Everyone seems to describe spoken word artist and writer/poet Beth Lisick as "fizzy" -- but she really is! City Lights was packed to the gills with Missionistas who walked up Columbus from the Montgomery BART/MUNI stop, eager to send Ms. Lisick off in style for the first stop on her book tour. City Lights generously sprung for champagne, wine, and focaccia, but we were too worried about losing our seat (which we'd cleverly selected in the exact center of the room) to actually get any.

Beth Lisick's new book, , is a collection of personal essays from childhood to 16th and Mission and onto motherhood, about "turning out too weird to fit into the mainstream world... but being too normal for the fringe." So, you know, essays about diligently attempting to be bisexual, the humiliation of SuperShuttle dropping you off on a crack block, dressing up like a banana for the Fruit Guys -- you know, living in San Francisco. It got an A from Entertainment Weekly!

What it was like writing The Buzz Life SFGate column, after the jump.

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