San Francisco Bay Times - May 7, 2020

May 7–20, 2020 | http://sfbaytimes.com

Louise “Lou” Fischer So here we are, week 7 (or is it 8? who knows anymore) of captivity and I’ve realized 2 things: 1) Trump sucks as president. He really sucks, as my sisters and I used to say back in the 70s, “he sucks out loud,” with loud being both literal and colloquial in this case. He is punching out of his weight class, is completely unqualified, and has not realized that the presidency is not a “fake it till you make it” job.

And 2) female leaders are schooling us on how to run a country during a pandemic.

About two weeks ago, while driving home very late from work (I’m an “essential worker”), I heard former President Obama’s voice on the radio (the day he endorsed Biden).

It was as if the angels were singing; I closed my eyes, smiled, and pretended he was still president. I was driving southbound on 101 at around midnight, so closing my eyes was 100 times worse than texting while driving, but it was a nice fantasy while it lasted.

Until recently, Trump’s incompetence was laughable and damaging

For those of you who got weeded out of pre-med in college, you can breathe a sigh of relief that you’re not one of the poor, hapless experts who had to stand with Trump at press conferences and squirm with embarrassment when he said the virus would be gone “soon” and if not, just drink/inject cleaning products because if they can disinfect your kitchen counters, just imagine what power they will have over a puny virus. I feel so badly for Dr. Deborah Birx and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who must wonder every day what holy hell they are in and may be feeling regret for missing out on all the keg parties and fun times during four years of college, four more years of medical school, and another 4–7 years of residency and fellowships.

Trump said, “our country wasn’t built to be shut down.” Well, our country wasn’t built to have an idiot like you as president either. He wanted to open the country and fill

Reopening of California Begins California Governor Gavin Newsom on May 4 announced that based on the state’s progress in meeting certain metrics tied to COVID19 related indicators, the state on Friday, May 8, could begin to move into Stage 2 of modifying the stay at home order. Guidelines are to be released as we go to press today, May 7.

does not include offices, seated dining at restaurants, shopping malls, or schools. As Governor Newsom noted last week, the state is working with school districts and the California education community to determine how best and safely to reopen. That continues to be the case, so the May 8 announcement does not move up this timeline.

“Millions of Californians answered the call to stay home and thanks to them, we are in a position to begin moving into our next stage of modifying our stay at home order,” said Governor Newsom. “But make no mistake—this virus isn’t gone. It’s still dangerous and poses a significant public health risk. As we move into the next stage of reopening, we will do so with updated guidance to help qualifying businesses make modifications needed to lower the risk of COVID-19 exposure to customers and workers. Californians should prepare now for that second stage of reopening.”

While the state will be moving from Stage 1 to Stage 2, counties can choose to continue more restrictive measures in place based on their local conditions, and the state expects some counties to keep their more robust stay at home orders in place beyond May 8.

San Francisco Mayor London Breed responded to the announcement by saying that she believes the city will “definitely work to achieve that goal and get to a better place.”

What’s in Early Stage 2 Stage 2 sectors include some retail, manufacturing, and logistics businesses, which will still have to undergo modifications to lower the risk of transmission. Businesses and employers in those sectors will be able to reopen as soon as Friday.

Some examples include bookstores, clothing stores, florists, and sporting goods stores.

Other Stage 2 sectors, such as offices and dine-in restaurants, will be part of a later Stage 2 opening. The announcement for Friday 2

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Regional Variation The Governor also announced on Monday that while the state is moving into Stage 2 together, counties can move more quickly through Stage 2 if they attest that they meet the state’s readiness criteria. Counties must create and submit a readiness plan that the state will make publicly available.

The Governor signed an executive order directing the State Public Health Officer to establish criteria to determine whether and how, in light of local conditions, local health officers may implement public health measures less restrictive than the statewide public health directives.

Counties must meet criteria including demonstrating they have a low prevalence of COVID-19, that they meet testing and contact tracing criteria, that their health care system is prepared in case they see a sudden rise in cases, and that they have plans in place to protect vulnerable populations. (continued on page 26) MAY 7 , 2 0 2 0

the churches by Easter because “we can’t have the cure be worse than the disease.” Really? Dude, at this point you are worse than the disease.

Please go away and take your incompetent, cheerleading sycophants with you. “Sleepy” Joe Biden, please wake up; we need you! Full disclaimer: Biden was my second to last choice for president (Kamala, Elizabeth, and AmyK were my top three) but, of course, I’m supporting him and you must too, because as Joy-Ann Reid from MSBNC says about Trump, “That man need to be gone.”

Female Leaders Excelling During Crisis A few weeks ago, pundits, columnists, and other members of the press noticed that countries that have fewer cases (relatively) of coronavirus happen to be run by women. Wow, what a surprise: a leader who tells the truth, listens to experts, can look beyond themself, act in the public good, and is not afraid to take decisive action is actually more successful in combating a deadly pandemic.

Gee, I wonder why? Maybe because women leaders have to be confident while maintaining humility, be assertive yet vulnerable, and show toughness and yet be empathetic. Call me crazy, but I thought that was the job requirement for all elected officials.

So, let’s look at these great gals who, along with my gal-pal and favorite mayor, London Breed, are showing the world how it’s done.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand, was quick to close borders and move to lockdown. The country had virtually no community transmission and pretty much eliminated the virus there.

Chancellor Angela Merkel, Germany, has a doctorate in quantum chemistry and we’re stuck with a flim-flam-man with a disregard

for scientific expertise.

Sheesh, who did we piss off? (Um, that would be Mother Earth; she’s pretty mad at the U.S. for the climate change stuff.” Merkel fasttracked COVID-19 testing and in mid-April, Germany was running approximately 120,000 tests per day while the Drs. Deborah Birx and Anthony Fauci appear distressed during U.S. was barely eking Trump’s comments at a White House briefing on COVID-19. out 15,000 per day. of Finland (the world’s youngest President Tsai Ing-wen, head of state) for using social media Taiwan, is the biggest “kick-ass” to manage the pandemic (while of the group. I’m thinking she has our idiot-in-chief uses Twitter as a Wonder Woman bracelets that were weapon), and Prime Minister modified to stop pathogens instead of Erna Solberg of Norway for holdbullets. In January, at the first whiff ing dedicated press conferences for of “a disease is a comin’ oh yeah,” children and explaining that it is OK she instituted measures to block the to feel scared (as opposed to Trump, spread without having to resort to who holds press conferences that lockdown. The country of 23 million make the entire population more has had fewer than 500 Covid-19 scared). cases, and, at last report, 6 deaths.

Imagine if the will of the people Prime Minister Mette had prevailed in 2016 instead of Frederiksen, Denmark, shut the Electoral College and we had a down borders and put the counfemale president who respects science try in lockdown early. More imporand would have governed with empatantly, Frederiksen is taking care of thy and care. While this won’t hapher people financially with various pen in 2020, you still have to vote economic policies as opposed to the for Biden to get us out of this mess.

U.S., where you may or may not get a As I say in almost every column, stimulus check, unemployment bene“Elections matter.” Stay safe and be fits; or a small business grant because healthy.

Trump gave them to public comLouise (Lou) Fischer is a former panies instead of actual small businesses. So, while Denmark takes care co-chair of the Board of Directors for the Alice B. Toklas LGBT of their residents, in the U.S., artists, Democratic Club and has served as musicians, bar owners, theatre peoan appointed and elected delegate ple, gig workers, etc. are relegated to for the State Democratic Party. She “GoFundMe” pages and interminais a proud graduate of the Emerge bly long lines at food banks.

California Women’s Democratic Honorable mention to Prime Leadership program, was a San Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir of Francisco commissioner, and has served in leadership positions in Iceland for providing free coronavimultiple nonprofit and communityrus testing to all citizens, 34-year-old based organizations.

Prime Minister Sanna Marin

About Our Cover Artist Debra Walker, who was appointed by Mayor London Breed to the San Francisco Arts Commission in March, created this issue’s cover, which captures the “social distancing” aspect of the coronavirus pandemic. The required need to maintain space between people when outside of the home has been especially challenging for those of us in a populous city like San Francisco, which is in the Top 25 (placing #21) of the most dense cities in the U.S. (Population density seems to be correlated to COVID-19 prevalence, with many of the densest cities in both the U.S. and throughout the world tending to have higher caseloads.)

Walker—whose striking images have been displayed at SFO, in office buildings, restaurants, galleries, and more—is known for her distinctive urban landscapes.

The work featured on the San Francisco Bay Times cover is unique among those pieces in that it melds such a landscape with human figures. Edward Hopper’s memorable Nighthawks (1942) comes to mind, as both works capture an isolating human stillness that seems at odds with unmistakable cityscapes.

Shown here in a new self-portrait as well as in a recent photo, Walker was born in Omaha, Nebraska. She completed fine arts studies at UCLA before attending UC Berkeley and making her way to San Francisco.

Original art by Debra Walker Trivia: One of her works, Chair, is featured in the 1993 movie Mrs. Doubtfire starring the late great Robin Williams.

Her work is now featured in a virtual exhibit from Live Worms Gallery: https://bit.ly/2zf YjJX For more information: http://www.debrawalker.com/

PHOTO BY JASON TAM

Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History

to democracy, but now it has turned deadly; just ask the families of the 72,417 people in the U.S. who have died as of May 6 (more by the time you are reading this article). After downplaying the risks and squandering precious weeks (months?) while blaming China, Europe, the Democratic Party, the media, and even blaming the bossa nova for all we know, he unveiled his specialized brand of sociopathy, narcissism, and ignorance for all the world to see. It’s so bad that even Ireland— where the people worship leprechauns, enjoy Riverdance, and consider Guinness Stout a “refreshing beer”—is pitying the United States. Do a search on Irish Times’ columnist Fintan O’Toole and read his article entitled “Donald Trump Has Destroyed the Country He Promised to Make Great Again.”

When you are done, go cry your eyes out for an hour or so.

CRONKITE NEWS/ARIZONA PBS

Female World Leaders Excel During Crisis as Trump Tanks

Power of Community Needed for Virtual AIDS Walk SF on July 19 needs to end the HIV epidemic once and for all—and now, it’s virtual!

We need the power of community right now, and the critical frontline Bay Area HIV providers AIDS Walk San Francisco funds need you.

From the Frontlines Brett Andrews From its best vantage point, this moment is all about the community pulling together. Sheltering in place is an act of community. It’s also a privilege. And when privilege is available, it’s a responsibility.

Every day, my team at PRC is problem solving for a growing number of people in need. The health and economic crises imposed by the novel coronavirus have come hard and fast for all of us, but it’s clearly those who were already the most vulnerable among us that are impacted most directly and most direly.

So, how do we balance privilege and vulnerability? We show up, in community, where we can.

While much has changed since the dark, early years of the AIDS epidemic, the compassion of AIDS Walk San Francisco participants remains as strong as ever. Born out of the Bay Area’s last health crisis, AIDS Walk remains a seminal opportunity to support those living with HIV/AIDS, to push back against homophobia, racism, and xenophobia, and to champion the complementary services our community

Livestreamed on ABC7 and your favorite online platforms, AIDS Walk San Francisco will take place on July 19—the very same day in July that the AIDS Walk San Francisco Foundation launched this radical act of community in 1987.

Together, as virtual walkers and team leaders and donors, we will raise life-altering funds for the safety net and advocacy organizations continuing to buttress and change the lives of people living with HIV/AIDS in our communities. Then, we will gather in the safety and comfort of our living rooms for an interactive, live celebration worthy of our efforts.

Be on the lookout for special guests and special challenges to be unveiled in the coming weeks.

PRC is spearheading AIDS Walk San Francisco 2020, as the primary beneficiary, with the same innovative vision that has made it a leading provider of wraparound social and behavioral health services and legal assistance in San Francisco. During the COVID-19 public health emergency, we’ve pivoted fast to keep lifelines alive to all those we can.

Requests by people living with HIV for emergency financial assistance to pay for the most basic health, housing, and medical expenses keep growing, and we’re trying to expand the pot of money we have available.

Hourly workers dependent upon the economic vitality of our city are out of work, out of money, and anxious about the future. We’re preparing for a 20% uptick in employment

services and related needs, as The Mercury News projects unemployment across the Bay Area will reach 17% or 800,000 lost jobs.

In the HIV/AIDS advocacy community, we have seen the direct correlation between the conditions where people live, learn, work, and play; and vulnerability to the spread of HIV as well as HIV-related health challenges and mortality through our tireless Getting to Zero efforts.

African American and Latino men have the highest rates of HIV diagnosis in the Bay Area, in grossly unrepresentative proportion. In 2018, homeless patients accounted for 20% of newly diagnosed HIV cases, despite only representing 1% of the population.

Inequities in healthcare access and root conditions fuel the spread of HIV/AIDS today and, in this particular moment, are intensifying the vulnerabilities in our community during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the Bay Area, 31,000 people live with HIV/AIDS. Half of those (16,000) live in San Francisco and more than three quarters (12,000+), before the COVID-19 economic crisis, earned less than 50% of the area median income, placing them at high risk of homelessness. Over 4,000 were already subsisting below the poverty line.

While there have been many advancements in the treatment of HIV/AIDS, there still is no cure.

Many people do not receive the HIV treatment they need because they struggle with poverty, homelessness, substance use, and mental health issues that make stabilizing and managing their health issues increasingly hard.

An essential priority of the fundraiser, the AIDS Walk San Francisco 2020 Community Grants Program, remains dedicated to providing strategic funding directed at HIV/AIDS service organizations throughout the greater Bay Area in 2020. PRC and all the day’s beneficiaries need you.

At this moment in this time, I hope you are even more compelled to join me in this critical fundraiser and essential act of community. Register a “walker” team of co-workers, neighbors, or friends today, or join “Team PRC” at https://sf.aidswalk.net/ Together, in community, we show our strength.

Leading PRC since 2003, Brett Andrews has overseen PRC’s evolution from a small HIV/AIDS legal service agency to an integrated social and behavioral health provider bent on fighting poverty, stigma, and isolation by uplifting marginalized adults and affecting the social conditions of health.

He holds an M.A. in Industrial/ Organizational Psychology from George Washington University, received the San Francisco Pride Celebration’s Heritage Award for 10+ years of service in 2017, and was appointed to the San Francisco Mayor’s Methamphetamine Task Force. https://prcsf.org/

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Emin Demirci: A Genius of the Mind and Heart

Photos Courtesy of Emin Demirci

nature and needs and the capacity to envision what people and the planet will need in the future. They must be extremely literate in multiple complex technologies and have a refined eye for beauty and aesthetics. It’s the ultimate polymath job.”

6/26 and Beyond John Lewis Every so often, you meet someone who changes the way you look at the world. One such a person for me is the highly acclaimed and soughtafter industrial designer Emin Demirci.

Demirci himself is the ultimate polymath. He’s a rare person who possesses exceptional intelligence, an extraordinary breadth of interests and curiosity, strategic vision and circumspection—and a heart of gold. What impresses me most about Demirci is his deep concern for the suffering of others and his ability to draw upon his wide-ranging talents to do something tangible about it.

Nowhere is Demirci’s vision more evident than his pathbreaking design concept Vald, a device to provide life-saving oxygen to coal minAn industrial designer is the perers trapped underground when a son who oversees the entire process of an idea becoming reality in terms mine collapses and a massive gas explosion and fire ensue. The horof the products we use in our daily rific mining disasters in Utah, West lives—all the way from conception Virginia, and his native Turkey that to development to production to marketing and distribution. Demirci killed over 300 miners deeply disturbed Demirci. Under existing proexplains that an industrial designer must have “keen insight into human tocols, “miners are expected just to run out of the mine as fast as they can or escape to sealed ‘refuge chambers,’ where they can survive for up to a week. But many miners can’t do so in time, leaving them trapped underground for as long as 20 Design of Q interface for captioning devices, providing hearing-impaired people graphic imagery to understand the emo- hours until the fire burns tional context of a speaker’s words. itself out. And they carry

Emin Demirci

Design for state-of-the-art DNA sequencer

only an hour’s worth of oxygen on them. It must be the worst feeling to be left alone gasping for air to survive.”

