We are forever amused by our good old pal Zennie, and his many rants and antics in his role as a City Brights vlogger on SFGate. In an effort to find something to do and/or vlog about during his holiday sojourn to his hometown of the south side of Chicago, Zennie discovers the movie Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, and decides to take a long awaited pilgrimage to an actual White Castle. Cue some dizzying camerawork and a lot of repeated chuckles about "burger heaven" and "that's what I'm talkin about." more ›

-- Sweetie and Love is Chemicals (image to the left): Hear rock and melodic ditties in the Mission with these two “sugary, pop” outfits. Show starts at 10 p.m. at the Knockout, 3223 Mission; $10 more ›

Anyone been to the Cerrito Speakeasy Theater in El Cerrito yet? The Cerrito is the sister theater to the fabulous Parkway Theater in Oakland and opened this past November. more ›

Your mainstream release pick: The Namesake. The saga of a family that journeys from homeland India to wintry New York, Mira Nair’s newest film is based on the titular bestseller by Jhumpa Lahiri and features Kal Penn (Kumar from Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle), Jacinta Barrett and Indian singer/actress Tabu. It’s a beautiful and sensitive look at identity in the context of a cross-cultural family. Nair’s known for bringing insight to her subject matter and this movie appears to be no different more ›

>-Berkeley loves them some traffic circles. more ›

Before we get started this week, we have to break from a completely reporter, "these are the blogs that were" voice to the voice of an actual food blogger. Someone with very exciting, very bad for you, very guilty pleasure type news. The type that can get you into drunken, one-in-the-morning type trouble. "Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle" type trouble. When we first moved to the Bay Area In 'N Out burger joints were still a rarity. In the past few years they've been dotting up more and more, which we love. Barney's is great and all, but sometimes you don't need 1/3 a pound of meat, sometimes you just need a double-double animal style. And there's the key: animal style. Now, for those of you who don't know animal style, don't feel so bad, it's not not on their menu. (A point Mighty Foods talks about in regards to Jamba Juice. This website goes into more detail on In 'N Out's items.) But, like Mr. Pibb and Red Vines, animal style is crazy delicious. Animal style burgers come with lettuce, tomato, extra spread, pickles, grilled onions, and mustard fried into the patty. Now, here's the kicker --which close readers of that last link will have no doubt already picked up on: You can get animal style applied to your fries. You don't get pickle and mustard, but you do get cheese, grilled onions and extra of the secret sauce. We can't recommend animal style fries highly enough. Everything that is bad and bad for you, but tastes so right. They will be the best fries you've ever eaten. Even better than the garlic fries down at the ballpark. (Which suckafree doesn't like anyways.) Go, go now, and feel the power of the dark side. more ›