Daredevil Marketing 3

After that close call, the crowd adrenaline started racing...



...but there were no further mishaps...



...and the last skydiver landed...



...with a barrage of balloons and confetti.



The security guys lifted their ribbons and the crowd was invited to meet the skydivers...



...and pose for pictures with them.



The Elvis costumed daredevil was a particular favorite.



I asked a female skydiver if the experience around the Embarcadero 4 building had been as hairy as it looked from the ground, and she nodded yes. "The wind currents up there were crazy."



In order to keep the marketing initiative alive all afternoon, T-Mobile sent out legions of people to "perform" in bright green T-shirts downtown...



...including this woman doing yoga in front of the naked mechanics statue at Market and Battery.

Sunday Crash

On Sunday afternoon, there was a crashing sound outside our apartment at McAllister and Franklin Streets in front of the San Francisco Unified School District headquarters.



It seems that Muni streetcar drivers are not the only serious menaces on local roads and rails.



A thin young man who looked like he hadn't been getting enough sleep somehow managed to sideswipe the parked car above and then plow into the parked van below, knocking it onto the sidewalk.



Be careful out there.

The Empresses' Old Clothes

Large, sparkly dresses have appeared on Hayes Street near the corner of Gough...



...in the space where the Hayes & Kebab restaurant used to be.



The store is only open for the month of August, and is designed to empty out the closets of various Empresses of San Francisco...



...led by the legendary Marlena (above) who owns the eponymous drag queen bar a half block away on Hayes Street.



The store is a wonderland, and the prices are recession specials...



...with fancy pairs of shoes going for $10.



The customers seem to be evenly divided between men and women, and it was amusing to hear the woman above lament not being able to fit into the slinky, fur-lined dress which was designed for somebody who was well over six feet tall.



"I'm having a ball with this," Marlena said. "People find their own treasures, and it makes them so happy that it makes my day."

In Solidarity with the People of Iran

About 10,000 people filled Civic Center Plaza last Saturday, July 25th to demonstrate their support for the people of Iran who are dealing with what appears to be a stolen presidential election and the autocratic rule of its religious authorities. This was one of hundreds of rallies held in cities around the world, mostly led by Iranian exiles who are making it very clear that they are not looking for any military action by the United States or anybody else.



Iran's civilization is one of the oldest continuous cultures in the world (about 7,000 B.C.), and because of its geographical location, it is no stranger to invasions, wars, and geopolitical struggles. The 19th Century was when they were raped by Russia and Britain, culminating in the country's occupation by those powers during both World War One and Two.



Its more current tormentors have been the United States in conjunction with Britain, who deposed the popular prime minister Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953 because he nationalized the Iranian oil fields. He was replaced by the reinstated Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was thrown out of the country during a popular revolution in 1978. This was followed by the twin disasters of Ayatollah Khomeini and his theocratic government, and the attack by Iraq's Saddam Hussein which initiated an eight-year war (1980-1988) that killed over a million Iranian citizens, many of them with American-supplied chemical weapons.



Currently complicating matters are the presence of bellicose politicians in Israel and their allies in the United States who believe it's fine to have "unacknowledged" nuclear weapons in Israel but it would somehow be a disaster in Iran. Their public threats have been sounding more lunatic all the time. Iran is also the epicenter of two cursed but god-given resources, oil and opium poppies, that are the lifeblood of far too many powerful interests in the world, both legitimate (such as the CIA) and criminal. I pray for their safety.