Demirci created an ingenious mobile oxygen delivery system that provides stranded miners oxygen for 24 hours and thus greatly increases their chance for survival. He combined the way astronauts aboard the International Space Station maintain their oxygen supply with a very sophisticated technology developed

Lyon-Martin Health Services Faces Uncertain Future

Lyon-Martin Health Services, which provides health care sensitive to the needs of heterosexual women, bisexual women, lesbians, and transgender people, is one of numerous LGBTQ health clinics nationwide that face an uncertain future in light of the coronavirus pandemic.

Prior to the emergence of the novel coronavirus, the clinic at 1735 Mission Street annually treated approximately 3,000 patients seeking gynecological services, gender-affirming surgeries, and more. The shelter-in-place order, associated financial concerns, and other problems have since posed threats to Lyon-Martin. Emergency funding from the city and private donors will allow the clinic to stay open until July 1, but its standing after then remains in question.

“The city needs to see how long COVID is going to play out,” J.M. Jaffe, the Transgender Health Manager at Lyon-Martin, told NBC News.

Another individual, a 17-year-old male, was also taken to San Francisco General Hospital, but his injuries are not considered to be life-threatening.

Brousseau, who identified as bisexual, was a Twitter Associate Product Manager and founded “Gay for Transit” with the help of BART Director Janice Li. He was a great supporter of public transportation, which holds numerous environmental benefits, and desired to strengthen support for it, particularly from the LGBTQ community.

“His mind was brilliant,” friend and adviser Michelle Saremi informed the San Francisco Examiner. “If he was told something was too hard or it couldn’t be done or it was impossible, he’d research it, come back the next day, and say it’s totally possible.”

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Not surprisingly, Vald won the first place Platinum Award at the Spark!

Design Awards, was runner up for the Core77 Design Awards, a finalist for the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) IDEA awards, and Fast Company’s World Changing awards, and has been discussed at numerous health and safety conferences.

Another design concept epitomizing Demirci’s vision is Q , an innovative wearable device and interface to help people with profound hearing impairment. Q also won prestigious awards from Spark!, IDSA, and Fast Company, and received a highly coveted grant from VentureWell, a nonprofit organization that funds only the highest quality designs that provide significant social benefit.

Lyon-Martin, part of HealthRight 360, now offers testing for COVID-19. Named after renowned lesbian activists Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, it is just one of over 200 LGBTQ health clinics in the U.S. that are facing immense challenges due to the global pandemic and other threats. For supporters of Lyon-Martin, the difficulties have been all the more disheartening given the recent death of Lyon in April.

A GoFundMe page has been created to help save Lyon-Martin and the Women’s Community Clinic: https://bit.ly/2ymDrRx

She added, “This is very tragic because he’s one of those students that you meet in your lifetime, that you just know is going to just change the world.”

In an Instagram post created by Brousseau shortly before he was shot, he wrote: “I just ate a delicious burrito in Dolores Park and for a brief moment everything felt okay.” He was likely referring to how such simple pleasures can provide comfort during an otherwise stressful coronavirus pandemic time.

Brousseau had just left the park and walked to 14th and Guerrero Streets, where the shooting occurred. Supervisor Rafael Mandelman the next day said that the details of the event were “chilling and heartbreaking.” Supervisor Mandelman added that “more than fifty rounds were fired.”

Anyone with information is encouraged to call the SFPD tip line at 415-575-4444.

UC Berkeley published a tribute to Brousseau that reads, in part, “Above all, Courtney was a kind and compassionate person who was always willing to lend a helping hand: someone whose dedication, spirit and belief in progress inspired us all. His future was bright and full of possibilities.

Courtney will be dearly missed.”

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They addressed the problem that voice captioning devices do not enable a hearing-impaired person to understand a speaker’s intonation and their emotions as they speak, leading to frequent miscommunications— and sometimes hearing people disengaging from contact with hearing-impaired people altogether.

Demirci and his colleague’s design uses sophisticated technology to provide hearing-impaired people graphic imagery and/or idiosyncratic vibrations that reveal the speaker’s emotions and intonations, and enable a hearing-impaired person to become aware of up to 25 phonetic sounds they cannot hear.

Another life-changing design Demirci created was for a leading developer of DNA and genomics research technologies, whose products “lie at the very forefront of human development.” He transformed their existing “ugly and ordinary” looking machinery into (continued on page 26)

Disturbing Parallels: No Excuse for Hate where victims can input their experiences. More than 1,600 instances have been reported in its first three weeks with encounters ranging from name calling to physical assaults. This trend was so disturbing, I had officials from CAA and SF State on a virtual town hall for my constituents recently to discuss this issue.

“They wanted to do a short-term contract so that we could re-evaluate what the situation will be in two months. I think they were just wary to make a commitment to continue to support us, but we did get kind of like a wink and a nod that they would like to support us to the end of the calendar year.”

‘Gay for Transit’ Founder Fatally Wounded in Mission District Shooting San Francisco transit advocate, LGBTQ community activist, and Twitter employee Courtney Brousseau died on May 7, according to a spokesperson for San Francisco General Hospital.

Brousseau was fatally injured when he happened to be in the Mission during an 8:20 pm May 1 shootout that took place between two as-of-yet unidentified groups of people. Brousseau was just 22.

by the USC Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute for a completely different purpose. “I encountered numerous failures along the way and many experts in electrochemistry said it just wasn’t possible. But I said to myself, ‘This has to happen,’ and I kept pushing to figure out a way.”

Demirci conceived Q because he saw firsthand how difficult it was for a colleague with severe hearing loss to communicate effectively and “how ancient” her equipment was. “I asked her if she’d like to collaborate with me to design something better.

I said together we could do something great.”

Assemblymember Phil Ting I don’t have to tell you; our world has changed drastically. I commend our state and local leaders who took decisive action to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus, otherwise known as COVID-19. While our way of life is disrupted for now, we in state government are working every day to help those who need assistance.

Many have referenced parallels of this pandemic to last century’s “Spanish flu.” However, the “Spanish flu” most likely did not originate in Spain. While it was spreading globally, the media only reported the cases in Spain back then because that country remained neutral during World War I, unfairly giving rise to its name.

Fast forward to today, and you see the president refer to COVID19 as the “Chinese Virus” or the “Wuhan virus.” This kind of language has incited attacks against members of our Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities, especially Chinese-Americans.

Perpetrators of hate are misplacing blame for the coronavirus on this population. They don’t understand our pandemic is a public health issue, not a racial one.

To help track this behavior and get a sense of how prevalent it is, the Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council, Chinese for Affirmative Action (CAA), and the Department of Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University have set up a website, “Stop AAPI Hate,”

Such targeting conjures up reminders of the AIDS crisis. On July 3, 1981, The New York Times wrote about a “rare cancer” diagnosed in 41 gay men in New York and California. Symptoms of possible HIV infection were observed in the late 1970s in other populations, such as intravenous drug users, but the disease was later referred to as GRID, or “gay-related immune deficiency.” Terms like GRID and “gay cancer” were used before the Centers for Disease Control coined the term AIDS in the fall of 1982.

It’s a saddening resemblance to today—a federal turning a blind eye to an epidemic, leaving localities essentially on their own to help their infected populations. The empty streets of today’s Castro remind those who survived the AIDS crisis of how the neighborhood looked in the 1980s when stigma and suspicion abound.

We, in San Francisco, are fortunate to have a public health system that was battle-tested by the AIDS crisis. The first Kaposi’s Sarcoma clinic opened at UCSF in September of 1981, and the world’s first dedicated outpatient AIDS clinic opened at San Francisco General Hospital in 1983. Many figures who led our response in the 1980s and ‘90s are leading our response now, including Dr. Grant Colfax, head of the San Francisco Department of Public Health and Dr. Paul Volberding, director of the UCSF AIDS Research Institute. Another figure who came to San Francisco during the AIDS crisis is Dr. George Rutherford, a leading researcher at UCSF on the prevention of infectious diseases, whom I also featured on a virtual town hall recently.

With professionals like these willing to give the necessary, tough advice to our local leaders, I am confident that we will pull through this, together.

Don’t be afraid to stand up against hate if you see it in your community. My office is here as a resource for those needing information and assistance from state government. Visit my website to learn more and get in touch: https://a19.asmdc.org/ Phil Ting represents the 19th Assembly District, which includes the Westside of San Francisco along with the communities of Broadmoor, Colma, and Daly City.

Message from Leadership

Facilitating Progress During Uncertain Times

By Gina Grahame “Change is the only constant in life,” the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus once said. While it’s doubtful he predicted the COVID-19 virus, his observation on life is as true today as it was 2,500 years ago. As entrepreneurs, we all know that change is not only inevitable, but also that it is sought. Because change means innovation, the desire for change is the search to be more profitable, more scalable, and more in demand.

We reformatted it to take advantage of the virtual environment and launched it as the CEO Virtual Roundtable Program (VRP). Created by Collaboration Business Consulting, the VRP is truly groundbreaking: Ten companies are taken through a three-month program structured around the Scalable Growth Model. The model is a tool for business owners to identify barriers to growth, assess leadership gaps, identify opportunity, and track goals and successes in a supportive, peer-driven environment.

As uncertain as these times are, the challenge for all of us is to find a way forward. Our goal at the GGBA is to help facilitate that progress. We believe, as member Karla Campbell of 4 Directions Coaching & Consulting said in March at Power Lunch 2020, “The answer is in the room.”

That’s why the GGBA is working to create more virtual opportunities for members to connect, discuss, brainstorm, and find the answers and ideas they need to pivot and grow their business.

Perhaps most exciting about the VRP is that the entire cost for members is underwritten by sponsors Wells Fargo, Granite Solutions Groupe, the GGBA Foundation, and the GGBA. We relaxed the qualifications for program entry so more members can take advantage of this incredible program. The inaugural class of ten companies is underway and we’re taking applications for the second class to begin in July.

For more information, contact CEORoundtable@ggba.com More Connections

We’ve amended the High Performance Accelerator Program to fit the needs that small business owners are facing now.

GGBA Member Spotlight

• Make Contacts - They take place on the second Tuesday of each month. Our next event will be May 12.

• Happy Hours - These pop-up parties are great for laughing and relaxing at the end of the day. Check here, at the GGBA website ( https://ggba.com/ ), and via our social media for days and times.

• Coffee with the President - This occurs each Tuesday through the end of May. The event offers a great opportunity to learn more about the organization, about LGBTBE Certification, and how to get the most out of your membership.

More Programming Learn the ins and outs of the PPP program from GGBA members going through it, along with officials and experts who will help to answer questions and provide guidance.

The date and time will be announced soon.

Other virtual ways for members to connect are:

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Olga Garcia of CG Moving Company, Inc.

CG Moving Company serves the Bay Area and the entire state of California by offering smart, safe, and professional moving services.

They have been in high demand, and receiving additional media attention, during this pandemic time because their team specializes in helping to provide very careful, Olga Garcia expert moving services to government agencies, biotech, pharmaceuticals, hospitals, healthcare, commercial, and residential clients. The firm has been a GGBA member since 2013. Here we catch up with Olga Garcia, CG’s Customer Service Manager.

GGBA: Please describe your business and its mission and values.

Olga Garcia: CG Moving Company is a commercial and residential moving company in the San Francisco Bay Area. Our mission is to make people love the moving experience. Our values are: In Lak’esh, Make a Mark, and Keep it Real. The first value is inspired by Mayan wisdom and tradition. It translates to: “You are my other me.” It means that we treat our employees and our customers as we would like to be treated. It is a moral code that helps us to navigate our interactions within and outside our company.

“Make a Mark” means we try to make a mark in anyone we encounter as we are serving our customers and each other. As an example, when we work with vulnerable populations such as veterans, elderly clients in adult protective services, or children in foster care or similar situations, we are very aware that the move has to be done swiftly, safely, and in a dignified and respectful manner. Moving is a stressful life event, and under those circumstances, you may be dealing with other issues such as trauma.

We keep this in mind and try to make a mark in that person who is moving to make the transition in a dignified and respectful and safe way. Lastly, “Keep it Real” means that we speak with truth and operate with integrity, from the moment a potential customer first makes contact with us, during the actual move, and at the invoicing and payment stage.

GGBA: Why did you decide to create your business?

Olga Garcia: Founder Charlie Gonzalez had been working for close to a decade in large moving companies. He had done the jobs of helper, packer, driver, installer, and supervisor. He felt that he could provide a greater moving experience, a more personalized and elevated interaction, while also bringing competitive pricing. We have a professional team of movers who deeply care for our customers and this shows in their work.

GGBA: Who are some of your role models, and especially those who helped to inf luence your business?

Olga Garcia: I learned a lot from people in different backgrounds and positions, and I have been blessed to work with great people in my moving career. But at the end of the day, my mother is my main inspiration.

She was a young widow with seven children under fifteen when my father passed away.

I saw her hustling in so many ways to bring food to our table, to keep our childhood as normal as possible, and to provide shelter and an education. She made the decision to leave me and my siblings behind and

ARIC CRABB/BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

ARIC CRABB/BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

PHOTO COURTESY OF CS MOVING COMPANY

Griselda Gonzalez, CFO and

Charlie Gonzalez CEO set out for the United States in the mid-1980s. We would eventually reunite. My other influence is also a woman, my wife Griselda.

We got married almost twenty years ago. We work together at CG Moving and she is the one in charge of finances, hiring and firing decisions, and day to day office related operations. We also have a young family and the way she can step in at the company and make negotiations on a customer contract and then step into our kids’ lives and move with grace, love, and authority is what keeps me going.

GGBA: Why did you decide to join the GGBA, and how long have you been a member?

Olga Garcia: We joined the GGBA in 2013. We have always been an ally of the LGBT community. I always say that if my customers are from that community and support us by choosing us for their office or home moves, I can step in and support my customers and advocate for their rights. Their well-being matters to me. I wanted to get a more intimate understanding of LGBT issues and how they related to the business world.

GGBA: How has being a member of GGBA helped your business so far?

Olga Garcia: We have received a lot of information on certification programs available not only to LGBT businesses but also to minority-owned businesses. Through the GGBA we learned about a Google and Tuck School of Business program on digital presence for minority small businesses. This then led to other connections that facilitated our participation in the Super Bowl 50 in 2016 as a contractor/vendor. From there we learned about the Supplier Clearing House and the CPUC MBE program. It’s just too much to detail here!

But we also have a network of other businesses that provide services or products. As an example, we met our employee benefits broker Joe Partida at a GGBA event. Our older trucks were wrapped by a GGBA member, A52 Signs company. We have purchased promotional materials from ellaprint. Our accounting is done by Richard Zee. Our workers received diversity training from Gina Grahame back in 2017. Joanna Zobjeck updated our logo; she was a contact we met at another GGBA event back in 2015. We met our bookkeeper Alan Pex from Pex Bookkeeping at an event at the GGBA as well. And the list can go on and on!

GGBA: Do you go to the GGBA monthly Make Contact networking events? Have they benefited you and your business, and would you recommend them to others?

Olga Garcia: Yes, we go to the events as much as we can. I am the person you will most likely meet at any of the Make Contacts. I always try to make sure to meet people and to connect them to our networks. There is always something for us to learn, to be entertained with, or

to connect! It is also a fun and professional group.

Whether you are a new or experienced networker, it feels very safe, not stuffy, and very diverse, so you can get contacts in different industries. In one of these events, we connected with Mark Madrid who is the CEO of the Latino Business Action Network at Stanford University. COO Griselda was able to attend and complete the Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative Scaling Program last year.

GGBA: What other advice would you give to someone who is thinking of starting their own business?

