Another installment of My Friends Are Awesome.

Come to find out yesterday that Chris Lane, multi-talented illustrator of the cover of Trevor's first book as well as the entirety of Zombies: A Record of the Year of Infection and Harry Houdini: The Legend of the World's Greatest Escape Artist, and super good friend and all-around piece of wonderfulness in my life, is now a San Francisco Chronicle Bar Star, 2013!

And then: amazing author and magnificent human being Renee Swindle read to a packed house at my favorite bookstore, Diesel, A Bookstore, for the publication of her second book, Shake Down the Stars.

Yes, it was a good day. So proud!

Wow!



















Berkeley Sculptor Aimee Baldwin's 'Vegan Taxidermy'

Although what Baldwin creates isn't technically taxidermy, it is vegan because her creations - shorebirds, corvids, owls, raptors and extinct birds, as well as plants - are made entirely without animal parts. Instead, she uses crepe paper, glue, found objects and wire in the meticulous creation of birds so lifelike, they look poised to hop off their perches and flutter away.

Any notions associated with the term 'vegan' aside, Baldwin's birds are both incredibly realistic and breathtakingly gorgeous, and you can really see the love and care she puts into them. I also love to see someone so talented making a living doing what they love.

To see more of Aimee Baldwin's work, check out her website or her Etsy site.

It's holiday shopping season! This year, like every year, I like to recommend giving easy holiday gifts that can possibly make a bigger impact.

I've advocated buying local and making community-based gifts in the past, but I must admit that in the age of the big box, it always felt a little futile. But with the entrance of Occupy Wall Street, this idea finally seems to be taking off big time. Occupy's large media presence has brought the idea of being a conscious consumer to the mainstream, and with that, the crucial building blocks needed to get started.

So in lieu of my regular ol' holiday giving recommendations for nonprofits and gifts of conscience, I want to recommend this great article that was forwarded to me by my friend Bicycle Irish:

Occupy the Holidays: Ten Ways to Make Your Gift-Giving More Meaningful

Gift giving is an honored tradition that gives you the opportunity to share joy with those you care most deeply for. But now more than ever, we need to make sure our purchases are meaningful. Being a conscious consumer is imperative during this Holiday season. This doesn’t mean forsaking your seasonal celebrations, including gift exchanges. But it does mean taking some time to reconsider out habits.

These are really easy but highly effective ways to incorporate conscious consumerism into your holiday -- and perhaps, daily -- life.


















Okay, but you're not getting away that easily! I also want to share a great piece I read about the transformative and healing power of being generous with one's spirit.

Knitting Behind Bars

Each week the men eagerly await the women's arrival, then promptly get to work. “It takes you away a little,” Horton says. “You have to watch what you’re doing, otherwise your stitches will become loose or tight or you’ll skip stitches. It almost makes you feel like you don't have to be anything. You’re all sitting there knitting. You can just be yourself.”

[Richy] Horton was released from prison last December and now works in construction. He believes his involvement with KBB helped him get out of jail and onto parole, showing the parole interviewers his small but positive effort to help the outside community. He continues to keep in touch with the women of KBB and is currently knitting a beaded scarf. “They’re not normal people,” Horton says of Zwerling, Rovelstad, and Heirs. “They’re almost like saints.”


















"It almost makes you feel like you don't have to be anything." This is a program that works.

To donate to Knitting Behind Bars, contact Lynn Zwerling at lynnzwerling@verizon.net.

I get really, really annoyed when bloggers have random paid product placement in their blogs. Yeah, I know, it's great if you can make money blogging blah blah, but c'mon, it IS kind of gross -- especially when the plug is inserted all pseudo-natural-like. Ugh! Totally gross. Admittedly, two of my favorite blogs do have product placement in some of their posts, but it is always posted as "sponsored content", which I can get behind an itty bit more.

That said, be forewarned that this post has some serious product pimping. But since I do not get paid to blog (unless you count blogging from work -- shhhh :P) you will understand that this pimping is completely from the heart. And if you have eczema, like I do, you will also understand why I want to pimp this motha out.

