The word "Wednesday" is derived from the Middle English Wednesdei, which translates roughly to "the day the alt-weekly papers are released." (Look it up.) While you do that, we'll be here rounding up this week's batch of Must Reads, Funny Reads and Don't Bothers from the Bay Area's stalwart weekly papers.

SF Weekly

Worth Reading: On the cover, Lauren Smiley's This is Your City piece looks real pretty. By which we mean, the cover design is actually quite nice. The article itself - about the Housing Authority creating injunctions against specific San Franciscans to keep them off of SFHA property - is worth a read for the tragic story of Johnny Jackson, a homeless man who has done more than his share chivalrous handiwork around the Westside Courts housing projects. But after the warm fuzzies fade, there's the cold reminder that most of these injunctions are intended to banish residents responsible for robberies, gun possession, drug sales and shootings. So there's that.

There's also a little snippet from Peter Jamison about a now-sealed secret bunker in the Presidio. Like all off-limits areas in town, the bunker is riddled with graffiti and someone definitely held a renegade dinner party there.

Funny: Bouncer's Katy St. Clair enjoys Churchill, the new WWII-themed thing that sprouted at Church and Market, but she has a hard time figuring out how the "downtown professionals and people who listen to John Mayer" ended up in the neighborhood (Hint: you can blame the bro-chic email lists).

One can never be sure whether food critic Jonathan Kaufman is intentionally trying to be funny, but his review of two shabu-shabu joints in the Richmond and the Sunset expertly explains why we love swishing around meat in broth: "The new restaurants, almost all of which are owned by Chinese-Americans, pair a New World disrespect for tradition with America's love of all-you-can-eat." And that doesn't even mention the all-you-can-drink booze.

Don't Bother: "Why Everyone Wants Ed Lee to Run For Mayor", learn to loathe the lazy listicles.

sfbg071311.jpg SF Bay Guardian

Worth Reading: It's True Travel Tales week at the Guardian. We have no idea how they could afford to send all these writers off to exotic locales and a local weekly isn't where we'd normally turn for travel writing, but Couscous with Al Qaeda actually brings together those two genres (Alt Weeklies, Travel Writing) with an account of "a newly gay-married, half-Arab virtual drag queen nightlife columnist and a punk-rock Jewish leather enthusiast" eating their way through an Arab spring.

"Great Bay Escapes" is also a decent piece if you need a refresher on how to get out of the city in this fog-soaked July. Who knew there was an Alameda Booze District? You can even take a boat there like a real vacation.

And if you like reading about cocktail trends rather than just drinking them in, try Virginia Miller's "The toast of London" to get a grasp of what cocktail luminaries across the pond are shaking up. Perhaps you could read it while seated on a barstool at Churchill to get the full effect.

Funny: The two-wheeled, wide-eyed and hard-to-pronounce Bicicultura has Caitlin Donahue traveling to Buenos Aires where all the bike lanes are protected and they stretch as far as the eye can see. It's still winter in July there though.

"Foxy Brown's 1999 album Chyna Doll deserves a filthy-fun place in the summer jams pantheon." Just that sentence.

Don't Bother: What's going to happen now that State Parks are closed? The Weekly couldn't figure it out last week, and the Guardian can't figure it out this week. Instead of reading about it, why not go outside and enjoy those parks while you still can?

Like everyone else, SFBG Editor Tim Redmond says he's perfectly fine with seeing "South California" secede from the rest of the state. Later, Riverside!

ebx071311.jpg East Bay Express

Worth Reading: In "The Bay Area Gets Fracked", Robert Gammon investigates that chuckle-worthy name for natural gas drilling that could make your tap water flammable. Sorry, this has nothing to do with Battlestar Galactica, nerds.

Also did you know deer will eat pot plants? That's what we learned from the cover story "How Green is Your Pot?"

There's an iphone app that connects you to webcams inside of local bars. Ostensibly, that's so you can see if there are still any barstools left, but apparently some people don't like being on camera while drinking. Ellen Cushing investigates the privacy issues.

Funny: The Letters to the Editor make for some out-of-context reading this week. Watch as readers get pissy about Slow Foodies and the "hood credentials" of white rappers.

Don't Bother: In food, John Birdsall goes in search of tacos in Oakland. Spoiler Alert: Oakland has taco trucks. They serve more than tacos.