THE REAL WORRYING starts tomorrow. What are we going to do next year? What are we going to do to make the next Best of the Bay the Best? It's a tough question: around these parts, you're only as good as your last Best Of. It's been that way for 30 years.

Whatever we come up with, it'll be hard to top this year's project.

It started off as a discussion about public art – something that's a big part of Bay Area culture – and somewhere along the line, we came up with the idea of hiring a mural artist to do the illustrations for the 30th-anniversary Best of the Bay issue. And then we thought: if we're hiring a muralist, why not have him or her paint a huge mural on the Bay Guardian Building (135 Mississippi St., here at the bottom of Potrero Hill) that encompasses what we consider the best of the Bay with a colorful, artistic flair that screams San Francisco? Photos of the mural could serve as our illustrations.

Great idea. No small task. I got on the phone and heard from a lot of artists: "I'm interested but ..." or "I'd need 18 months to do the job right ..."

And then I met Brian Barneclo.

Brian walked in, listened to my proposal, looked at me and said point-blank, "No, you're not insane" – always a relief. Then he took it a step further and said, in his nonchalant, self-confident style, "I really like this project, and I'd like to do it, and I can make your deadline no problem."

And lo: he delivered (just) on time.

The full-color illustrations you see in these pages are panels from the official 2004 Best of the Bay mural. A composite photo of the entire mural is on page 23. Come by and see it on the wall; it's amazing.

And now it's Wednesday, and you're holding a copy of the Bay Guardian's 30th annual Best of Bay. It's the product of a lot of hard work by a lot of good people who care deeply about their home and community and who work hard all year to bring you the best of the Bay, not just today but all year long.

And I'm, hopefully, drinking a nice glass of scotch somewhere, planning to wake up on Thursday, get back to work, and dive into the process all over again.

Victor Krummenacher