Griffin Remedy Bulgarian Lavender Body Lotion



















Griffin Remedy, based in San Francisco, offers vegan products that are 100% paraben-free, with no artificial colors or fragrances. I've been using Griffin Remedy's shampoo and conditioner for years now, because I wash my hair every day and want something less chemical-based but not so crunchy I get no hair shaft protection and end up with nasty hippie hair, and their shampoo and conditioner are THE BEST. So naturally, I decided to try out the body lotion because I needed some not chemical moisturizer for my super dry office. I found it very emollient, yet not super greasy. Great, that'll do.

But the unexpected side effect? Eczema on my fingers lessening significantly, and in some areas GOING AWAY.

This is big news in my world. Big enough (yet not TMI) to BLOG about it and maybe, just maybe, help someone else looking for relief and give one of my favorite little companies a little boost.

Their body lotions contain MSM, or sulfur. My understanding is that sulfur is used to control dandruff, another type of dermatitis. And you know that rotten egg smell at hot springs? The same hot springs that are touted as oh so good for your skin? Sulfur, baby. It also probably doesn't hurt that this lotion is free from parabens and other nasty stuff. And that it also contains lavender, which has been traditionally used to treat skin wounds and irritation.

The forever skeptic in me also acknowledges that there's a chance it's all psychosomatic (and full disclosure -- that seems to be my [Western, and very skeptical] doctor's opinion). But what if it ISN'T psychosomatic? Either way, I feel great knowing that I can support a local business by using a product I need to use anyway that is both natural and may be giving me this benefit, and share it with people who may have similar problems. For real, go get some!

Oakland what what!



















Brutus, a men's lifestyle magazine in Japan, just published a best of California businesses issue that features one of my favorite Oakland businesses: Issues, the mucho magazine and cool literary/musical what-have-you shop. Also featured are a slew of other Oakland and Bay Area goodies like the Pop Up General Store, crazy-famous-already-but-so-totally-worth-the-hype Bakesale Betty, and Bicycle Coffee.

I love Issues because they are incredible champions for Oakland business, and such nice folks t'boot. I am so pleased they are getting this kind of publicity. Read their blog post about it here.

It's that time of year again -- the holiday gift-giving season is upon us!

This year, as I do every year, I encourage folks to support their local economies and buy their gifts from local, independent retailers as often as they can. Even better -- buy items from your local retailers that are made in the USA and/or are compliant with fair trade guidelines (North Americans can look up companies and suppliers at the Fair Trade Federation).

Okay, I know, I know: this type of shopping isn't always realistic -- even for folks who trumpet it all the time -- especially with time constraints and while still in the midst of a bummer recession. But I think attempting to adhere to these guidelines is really important.

So with the realities of the holidays in mind, I always like to list a few great (and inexpensive) places online where your hard-earned dollars can get you a beautiful, quality gift, a clean conscience, and the knowledge that you are actively participating in philanthropy that is helping to build a better world.

My picks this year:

1) Rwanda Baskets

The vision of the Rwanda Basket Company is to empower the impoverished women of Rwanda to rise above their subsistence level existence by providing them with the training, tools and support needed to sell their baskets in the West.

The United Nations estimates that women make up 70 percent of those living in absolute poverty. Many of these women are cut off -- geographically, financially, or sociopolitically -- from fair and sustainable ways of making a living. Business ventures like Rwanda Baskets help bridge that gap.

Also, these baskets are stunning!

2) TOMS Shoes

TOMS Shoes was founded on a simple premise: With every pair you purchase, TOMS will give a pair of new shoes to a child in need. One for One. Using the purchasing power of individuals to benefit the greater good is what we're all about.

I've admired this company for a long time. Their original slip-on shoe is IMO really cute, but admittedly isn't everyone's cup of tea; recently, they've expanded their shoe line to include sporty looking lace-up models and the like, as well as a full vegan line for the hippies. :)

Watch this video and see if you can keep from buying at least a couple of pairs.