Olga Garcia: Don’t do it for the money! I know it is very cliché to say this, but it is the truth. For us, our first years were a lot about knocking doors and (continued on page 25)

GGBA CALENDAR For more information about these and other Golden Gate Business Association (GGBA) events, please visit the association’s website ( https://ggba.com/ ) or email events@ggba.com Coffee with the President via Zoom May 12 (morning and afternoon sessions) May 19 (morning session) May 26 (morning and afternoon sessions) GGBA President Gina Grahame writes: Hello GGBA, I’ve missed you! I’m happy to announce the return of the “Coffee with the President - Zoom Edition.”

Join me on Tuesdays for either your morning coffee from 9 am–9:30 am, or your afternoon coffee from 1 pm–1:30 pm.

During this challenging time, it’s especially important that we stay connected. To talk through our feelings, share our concerns, and to be a sounding board for one another as we strategize the future of our business. Or, as always, I welcome your thoughts on the GGBA. Seating is limited to two individuals for each session, with priority given to existing members.

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Roland Schembari and Bill Hartman, Co-Founders Randy Alfred, Founding News Editor 1978

Grand Reopening: The Grim Politics on Erring on the Side of ‘I Told You So’ 58,220 American fatalities in the 20-year war in Vietnam between 1955–1975, the national lockdown due to Trump’s neglect, disregard, and eventual reckless response to the crisis has sharply upended his acein-the-hole to re-election: a healthy economy. Without a booming economy (for somebody) to boast about towards re-election, what else is there? What else matters?

Kim Corsaro Publisher 1981-2011

2261 Market Street, No. 309 San Francisco CA 94114 Phone: 415-601-2113 525 Bellevue Avenue Oakland CA 94610 E-mail: editor@sfbaytimes.com www.sfbaytimes.com The Bay Times was the first newspaper in California, and among the first in the world, to be jointly and equally produced by lesbians and gay men.

We honor our history and the paper’s ability to build and strengthen unity in our community.

The Bay Times is proud to be the only newspaper for the LGBT community in San Francisco that is 100% owned and operated by LGBT individuals.

Dr. Betty L. Sullivan Jennifer L. Viegas Co-Publishers & Co-Editors

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Business Manager

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Web Coordinator

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CONTRIBUTORS Writers Rink, Sister Dana Van Iquity, Ann Rostow, Patrick Carney, Kate Kendell, Alex Randolph, Heidi Beeler, Gary M. Kramer, Dennis McMillan, Tom Moon, Tim Seelig, Cinder Ernst, John Chen Rafael Mandelman, Jewelle Gomez, Phil Ting, Rebecca Kaplan, Kin Folkz, Leslie Katz, Philip Ruth, Peter Gallotta, Bill Lipsky, Karen Williams, Donna Sachet, Gary Virginia, Zoe Dunning, Marcy Adelman, Stuart Gaffney & John Lewis Brandon Miller, Jamie Leno Zimron Michele Karlsberg Lyndsey Schlax, Randy Coleman, Debra Walker, Howard Steiermann, Andrea Shorter, Lou Fischer, Karin Jaffie, Brett Andrews, Karen E. Bardsley, David Landis, Jan Wahl

Cross Currents Andrea Shorter U.S. Congressman Adam Schiff deserves the first “I told you so” credit.

After the GOP Senate refused to remove the impeached president from office following his recorded shakedown of Ukraine for dirt on the former vice president and now the definitive Democratic nominee to win back the White House, chief House prosecutor Schiff warned us.

Failing to remove an obviously unfit Trump from office for clear and present danger to our national security, we were bound to witness and experience extreme consequences of maintaining the least prepared, most morally deficient, and corrupt president in U.S. history.

There are no circumstances by which Trump is going to change or rise to the seriousness of presidential leadership challenge for the better, least of all for the sake of anyone else, save for the sake of himself. The only good that it is ever going to get with Trump is worse.

As the coronavirus pandemic has now spread to infect well over one million Americans, taking the lives of tens of thousands more Americans in less than 100 days than the

We are about to see the hazards and dangers of Trump craziness on a whole new level.

Trump is now more than ever the most desperate man on this planet.

As a man who severely lacks ethics, moral compass, or empathy, he is also the most dangerous man. He will do whatever he thinks it takes to extend his presidency into a second term.

The race to re-open states from necessary lockdowns against the spread of and fatalities to coronavirus to resurrect a severely depressed economy, and the apparent lack of interest in massive testing of a massive American populace to better measure and manage the virus’ spread likely among far greater numbers than the president cares to hear are indicators enough of doing whatever it takes to push past the realities and collateral damages of a failure to prepare for and lead through a pandemic.

Yes, sheltering-in and socially distancing are growing tiresome. As spring and summer months grow warmer, it is going to be more difficult to keep a so far compliant majority populace to stay the safer course.

We can already see that with the beachgoers on the first day of 80 plus degrees in California—the most sheltering-in disciplined of the 50 states.

Still, most of us would rather be hot at home than sick or dying from a spreadable deadly virus.

In this issue of the San Francisco Bay Times we are launching a new column on the AIDS Memorial Quilt, which was conceived by Bay Times founding contributor, San Francisco AIDS Foundation Co-Founder, and renowned LGBTQ activist Cleve Jones. He envisioned the project in 1985 during the candlelight vigil that year marking the 1978 assassinations of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk.

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Numerous panels of the quilt returned to the Bay Area earlier this year after a showing in Atlanta. They were being readied by the National AIDS Memorial for an historic display marking the 150th anniversary in April of Golden Gate Park. The coronavirus pandemic unfortunately put a stop to those plans, which would have in size and scale rivaled the quilt’s 1987 unveiling at the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C.

© 2020 Bay Times Media Company Co-owned by Betty L. Sullivan & Jennifer L. Viegas

For others, no matter the number of fatalities that are or could have been prevented, the desire to allow

Perhaps in desperate times, a desperate majority of voters will relieve us all of the growing dangers of this president. There were very good reasons why he was impeached in the first place. The horrid consequences of not going all the way to remove him from office as he should have been? What can anyone really say but, I told you so.

Andrea Shorter is a Commissioner and the former President of the historic San Francisco Commission on the Status of Women. She is a longtime advocate for criminal and juvenile justice reform, voter rights and marriage equality. A CoFounder of the Bayard Rustin LGBT Coalition, she was a 2009 David Bohnett LGBT Leadership Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Volumes could be written about Sims, who founded the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Marching Band (now the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band), the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus, and much more.

Robert Michael Flaherty was one of the owners of the Hayes Street Grill and Vicolo Pizzerias. Both businesses are still thriving.

These three men, and the others honored in this panel, left lasting legacies that still benefit our lives. We are

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For Trump, should the fatalities from coronavirus prove less than one million before election day—”I told you so.” He will go on to claim that the Dems and liberal media totally overreacted, that the Dems broke the economy in this overreaction that he alone can fix, and that his leadership actually saved so many more lives than what could have been millions more dead. He therefore will hold that he deserves to be re-elected.

Only a morally deficient, self-serving, desperate man muses on national television about injecting poisonous disinfectants into other human beings as a cure against COVID-19. Would he actually consume poisonous disinfectant himself? Of course not. Would he be okay if you or I did? Sure, we’re not going to vote for him anyway. He’s just spit-ballin’ for solutions to a nattering pandemic that is eating away at his chance for re-election.

He’s not responsible for anything or anybody, including the security and well-being of the nation he purports to preside over.

Focusing on just a panel at a time, this column provides an intimate look at each individual tribute to those whose lives were lost as a result of HIV/AIDS. It is overwhelming to consider the loss of life and talent, which particularly affected—and continue to impact—our LGBTQ community. This panel, for example, pays tribute, in part, to Jon Sims, Allan Estes, and Robert Michael Flaherty.

Estes, in turn, was the Co-Founder, with his partner Lanny Baugniet, of Theatre Rhinoceros. Estes went on to serve as the theater’s Artistic Director.

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Economic depression is the collateral damage most Americans overwhelmingly continue to choose over further, preventable loss of life to a pandemic, and will do what is necessary to save each other’s lives. Americans understand and believe in the science that tells us that reopening states, even in measured, phased plans, will not take care of the coronavirus before election day. Less testing where needed will not take care of the coronavirus before election day. Still, against the hopes of a desperate man, we are now in a battle of “I told you so” grim political narratives and calculations of collateral damage.

for science-driven guidance, policymaking, and the further demonstration of this president’s exposed incompetence, lack of moral leadership, and dangerous bloodlust want to preserve power and prevent humiliating defeat at any costs, “I told you so.”

Panels from the AIDS Memorial Quilt

Photographers Rink, Phyllis Costa, Jane Higgins Paul Margolis, Chloe Jackman, Bill Wilson, Jo-Lynn Otto, Sandy Morris, Abby Zimberg, Deborah Svoboda, Morgan Shidler, JP Lor

CALENDAR Submit events for consideration by e-mail to: calendar@sfbaytimes.com

The good news remains that an overwhelming majority of Americans in both blue and red states, over 55%, agree that it is for the best for all to maintain social distancing to flatten the COVID-19 curve, and to save lives. This is one fact that has managed to unite us as a majority. We are also united in putting our trust and confidence in science over politics and the politics of fear to eventually see our way through this crisis, even if our economy takes a severe downturn in the process.

MAY 7 , 2 0 2 0

grateful for their contributions to our community and beyond. Thanks also go to Jones, John Cunningham (Executive Director of the National AIDS Memorial), Memorial Spokesman Kevin Herglotz, and to the many other workers, family members, volunteers, and partners who continue to make the quilt possible.

Gert McMullin, the quilt’s longtime Production Manager, is now using leftover fabric from the quilt to make face masks safeguarding against COVID-19. She says about the quilt: “This is my life’s work. These are my boys. I watch over them and they watch over me.” https://aidsmemorial.org/the-aids-memorial-quilt/

GLBT Fortnight in Review

By Ann Rostow From Bad to Worse I think we all expected by now that Corona Life will be with us for months, a year, maybe more. But in my case, I also expected that this meant we’d have to get used to a new normal. No more crowded bars.

No more massive sports events or parades, and so forth. Perhaps we will all stop shaking hands and I supposed we would habitually wash up in hot soapy water while singing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.” But otherwise, we might return to traveling, shopping, restaurants, and whatever else we can still afford to do.

Now, this idea of the future feels like a complacent dream. First, while I’ve been watching TV and perusing new recipes, the virus has aimed its most lethal assault on people of color, seniors in nursing homes, prisoners, and low-wage workers. What kind of a country allows this to happen without profound self-analysis? Yes, part of the problem is inherent in institutionalized settings, which are more contagious. Some is attributable to the link between income and health care. But then there’s the feeling that policymakers are simply drawing a line and allowing whole classes of people to become disposable.

Second, the economy is not going to roar back in July, no matter what Jared Kushner thinks. Some sectors seem damaged beyond recovery. I was going to write a whole section about how gay and lesbian bars, already an endangered species for numerous reasons, are about to become a thing of the past. But so are many other bars and restaurants. Department stores? Bye bye.

Airlines? Operating at a fraction of capacity for a year, two years, three?

Manufacturing, meat processing, industrial plants? There’s no way these mega-employers can ignore the risk of death and disease and go back to business as usual. As for the oil and gas industry, I’m no expert but I can’t see how future fuel use will drain the massive glut anytime soon.

The list goes on, but it represents a massive loss of wages and consumption, a poorer nation, a more desperate society.

Finally, it now looks as if even an attempt at recovery will have to wait months more than we thought. There are horrible projections coming out of the CDC, which suggests in an unverified draft report that we could see 3,000 deaths a day by June 1. I say unverified because, of course, the agency now disavows the draft document that bears its logo.

I’m an optimist by nature, so I can also imagine that other unforeseen events intervene to brighten the picture. Perhaps in the near term we refashion our lives and our economy in a positive way. Maybe a vaccine comes sooner rather than later.

Maybe we seriously address global warming, universal health care, inequality, immigration. Maybe in a decade or two we look back in awe at what changes this disease has wrought. Or not.

In the Loophole Moving on, we are continuing to watch for the High Court opinions on Title VII, the federal law that bans discrimination in the workplace on the basis of sex and other factors.

Does Title VII protect gays and lesbians? Does it protect transgender workers? Many courts have been saying yes to both questions over recent years, but the nine justices could reverse those precedents in one fell swoop. Actually, that would be two fell swoops.

Meanwhile, as we go to press, the Court will hear oral arguments on a related question, to wit: when can religious employers use the “ministerial exception” to avoid having to

abide by civil rights laws? Under the exception, churches have the right to hire and fire ministers for any reason, regardless of state or federal anti-discrimination laws. Okay, we’ll allow it, right? If you’re a crazy homophobic church, you can hire your favorite crazy homophobic “pastor.”

But what about the church receptionist? And how about the teachers at a religious school? Surely, they are not “ministers” or “ministerial” employees. In the two teacher cases that the Court will hear on May 11, religious schools fired one teacher who was diagnosed with cancer in seeming violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act, and another who believes she was targeted for her age.

In both cases, the schools claimed the ministerial exception because the lesson plans included limited religious instructions.

I don’t have to remind you how many gay and lesbian teachers have been told to take a hike by parochial schools and other religious employers, although unlike the two women on appeal at the High Court, most gay teachers are accused of violating contractual rules about moral behavior. For example, the Archbishop of Cincinnati just fired Jim Zimmerman, a gay English teacher who had worked at Alter High in Kettering, Ohio, for 23 years, after Zimmerman got married. Same-sex marriage seems to be a final straw for Catholic employers, who graciously tolerate single gay men and women, but slam the hammer down on those of us who make public commitments to life partners that then serve as proof of sexual deviancy.

Religious employers may not always have to resort to proclaiming a ministerial exception when they get rid of a gay worker, but let’s just agree that church groups have enough loopholes at their disposal. Let’s not enlarge any of them any further. Oh, and if you have nothing better to do, you know you can listen to live oral arguments. Check out Scotusblog for the link.

A Flag for All Seasons I was just reading an absurd story about how the BiNet bisexual rights group was claiming that they owned the legal rights to the Bisexual Pride Flag, which apparently is a thing.

This flag, which consists of three meaningful stripes, was designed by a guy named Michael Page over twenty years ago, and even though Page was affiliated with BiNet at the time, the flag he created doesn’t “belong” to anyone. Don’t tell that to the fussbudgets over at BiNet who twisted themselves into knots when activist Jayne Shea used the flag in a virtual event.

“Hi Jayne B Shea,” they wrote. “We at BiNet USA are asking you to get in touch so we can discuss your use of the bisexual pride flag without any money going to our organization.

Thank you for removing the flag from your site, socials or work. We know this is a lot so we hope we can work a new deal.”

Say what? Does BiNet really think individual activists have cash to burn on faux flag fees? And shouldn’t they be welcoming Shea’s efforts in solidarity? According to Gay City News, the attempted shakedown didn’t stop there: “If you’re using the bi pride colors, or any @BiNetUSA work,” they warned in a subsequent tweet, “please remove them from your website before we send a legal letter advising same.”

In the course of researching these litigious bi-bozos, I found a website that offered “a complete guide to queer pride flags,” which indeed are myriad. There’s even a “pony (continued on page 26) S AN F R ANC IS C O BAY T IM ES

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This Month at the Castro Farmers’ Market Castro Farmers’ Market New Hours, New Look!

Photos by Rink The Castro Farmers’ Market is happy to announce that we have changed our hours of operation, which until further notice are now 2:30 pm to 7:00 pm. The first hour, 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm, is to serve seniors and those most at risk during this pandemic time. We believe that everyone should have access to produce grown by local farmers and ask that our shoppers respect this special hour so that others may shop the farmers’ market.

La Méditerranée staff were on hand at their table with “to go” offerings of Sangria, wine and the restaurant’s famous hummus.

