Ready, aim.... and look out for firebugs this Saturday at the Noe Valley Farmers Market, as the Neighborhood Emergency Response Team (NERT) and the SF Fire Department highlight this month's safety theme, "Light My Fire And Put It Out Safely Month." (that's an theme.)

So along with your organic oranges and leafy greens, reps from the fire department will be setting fires in the parking lot and inviting local residents to put them out. You're encouraged to bring your home fire extinguisher so you can practice using it too. We're so intrigued by this combination of "what a great idea!" and "what a terrible idea!" that this represents that we've gotta check this out.

NERT runs free disaster-prep training classes throughout the city and works with neighborhood groups to coordinate emergency plans. For instance, NERT, working with the Noe Valley groups, learned that their plans to use the James Lick Middle School parking lot as their post-disaster staging area was in conflict with the school's plans to use that same parking lot to gather students. It may not matter, though, because both NERT and the school then subsequently learned that city experts are saying that the parking lot's retaining wall may collapse in an earthquake anyways. Note to self: don't go into the James Lick parking lot after an earthquake.

awesome