3) Peacekeeper Cause-metics

Peacekeeper Cause-Metics is the first cosmetics line to give all of its after-tax, distributable profits to women’s health advocacy and urgent human rights issues. PeaceKeeper builds a bridge between extraordinary women in the land-of-plenty with extraordinary women who, by chance of birth, don’t have our resources or opportunities.

'nuff said? Well, not really.

Y'all know that women's issues are of particular importance to me. Y'all also know that makeup is a huge expenditure -- both financially and toxicity-wise -- for most women of means. Peacekeeper is dedicated to helping poverty-stricken women all over the globe, and they are funding it with the sales of non-toxic makeup. Righteous! They are part of a business model called "all benefit" (a term, for lack of sufficient linkalicious-ness, that is better explained by the "Paul Newman business model") that gives all of their profits after company costs to charity. Go get some!

4) Better World Books

Better World Books collects and sells books online to fund literacy initiatives worldwide. With more than six million new and used titles in stock, we’re a self-sustaining, triple-bottom-line company that creates social, economic and environmental value for all our stakeholders.

Before I get reamed by my independent bookstore friends for recommending an online retailer, let me just say that I am a big supporter of local independent bookstores, full stop. But if you've got to buy online (especially true for folks where the big bookstore bads have run every independent out of business) independently owned Better World Books saves books from landfills, supports literacy programs in the States and around the world, and gives you an option to ship your books not only for free, but also carbon-neutral. Excellent.

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If anyone has some resources for other eco-friendly, fair trade, and/or cause-driven gift-giving, please feel free to post in the comments. Happy holiday shopping!

Temescal Street Cinema starts tonight!







This happens 2 blocks from my apartment, on 49th and Telegraph in Oakland:


View Larger Map

49th is closed down at Telegraph so people can sit in the street, movies are projected onto the Bank of the West building, and Temescal merchants sponsor free popcorn. Bring a chair or a blanket to sit on and something warm to wear when the sun goes down. Come out to support local film, and the best neighborhood in Oakland!

Get the schedule here.

Oh man, is the holiday crazy totally on or what?

You know, every Christmas, Trevor and I try to get educational toys, books, and comic books for our gaggle of rambunctious nephews, and every year we feel sort of lame because while they are all great kids who always appreciate a gift from their Auntie and Uncle, what they really really want is plastic crap from China. So this year we decided just this once we'd give in and whore ourselves out to the People's Republic of Melamine, Lead Paint, and Horrific Labor Violations.

And as anyone exposed to children who are exposed to advertising knows, getting holiday lists from 2-7 year olds is a pointy, flashing, two-AA-battery laden plastic sea of Transformers, Bionicles, Ben-10, and random superhero toys. Most locally owned shops don't carry this stuff, so trying to mitigate possibly ethically-challenged gifts by at least shopping locally is also quite difficult.

So yes, I'll admit, I went whole hog: I went to Target.

Like other guilty American pleasures including but not limited to Jack in the Box and firearms, I do love myself some Target, but I only ever go once a year or so because 1) I want to support local business, and 2) going to the mall is like walking into hell. And ugh, I know, Target is really just the more pleasant -- albeit also union-busting and slave-wage paying -- cousin of that nasty, global community-raping behemoth, Wal-Mart. But unlike the Wal, they do offer domestic partnership benefits to their LGBT employees, more products made in the United States, and many green products, including organic foods and clothes.

Look at me rationalize! Such bad juju to shop at these types of stores -- especially when we're in a recession and we should be supporting our local economies instead.

So I'm here to ask you to help me with my bad juju: since I was only able to appease my moral conscience with my gifts for friends and non-children this year, help a sister out and give some love to my 2008 list of great places to shop for socially conscious, recession-busting holiday gifts.

1) Buy local whenever you can.