As local farmers’ markets slowly return, the asparagus continues to grow, sweet cherries await harvesting, and lettuce and carrots shine. Small farmers continue to plant, nurture, and harvest their produce. Farmers need your support so they can continue growing and selling their fruits and vegetables directly from the farm to you.

Farmers’ livelihoods depend on your purchases.

Farmers’ markets have been designated an essential business during the coronavirus pandemic, though fewer farmers’ markets are open and farmers have had to improvise on how to sell their products. Some farmers have opened farm stands, some are offering CSA boxes, while others are kind enough to donate some of their produce to those in need.

Cheuzie Moua from Valley Bee Farms says, “It’s sad that some markets are closed, but the ones that stayed open are busier than ever. “I’m still very glad to be able to come out to markets and sell,” Charlie Cunha from Rodin Farms states.

When you purchase from a farmers’ market, you not only get the freshest possible produce, but you are also supporting local farmers who depend on selling their produce directly to customers. The Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association (PCFMA) and your local farmers wish to thank you, the local community and market customers, for your continued support.

With a range of safety precautions in place, such as wearing masks, staying a safe distance from customers and others, and a no-touch policy on fruits and vegetables, Kue Thao from Ken’s Top Notch says, “We are selling only around 60% of a normal year. We’re hoping that everything reopens soon. Stone fruit needs to be moved when ripe. A lot of people don’t like the fact that they can’t choose their own fruit—with stone fruit, people want to feel what they’re getting, and they want to taste what they’re taking home.” We do appreciate both farmers and customers following all safety guidelines.

For sale at the Feel Good Bakery booth were a variety of breads and pastries.

When visiting your local farmers’ market this season, look for the arrival of sweet cherries this month.

Asparagus is still available. Spring artichokes, green onions, fava beans, and peas are here. So, please visit your local farmer and find some of the freshest seasonal produce available, direct from the fields to you!

We are pleased that the Castro Farmers’ Market remains open and hope you visit each week. PCFMA is committed to creating a safe environment at each farmers’ market and has implemented changes to its operation. Before you visit the farmers’ market, please become familiar with our Customer Safety Guidelines, which you can find at http://pcfma.org/pcfma-coronavirus/ We hope you remain safe and healthy during this difficult time. Keep updated on any changes to our farmers’ market schedules through the market Facebook pages and email newsletter. Please visit our website to find current market information or to sign up for our email newsletters.

Debra Morris is a spokesperson for the Pacific Coast Farmers’ Market Association (PCFMA). Check out the PCFMA website for recipes, information about farmers’ markets throughout the region and for much more: https://www.pcfma.org/

The PCFMA staff maintained social distancing at their booth on April 22.

The Jacobs Farm’s booth on April 22

The Alpine Blue Farms’ booth offerings included walnuts, cherries and berries.

The Happy Boy Farm’s booth is among the most popular at the Castro Farmers’ Market.

Masked and distanced shoppers at the Castro Farmers’ Market on April 22.

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LaVerne Shirley’s Home Cooking

The Gay Gourmet David Landis LaVerne Shirley’s Memorable Meat Loaf

Yup, that was her name: LaVerne Shirley Landis.

l/2 onion, diced

She was exactly what you’d expect: the life of every party, the first to sit with me at the piano (yes, I was a piano major) and sing a showtune (“Sing out, Louise!”), and—most of all—one of the best cooks ever.

LaVerne would never use the term “chef,” but that’s really what she was. Back in the 60s (in the Midwest, no less), she was reading Bon Appetit and Gourmet Magazine and cooking Chinese, Italian, French, German, and Lithuanian (our heritage) specialties. While we didn’t have a ton of money, she and Dad always took us to the most interesting restaurants— everything from Japanese to South American to Kosher delis and more.

No wonder I grew up to be “The Gay Gourmet.”

So, in the spirit of “sheltering in place,” I’m fondly remembering LaVerne by offering up some of my most favorite of her recipes. And, keeping up the family tradition, these recipes were compiled by my sister Kate Landis. If possible, she might even be giving LaVerne a run for her money in the cooking department.

Enjoy!

1 pound ground beef (the more fat, the better) 1 can condensed vegetarian Campbell’s vegetable soup (yes, it has to be Campbell’s) 2 eggs, beaten l/4 or l/3 cup of Italian bread crumbs Salt and pepper to taste 6 strips of bacon Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

Beat eggs in a separate container. In a big bowl, combine the hamburger meat (add in spoonful by spoonful), diced onions, condensed soup, eggs, and bread crumbs. Mix until moist but solid. Form into a rectangular, oval loaf and place in an oven-friendly casserole dish. Cover the loaf with six bacon strips. Bake until meat is cooked through but still moist (about 30–40 minutes). Optional: broil the loaf for the last couple of minutes to make the bacon strips crispy.

LaVerne Shirley’s Super Stuffed Mushrooms Large button mushrooms l/2 pound pork sausage 2–3 tablespoons chopped water chestnuts 2 tablespoons chopped green onion 2 tablespoons soy sauce l/4 cup chicken stock 2 teaspoons cornstarch

Dining Out (In) for Life 2020 The 20th annual Dining Out for Life benefit in San Francisco this year became “Dining In for Life” due to San Francisco’s “stay at home” order during the coronavirus pandemic. The virtual event was held on Tuesday, April 21, and was hosted by the San Francisco AIDS Foundation’s Joe Hollendoner, who appeared as “Ginger.”

Check out Ginger’s special message: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1525482337606938

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Wash mushrooms in cool water.

Drain on paper towels for 15 minutes— or in a colander. Remove stems. Set aside.

Chop stems and set aside to add to filling. Parboil sausage. Mix with water chestnuts, cornstarch, green onion, chopped mushroom stems, and soy sauce. Mix thoroughly. Fill mushrooms with mixture.

In a medium skillet, mix 2 tablespoons peanut oil and chicken stock.

Add mushrooms, cover, and steam gently over medium flame for 15 minutes for medium mushrooms or 20 minutes for large mushrooms.

Keep flame only high enough to produce steam. Add another l/4 cup of chicken stock if necessary.

LaVerne Shirley’s Stupendous Stuffed Cabbage 1 pound ground beef 1 large cabbage l/2 large onion, chopped fine Garlic to taste 1 and l/2 cups cooked white rice 1 can tomato soup, diluted Steam cabbage until the leaves are tender and pliable. Remove leaves.

Brown the meat. Add garlic to taste.

Add onion, cook. Mix rice with the meat and onion combination. Place in a casserole dish and pour the soup over the top. Heat until bubbly (350 degrees, or you can microwave).

Sister Kate’s version: Shred cabbage and stir into the mixture. Add two

tomatoes, chopped fine. Top with shredded cheese, if desired.

LaVerne Shirley’s Pineapple Upside Down Cake 2 tablespoons butter l/2 cup brown sugar 5 slices pineapple (LaVerne used canned pineapple, but we’d recommend fresh, if possible) 9 maraschino cherries (again, that’s what LaVerne used, but we’d recommend the chichi ones from Bi-Rite) 2 eggs

While you’re enjoying your food, remember that LaVerne Shirley ate with gusto—so much so that it always dribbled down her blouse.

Today, when that happens to me and my husband (which is often), we say, “LaVerne is visiting.”

I hope she visits you often.

David Landis, aka “The Gay Gourmet,” is a foodie, a freelance writer, and a PR executive. Follow him on Instagram @GayGourmetSF, on Twitter @david_landis, email him at: david@landispr.com or visit him online at: www.gaygourmetsf.com

l/2 cup hot milk 2 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 cup flour l/4 teaspoon salt l and l/2 teaspoons baking powder Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Melt the 2 tablespoons of butter in an 8 x 8 x 2 pan. Add brown sugar and blend.

Arrange pineapple slices and cherries at the bottom of the pan.

In a separate bowl, add hot milk to butter. Beat eggs until thick and lemon colored. Add sugar. Gradually beat after each addition. Add vanilla, then add dry ingredients, alternating with hot milk. Pour over pineapple and cherries.

Bake for 40 minutes, let stand in baking pan 10 minutes. Invert onto serving plate.

LaVerne Shirley Landis

PHOTO COURTESY OF DAVID LANDIS

Those of you who know The Gay Gourmet know that even though my parents passed away a long time ago, they had a big influence on me. I couldn’t have started my public relations business without the guidance of my dad, John Landis, who taught me finance and business. And my (sometimes) bubbly personality came from my mom, LaVerne Shirley Landis.

SIP on the Eve of Phase 2

TLC: Tears, Laughs and Conversation Dr. Tim Seelig We have come to know the word shelter as many different things.

Most of them have to do with a temporary spot. The concept of a shelter is that it provides a transition between things: homeless shelter, women’s shelter, animal shelter. And now, we have corona shelter. And we have a new phrase in our “normal” lexicon: shelter-in-place (SIP).

It’s not the first time it has been used, just the first time it has been applied to hundreds of millions of people at once. The term came into use when chemical, biological, or radiological contaminants were released accidentally or intentionally into the environment. It was then used to describe precautions to be taken when violence has occurred and the perpetrator was believed to still be in the area.

What do you do when, rather suddenly, you are told to SIP? Having no experience with such things, you do the “normal” things you might do if planning a longer vacation than you have ever actually taken.

You get ready as best you can. You gather the things you think you’ll need. I’ll bet you never departed for an extended trip and stocked up on toilet paper and hand sanitizer before! On March 17, 12:01 am, when our local six counties were issued the SIP ordinance, we all thought it might be two weeks. Four weeks was unimaginable at that point. Stretched to six and now, with Phase 2 as the next threshold and still another two to go after that, it will have been 2 ½ months. That’s a cruise around the world!

Those of us in the LGBTQ community, and of a certain age, can link the fear, hysteria, poor information, and social judgement to the early days of the AIDS epidemic.

Who has it, how did they get it, and did they pass it onto me? Add to those: why isn’t she wearing a mask or standing further apart? It’s now socially unacceptable to hug you on the street. Will I get arrested if I’m not in my neighborhood? I guess it could also be compared to Gideon from The Handmaid’s Tale.

The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus was only two weeks from our spring concert at Davies Symphony Hall when SIP was enforced. It was to be with the Palo Alto High School Choir, four young actor/singers from Oakland School of the Arts, and guest star Alex Newell. That simply disappeared.

Three months of learning our music, choreography, and staging. Our annual fundraiser Crescendo, slated for April, was cancelled, as was our Pride extravaganza for June. We have created contingency after contingency and a strategic plan absolutely chock full of “what ifs.”

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For the chorus, this has definitely meant punting. As most of you know, we’re not just a choir. We truly are one of what Armistead calls “logical” family. We work hard at our music, but we also work hard at the family aspect of what we do.

So, we not only lost our music, but also the people we hang out with multiple times a week. And, for such a huge group of people, it’s impossible to retain the closeness we took for granted. Groups within the chorus got together to bake online, do make-up online, watch movies together, workout together, all online.

Day 19. Clara (9-year old granddaughter) learned to sew masks.

We have all learned much. We learned Zoom! Even more important for us, we learned you can’t rehearse a chorus on Zoom. The very act of “choir” depends on creating, communicating, and crafting a sound together.

Day 9. First San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus Zoom rehearsal with 162 attending. It doesn’t work.

Of course, the first thing we did was try to figure out how to keep engaged during this time. We needed a way to take care of our twins: Music and Mission. The first thought for everyone on the planet was the internet. We began to strategize what we could do to use that during this time. So, what else but create SFGMC TV. It’s not really television, but it does come to you on a small screen.

Day 28. Changed to paper plates!

Day 1. Take stock of the pantry. Get toilet paper and hand sanitizer and wine. Found “Emotional Support” M&M’s. Seriously.

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Day 15. Created exercise video to Olivia Newton John’s “Let’s Eat Cereal.” Using beer bottles and chardonnay for hand weights.

Day 4. Started a Jigsaw puzzle of lots of brown puppies.

When SIP began, it was rough, but there was a bit of an adventure involved. I immediately began posting a “Shelter in Place Day 1” message on Facebook. How fun would that be for the two to three weeks we would be sipping? I’ll share a few of those posts along the way. It got really old!

Then, everything changed. Physical distancing has most definitely had an enormous toll on all of us. SIP has especially dealt a very specific blow to artists and arts groups who rely on performing to survive in every possible way: artistically, spiritually, and economically. The proverbial rug has been thoroughly pulled out from under us and sent off somewhere to be cleaned. Will it come back in one piece or smaller pieces? Will it come back at all?

Instead of greeting, “How are you?” we ask a more honest question, “How are you holding up?” Instead of, “Goodbye,” we say, “Stay safe.”

by themselves or by SIP partners.

Baking fabulous items never before dreamt. And did I say Zoom? Some of us who were lucky enough to SIP with another person.

We’ve learned how to use and how not to use disinfectant! And we’ve learned what it’s like to wear a mask. I think it’s a good thing we got to break those in while sheltering. Getting used to wearing masks is hard. And you should hear singing from behind a mask of varying materials. It’s not pretty.

All that said, we have learned a great deal about ourselves. We are a resilient lot. And we’ve learned how creative we can be when forced to prepare meals at home. Three times a day! People have gotten creative with hair color—and cuts—

What is it, you ask? Well, we do have quite a bit of archival performances on video that we have not released to the public before. We are doing that on a weekly basis. But we also created three additional categories: Behind the Curtain, an interview format of movers and shakers; Out in The Community, non-performance related activities such as our youth outreach program RHYTHM; and, Inside the Chorus, for a look at how the chorus works.

Day 31. Washed the dog. Again.

We now have four episodes out there. We “launch” a new episode every Thursday. All of the content is at https://www.sfgmc.org/ Our Executive Director Chris Verdugo and I host the Behind the Curtain interviews. At this point, we have interviewed Broadway stars Laura Benanti, Billy Porter, and (continued on page 26)

Investing in the Time of Coronavirus investments are low and sell when they’re high. This is challenging, to say the least, since no one really knows where the market is headed at any given time. And it could actually end up costing you money if you get into or out of the market at the wrong time.

Money Matters Brandon Miller There’s nothing like a global pandemic to send stock exchanges into a whirl. Unprecedented freefalls are followed by record gains, only to drop again days, even hours, later.

Good news tanks the market while bad news causes historic rises. In our new up-is-down world, there is just no predicting what will happen with investments from day to day.

So, should you keep investing during this time if you are able? (Short answer, yes.) And what can you do to protect yourself during these uncertain times?

Here are a few suggestions: Keep things in perspective.

Simply put, volatility is a given when you are investing. It doesn’t have to be anything as dramatic as a killer virus to affect the market. Something as simple as an earnings report can rattle investors. But history has shown us that market setbacks are typically followed by periods of recovery. This tends to be the case even after pandemics, wars, political uprisings, and more. So, it’s always best to keep the long view when thinking about investing.

Create a goals-based plan.

Instead of chasing the next great investment or bailing out when stocks sink, develop an investing strategy that centers around what you want to achieve in life. Your goals are probably more stable than the markets, so a solid plan makes it easier to weather ups and downs.

A goals-based plan also removes the temptation to try market timing, where you attempt to buy when

Diversify your investments.

Investing in different types of assets helps to spread out your risk. Often when one type of investment is down, another asset class may be experiencing banner growth. For example, many bond investments have gained a tremendous amount of value in 2020, but at the same time many stocks have lost significant value. Using an asset allocation strategy, you can balance risk and reward by investing in different types of assets in portions that make sense for your goals, risk tolerance, and time horizon.

Invest regularly. One of the smartest ways to combat market uncertainty is to create a regular investment schedule. You can choose any interval that works for you— weekly, monthly, quarterly, or per paycheck. The beauty of this strategy is that you invest during both peaks and valleys, which helps to even things out. And this disciplined approach helps to ensure that downturns have less impact on your portfolio’s ultimate performance.

Review your investments often.

As this pandemic has made all too clear, your world can change quickly.

Your investments may need to change too, to reflect new realities.

