuesday giving the weekend nights a run for their money. Tuesday can't come soon enough because we've got tickets to Eisley on the release date of their debut record Room Noises! See what the buzz is about after the jump. Tonight marks the kickoff of the 6th Annual San Francisco Bluegrass and Old-Time Festival, which runs through February 13th.......