We all shop at chains, and that's not the end of the world. But doing it all the time can suck the lifeblood out of a vibrant and diverse community. One could go as far to say that democracy thrives in a culture of independent business. And just like our civil liberties can be slowly chipped away without our notice, by the time we realize the variety and spice we've lost in our communities by supporting big-box stores, one can feel like it's a lost cause that is too difficult to remedy. Not so!

I saw a great flyer the other day that recommended simply taking at least 4 days out of the month to support local business. Whether that's buying a book at your local bookstore one day or spending just a few dollars more for that birthday gift at your neighbor's shop the next week, buying local need not be bank-breaking, inconvenient, or difficult. It's an investment in your community -- and it's probably the safest investment one can make right now!

2) If you've got to buy non-US made or non-locally, why not buy fair trade?

Goods from China and many developing countries are cheap because gross labor violations and intimidation/exploitation of the poor and desperate drives down labor costs. But socially conscious alternatives need not cost you an arm and a leg. The Global Exchange offers over 100 fair trade gifts under $30.

3) Get your nature on: check out the rocks and fossils, beautifully polished and set as jewelry, from lapidopterix. Or spend your dollars at any number of other handcrafted artisan shops on Etsy.

Full disclosure: lapidopterix is a friend of mine who just started his wonderful little Etsy site. He travels all over the Western US on rock digs. When we visited him last, he took us out to a remote area of Northern Oregon to go augite hunting. We spent the afternoon in a beautiful rainforest setting, being rained on (naturally), digging our heels and our tiny hammers into the side of a muddy hill looking for little black faceted nuggets of goodness. What a blast!

He's been a rockhound as long as I've known him, and he really knows his stuff. Check out his gorgeous pieces, and if there's something specific you're looking for, hit him up on Etsy. Chances are he has it!

4) Honor your friends and family with a gift of supporting women's economic security, health, education, and leadership by making a donation to the Global Fund for Women.

Cutting back in a recession can be hard. But it is important to remember that compared to most other parts of the world, in the West during our recessions we are still very very rich.

Worldwide, women perform two-thirds of all labor and produce more than half of the world's food. Yet, women own only about one percent of the world's assets, and represent 70 percent of those living in absolute poverty. Supporting the Global Fund supports women's ability to contribute to and benefit from economic growth and development.

From the Global Fund for Women:

The Global Fund for Women provides grants to organizations that promote women’s economic empowerment through a variety of strategies, including skills training, access to microloans and organizing migrants and other women workers. Our grants promote women's leadership in environmental and natural resource management and efforts to educate policymakers on how macroeconomic policy and trade negotiations affect women’s economic well-being.

Happy shopping!

Trevor relays the truth about the importance of independent bookstores.

A plea for foresight, indeed.

Ex-Sierra Club head Adam Werbach hired to "green" Wal-Mart.

First reaction: WTF? Wal-Mart, that anything but sustainable, community-raping, evil den of buy-more-stuff-to-fill-your-empty-heart?

But then, one stark reality:

I was a typical San Franciscan, very disconnected from Middle America, and, I tell you, now I'm turned off when I hear people use the expression 'fly-over states.' I mean, I love my little Bernal Heights neighborhood, I love having Progressive Grounds Coffee right up the street, and all those things. But the thing that was most educational to me is that this isn't the dream everyone has. Democrats, Republicans, conservatives, it is America out there, and right now what they want is to have parking to do their shopping all in one place, to have strawberries for $2 in February. And if the public demands, a retailer will provide. You say you hate Wal-Mart? Well, the American public has chosen this place; they like Wal-Mart a hell of a lot.

Okay, so Werbach would also make a great politician. But it is true: people love Wal-Mart. And no amount of maintaining that they are a hellmouth of evil is going to change that. Hell, even if they had children sacrifice goats to some archaic god at noon in the food court and had terrorists publicly molest the elderly and infirm in the pharmacy y'all just know most people would put their blinders on and continue to buy the Wal's cheap-ass Chinese crap and then complain about lead poisoning and the export of American jobs. That's how we humans work.