Reviewing your portfolio regularly— every year or six months, for example—can help to make sure that your investments take advantage of new opportunities, while still aligning with your ultimate investment goals.

Turn to the professionals.

Money is a very emotional thing for many people and staying objective about it can be hard. Worrying excessively about your investments could be a sign that you’re not in the right ones. Or maybe you’re not comfortable with, or willing to do, all the work of creating and managing an investment schedule and plan.

Luckily, there are lots of people like me who can take that on for you.

A professional financial consultant can help you to find assets that fit your risk tolerance, while also making sure that your investments reflect your values (keeping gun investments out of your portfolio, for example), and advance you toward your goals. I highly suggest working with someone who is a fiduciary, which means that they are legally obligated to work in your best interest.

Whether you turn to professional help or go it alone, the main thing to remember is that a goals-based investment strategy is one of the best antidotes to investment market uncertainty and anxiety. Given that we have no idea how long this virus will be with us or the full impact of the financial fallout it will cause, creating a solid financial plan now may be the closest thing to a vaccine that you can get for your financial health.

The opinions expressed in this article are for general informational purposes only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual or on any specific security. Brio does not provide tax or legal advice, and nothing contained in these materials should be taken as such. To determine which investments may be appropriate for you, consult your financial advisor prior to investing.

As always please remember investing involves risk and possible loss of principal capital; please seek advice from a licensed professional.

Brio Financial Group is a registered investment adviser. SEC Registration does not constitute an endorsement of Brio by the SEC nor does it indicate that Brio has attained a particular level of skill or ability. Advisory services are only offered to clients or prospective clients where Brio Financial Group and its representatives are properly licensed or exempt from licensure.

No advice may be rendered by Brio Financial Group unless a client service agreement is in place.

Brandon Miller, CFP®, is a financial consultant at Brio Financial Group in San Francisco, specializing in helping LGBT individuals and families plan and achieve their financial goals.

Two Lively Auto Antidotes to the Pandemic

Auto Philip Ruth “No, I’ve got you beat,” said a client, as we compared our losses of income during the current pandemic. Mine was the sudden torching of the classic-car market, as few are looking to buy little beyond toilet paper and pantry basics, much less an expensive toy they aren’t currently allowed to drive very far.

“Same here, except mine’s jewelry,” he replied. But he did have me beat, as his main income came from brokering international travel, specializing in cruises. Ouch, right?

Thankfully journalism is an essential service, and the two five-door pressers we’ll check out this week— the Kia Seltos and Toyota Yaris— revealed a lot about themselves even

Kia Seltos

Toyota Yaris

within the current strict boundaries of travel.

Driving both of them represented bright spots in a dark week with rivers of bad news, and not just because they got me out of the house. The Seltos and Yaris I sampled were lively and engaging.

The Seltos and Yaris are sized differently, and the Yaris hatchback I examined was a parking star, with an overall length less than 162 inches. If you chose the trunked Yaris sedan, its length compared to the Seltos would be a draw at 172 inches. The Seltos’ crossover nature takes it from there, with four more inches of width and five more in height.

As you’d expect, the Yaris is economy-car affordable, with base prices (including delivery) in the $16,000– $19,000 range, while the Seltos starts at just over $23,000 and heads upward as luxury items and a turbocharger are added. I drove the top Yaris XLE hatchback, priced just less than $20,000, and the Seltos S Turbo’s price added about $7,000 to that.

The Yaris widely sold outside the U.S. is a Toyota design, and they’re welcome to it, because our Yaris is a rebadged Mazda. That means it has Mazda’s rare combination of substance and light weight, and it feels ready to run whenever you are.

Toyota sells the Yaris hatchback with a six-speed automatic; the manual option is sedan-only. The automatic maximizes the 1.5-liter four-cylinder’s 106 horsepower, but there are no silver bullets here. Sport mode sharpens takeoffs but leads to abrupt shifts, while Normal mode is slower to start but operates more smoothly as speeds climb. (continued on page 26) S AN F R ANC IS C O BAY T IM ES

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SF Bay Area Nightlife Fund The SF Bay Area Nightlife Fund was created by a collective of nightlife organizers, producers, entertainers, venue owners, and nonprofit community leaders. The Fund provides direct gifts of aid to workers from LGBTQ nightlife groups in the Bay Area. The purpose of the Fund is to provide financial relief to workers in the nightlife industry who are experiencing economic insecurity as a result of bar closures and event cancellations resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Find out more and donate: http://www.sfqueernightlifefund.org

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CELEBRATING FOUR DECADES (1978–2020)

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Donna’s Chronicles

“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass. It’s about learning how to dance in the rain.”

By Donna Sachet

–Vivian Greene

oo often stories of genuine kindness, heartfelt empathy, and simple giving that this global pandemic has spawned are lost in the flood of news about personal greed, dire predictions, and aching hardship. Our LGBTQ Community, however, has always been known as a group that rallies in a crisis, offering a helping hand when those around us need it most. The SF Queer Nightlife Fund is a perfect example of the best in our Community!

When a group of nightlife individuals within the LGBTQ Community saw the rapid closure of bars and event spaces and the devastating impact that was having on those who make their living in that world, they took action, forming the SF Queer Nightlife Fund. With an ambitious goal of $200,000 and 200 grants, they did their homework, using the Q Foundation as their fiscal umbrella and spreading the word far and wide primarily through social media. Contributions have come from individuals, special events like the Sisters’ Hunky Jesus and Foxy Mary Contest, weekly Quaran-Tea Dances with internationally loved DJs, and through celebrity endorsements. They seem to have done everything right! In this time of delayed and confusing federal response, what a relief it is to see such organized and aggressive action from within our own ranks.

It was recently announced that this grassroots group has received since its inception in mid-March $160,000 and will now begin the promised distribution of this money. This is a remarkable achievement that is going to make a very real difference in the lives of hundreds of local people.

That friendly bartender who always has a smile and your favorite cocktail ready will now be able to pay rent. That talented performer who adds immensely to any show will now be able to catch up on PG&E, cable, and other bills. That experienced DJ who always lures you to the dancefloor will now be able to tend to medical needs not covered by any insurance provider. And maybe, someone who loves this City and has consistently been a vital part of our Queer nightlife will reconsider moving and decide to stay right here.

In some worlds, raising this amount of money over this period of time is nothing unusual. We’ve all attended pricey galas and been amazed at the generosity demonstrated. But the SF Queer Nightlife Fund formed quickly in response to an immediate and unforeseen need without paid staff or professional fundraising expertise and we stand amazed at their bravery, creativity, and resounding success.

Fundraising is not easy! Given the extension of Shelter-in-Place directives, and although we are moving into Phase 2, the Fund will continue to accept donations and distribute grants until we see an end to this current climate and some kind of return to a vibrant and healthy San Francisco nightlife. Committee member Phil Hammack writes, “Our commitment to queer nightlife is both to the individuals who make the magic happen day in and day out— the bartenders, drag performers, dancers, DJs, lighting & production designers, producers, etc.—and to the larger culture of nightlife itself.” We unreservedly request that you go to their website now and make a generous contribution.

Calendar

a/la Sachet Every Sunday Quaran-Tea Dance Popular DJs, high energy music, benefiting the SF Queer Nightlife Fund 1–6 pm Twitch and Zoom Every Wednesday Virtual Musical Wednesdays Host Brian Kent, Edge regulars, sing along at home 7 pm Twitch and Zoom

Other opportunities to help others are readily available, some sponsored by bars and other businesses that have been forced to close and furlough their employees. If you loved spending time at The Edge, especially with a particular bartender, check out their website and extend a helping hand. Virtual drag shows, comedy events, and elaborately produced online videos offer chances to enjoy nightlife virtually and most have easily accessible contribution tools. We hear that Lookout offers cocktails lowered from their balcony to patrons below. Beyond direct financial help, you can offer volunteer hours, if your health permits, and we love seeing friends in face masks and gloves supporting the many established nonprofit organizations in town.

Although one reads a lot about all of us being in the same boat with this pandemic, that really is not true. Shelter-in-Place for a single person living alone in a small apartment is very different from sharing a home with family members. Check on your single friends by phone or other digital device; a conversation can mean a lot to someone in isolation.

We hear stories of people automatically receiving those government stimulus checks and after careful review of their own situation deciding to donate that money to those in more need. And there are those among us going above and beyond what official government programs offer, like some landlords simply asking their tenants to skip a month’s rent. Perhaps you’ve seen artists and other creative folks painting colorful murals where bare plywood boards had covered favorite hang-outs.

We’ve seen honey bears, cartoon characters, and even the once omnipresent Brown twins popping up, all wearing appropriate face coverings, of course.

https://tinyurl.com/y8rmf2tp

It is these charming stories and generous acts that add some balance to the unprecedented impact the pandemic is having on all of us. We have always avidly watched the news, but how much can one stand night after night? So, share some good news with each other whenever possible, not closing your eyes to the reality around you, but in order to keep some balance and maintain some optimism. No one knows what San Francisco or the world is going to look like in June or September or 2021 or further, but recognizing the best in our nature reminds us of hopeful possibilities around the corner.

So, stay home, stay safe, and stay calm. https://www.facebook.com/donna.sachet/videos/10158307424118390/

Donna Sachet is a celebrated performer, fundraiser, activist and philanthropist who has dedicated over two decades to the LGBTQ Community in San Francisco.

Contact her at empsachet@gmail.com

PHOTO BY SHAWN NORTHCUTT

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Antonio Rocco: Priest, Philosopher, Pornographer (Left) Masked Characters During Carnival, Venice, 1614, from the Codex Bottacin (Right) Alcibiades the Schoolboy, Venice, 1652, Cambridge University Library

Faces from Our LGBT Past Dr. Bill Lipsky Whoever said, “Truth is stranger than fiction,” could have had Antonio Rocco in mind. Someone had to do it, but it certainly seems contrarian that L’Alcibiade fanciullo a scola (Alcibiades the Schoolboy), the book many consider to be the first modern homoerotic novel and the first clear statement of a “gay identity,” was written by a respected Catholic priest, philosopher, teacher, author, and rhetorician. Besides, as Eulalie Mackechnie Shinn would have said, “It’s a smutty book.”

logical, cultural, and artistic centers, Brother Antonio became a noted man of letters, rhetorician, and author.

He was famed as an Aristotelian, his opinions valued as authoritative.

In 1633, the year Galileo was tried by the Inquisition, Rocco assailed him for supporting Copernicus’ view of the sun being the center of the solar system. The next year he lectured about “love in all of its manifestations,” arguing: “Love is a pure interest,” that “each person loves only himself.” In 1636, Venice named him its official teacher of rhetoric and, possibly with some irony, moral philosophy.

Researchers initially believed the book’s author was Pietro Aretino, religious biographer, pornographer, and blackmailer.

More recently, credit Written in 1630, went to Ferrante Alcibiades the Schoolboy Pallavicino, whose may have circusexually explicit lated in manuscript tomes, includbefore being pubing The Whore’s lished anonymously Rhetoric (1642), and in 1651 as a “libretto criticism of Pope da Carnevale” or a Urban VIII, led to book for Carnival, the his being purified by famed Venetian celebraAlcibiades by flame in 1644. Rocco tion of permission and François-André Vincent was more fortunate. pleasure that ended with Although denounced five times to Lent. It was immediately condemned the Inquisition in Venice, he always and then suppressed by the Church, escaped punishment. with no copies of its first printing and fewer than a dozen copies of its next Born in 1586 in Scarcula d’Abruzzo, two printings surviving.

Italy, then part of the Kingdom of Naples, Rocco studied theology and Possibly “the most extraordinary disphilosophy in Rome, Perugia, and sertation of homosexuality in early Padua before he settled permanently modern Europe” and “the first clear in Venice. His was a distinguished expression of a homosexual idencareer. A teacher at San Giorgio tity and subculture in the modern West,” it was two hundred years Maggiore monastery, one of Europe’s before a new edition of the Italian most important and influential theo-

text appeared in 1862, published in Paris by Jules Gay. Denounced the next year by the Public Prosecutor as “a most filthy book,” nearly all copies were destroyed.

Gay took exception to this action. He had the book translated into French and published it in Brussels in 1866. It was again condemned as “an outrage to good morals,” and again, in 1868, ordered destroyed. The French translation was reprinted in Brussels in 1891, in Paris in 1936, and Montreal in 1995. The first English translation appeared in 2000.

The story is simplicity itself.

Philotimos, a respected teacher, lusts for Alcibiades, his best loved and most alluring student. Alcibiades resists all of his advances, telling him, “What you wish to do offends honor and is contrary to Nature and to law.” Philotimos, however, persists over many encounters, finally asking, “Tell me, I pray you, what drives you to resist the ardors of your lovesick master so obstinately?”

Alcibiades shares his reasons. First, “What you wish to practice is a hideous vice which offends Nature.”

Second, “Our law forbids it.” Third, “If you consider that the punishment does not stop at worldly griefs, but that the soul itself, when separated from the body, is visited by eternal and inexpressible tortures, do you wonder that I hold this vice in horror, that it fills me with terror and repugnance?”

What follows—the majority of the work—is a conversation between

Philotimos and Alcibiades, in the form of a Socratic dialogue, in which the teacher counters and dismantles these arguments and others that grow from them. “You say that it is a crime against Nature,” he says. “Yet how can desires dictated by Nature herself be called ‘unnatural’? An act is natural when Nature impels one to it, when she desires it.”

Men loving men may be against the law, but “men make laws to conform to their own interests, not always to what is right and just ... more to answer the interests of the State than the laws of reason or of Nature ... and it is the purpose of the State to make so many repugnant laws seem, to the eyes of the stupid and vulgar, pious and sacrosanct.”

Regarding the peril of our immortal soul: “Those who, in their own interests, have believed it convenient to forbid this form of love, know very well that their proscription is, to those of wisdom, contrary to all reason, so they have sought to attribute their pathetic law to the dictates of God. In

the same way do deceitful men use the Oath to cover their lies and to introduce their false dogmas, mingling the sacred and the profane.”

The book is still controversial.

Alcibiades’ age is never given, but he clearly is much younger than Philotimos. In addition, Philotimos uses his position of authority as his teacher to convince and eventually win his student over. Whatever the laws and customs of Ancient Greece and 17th century Italy, his deeds would be illegal in all fifty United States today.

Even so, Rocco’s work shows that four centuries ago, some at least recognized same-sex attraction as natural and normal. They had some sense of a “gay understanding” and a “gay identity,” which we accept as fact today. They also had a “gay network” to come together and to preserve and convey an outlawed homoerotic novel from their time to ours. Whether or not “it’s a smutty book,” it is one of great historic value.

Bill Lipsky, Ph.D., author of “Gay and Lesbian San Francisco” (2006), is a member of the Rainbow Honor Walk board of directors.

(Above) Portrait of the Italian philosopher, teacher and writer Antonio Rocco (1586 –1653) by Jacopo Pecini, from the book, Le glorie degli Incogniti, 1647.

(Left) Venetian School, Carnival in Piazza, San Marco, 18th Century 18

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Five Pillars for Health

Photos courtesy of John Chen

Sports John Chen My fellow amateur sports hacks and fans, how are you doing during our long and unexpected shelter-in-place? Did you fill out an imaginary March Madness bracket just because? Did you dream about the Giants annihilating the muchdespised, but championship caliber, Dodgers on supposedly baseball’s opening day? Did you watch the much less spectacular NFL Draft on TV and boo Commissioner Roger Goodell anyway? Did you attempt to play any kind of “sportsketball” at home or in your less than adequatelysized yard and realize it’s just not the same? Do you miss your sports friends, teammates, and camaraderie very, very much?

I’d like to share with you how this amateur sports hack and fan has been coping with being cooped up, as well as some advice from my fitness guru friend during these unprecedented times.

First, I’ve watched a ton of past sports clips, games, and highlights.

