The Blog

Photo by mollypop

Turns out, March 8 is International Women's Day – who knew? Not this gal. Anyway, in the spirit of celebrating the world's ovaries we've compiled the best possible things all San Franciscans can do this very night to commemorate the superior gender. 

See Sex and the City at Trannyshack 

These fabulous queens really know what it means to be a woman. They reenact classic scenes from Sex and the City every night, and we all know that Carrie Bradshaw is the epitome of womanhood (cough).

GNO (Girl's Night Out) 

Put on some heels, head over to your favorite karaoke bar, request Destiny's Child (or some other equally powerful feminist anthem performer) and shake your booty – after all, your waist to hips ratio is one of the things that differentiates you from the other, boxier half of the species. 

Call Your Mom 

This is sincere, guys. After all she did push you out so that you could become the burrito-eating, fixie-riding, coffee connoisseur that you are today. Consider sending her a thank you card for your good looks.

Get Laid  

Think about the years and years women had to fight for basic rights like birth control. Pay homage to your foremothers and get some tonight (safely, of course). 

Go Tampooning

Okay, this is basically TPing but with tampons ... you get the picture. Now go out and paint the town red. 

I've made a hobby out of scouring our analytics and reading people's awkward and entertaining searches. I've decided to share the splendors of my nosey antics and see if you come to the same conclusions I did: San Francisco likes sex, rhinestones, and pork. Since the internet works in mysterious ways some of the links seem random, but all are worth a read. Here is a list of the top key terms that brought you lovable weirdos to The Bold Italic:

1. Bea Arthur Sexuality

Read the story here

2. Always Carry a Knife

Read the story here

3. Gloryhole Locations in Seattle

Read the story here

4. A number that can be used for sexting any time

Read the story here

5. Big ass sex

Read the story here

6. Dedicated foot slave

Read the story here

7. I hate the Tenderloin

Read the story here

8. Male entertainer for a gay party

Read the story here

9. I'm black, but how do I make white friends?

Read the story here

10. Bold Rhinestones to wear in Europe

Read the story here

11. Does your ex-wife still fuck?

Read the story here

12. What is a bro?

Read the story here

13. Can I legally own a pig in San Francisco?

Read the story here

14. Sexual power echsnge.com porn

Read the story here

15. Broadcasting with nothing but a cock ring on

Read the story here

It's been a good week in the Bay Area – a little sunshine, lots of shiny new lights, and we spotted someone famous on BART. Here's what you might have missed in the news.

Photo by Angela May Chen

Tuesday night, the Golden Gate Bridge's less famous little sister finally got to take center stage and shine. Designed by Leo Villareal, the Bay Bridge is now the world's largest LED light installation and its inaugural show garnered thousands of "oohs" and "ahhs" from the Bay Area residents who braved the rain to see the spectacle. If you missed the premiere, never fear! The lights will go on everyday for the next two years for your viewing pleasure. (Bay Lights) 

In a tragic final look at California's quickly disappearing glaciers, Tim Palmer spent almost a year photographing the last of the rare breed. "It was a privilege to see such beauty. It was tragic to know I would not see it again," he writes in an article in The Chronicle. Palmer also cites a chilling fact: scientists have predicted that the entire snowpack of the Sierra Nevada will diminish by 30-60 percent this year alone; the same snowpack that accounts for 60 percent of California's water supply. (SF Gate)

Photo by eytonz 

Looks like George Lucas is continuing his slow domination of the universe (aka Bay Area). The Emperor of the Nerds wants to build and fund a new museum in the Presidio that would house an art collection he's been curating for more than 40 years. The collection would focus on 150 years of populist art, including original Norman Rockwell works. Thanks for sharing with us little folk, George, can you just make sure you put a Yoda statue there too? (NPR) 

In other news, San Francisco’s homeless will now be receiving free cell phones. According to CBS Local, a new statewide program has been instituted that will allow homeless people and Californians who make less than $14,702 a year to get free cell phones and service. The program is brought to you by Lifeline, which previously only provided land lines to the needy, but recently realized it was the 21st century and no one uses land lines anymore. (CBS) 

Photo via Jerry Brown's Twitter

BART etiquette is seriously declining when this guy can't even get a seat. Governor Jerry Brown tweeted this picture of him hanging on for dear life on a recent trip to the city. Thankfully, it looks like the 74-year-old is still in pretty good shape – way to go Moonbeam! (SFist) 

Tired of having to sign into Twitter to make someone cry? Cryface makes bringing someone to tears easier than ever before. Let's be clear, I normally never pay for apps when I'm sober, but I made an exception in this case because Cryface brings me enough evil satisfaction to justify spending a 1/4 of a box of Girl Scout cookies. 