So, as much as it pains me to say it, I think Werbach is doing more good than harm by partnering with the devil.

The "greening" of America's biggest retailer -- even if it is selective and I suspect merely to help their bottom line -- cannot be denied as a very good thing. Analyzing and implementing where they can cut down on fuel and electricity would make huge dents in carbon emissions around the globe and possibly cause a ripple effect among their suppliers and distributors. Marketing organic produce in 4,000 megastores increases the demand for this type of farming. And bringing the concept of global warming to the "red states," as it were, is a tasty proposition. With a glass-half-full mentality you could almost say they would be creating demand for things (in this case, good things) people never thought they needed before. And lookee there -- isn't that the Wal-Mart way? Everyone's happy.

This still doesn't mean I advocate shopping at Wal-Mart. Though I can understand the sentiment this might promote, it in no way means if you can't beat 'em join 'em. There are certainly still glaring problems with Wal-Mart, the biggie being their tendency to make money off poverty. This starts with stores that are more often than not opened in economically depressed areas with employees who make the lowest possible wages and are denied affordable healthcare (and are therefore often subsidized by taxpayers), and ends with catering to a customer base largely populated by the poor, the elderly, and the chronically un-or-under employed.

The in-between in this poverty clusterfuck? Exploiting sweatshop and child-labor to fill their stores with low-quality crap. This leads to the other big bad no-no of supporting Wal-Mart -- the horrifying cause and effect of its supply chain. From the loss of domestic jobs to the sweatshops that are a direct result of supply and then demand of toasters or sweatpants or what have you for $4.99, the suffering that exists because of corporate and consumer greed is appalling.

I'm not trying to invalidate all the criticism Wal-Mart gets, but in this crisis we collectively face, being negative is not a winning strategy. The whole system is broken, and we've all got a moral charge to fix it.

We're all hypocrites somehow when it comes to sustainability and the like, so I acknowledge the importance of baby steps, especially with the Big Bad. I remain a Negative Nellie about Wal-Mart's actual motivation and investment in becoming more "green," but I'm on board with seeing what happens.

I can't believe it, but I think I may be even more awesome than I assert in the previous post, only on a different awesomeness meter. More Domestic Duties than Diamond Dave. Today the man and I:

*slept in
*made French toast and Denver scramble
*took a long walk in the sunshine
*found a beautiful but functional new-with-tags professional jacket at a yard sale for Yesterday's Ester, who just finished grad school (yay!)
*bought groceries at the lovely new Trader Joe's in Rockridge, as well as the fifth and sixth circles of hell (and we didn't wish death upon anyone!)
*finished Christmas shopping (pat us on the back, almost all local) and making some sweet homemade gifties
*did laundry
*called our mothers
*cooked dinner (okay, the soup was canned...)
*went to TWO parties on different sides of the Bay, mingled, and drank champagne, AND...
*got home by 11:30 pm

Oh my god, we RULE!

Nice little article in the San Francisco Chronicle today on my honey's workplace, Diesel, a Bookstore.

While I would have liked a little more concrete discussion about why people should shop at local businesses (community character, supporting your local economy, ethical consumerism, and how all of that ultimately protects your interests, etc.), I am impressed that an independent, local shop is getting ink in one of the biggest newspapers in the country. And I suppose it is an article in the business section -- not so much a place to proselytize.

But I am happy at the very least that the guts of how a small business works is being conveyed to consumers. The real in and out, everyday workings of a small business is an important piece of the puzzle in educating consumers about the difference between a place like Diesel and a place like Borders or Barnes and Noble.

Now just get the piece out of the business section and into the parts of the paper people actually read!

For me, the importance of knowing how a small business must conduct itself is this: I still find it funny that it isn't common sense -- and that small businesses have to defend -- why they can't offer the same deep discounts as Amazon or why they don't have every fucking thing under the sun in stock. I am blown away by how annoyed customers get when something not in stock is offered as a special order, or in the case of a bookstore, questions are asked of the customer and something else is suggested. It's like for those folks, customer service only matters when they want to complain.