I know it’s not live and I know who won, but I can relive the dramatics, the comebacks, the spectacular and unbelievable plays, shots, and rallies. Whatever sport(s) you are into, there are thousands of hours’ worth to watch.

I’ve leaned on others in my household for stretching and resistance training. And I’ve created a mini asphalt tennis court in front of my garage with chairs, rope, sidewalk chalk, duct tape, and an old volleyball net. I will be ready for Wimbledon in no time!

Finally, my health and fitness guru friend Desmond Smith offered great suggestions and advice for all of us sheltering in place.

Smith encouraged me to focus on the “5 Pillars for Health”: Sleep, Stress, Nutrition, Movement, and Community.

1. Get plenty of quality sleep. Turn off and cover any light, and if possible, install blackout curtains. Power down all electronics at least an hour before bed, and don’t eat at least two hours before going to sleep. I know the latter is hard.

2. Reduce stress through daily meditation of 10–15 minutes, twice a day.

3. Eat real (unprocessed) and nutritious food including lots of vegetables and fruit. Smith’s favorites are: fresh or frozen berries with yogurt and cacao powder (add oats for something heartier); spinach & arugula with cooked & cubed beets, blue cheese, sunflower & pumpkin seeds, and hard-boiled eggs; baked salmon with baked sweet potato or yam, and steamed kale tossed with an olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, and curry powder dressing.

Second, try using creative ways using limited space to play ball. In fact, top pro athletes from all over the world have posted challenges you can do at home to develop and hone your skills until you can get back out on the field and on the court. I’ve tried some ball handling challenges from the likes of Stephen Curry and volleyball pros as well as attempting the tennis volley challenge issued

by Roger Federer. However, I shall withdraw any confession to how well I did. All I can say is I gave myself an A for effort.

4. Do your best to have movement equaling to 10,000 steps per day. Most smart phones can track and provide stats of your health through steps and floors climbed every day. You can also do simple at home body weight strength training by doing “Squat Lunge Hinge Push Pull Carry” at least once per week. Smith recommends this easy schedule: Monday - 3 sets of squats, 3 sets of pushups; Wednesday - 3 sets of lunges, 3 sets of table rows; and Friday - 3 sets of single leg toe touches, 3 sets of carrying something heavy (to the side, by your shoulder or overhead).

Third, I’ve used things around the house to help me exercise and get rid of physical tension. For example, I used an extension cord as a jump rope. I’ve stuffed frozen meats in grocery bags and used them as weights.

There you have it. With a little help from Smith, this is how a sports hack like me is surviving sheltering in place. Although it hasn’t been easy and takes extra self-discipline, I know I will come out of this challenging time sane, safe, and healthy with minimal (fingers crossed) weight gain.

5. Keep up and connect with your community and for your own emotional health as well as for the emotional health of the people you care about. Make at least one video call per day to a sports buddy, teammate, friend, or family member using Facetime, Zoom, Facebook Video Chat, or whatever video conferencing app available.

John Chen, a UCLA alumnus and an avid sports fan, has competed as well as coached tennis, volleyball, softball and football teams.

Take Me Home with You! “My name is Clay! I’m 7 years young and still learning about the world. I understand a lot of basic obedience commands and I’m eager to learn more! If you’re looking for a loyal best friend and sidekick, I might be your fella. My tail never stops wagging and the thing I enjoy most is spending lots of time with the people I love—if you work from home or have a dog-friendly office, that would be ideal! Come be my new best friend.”

Clay

Clay is presented to San Francisco Bay Times readers by Dr. Jennifer Scarlett, the SF SPCA’s Co-President. Our thanks also go to Krista Maloney for helping to get the word out about lovable pets like Clay.

Anyone interested in adopting Clay can email: adoptions@sfspca.org For more information: https://www.sfspca.org/adoptions

Dr. Jennifer Scarlett and Pup

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Scandals and Mystery in Hollywood History

Off the Wahl Jan Wahl It’s a perfect time to be swept away into intrigue, mayhem, and mystery ... and I’m talking onscreen! Cinema comes through with engrossing mysteries and even mystery comedies to get us out of ourselves and into some terrific plots, characters, and whothe-heck-did-it.

Let’s begin with one of my favorite recent films that not enough people know about. 2006’s Hollywoodland stars a perfectly cast Ben Affleck as George Reeves, TV’s Superman. The word on the street and officially is that he died by suicide, distraught over his typecasting. The true story many of us knew about is that he was murdered. The moral turns out to be: be careful when having a steamy love affair. This engrossing film costars Adrian Brody, Bob Hoskins, and Diane Lane.

Another Hollywood scandal was brought to us by Peter Bogdanovich in 2002. The 1920s come alive in The Cat’s Meow, the true story of William Randolph Hearst’s luck and talent in getting away with murder. Aboard his gigantic yacht were Charlie Chaplin, Marion Davies, Louella Parsons, and producer Thomas Ince. Hearst may have shot Ince, hid the evidence, and had his body immediately destroyed. Eddie Izzard is terrific as usual; watch for him as Chaplin.

Costumes, sets, dialogue ... it all works in this movie of money and power running the show.

as the sweet but sneaky little ol’ lady detective, able to solve crimes and get information far better than Scotland Yard. Margaret Rutherford played this part beautifully too, but this Jane Marple makes it all new again.

It does not get funnier than Neil Simon’s Murder by Death in 1976. The world’s great detectives (Sam Spade, Charlie Chan, Nick and Nora Charles of The Thin Man, Miss Marple) are summoned by eccentric millionaire (Truman Capote) to guest at his remote mansion. Peter Sellars, David Niven, Maggie Smith, Peter Falk, and even Alec Guinness turn this mystery into a spoof full of out loud laughs. We could use it now. A rare chance to watch Capote at his best!

We can’t leave the genre without at least one film noir. Murder My Sweet by Raymond Chandler in 1944 gives us Moose

Malloy trying to find his love Velma. Phillip Marlowe is driven into a web of blackmail and murder. For years after this, I asked boyfriends to call me Velma. Weird, right? Guess I was looking for my Moose. As good as Dick Powell is in this, I’ll park my shoes next to Bob Mitchum.

Some other mysteries to take us away: The DaVinci Code, Gorky Park, The Ipcress File, L.A. Confidential, The Fugitive, Chinatown, all six Thin Man’s, and The Player. Settle in and escape!

Emmy Award-winner Jan Wahl is a renowned entertainment reporter, producer, and teacher. A member of the prestigious Directors Guild of America, she is regularly featured on KPIX television (every Monday morning starting at 6:15 am) and on KCBS AM & FM and other media outlets. To read and listen to her reviews for KCBS, go to: https://kcbsradio.radio.com/authors/jan-wahl For more info about her remarkable life and career: http://www.janwahl.com/ Check out her entertaining and informative videos at http://sfbaytimes.com/

Spotlight Film for SF Pride 50: The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994) By Jan Wahl One of my favorite movies of all time, Priscilla is uplifting fun with poignant scenes you’ll never forget. Under the beads, feathers, and ABBA is one of the best closing sequences between a father and son ever put on film. But along the way is the story of two drag queens and a transgender female who journey across Australia’s outback in a decorated bus.

Two wonderful British TV series are worthy of searching out on BBC America, Google, or PBS. Inspector Morse stars John Thaw as a charismatic but complicated detective in Oxford. The series features gorgeous locations and smart intrigue. Endeavor is the prequel to this series, showing Morse as a young man fighting the system. Miss Marple has Joan Hickson

Terence Stamp, Hugo Weaving, and Guy Peace lead a strong group of character players. It is Stamp who stole my heart in this one, and he almost didn’t get cast because filmmakers were set on Tim Curry. I was fortunate to cruise with Stamp (on the QE2) and he told me of his anxiety at taking on this role since it was so different from his past. He was also steamed that To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar seemed to take away the originality of Priscilla.

Stamp’s character of Bernadette is completely original and touching. By the way, Stamp in person was one handsome hunk. But moving along, Priscilla won the Oscar for Best Costume Design, though I would have voted for this brilliant, bawdy, poignant classic as Best Picture of the Year! The late Steve Silver once rented a private screening room for a showing of this movie and a bunch of us watched it together. These are memories that matter, as does this fine film.

KIT’N KITTY’S

QUEER POP QUIZ 20

SA N FRANCISCO BAY T I ME S

GRAB SOME PINE This city is home to PRIDE in the Pines, an annual LGBTQ celebration that has featured neon dance parties and performers from RuPaul’s Drag Race.

A) Parkland, FL B) Nevada City, CA C) Flagstaff, AZ D) Rand Lake, CO

MAY 7 , 2 0 2 0

ANSWER ON PAGE 26

Karin Jaffie, aka Kit/Kitty Tapata, won the title of Mr. Gay San Francisco in 2011 and has earned many other honors since.

Connect with Jaffie via Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/pg/ktapata

Bay Area Filmmaker’s The Half of It Is a Complete Delight

Gary M. Kramer The Half of It, available on Netflix, is only the second feature by out lesbian filmmaker Alice Wu—after 2004’s Saving Face—but it is worth the wait.

This fabulous romantic comedy, set in a rural high school, is as charming as it is thoughtful. Moreover, it offers messages about love that are tender and heartfelt.

Ellie Chu (Leah Lewis) is an overachieving senior who makes cash writing papers for her peers. When Paul Munsky (Daniel Diemer) hires Ellie to pen a love letter to Aster (Alexxis Lemire), she reluctantly agrees. Ellie is secretly crushed on Aster, and as she gets to know the object of Paul’s affection better, she comes to understand herself more.

The Half of It may be steeped in a Cyrano-esque trope for the texting generation, but it shows how Ellie’s friendship with Paul improves both of their lives. It also illustrates how her unlikely connection with Aster sparks a sense of independence for each of the young women.

Wu chatted with me for the San Francisco Bay Times about her new film.

Gary M. Kramer: What were you like in high school? Were you, like Ellie, the only Asian and/or closeted queer student in your class?

PHOTO BY K.C. BAILEY - NETFLIX

Film

Alice Wu: My high school was fairly racially mixed. I was born in San Jose, when it wasn’t Silicon Valley.

We moved to Michigan for a few years then back to the Bay Area. I didn’t grow up in a small town, but I was called “Chugga Chugga Choo Choo,” and biked everywhere [like Ellie]. I was so shy in high school.

I just remember walking down the hallway, hugging the wall, because the last thing I wanted was attention.

If you told me that kid would someday direct a film, I’d never believe it.

I think high school was a profoundly lonely experience, but as an adult you realize it’s lonely for everyone— even if, at the time, it looks like they are having a much better life. When I was in high school, nobody was saying they were queer. When you are growing up, and you are not out, all of your crushes are taboo. Ellie doesn’t have queer consciousness, but she does have a crush on Aster, and she’s not ready to admit this to herself. I had a crush on the same girl for all three years of high school.

Gary M. Kramer: The teens in The Half of It are respectful of their families but still find a measure of independence. Can you talk about that theme?

Alice Wu: I think it stems from my naturally not being a rebellious person. But coming out at 19 felt like a giant rebellion. If I could have married a guy I would have, because I didn’t want my parents to be unhappy since they sacrificed for their kids to have this life. The characters in The Half of It do love their parents. And the parents are thinking they are doing what’s best, and yet things go awry with families.

Ellie’s [widowed] father doesn’t want to keep Ellie in a box, but he lost the love of his life and he’s terrified and wants to protect his daughter.

Gary M. Kramer: In the film, Ellie is more cynical, and Paul is more romantic. Which are you?

Alice Wu

Alice Wu: I have a dry sense of humor. I can be sarcastic. But I’m not cynical. I was romantic growing up—and there’s a part of me that’s deeply romantic—but I’m also very practical. I come from young immigrant parents. I’d be Ellie, but her cynicism hides a deep romanticism.

Part of the deliciousness of The Half of It is the idea of being able to woo your crush with the safety of a ven-

triloquist. And discovering this connection—of having that person liking what you have to say.

It’s more doing something out of love—it can be wrong—but that’s the more interesting thing to show. I love things that are happysad and connected to greater humanity. That is hope.

Gary M. Kramer: Do you agree with Ellie’s comment that “everything beautiful is ruined eventually”?

Alice Wu: Yes and no. I think as I’ve gotten older, life ebbs and flows.

Right now, I’m in a good moment. I have a film coming out. But I realize everything is great right now and I’m going to hold on to this, but the arc of life is ebb and flow and part of my growth is that as things are going well, the cycle will go down. But when things are really

sucky, I have to hang on because they will swing up again.

Gary M. Kramer: Ellie’s dad watches movies and always says, “This is the best part!”

What, for you, is the best part of The Half of It? Alice Wu: I cannot answer that question. There are so many. But I can tell you what is meaningful to me. The quiet scene of Ellie and her dad making dumplings, and I also love Ellie in the hot springs with Aster. © 2020 Gary M. Kramer Gary M. Kramer is the author of “Independent Queer Cinema: Reviews and Interviews,” and the co-editor of “Directory of World Cinema: Argentina.” Follow him on Twitter @garymkramer

Defying Writing Patterns in Gay Fiction

Words Michele Karlsberg Michele Karlsberg: Dominic Ambrose, the author of Nickel Fare, is featured in this issue of the San Francisco Bay Times. For the novel, he goes way back to the post-Stonewall years in the outer boroughs of New York City. He believes that people may think that every relationship has already been explored in gay fiction, but they would be wrong.

Dominic Ambrose: All writers dream of creating stories that will inspire, transport, and entertain the reader in new ways. But when writing about relationships, is there anything new to say under the sun?

The most basic romantic trope is, as we all know, boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back. Is it really any different if you make it boy meets boy or girl meets girl? In my opinion, yes, it most certainly is. The “boy meets girl” trope contains within its very nature underlying social norms that are never openly expressed, but which inform every step of the story.

There is a certain power in the boy role, as he exercises cold strategy.

The girl drives the emotional narrative, as she calculates in a less logical way, calling on friends for help and eating chocolates. We roll our eyes and groan at the clichés, but we rarely question them because they are a part of the gender stereotypes to which we are accustomed.

When a writer makes it boy meets boy, the power role becomes diffused and elusive; the strategies weave in and out unpredictably and the emotions go haywire. In the story Nickel Fare, the central relationship is between Nicangelo, the young, naive protagonist, and Ned, the worldly, diabolical lover. In many ways, they mimic the normal male-female relationship. But then Nicangelo’s submissiveness and degradation lead

Dominic Ambrose

to his explosive “masculine” rebellion. And Ned’s emotional fragility, a cliché “feminine” trait, makes his evil fetishes look almost logical.

It happens in ways that would seem odd and contrived in a male-female relationship, but grow out naturally between two males.

There are complex personalities in Nickel Fare that create new dynamics, simply by being who they are: the Dutchman, whose role goes from exploitative sex partner, to father, to city marshal; and the militant dyke who is at first impatient with Nicangelo’s self-pity and adopts a tough love “big brother” attitude.

When she fully understands the situation, she changes dramatically and becomes a nurturing “big sister” in a way that completely disarms Nicangelo and leaves him sobbing into her flannel shirt. And there are others who subvert traditional boygirl roles with comical results: the flim-flam man from the Midwest and his effeminate boyfriend, and the phony preacher and his devoted young acolyte. When they adopt these stereotypical roles, they play with them in ways that are sexually stimulating to themselves, and hope-

fully, intellectually stimulating for the discerning reader.

The proliferation of gay fiction writing in recent decades means that an enormous number of human relationships are now being described and explored in ways that were previously hidden. I feel that this is the case with Nickel Fare, in that the three native New Yorkers at the center of the story have relationships that defy the usual patterns and create gender role dynamics not previously contemplated in general fiction writing.

Dominic Ambrose is a writer who has lived in ten different cities, but has ended up where he started in bridge and tunnel New York. He is an author who believes in writing what he knows, and for him, this period of New York City history is territory that he experienced firsthand.