The Cryface app understands that Homeland isn't on right now and many of us have found ourselves hard up for ugly cry faces. The app allows you to upload photos of whoever you want to see look puffy and edits them to make them look like they just watched Downton Abbey Season 3 Episode 5 complete with frown, tears, and mascara. You can then send your cry pics to friends and laugh at the absurdity or accuracy of the sour pusses. 

I recommend waiting to send cry pics until the timing is right. Why not try your luck on a morning after a friend blacks out and might be hung over enough to believe you photographed them balling over American Idol? If you're not the emotional blackmail type, there's another $0.99 feature that allows you to add text and finally become the third world problems spokesperson you were always meant to be.

This addition to the app world reminds me that photoshop can be used for both good and evil. And I find it nice to be reminded that everyone looks ugly when they cry. Sure, the edited pics look a little computer generated-y, but I would argue that some people (especially the Kardashians) always do.

Biking and BARTing are two great things that don't go great together. If you wanna get people pissed off at each other, stick them in a small, crowded moving space together while one (or more) of them is holding an unwieldy object on wheels. Up the ante by having this happen during commute hours – right after the restricted bike hours end, of course – and you've got a really ugly situation. 

I've learned that the best option for me is to keep my bicycle at the BART station to avoid all that. But that means leaving my house an hour earlier than I normally would in order to secure bike parking. And sometimes, even when I'm really early, there still aren't any spots available. Well shit. I hope BART adds more BikeLink lockers/rooms and in-station bike parking soon. Please don't make me buy a folding bike or a unicycle.   

The good news is that it seems like BART is trying to figure out ways to make commuting for cyclists a little less painful. Last August, they tried a pilot program that allowed people to bring their bikes on BART all day on Fridays. And from March 18-22, they'll be trying a new test, to allow non-restricted bike access (in all about the first three cars) on BART for an entire week. I'm happy for all the experimenting, but I'm also hopeful for better solutions. Is it asking too much for a bike train, a la Caltrain? God I hope not. 

While daydreaming on Google, I came across a few bike-meets-train solutions that actually exist and could make commuting less sucky:

Photo by georad

Caltrain has two, count 'em, two types of trains that allow for bikes: The gallery train fits 80 bikes total and the snazzily-named Bombardier allows for 48 bikes. There are bungee cords to keep your ride in place, and even seats for cyclists to take a load off during the commute. 

Photo via MBTA

Boston gets a lot of shit for being ... Boston. But the MBTA has one thing that's superior to us that you can't knock: a special high-capacity bike coach. It seems like the coach only operates on one line, and for only certain parts of the year, but hey, that's one more bike train than BART has. 

Photo by mtaphotos

Being a short person with the upper body strength of Steve Urkel makes me a little hesitant to suggest hanging bike racks, but I see the benefits of getting bicycles upright and out of the way. The Metro-North Railroad tested bike hooks on the M-7 and M-8 railcars. Unfortunately, they installed these hooks in the disabled section of their trains, and non-folding bicycles were still not restricted during high-commute hours. Still, the idea could be cool. I imagine these working best in a car filled with a row of these hooks, without any seating below – because getting conked in the head with a bike sounds like the worst way to start my morning.

Photo via www.stuttgart.de

Finally ... why not take a cue from the Germans and create a train with front-loading bike storage. The Stuttgart to Degerloch Zahnradbahn is an open car meant only for bicycles. It's kinda like a bigger, better, roll-on version of the bike-rack on Muni. The only thing I'd suggest is a valet to prevent theft, which I could see being a problem here.