Amazing to me too is a debate that periodically rages in my hometown paper's Letters to the Editor as to why a local hardware store (that provides benefits and a living wage for knowledgable employees and doesn't have bulk-buying power) charges a dollar more than Lowes or Home Depot for the same piece of lumber or whatever. Duh. And oh so related, I am equally shocked at how often some consumers act like they are getting one over on the little guy by getting it cheaper or without waiting for a special order at the megachain -- like the local shop was trying to fuck the consumer over and "they showed them." Right.

Recently, my friend and super manga expert, Domi, who works at local comic purveyor Dr. Comics and Mr. Games related her funny big chain bookstore manga experience. Crouched down in the children's manga section, checking out the competition's wares, she found amongst the Doraemon and other such kiddie fare many sexually explicit yaoi and other adult manga. Shocked, she pulled them all out and took them to the counter. Thumbing through them to illustrate why they shouldn't be housed in the children's manga, she was told to put them back in the section because that is where "the manager told us to put them."

Hmmmm, okay. I think I'd rather pay that dollar more to a business where the employee is more likely given the freedom to think and use common sense, and therefore hopefully invest themselves in their employer, stock, and customers. Sheesh.

Alright, this is spiraling into a diatribe of black-hole ickiness. Let's lighten the mood, shall we?

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I'm loving Sex in a Can. Only in Asia, baby. Or possibly a Tijuana pharmacy.

And in the era of the 3 ounce only rule and cavity searches, Violet Blue tells us how to safely fly with your sex toys.

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Ever notice how much the new Blonde Redhead sounds like Lush? The hubby just put it on and I thought it was Miki and Co.

NP: Grinderman. Slow to pick this up because of all the hype, though I heart Nick Cave (I even heart his child molester moustache). I am not disappointed. Brilliant, as hyped. Definitely reminiscient of The Birthday Party, but less chaotic or bewildered in its longing and vitriol. There's an understanding there, finally. Still primal, yet seasoned. Superb.

Attended Rusty and Ken's book release party yesterday at Diesel, A Bookstore for their new title, Paraspheres, from their baby, Omnidawn Publishing.

Paraspheres was conceived of and published as a way to expose Latin America's magical realism literary styles and themes on a more global scale, and is flying the flag of the "New Fabulists." Of course, there are many gringo authors who have been writing in this style for some time, most notably one of my favorites, Rikki Ducornet (who also lends her words to this anthology as well as the introduction) but this is one of the first anthologies to surface, and it is very well done.

Superb pieces at the reading, all different, all touching and complex in their own way, and all with that enchanting glint of magic running like a vein of gold throughout. Amongst the 7 readers -- all excellent -- Charlie Anders spoke as one of a power couple (she a med student, he a law student), mad for each other's love but unable to reconcile their equally mad schedules in order to capitalize on that love, and their so-crazy-it-just-might-work scheme to take turns in cryogenic freezing to allow the other to complete their studies and preserve their love for a later, less hectic date. Carol Schwalberg regaled us with the story of Annie, an artist no longer struggling to make ends meet, but with the guilt over her Jewish identity amid a marriage to a good, safe, secure, but ultimately boring Protestant named Frank, and her dreamtime visitations from the strict and oh so Orthodox Moish, who wants to marry her and make her the proper Jewish girl she never was. And Laura Moriarty, poet and Deputy Director at Small Press Distribution stunned with an excerpt from her latest book, Ultravioleta -- a poem, a war, a narrative, a song, and a science fiction novel all as one.

Pick up Paraspheres directly from Omnidawn, Small Press Distribution, or Diesel, A Bookstore (links above). And if you're local to the Bay or visiting San Francisco soon, check out Omnidawn's second reading for Paraspheres on Thursday, September 28 at City Lights Books, where Rikki Ducornet will be flying in from Colorado to read her contribution. See you there.