Michele Karlsberg Marketing and Management specializes in publicity for the LGBTQ+ community.

This year, Karlsberg celebrates 32 years of successful book campaigns.

For more information: https://www.michelekarlsberg.com

S AN F R ANC IS C O BAY T IM ES

M AY 7, 2020

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Update from the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band

By Phillip Spencer Huff Greetings of health and happiness from the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band, the Official Band of San Francisco! As musicians, we thrive on bringing people together in song and harmony, and I must say we truly miss seeing you at festivals, parades, and concerts. I’m happy to report that the Band is safe as our musicians shelter-in-place together with you.

Many of our musicians are among those essential workers putting themselves at heightened risk at work daily to get our community through the other side. A flutist/public health professional. A percussionist/hospital respiratory department manager.

Trumpeters, saxophonists, and trombonists are nurses. We have doctors, mental health professionals, grocers, clerks, attendants, and government employees in our various sections.

To them and everyone else who suddenly found their workplaces potentially hazardous to their health, we exclaim a resounding thank you!

I’d also like to say a special thank you to all of our musicians who are teachers. It’s been a difficult challenge for all teachers to transition to virtual learning, a challenge tackled with the customary zest and zeal common to those in the teaching profession.

We can’t thank you enough for the dedication shown to your students.

For the Band, a key component of our mission is bringing people together, and we are exceptionally proficient in doing so. The Band has been a source of comfort during previous crises, even putting on

a community concert on September 11, 2001, when all other local arts organizations had cancelled theirs. The question I and the rest of the Band faced when COVID-19 changed everything was, “How do we continue our mission and bring people together through music when we must keep apart?”

When we asked the question, the Band unsurprisingly sprang into action.

The Board of Directors came together, professionally addressing immediate issues. During the Band’s regular rehearsal time on Tuesdays, we all joined over video calls to stay connected and continue our music education, learning about the life and times of “America’s Mother,” Ernestine Schumann-Heink (definitely recommend looking her up!), and the origins of the instruments we play.

We also recorded the City’s official ballad, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” shelter-in-place style.

The video was released on April 6, and we also put on a special live stream of the recording on April 25 when all of San Francisco came together to sing the ballad in unison.

You can watch the video anytime through the Band’s website. (https://tinyurl.com/y8dz86hq ) Do you have a favorite Freedom Band song? Let us know; we have other recordings planned and may

SF Sketch Randy Coleman Randy Coleman hails from New York, but has lived in San Francisco since 1975. Coleman shares that before moving to the Bay Area, he studied Art History and Architecture at Boston University while working as a resident artist for architectural rendering at a Massachusetts historical society. “All of my life I’ve been an artist,” Coleman says. “To know me is to know that I have a passion for art and architecture. I love this project for the San Francisco Bay Times, and hope that you enjoy my sketches.”

© Randy Coleman, 2020

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be able to include your request!

We look forward to sharing these videos with you as they come out to bring moments of joy through music to your homes. We take our inspiration from Harvey Milk himself: “You’ve got to give them hope.”

Phillip Spencer Huff, SFLGFB President, reporting from his garden deck during shelter-in-place In an exceptional time with unprecedented chal- https://tinyurl.com/y8tdxb3w lenges, the Band’s adapt- Fundraiser: https://tinyurl.com/ya4jtc3j ability, ingenuity, and healthy position. All tax-deductible to postpone. Among those is Notes perseverance have been from the Peace Corps, a benefit concontributions are welcomed with the nothing short of supersonic. Each Band’s gratitude and my personal week we come together with new and cert originally scheduled in March to raise funds for the NorCal Peace thanks. A special thanks also goes exciting ways of fulfilling our misCorps Association, in furtherance of out to the San Francisco Bay Times for sion. Our drive to press onward to numerous projects they support glob- their decades of support, as well as greater heights while marching forally. Of course, there is also Spotlight to our major sponsors, Grants for ward with pride has never been on Broadway, the Band’s major fundthe Arts, Horizons Foundation, and stronger. At a time when humankind raising event of the year, originally Folsom Street Events. looks to the arts for relief, escape, scheduled for this coming Saturday, and a glimmer of hope, the Official Don’t forget to connect with us on May 9.

Band of San Francisco rises to the social media and get notified when challenge to support and serve our With our fundraiser cancelled, our latest shelter-in-place videos community in the Bay Area. To say I humbly ask you to point your release! You won’t want to skip a I am proud of our Band’s response browser to our website and kindly beat. ( https://tinyurl.com/yct7x3jq ) feels like an understatement. The consider participating in the Presireal emotion is much deeper, far Brighter days are on the horizon. dent’s Shelter-in-Place Fundraiser more profound, and iterated indiTogether we will overcome this, and ( https://tinyurl.com/ybq33uov ). vidually 80-plus times over from the your Official Band looks forward to We know times are difficult, tops of our piccolos to the bottoms of the day we can harmonize with each but if you’re able to support us, our tubas. other—and you. your generosity now will help us As the Band transitions to virPhillip Spencer Huff is the Presito continue to provide virtual tual performances, we look forward performances as well as returning dent of the San Francisco Lesbian/ to rescheduling concerts we had from hiatus in a financially Gay Freedom Band.

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LGBTQ News & Calendar for the Bay Area

PHOTO BY GARY SAPERSTEIN

the Virtual Seder

Matthew Scott Long, Kyle Kuklewski, Jeremy Turpen and Michael Molina at the Seder in Sonoma, organized by Out in the Vineyard's Gary Saperstein.

KELLY GREENE DESIGN

CELEBRATING FOUR DECADES (1978–2020)

2020

San Francisco Bay Times contributor Howard Steiermann family Zoom Seder

San Francisco Bay Times designer Abby Zimberg's seder plate

Felix, New York, NY

Layla Greene, Salt Lake City, UT

San Francisco Bay Times contributor Paul Margolis Seder

Brianna Shepard Santa Monica

Greene Seder plate, Salt Lake City, UT

Greene family Zoom Seder, Woodland Hills

Greene family Zoom Seder, Salt Lake City, UT

Greene family Zoom Seder, San Diego

Abby Fields' Zoom Seder, Nicaragua

Hansen family Zoom Seder, Las Vegas, NV S AN F R ANC IS C O BAY T IM ES

M AY 7, 2020

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Sister Dana Sez: Words of Wisdumb from a Fun Nun

By Sister Dana Van Iquity Sister Dana sez, “Testing!

Testing! (tap tap tap - is this mic on?) All of us Californians MUST get tested for C-19! Our beloved House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said so!”

Senator Scott Wiener told me, “Congrats to our 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners in the #MASKSAREFIERCE contest: Sarah Boll, Natalie Walsh, Christina Molcillo!” He added, “I hope these creative masks inspire others. And thanks to our amazing panel of drag queen judges who chose our winners.” He concluded, “Now make sure to wear your masks!” Over 150 participants were encouraged to submit fabulous and safety-compliant masks for judging. Senator Wiener and SF’s famed drag queens, Bebe Sweetbriar, Peaches Christ, and Donna Sachet, served as judges. Fierce!

Nearly 500,000 LGBTQ+ students are graduating this year.

The HUMAN RIGHTS CAMPAIGN and GLSEN, an organization devoted to advancing LGBTQ+ inclusion in K-12 education, are partnering to host a virtual graduation ceremony on May 8. Good friends at PFLAG will be there rallying parents and other family members to cheer on grads, too. https://tinyurl.com/yd2xxpss Three organizations serving vulnerable LGBTQ populations—FAMILY EQUALITY, TRUE COLORS UNITED, and SAGE—have sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for its unlawful November 2019 announcement that it would stop enforcing anti-discrimination protections against federal grantees that deny services to, or otherwise discriminate against, individuals. The administration’s unlawful action endangers already vulnerable populations, especially

Sister Dana sez, “It has just been reported that 80.3% of Democratic Respondents believe Trump should go to JAIL for his NEGLIGENT leadership during the current crisis. Yeah, that’s just ONE reason to put him in the pokey!”

THE CASTRO FARMERS’ MARKET (every Wednesday, 2:30–7 pm) needs volunteers to enforce social distancing measures so neighbors can safely shop for fresh vegetables, fruits, and foods. If you are interested in volunteering, contact Mia Simmans at 415-9948240 or via email, miasimmans@ pcfma.org Taylor Swift performs her latest heartfelt song during these awful times, “Soon You’ll Get Better,” and listening to this we just can’t help but get a little better: https://tinyurl.com/y7vyc93u Sister Dana sez, “May 10 is Mother’s Day. So, I wish all you mothers a very happy day! And that includes drag mothers as well!”

TOGETHER SF is a new nonprofit dedicated to connecting neighbors in need with able volunteers and connecting volunteers with other nonprofits that need help. If you find yourself with free time, you might consider donating some of that time to the community. Visit Together SF’s website or call them at 415-4801566 for more information. https://www.togethersf.org/ Sister Dana sez, “Regarding foolish protesters (suffering from moron-a-virus) refusing to take proper precautions, I saw this online: ‘They say you can’t fix stupid. Turns out you can’t quarantine it either!’”

AIDS/LIFECYCLE will not return this year due to COVID19 concerns, halting the annual fundraiser for HIV/AIDS service providers for the first time since it began in 1994. Not only will it be emotionally devastating to riders and

crew, but also it will be a major blow to fundraising efforts for HIV/AIDS services: the event brought in $16.8 million in 2019, $16.6 million in 2018, and $15.4 million in 2017.

The Bay Area performing duo, Emma’s Revolution, have created a parody song and accompanying video that is an online hit, providing some muchneeded inspiration and laughter during the pandemic. “FROM A (SOCIAL) DISTANCE” is based on the original song

by Julie Gold, recorded by the Divine Bette Midler in 1990, and now offers musical advice for these terrible times. It›s both serious and humorous. https://tinyurl.com/y7bepkhv Sister Dana sez, “Having just heard Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day sing ‘Wake Me Up When September Ends,’ I am hoping all of us will awaken from this horrible pandemic after September!”

I love HBO-TV comic newscaster John Oliver for scrambling the letters of “CORONAVIRUS” to read a much nicer “VARIOUS CORN.” Silly, but try it yourself!

Sister Dana sez, “Liar-in-Chief Trump has repeatedly exhorted, ‘We cannot let the cure be worse than the problem itself.’ No, dummy Donald, the cure is definitely our goal! And science, not Fox News, is the way!”

NETFLIX is now screening a new series, HOLLYWOOD, by openly gay, openly clever Ryan Murphy.

This delicious show follows a group of aspiring actors and filmmakers in post-World War II Hollywood as they try to make it in Tinseltown— any way they can. It’s listed as LGBTQ! www.netflix.com/Hollywood Novice Sister Celine Dyonysos of The SF Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence has created a very helpful site for dealing with pandemic issues. The official motto of SPI is “promulgate universal joy and expiate stigmatic guilt.” So, here is some joy without guilt: https://www.thesisters.org/joy One of my fave parodists, Chris Mann, has a hysterical C-19 take on a 1979 golden oldie, “My Sharona,” entitled MY CORONA:

FACEBOOK/KELLY RIVERA HART

as the country confronts the coronavirus pandemic. The lawsuit was filed by Democracy Forward and Lambda Legal. BTW the LAMBDA LEGAL SOIRÉE has been rescheduled to September 10, 6–9 pm at The Pearl. https://www.lambdalegal.org/

Sister Dana with Michael Johnstone and Vera Newman celebrating Easter

https://tinyurl.com/repnw5w Sister Dana sez, “As a politics junkie, I watch a lot of MSNBC and local news. And I am so grateful for my DVR to record everything. But when I see that ugly orange face and his antigay Veep, I simply hit ‘fast forward’ to get past them and on to Dr. Fauci and other learned people.”

Message from Elizabeth Warren: “Our Postal Service is on the verge of collapse. I’m calling on Congress to shore up USPS so as many Americans as possible can vote from home.”

“50 YEARS OF PRIDE” opens on the GLBT HISTORICAL SOCIETY’s website on May 15.

The installation at SF City Hall will follow when the state’s shelter-inplace order has been relaxed. https://tinyurl.com/ycnlq2sge A major cable network will be doing a documentary profile on José Julio Sarria (gay activist and founder of the INTERNATIONAL COURT SYSTEM). THE NELLY QUEEN will be aired in June 2020.

For much more information on ICS: http://www.imperialcouncilsf.org/ The new “queereality” series, WE’RE HERE, on HBO features RuPaul superstars, Bob the Drag Queen, Eureka O’Hara, and Shangela Laquifa Wadley putting on one-night-only drag shows with locals in need of a little support and empowerment.

Fierce and heartwarming! I laughed!

I cried! I cried a lot. Check your local HBO service. https://tinyurl.com/yblc5w48 Can’t get enough drag realness? Tune into TLC-TV for DRAGNIFICENT! with four delightful superstar DQs: Alexis Michelle, Bebe Zahara Benet, Jujubee, and Thorgy Thor being similar to We’re Here. Dragalicious! https://tinyurl.com/y9or3o33

(continued on page 20)

Please sign this petition: Dr. Fauci is saving lives. Trump must not fire him. https://tinyurl.com/ydxqjmzr Sister Dana sez, “Trump released his horrifying new budget, and it cuts BILLIONS from Social Security and Medicare. Republicans have been working toward this moment for years. This must stop!”

I am not happy to say that FOLSOM STREET EVENTS (FSE) has announced that this year’s UP YOUR ALLEY, FOLSOM STREET FAIR, and related events will be held virtually rather than in-person. They will produce virtual events to celebrate the historic fair weekends by staying socially connected while physically distant. The new events will

be on the weekends of July 26 and September 27. For more information, visit https://www.folsomstreetevents.org/ Additionally, REAL BAD32 fundraising leather dance party has been canceled. https://tinyurl.com/yblwht5d Mayor London Breed has announced that the City’s ARTS AND ARTISTS RELIEF FUND has made its first round of grants and loans, providing $1.5 million in much-needed financial support for the local arts sector struggling from substantial income loss due to COVID19. Mayor Breed launched the Arts and Artists Relief Fund on March 23.

Sister Dana sez, “What nerve that a group is threatening legal action and demanding payment for use of the Bisexual Pride Flag! That symbol freely belongs to the community, and they are Bi-Furious!”

You absolutely must hear our SF gem, Jason Brock, singing his witty C-19 parody of the Whitney Houston hit, “I Have Nothing,” with the revised title, “Nothing Else to Do.” https://tinyurl.com/y7gdz43x The latest ROFL Randy Rainbow C-19 song parody should be taken with “A Spoonful of Clorox”—but please don’t! https://tinyurl.com/y75c2l4a I hope everybody is watching SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE AT HOME broadcast on NBC. It›s even better than the live show—seeing how stars cleverly adapt with skits in seclusion.

May 8 continues Full Moon Fridays: Live Cabaret Series when it’s Ladies Night! Live cabaret features music from all female songwriters; sung by some of 42ND STREET MOON’s favorite ladies. https://tinyurl.com/y9pp5xgd THE GLBT HISTORICAL SOCIETY has unveiled an online version of its exhibition, “Performance, Protest and Politics: The Art of Gilbert Baker,” which I enjoyed at the Museum on November 1.

My dear friend, artist/activist Sister Chanel 2001 aka Gilbert Baker (1951–2017), designed the iconic rainbow flag. https://www.glbthistory.org/gilbertbaker-exhibition Sister Dana sez, “Here in my Castro gayborhood, we have a charming nightly ritual. At 8 pm, we shout out our open windows with a loud, long WOOOOO! It shows a salute to our first responders, a sense of community, and is kind of a safety valve. Try it!”

Stay Home! Stay Safe!

