Good grief. The Junior Paper’s troika of editors hands down an ukase that a lesbian couple, a reporter and a photographer, on the paper’s staff may no longer cover the gay-marriage story lest their newly achieved state in life create the perception – I guess among readers – of conflict. Well, this move, aside from constituting a gratuitous slap at the dignity and reputations of the two highly respected journalists involved, is just the latest example of how absolutely out-of-it the Junior Paper’s editors are. No wonder this newspaper loses a million bucks a week. Instead of figuring out ways of enhancing the paper’s daily report, the editors are intent on diminishing it.
Any decent editor would be touting this remarkable occurrence, by which two of the paper’s own find themselves in the middle of an astonishing social movement and phenomenon. Far from limiting their involvement, the Junior Paper should be asking the two to do first person, or first couple, coverage.
Basically, this tortured act of showing off your ethics is nothing more than an exhibition of bad journalism. It’s a disservice to the readers, to information, and to society. By this token, the Chronicle's current editors would have removed the Chronicle's late Randy Shilts from covering the AIDS beat. Shilts, who later died of AIDS, was a most rambunctious journalist. His reporting shook up the medical world and the gay world. But by the edict of Bronstein et al, Shilts, whose book “And the Band Played On,” based on his Chronicle reporting, is the best account of the years of the AIDS plague, would not have been allowed to cover AIDS. Bonehead play, Phil ….
Some bonny, heady, philharmonic play Sunday afternoon at the great & cool new home of Nicola Miner & Robert Mailer Anderson up on Pacific. The Cypress String Quartet (which the Chron managed to misidentify as the “Cypress Spring Quartet” – but they’re too busy unraveling putatively ethical conundrums to be bothered with a simple journalistic task such as spelling a group’s name right in the edition) came by and played some old and then some new work, including quartets by Jeffery Cotton (whose name the Chron also managed to misspell – so busy are they unraveling putative ethical dilemmas).
The Cypress String Quartet has been around for eight years and once upon a time played at Robert Anderson’s old café in Marin. They’re rather precise and clean, with a marvelous timbre. Of course, they rehearse four hours a days. Neat stuff, and not nearly stuffy. … The Quartet has a program titled “Call & Response” by which they commission new works inspired by older. This leads to some tasty music. You can hear them this Friday, 7:30 p.m., at Yerba Buena. … Ethan Filner … Cecily Ward … Tom Stone … Jennifer Kloetzel make up the quartet. They are doing some yeoman work these days in the public schools, trying to keep music in the ears, if not in the curriculum, of the students. ’Grats and thanks for that. … Suave note, so to speak: The 320 year-old violin now owned by Cecily Ward is known in the music world as “the Fleming,” for its former owner Ian Fleming. …
The Anderson/Miner home, a block long marvel of wood and stone with a courtyard and movie-set view of the Golden Gate, is a terrific venue for music. It was a pleasure being in such a neat home, with people having such fun…
Anderson, who is the acclaimed and comic author of the novel “Boonville," is a better than average performer himself. He used to do stand-up. He did a little political work Sunday, signing Randy Newman’s “Political Science,” with Jay “Nickels” Berry of Chicken Truck on guitar. This was the tune that Anderson first sang a capella on the radio the day after the US first bombed Iraq. Little wonder up there in tony Pac Heights, they call the Anderson home “The People’s Palace.”
Another engaged youngish musician there was Awadgain Pratt, a rock star of classical piano. From gigs at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the White House, he came to the living room on Pacific Heights to punish the keys. ...
Good crowd of talkers there as well. Amongst ‘em: Tom Barbash (author of the award winning novel “The Last Good Chance,” and the NY Times bestseller 9-11 non-fiction “On Top of The World”) … Julie Orringer (author of bestseller short story collection “How to Breath Underwater”) … Ryan Hardy (author award-winning “Bring Me Your Saddest Arizona”) … Anderson Valley Advertiser columnist Zack Anderson, who is also working of the TV version of “Boonvillle” with Cousin Robert M. … Also there: former Frank Zappa bassist Scott Thunes … punk rocker Joe Pop-O-Pie … visual and fine artists Christopher Garrett … Frank Haines … John Rogers … Jason Leggiere … Nemo Gould (who created the jaunty robot sculpture on the B’dway side of the Anderson/Miner house) …
Gallery owners George Krevsky and Stephen Wirtz … politicos Willie Brown and Kamala Harris … good neighbor Vanessa Getty ... art collectors and philanthropists Byron Meyer … Poonie Lanie and Pasha Thornton … Sari Swig … SF Jazz director Randall Kline … SF Library Book Bay director Byron Spooner … fellow journalists Jonathan Keats and Jack Boulware … perfumers Yosh Han and Sebastian Baumann, and basketball great Wilkes Bashford who inspected the basketball court in the cellar of the house while the March Madness seedlings were announced on the tube ….
