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Caitlin Donohue

Are your friends criminals?

Things get weird at the Zero Graffiti International Conference

01.22.13 - 7:28 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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STREET SEEN Nearing the climax of her presentation at last week's Zero Graffiti International Conference, Vancouver PD's graffiti-fighting specialist Valerie Spicer despaired over graffiti's affects on its perpetrators.

"He didn't die because of graffiti," she said sadly, a deceased Canadian graffiti artist's childhood photo on the PowerPoint screen behind her. "But I'm quite sure that the behaviors he learned in the subculture didn't help him confront the man who stabbed and killed him."Read more »

Mestranda Cigarra kicks ass

She started practicing capoeira when women didn't do that kind of thing — now she runs the show at her own school

01.22.13 - 5:46 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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caitlin@sfbg.com

HEALTH AND WELLNESS It is impossible to climb the stairs to the San Francisco chapter of Abadá Capoeira and not know that you are in the Mestranda's house.Read more »

Meditate on social justice: Yoga Journal Conference crosses the picket line

01.16.13 - 6:48 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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Does inner peace include caring about the wellbeing of the workers cleaning up after your yoga conference? Jury's out in this particular case: this weekend, the Yoga Journal Conference will cross a hotel workers' union picket line for the third year in a row at the Hyatt Regency. Read more »

3 ways James Franco gets kinky -- and ways you can, too!

01.16.13 - 2:39 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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Is it safe to say at this point that James Franco is our kind of freak? The king of hyphens (indie-mainstream-actor-author-producer-director-etc.) is in the midst of various voyages into SF BDSM culture. Shall we count the ways?

1. The trailer for Franco's documentary on Kink.com, helpfully titled kink, came out yesterday. It features bound musclemen and bos-say female directors. Read more »

Denim legends and stained glass socks

Japan blows your mind, via the family-run boutique Cotton Sheep

01.15.13 - 6:46 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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caitlin@sfbg.com

STREET SEEN First, I saw the socks. Half sheer, half solid, the pair's blue rose design made me flash on stained glass cathedral. Like a sock-crazed zombie, I turned on my heels and entered the most unassuming, unmarked shop on Hayes Valley's row of quirky boutiques and designer collections.Read more »

On the Cheap Listings

01.15.13 - 6:28 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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On the Cheap listings by Caitlin Donohue. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

WEDNESDAY 16Read more »

Estamos atentos: Photos and lessons from Friday's anti-violence march in the Mission

01.13.13 - 12:14 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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Lynn Breedlove of Homobiles addresses the pre-march rally. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Protester at the Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Protester at the Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Protesters at the Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Protesters at the Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Protesters at the Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
The march's flyer. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Backpack signs. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
The march finds its way down Valencia Street, led by an ambulatory drum circle. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue
Author Rebecca Solnit at Mission anti-violence march. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue

It's hard to say if the march of neighbors from the 16th Street BART station, to Valencia Street, to 24th Street, and back down Mission Street will stop attacks like the January 6th assault on 23rd and Guerrero Streets that inspired last Friday's anti-violence demonstration and walk. But for a community that feels nervous about walking one's own sidewalks at times due to an ongoing spate of sexual assaults, that wasn't really the point. 

"No violence, no police! From the bathroom, to the streets!" went the crowd's chant, led by an ambulatory drum circle past the 1,000 new restaurant seats on Valencia and the tourists snapping photos of the massive, swaying protest puppets above our heads. Making the violence visible? Check. A disempowering situation turned into a show of strength? Check. Read more »

The Haight Street Banksy rat is looking for a good home

01.11.13 - 2:43 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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Removing the Haight Street Banksy rat, April 2010. Photo courtesy Brian Greif
Removing the Haight Street Banksy rat, April 2010. Photo courtesy Brian Greif
Removing the Haight Street Banksy rat, April 2010. Photo courtesy Brian Greif
Installing the Haight Street Banksy rat at Design Miami. Photo courtesy Brian Greif
Installing the Haight Street Banksy rat at Design Miami. Photo courtesy Brian Greif

Kerfuffle attended the publication of my Street Seen column on the reappropriated Banksy street art that popped up at Context art fair during Art Basel week in Miami last month.

Hamptons gallerist Stephen Keszler wrote to tell me that my account of him taking two of the pieces from Palestine and affixing $400,000 price tags to the them was so boring that it made him fall asleep in the bathtub (probably just part of growing old, darling.)

But I also received an interesting communique from a man who claimed responsibility for getting the Banksy rat originally painted on Haight Street's Red Victorian hotel and cafe to Miami. He says it needs a home. Read more »

Clergy summons sexy undead (local Episcopalian priest pens racy vamp novel)

01.11.13 - 5:13 am | Caitlin Donohue |
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It is perhaps indicative of my professional scope that I was nervous to talk to Amber Belldene, Bay Area author of a "racy romance" vampire novel (her words.) But be advised, my anxiety was due less to her literary pursuits and more with the fact that she is an ordained Episcopalian priest. Religion, it would seem, is a harder passion to penetrate for me than undead sex scenes. 

On her end, Belldene sees no conflict between the two. "Romance novels are really about love, and so is being Christian," the neatly-attired writer, who "fell down a slippery vampire slope" when she was a young thing told me during her visit to my office. The tagline on her website reads "Mystically Sexy Paranormal Romance…because Desire is Divine." [sic] Read more »

Pack condoms (now without cop paranoia!) for this week's sexy events

01.10.13 - 12:30 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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A major, massive shout-out to the local activists who finally convinced SFPD to get rid of their draconian, awful policy of using condoms found on suspects as proof of intent to do sex work. The last thing we needed was our community's most vunerable sex workers being afraid to carry protection -- not to mention having the plain old slutty among us leaving rubbers at home for fear of police harassment.Read more »