Just another weekend in San Francisco

I am coming to the end of a well deserved vacation. I was burning out at the job, and I have between eight and nine weeks of time I can take off (between actual vacation time, comp time, and nine floating holidays that the city gives us every year). I opted to take one (week that is). I stayed at home, went to parks for picnicing, and spent the weekend going to all kinds of public events.
Saturday I went to the antiwar demonstration. It started with a rally in Dolores Park. The same stupid speeches, the same stupid marginal utterly irrevelent utopian groups selling the same stupid newspapers. Anyway, I ate my picnic lunch, met some old friends, signed an initiative for a preschool program in California, and started marching at 12 noon.
Some Unitarians from my church had a banner and I started marching with them. Saw mostly stupid slogans (Fight Plaque, Not Iraq), saw some good street theater ( a dynamite caricature of Condi Rice with a t shirt that read "Going Shopping"), and even spotted some lizards along the way. When we got to Jefferson Park, there was a line of people with Israeli flags who were counter protesting. One little old lady with a Jewish Film Festival t shirt had a sign that read something like ""When Will You Stop Blaming Israel For Everything". I walked up to her and said "I agree with you."
Naturally there was a strong pro Palestinian contingent. They used loudspeakers and kept chanting "Free Free Palestine" over and over and over and over and over again. I wanted a loudspeaker that I could chant back "As soon as you stop blowing up Jews". There is a divide between certain people who believe that the Iraq war was a serious blunder and people who believe that Israel has the right to defend it's citizens against terror attacks. I wished that I had an Israeli flag to march with, just to piss off the Marxists.
One lady with an Israeli flag flashed a sign at me that read "Antiwar activists are fronting for terrorists". I wanted to say "not", but surveying a lot of the booths, I had to admit that in some cases, it was true.
Anyway, I met up with an old buddy at the Jewish Voice for Peace table. He's still homeless, still can't hold a job for very long, and is a very intelligent guy who seems totally disfunctional when it comes to getting his personal act together. We had a good talk. I could have bought some Palestinian olive oil from him, but Trader Joes is cheaper.
Left the rally and walked into the much larger "Love Parade" rally at civic center. I have no idea what the Love Parade is, but there were a lot of younger, drunk people there. Walked up Market Street and the Golden Gate Theater was letting out. The show was "Annie". I heard that there was a Giants game at SBC park. In other words, zillions of people in San Francisco that day.
I went home and took a nap.
Sunday morning I took off to the Folsom Street Fair. That's our annual leather, S and M fair. Booths featuring whips, chains, torture beds, naked people, people in leather, people selling porn and poppers, and pot brownies, and sausages, and chicken on a stick, and community groups, and an SFPD recruiting booth, and free condoms (with water based lubricants thrown in) and spanking booths, and....well you get the idea. I got a free hepatitis A and B shop (not that I think I'll ever need one, but who knows?) . Ate good food, met some old friends (at the anti popper booth). Got tired, sunburned, and went home.
Tomorrow I'll have to do some more cooking, eat leftover leftovers (including some fried eggplant with Italian seasonings, some poached salmon (made from fresh king salmon fish bones that I bought for one buck from the fish lady at the farmers market) and a salad with some left over broccali, spinach and cherry tomatoes. God life is hard. Not.
Tuesday it's back to the salt mines.
It's been a good vacation. And I didn't even have to go anywhere.