We complain a lot about San Francisco -- MUNI is a disaster, the homeless guy down the street left his post-digested lunch on our doorstep again, our bicyclists are psychopaths, our supervisors accept big bags of cash from businessmen and the paper doesn't mention that, um, taking big bags of cash is downright weird. You name it, we'll bitch about it, sometimes to the point of distraction.

Sometimes it takes an outside perspective to remind us of the good things. Today's kick in the head comes from Jonathan Zwickel at The Stranger's Slog blog, where he writes about his first-ever latest Bay to Breakers last weekend:

"Bay to Breakers is the most grand expression of civic pride I've ever been a part of. Bands and DJs rock out on street corners, mobile soundsystems cruise the streets, elaborate floats are built and pushed to accommodate bars, kegs, beer pong, dance floors. There are no spectators. Everybody walks, runs, or rolls. You reach the top of Alamo Square--the halfway point, and the only hill on the course--and look down from the peak. In both directions, thousands of people of all stripes are celebrating life for the best of all reasons: Because it's there."

Thanks for reminding us how great it can be to live here, Jonathan! That was a hell of a time this weekend, wasn't it?

Photo from Slog, The Stranger's Blog -- check out the entry for a bunch of great photos.

SFist Dan found this while fooling around today and thought it nicely captured his sentiments about our fair city