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Feature

Rewarding Failure

What's really wrong with Muni? For starters, one third of its employees don't show up to work, causing systemwide delays and costing the agency more that $20 million a year in overtime. First in a two-part special report

By Peter Byrne

Published: December 2, 1998

In mass transit, beauty is being on-time, and being on-time is beauty. And that is all you need to know to understand why San Franciscans hate the Municipal Railway. Hating Muni has become a...

News

Dog Bites

By Laurel Wellman

Published: December 2, 1998

The Miracle Whip of the Web? Apparently imbued with the warmth of the incipient festive season, Mission revolutionary Nestor Makhno called to wish us a happy Thanksgiving. "You get some...

Letters

Letters

Published: December 2, 1998

But You Did Read It, Didn't You? I read with amazement the cover story "Trophy Boys" (Nov. 18). The only reason that I kept reading the story was to see how much more inept and boring it could...

News

Wages of Vice

Police find a way to make money by busting massage parlors

By Renata Huang

Published: December 2, 1998

Cynthia Hammond dropped by the Tenderloin massage parlor where she once worked about three weeks ago, figuring to retrieve an old pair of bluejeans. Business was slow, so Hammond took time to catch...

Music

Riff Raff

By Mark Athitakis, Silke Tudor, Johnny DiPaola

Published: December 2, 1998

People Who Lived When Jim Carroll -- poet, rocker, and recovered heroin junkie -- played the Great American Music Hall last month, he took a few moments to talk about his experiences in the Bay...

Music

House of Tudor

By Silke Tudor

Published: December 2, 1998

It's easy see how Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire has benefited from the Squirrel Nut Zippers' style and fame: Zippers guitarist James Mathus and leading femme Katherine Whalen both play a substantial...

Music

Hear This

By Sam Prestianni

Published: December 2, 1998

Pamela Z Vocalist Pamela Z knows more about the complex music of language than a lecture hall full of Shakespearean scholars. She's a singer with a poet's ear, a composer with a director's...

Music

A Cut Above

It took a move from New York for Vinroc to become a world champion DJ

By Craig Smith

Published: December 2, 1998

Vinroc, the two-time world champion DJ, is reclining in an old chair at Daly City's hip-hop record store, Cue's Records, where he works as a buyer. Wearing his trademark New York Yankees cap and a...

Music

Swing Shift

By Ezra Gale

Published: December 2, 1998

Count Basie Orchestra (Grover Mitchell, Conductor) 7th Note Showclub Monday, Nov. 23 The Count Basie Orchestra came to town last Monday on the heels of a wonderful new album, the Duke...

Eat

The Man Who Came to Dinner

By Barry Levine

Published: December 2, 1998

The Man Who Came to Dinner will visit all kinds of interesting people in the Bay Area -- as long as they cook him a meal. Dining with Sarah and Vinnie, of Radio Alice morning show fame, is a bit...

Eat

Not Con-stantinople

By Naomi Wise

Published: December 2, 1998

Cafe Istanbul 525 Valencia (at 16th Street), 863-8854. Open Tuesday through Thursday and Sunday noon to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday until 2 a.m. The restaurant is wheelchair accessible....

Eat

Leftovers

By Paul Adams

Published: December 2, 1998

Home-Baked Activism Everyone knows about the recent series of pie attacks on city officials. But what nobody's discussed is that these attacks have all been made with store-bought pies....

Eat

Side Dish

By Harry Coverte

Published: December 2, 1998

Operators Are Standing By Now gourmands worldwide can join our special club. Thanks to Chuck and the gang at Williams-Sonoma, all it takes is one push of the speed dial button to access some of...

Film

House of Mirrors

By Andy Klein

Published: December 2, 1998

Shattered Image Directed by Raul Ruiz. Written by Duane Poole. Starring Anne Parillaud, William Baldwin, Graham Greene, and Lisanne Falk. Opens Friday, Dec. 4, at the Galaxy. According...

Film

Reel World

By Michael Fox

Published: December 2, 1998

Happy Together It would be hard to find a more enthusiastic crowd than the nearly 700 rowdies who recently crammed SFSU's McKenna Theater for the premiere of Rice & Potatoes, Todd Wilson and...

Film

Money Changes Everything

By Bill Gallo

Published: December 2, 1998

A Simple Plan Directed by Sam Raimi. Written by Scott B. Smith, from his novel. Starring Bill Paxton, Billy Bob Thornton, Bridget Fonda, and Brent Briscoe. Opens Friday, Dec. 11, at the...

Night&Day;

Looking Back

By Marcy Freedman

Published: December 2, 1998

Ever walk through one of the greatest art shows you've seen in a while and then, looking for more of the wonder, happen to peek around the corner into a gallery's "back room" and been completely...

Halloween

Cothran

By George Cothran

Published: December 2, 1998

The Banger Who Came in From the Cold Ollie Bryant was unpleasantly surprised last year when he found himself up on Potrero Hill, running from the cops. He'd last gone rabbit in 1988, when...

Night&Day;

NIGHT & DAY

By Heather Wisner

Published: December 2, 1998

Wednesday December 2 Oh, You Beautiful Doll! Cartoon characters, chinoiserie, celebrities, and popular entertainments like Ballet Russe and Comedie Française influenced the Italian...

Night&Day;

Mazel Tov!

By Heather Wisner

Published: December 2, 1998

Any schmuck can toss off a few words of Yiddish (Al D'Amato, are you listening?) but it takes a 2-decades-old company like A Traveling Jewish Theater to mine the true beauty of the language. ATJT's...