The ramble continues: It was off to Narsai & Veni David’s house in Berkeley Friday night for a spring supper courtesy of the glam Sherrie Matza who brought along a few pals including Nathalie Wong, and Joe O’Donoghue. Joe was so inspired by the energetic evening that he may buy the neighborhood. Sherrie made a generous donation to David’s Assyrian Aid Society, so the dinner was a lagniappe. But done Narsai style.... No disrespect to Alice Waters, but David is the chef who first put Berkeley on the culinary cartograph. ...
The David house is about a century old, full of woods, and warm textures. But Veni and Narsai have opened up the square formats so the rooms flow into one another. Or at leas the people do. At the back of the house, under skylights and decorated with marble, granite, steel and wood is the kitchen. The stove is a Russell (no longer made) and while the place is hospital clean, it’s hospitably charming. Bottles of wine, jugs of preserved fruits, ovals of fresh bread, and a couple of fresh students working in the kitchen, including one from Mills College and one from Mt. Diablo Community College round out the scene …
Wouldn't be a modern kitchen without a computer though. Narsai's is an Apple. Apple's making a comeback. Anderson has one too up on Pacific. ...
All the David veggies come from Berkeley Bowl, and unusual were they. What’s Narsai serve on a spring night? Lamb, of course. Not just roasted, but also braised. Potatoes, carrots, rutabagas, parsnips, artichokes. Yum. .. First Brussels Sprouts on the stalk (from Half Moon Bay) ... caviar … then Irish Green Pea Soup, and Soda Bread … Sausage stuffed Quail and then the lamb. …
Nice cellar. With the lamb were decanted a 1970 Chateau La Conseillante (Pomerol) and also a 1953 of the same. … Dessert was a summer berry pudding. Then came spirits, including a spiritual Single Malt, Highland Park, the fumes alone of which could rouse Queen Victoria and John Brown from the shades….
David is a renaissance guy. For souvenirs, he handed out bow ties that he made himself. And he is a fount of lore, Assyrian and Bay-arean. Did you know that the Miners, as in Nicola Miner (see above), are Assyrians? Yep. Robert N. Miner, the late father of Nicola and Justine Miner, came from Chicago along with Narsai’s people. Chicago is the Old Country for lots of people. .. Now the Miners have a vineyard and share a winemaker with Narsai. Aren’t you glad I go to these things? Who else ever would tell you this stuff? And I could have gone to Spring Training. ...
Anyway, Justine Miner has a terrific restaurant in the Haight named “RNM” after her late father. Narsai likes and so do I…
More rambling: Talk of the lunch given by the capa di tuttae capae of society, Denise Hale, Monday at Postrio is that Sharon Davis is planning on doing a book called "Graceful Exit." She says that the departure of herself and Gray from the State House has been more of transformativre than bitter experience. She even likes Arnold ...
By the way, while there are no panhandlers in Narsai’s modest Berkeley neighborhood, there are now panhandlers up on Pacific. After leaving the music fest at Anderson’s Sunday, I was strolling down the hill, when a Pac Heights homeless person came out of the ether and asked me for money. Not for spare change, but for $5.50 to catch the Golden Gate Transit Bus to Marin. ...
Then later I was at the Ferry Building where a guy came up and asked for $14.00 Greyhound bus fare to Stockton.
I figure this is the unintended consequence of “Care not Cash.” The homeless, figuring that the city cash is gone, are now simply asking us for more on the street. And they’re going into venues where they think they can get $5.50 or $14.00. … Gavin, what gives? Is the price of "Care not Cash", an increase an amount being begged for? I'm inured to, my shame and irritation, to all but a few requests from people on the street, but, man, being hustled for $5.50 or $14.00. Well that is crust. ...
Matt Buka sends on this nice play on words in a quote from Rob Schwartz, head of distribution for Newmarket Films, which released "The Passion." Discussing the broad audiences “The Passion” is attracting, Schwartz says, "It's a large cross-section of America."
See ya. … And who put the weather on steroids? …