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Professional Services

N ewPer spec ti ves Center for Counseling

A full LEADERSHIP service catering company GGBA (continued from page 7)

GGBA MEMBER SPOTLIGHT (continued from page 7)

serving the greater Bay Area

• Weddings, Commitment Ceremonies, GGBA also promotes programming from the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC). It is especially Anniversaries and many other social beneficial for certified LGBT owned businesses and includes “Webinar Wednesdays” and “Sip-n-Pitch Fridays.” occasions and corporate events More Opportunity • We offer Custom-Designed Menus in various cuisines with vegetarian, vegan We’re excited to alert members to RFP opportunities from our chamber partners such as PG&E, Southern and multi-cultural food options California Edison, Comcast, and others. Subscribe to the GGBA newsletter and social media for the latest • Full Service Event Management updates.

415.308.4555 “Our business literally doubled from our membership in the GGBA,” said Audry deLucia of ellaprint. And that www.cheatalittle.com sentiment is one I’m proud sayAbout!

I’ve heard from countless other members. Two avenues members can use to proWe Give You Something TotoTalk mote their business are: 1. Hot Deals - Found in your account at the GGBA website, these member-to-member specials provide great opportunities and you will soon see the Hot Deals members promoted in our bi-weekly newsletters.

PHOTO BY SANDY MORRIS

2. GGBA Member Spotlight - We’re always wanting to help members shine and the Spotlight includes an interview in the San Francisco Bay Times, blog post at the GGBA website, and starting this month, a recorded Zoom interview with me. To get your interview scheduled, contact Membership@GGBA.com In closing, l challenge you to use any downtime you have to actively nurture your business; to do what you’ve always done, facing this challenge with the same verve as when you first opened your business’ door.

Neil deGrasse Tyson recently reminded us what we are capable of when we put our mind to it, saying, “When Isaac Newton stayed at home to avoid the 1665 plague, he discovered the laws of gravity, optics, and he invented calculus.” Your next business pivot may not change the world, but then again it just might. We’re in your corner and ready to help.

I look forward to seeing you at our next event.

Gina Grahame, the Founder and CEO of the Grahame Institute of Strategic Communication, is the President of the Golden Gate Business Association (GGBA). Grahame also serves as a Communication Coach at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and is a member of the Board of Advisors for the Transgender Advisory Committee of the City and County of San Francisco.

establishing a presence and reputation. We made sure it was a good reputation. A lot of jobs we took on were not profitable but provided experience.

As we grew our professional résumé, we were able to be more aggressive in our pricing and eventually gained stability. We operate from a point of being smart, safe, and professional movers, and we keep that in mind with our customers and with our workers. If you do a good job, people will tell their contacts.

GGBA: Is there anything else that you would like to share?

Olga Garcia: We were recently featured in a Mercury News article about moving in the time of COVID-19. We are considered essential workers and our experience in moving clinics, hospitals, and biotech labs has been extremely important during this pandemic. I am very proud of the work we do, the company we built, and our workers. I hope you get a chance to read the article or visit our blog on our website to learn more about us.

For more information about CG Moving Company: https://www.cgmovingcompany.com/

Check Out the New Bay Times Video! http://www.sfbaytimes.com S AN F R ANC IS C O BAY T IM ES

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REOPENING CALIFORNIA (continued from page 2) Contact Tracing Contact tracing enables the state to suppress the spread of the virus to avoid outbreaks and allows officials to maintain CA’s health care capacity and confidently modify the stay at home order. To work toward these goals, Governor Newsom announced a partnership with UCSF and UCLA to immediately begin training workers for a landmark contact tracing program that will help contain the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic while the state looks to modify the stay at home order. The partnership will include a virtual training academy for contact tracers. The first 20-hour training began on May 6 with the goal of training 20,000 individuals in two months.

ROSTOW (continued from page 9) flag” with little horseshoes. “Pony play,” we learn, “is a distinct fetish where people are treated like horses by wearing hooves, ears, and saddles and pulling carts. Carrie P created this flag in 2007; it uses black in solidarity with the leather community at large.”

For updates specific to San Francisco, go to: https://sf.gov/topics/coronavirus-covid-19

Sorry, guys, but I draw the line at including pony play in my personal rainbow spectrum. I’m fine with gay men, gay women, bisexuals, transgenders, and a hint of, well, chacun a son gout. But that’s it. Leave the rest behind the stable door, please.

SEELIG (continued from page 14)

Lost in Space

Britney Coleman. We’ve also interviewed Broadway composer Andrew Lippa, skater Adam Rippon and, wait for it, Chasten Buttigieg! All of those are available for you to watch, with more added every week!

We launched SFGMC TV with our virtual chorus rendition of “Truly Brave.” It has now reached a quarter of a million views, including praise from the two composers of the two songs: Cyndi Lauper, “True Colors,” and Sara Bareilles, “Brave”! It’s been an auspicious launch.

Day 34. Facials.

Last week, we released the uplifting song, “Dance with the Storm,”

by Andrew Lippa. Both this piece and “Truly Brave” are with gratitude for, and in honor of, first responders and those who continue on the front lines making our lives livable.

Just like you, we are ready for life to get back to the “new normal.”

We are ready for our sheltering phase to come to a natural end.

We know that it may come again.

We’ll be better prepared in every way. Patience is not one of my spiritual gifts.

Day 40. 40 days and 40 nights.

And God said, “Go to your room and think about what you’ve done.”

(That was actually our friend Laura Benanti.)

One day soon, we’ll be able to sing together again. Even that won’t be the same for a fairly long time, but I can absolutely guarantee it will be performed with even more gusto, fervor, and joy than ever before—and we had a lot of all that. There is still a world out there waiting to hear music.

Heart-warming, life-changing music.

Today is Day 52. I stopped my daily updates more than a week ago. The fun of doing them wore off along the way. I was certainly not doing anything interesting or out of the “new normal.” I found myself with daily days.

How do we come out of this? We know less about that than we did what it was going to be like when we started this grand experiment. I’m pretty sure we won’t be experiencing the song “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over.”

I’m pretty sure it is going to more like the proverbial “out like a lamb.”

I think it is going to be like approaching a cold swimming pool. We’ll be testing the water with a finger, then a toe. Starting at the shallow end, we go in ankle deep and acclimate before slowly moving up to our private parts where the cold really gets our attention. But we keep going, and at some point, we find ourselves half in and half out. Nothing bad happened, so we go all the way. Next stop: high dive! For me, that high dive is the day I will get to stand before the chorus, raise my arms, signal the downbeat and they sing! And you will be behind me soaking up that glorious sound once again.

I’m more than ready.

Stay safe.

Dr. Tim Seelig is the Artistic Director of the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus.

KIT’N KITTY’S

QUEER POP QUIZ C) Flagstaff, AZ

The city of Flagstaff, AZ, is nestled next to ponderosa pine forests and mountain ranges. Although 2020’s “PRIDE in the Pines” has been canceled due to the pandemic, the organizers are already planning and looking forward to the 25th anniversary celebration of the event, which will take place next year.

SA N FRANCISCO BAY T I ME S

The lesbian astronaut story was from last August, but I am sure I read an update of some sort last month. I can’t tell who’s in the wrong, but I do know that the astronaut had been in charge of the couple’s finances and said she was checking activity on the bank account. Indeed, no transactions took place, but the earthbound one insisted that the astronaut had “stolen her identity” for nefarious purposes. I can’t find the update, but I choose to align myself with the astronaut. Meanwhile, the dog story is a sweet video about a different female astronaut who returned to Earth after nearly a year and was greeted by her hysterically happy dog.

All in all, I’m not sure that our communal wisdom was advanced by either of those items, although it’s worth your time to watch the dog

Court-side Of course, I have a number of actual GLBT news bits, including Lambda Legal’s challenge to Idaho’s two new anti-trans laws, both mentioned in previous dispatches. But I’d rather tell you about the Broward County, Florida, judge, Dennis Bailey, who felt compelled to send a letter to the Weston Bar Association, complaining about the declining dress standards on digital hearings.

“We’ve seen many lawyers in casual shirts and blouses, with no concern for ill-grooming, in bedrooms with the master bed in the background, etc.,” wrote Judge Bailey. “One male lawyer appeared shirtless and one female attorney appeared still in bed, still under the covers.”

I admit, that last one was my favorite. I love this female attorney, a woman after my own heart. I picture her, pen and pad in hand, legal papers in organized piles on the duvet, a mug of coffee on the bedside table, and maybe a cat dozing near her feet. Maybe she put one of her silk blouses over the white tee she wore to bed in an effort to upgrade her image for the court.

Or maybe not. Maybe she was still wearing an old rock concert shirt from college days. Perhaps she had a margarita just off camera instead of the coffee. I’m guessing the pillow behind her head gave her away, or maybe the edge of the bedsheet.

“Putting on a beach cover-up won’t cover up you’re poolside in a bathing suit,” Bailey added. “So, please, if you don’t mind, let’s treat court hearings as court hearings, whether Zooming or not.”

Yes, I loved that one, too. I envision a woman at the pool, because men don’t wear “beach coverups.” I’d also like to think that she was arguing against the woman in bed, the two of them engaged in complex legal jousting.

“Your Honor, my opponent’s reliance on the Cavendish case is inapposite given the constitutional amendments of 1997 that subsequently informed Bishop ... (pauses to sip from a coconut umbrella drink) ... excuse me, Your Honor, which I would argue makes Cavendish irrelevant to our current situation. In fact ... ” “Ms. Jenkins, what say you to that?”

“Your Honor? (Sits up and adjusts pillows, reaches for papers.) The citation in Cavendish has nothing to do with the subsequent amendments, nor does Bishop have the slightest impact on our argument, which ... (cat wanders in front of the camera, stretches and moves languidly away) ... which, if I may summarize again in the main ... “ “Ms. Wallerson, if I may interrupt here and ask that you please refasten your beach coverup!”

End Notes Let’s see. You all know that Anderson Cooper had a baby.

That’s nice. A state appellate court in Florida struck the GLBT rights ordinance in Jacksonville on technical grounds. I assume it will be revived. And speaking of babies, a transgender U.K. man who gave birth has lost his fight to be listed as the child’s father, rather than the mother, even though he was legally male at the time of birth.

Chief court mucky muck Sir Andrew McFarlane concluded that anyone who gives birth is legally a “mother,” observing nonsensically that there is a “material difference between a person’s gender and their status as a parent.”

Yes, Sir Andrew, it’s a brave new world. But it’s not hard to state that a male parent is a father and a female parent is a mother. And exactly what purpose does it serve to hurt this man and make his family’s life difficult? arostow@aol.com

LEWIS (continued from page 6) a modern totemic device, using very special hues of light that give the appearance of levitation to reflect the mind-boggling DNA sequencing and analysis the machinery does.

The design so greatly improved users’ attitudes toward their work that it changed the company’s entire branding philosophy.

Demirci’s designs lie at the cutting edge of technological and societal development. His current project Rimpski represents an entirely new way of using augmented reality.

Rimpski takes virtual reality glasses and other wearables and reverses their purpose from altering the way we see the outside world to enabling us to transform the way the outside world sees us. It employs sophisticated visual technologies we can wear to allow us to express ourselves physically in myriad different ways—and thus experiment with and present to the world all sorts of

creative and life-affirming images of who we are.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a profound wake-up call for Demirci to maintain his vision of industrial design. “It caused me to stop and think about what matters from now on.” In the pre-pandemic “fast consumption” economy, “companies constantly launched new products that regularly needed upgrade and replacement and fed people’s hunger for the latest new thing. As a society, I think we knew deep down we could consume less and that our environment cannot sustain continued proliferation of products that quickly end up in the trash heap.

The pandemic forces us to recognize these truths. From now on, I want to focus my designs on what’s valuable, what’s durable—what’s long lasting.”

As an industrial designer, Demirci does not just muse or fantasize about change; he comes up with “tangible solutions” that can actually be implemented. “When millions of people purchase a product I design, I will never know who exactly uses it or touches it, but I hope they sense something in it— my love, my ideas, my vision to make their lives better.”

Emin Demirci is a genius of both the mind and heart.

John Lewis and Stuart Gaffney, together for over three decades, were plaintiffs in the California case for equal marriage rights decided by the California Supreme Court in 2008. Their leadership in the grassroots organization Marriage Equality USA contributed in 2015 to making same-sex marriage legal nationwide.

RUTH (continued from page 15) The Seltos felt strong, thanks to the 175 horses produced by the turbocharged 1.6-liter engine; and its dual-clutch, seven-speed transmission was responsive. Handling was precise enough to make the Seltos feel sporty.

ANSWER (Question on pg 20)

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I was just checking my old column idea list and, as usual, discovered a number of promising entries.

One is “lesbian astronaut,” which if I remember correctly involves two lesbians who broke up, one of whom was on the space station trying to access the other woman’s bank account. That sounded like a fun topic to revisit, but I also noticed another reference, weeks earlier, titled “astronaut dog.” What? Total mystery.

video, which I found by googling: “astronaut dog.”

MAY 7 , 2 0 2 0

Both were accommodating inside, though the driver’s seat in the Seltos was unworkable for me, as it pushed forward my shoulders and left my lower back hunting around for firmness. A jump from the tested S trim level to the SX, with its 10-way power seat with lumbar support, would likely solve that.

To my eye, the Seltos and Yaris both have attractive styling, with tight contours and an athletic presence. And in our time of uncertainty, both were reminders of how satisfying a well-designed car can be.

Philip Ruth is a Castro-based automotive photojournalist and consultant with an automotive staging service.

LGBT Community Virtual Events

BAY TIMES S

Photos by Paul Margolis

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LGBTQ News & Calendar for the Bay Area

CELEBRATING FOUR DECADES (1978–2020)

San Francisco Bay Times photographer Paul Margolis has been busy attending and documenting LGBT community events gone virtual throughout the month of April and now into May. He has, for example, recently captured images from online gatherings that include SFGMC TV - Chasten Buttigieg and Adam Rapon, Equality California, LYRIC Annual Open House, COVID-19 & Living with HIV - Getting to Zero SF & Ward 86, Gregangelo Artalks, and Barechest Calendar 2021. View these and more at OurTownSF: http:// www.ourtownsf.org

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Virtual OurTownSF LGBTQ Nonprofit Expo 2020 on August 15

by Paul Margolis OurTownSF LGBTQ Nonprofit Expo 2020 will be a virtual event taking place on August 15 from 12:30 pm–4:30 pm. Now in its fifth year, this community resource fair is free to attend and offers Bay Area groups serving the LGBTQ community the opportunity to attract new clients, volunteers, board members, and donors.

These groups are going through tough times like never before and we expect over 150 groups to participate and thousands to attend, anxious to offer much-needed support.

Follow the Facebook event page https://www.facebook.com/events/2201298380166099/ Or, also to learn of updates, follow the OurTownSF webpage’s Nonprofit Expo tab: https://www.ourtownsf.org/nonprofit-expo A full list of participants will be available in the near future. In terms of programming for the event, it will begin with a short intro with entertainment. Attendees will then be directed to links in order to reach participants. The Expo will be super queer and include additional entertainment, discounts at various Castro businesses, and door prizes! Several forms of health consultations and insurance registration will also be available.

Paul Margolis is the Founder and Director of OurTownSF ( https://www.ourtownsf.org/ ).

Pandemic Art in the Castro

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SA N FRANCISCO BAY T I ME S

MAY 7 , 2 0 2 0

Photos by Rink

Round About - All Over Town - COVID-19 Pandemic

Photos by Rink

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence placed an immense mass of balloons on the Bank of America building at 18th and Castro Streets (known historically as Hibernia Beach).

A message board under the balloons was signed by Castro neighbors and visitors.

Philz Coffee on Market Street in the Castro is operating from its front take-out window.

Poesia restaurant in the Castro is open for carryout and delivery.

Server Philip welcomed customers to the take-out table at the Castro Starbucks.

An art installation of LoveYou2.org notes by artist Shannon Weber is on display next to the waiting line at Cheese Plus on Russian Hill.

Zaid “Ze” Almassri (right), familiar to Castro neighbors in his role as cashier at the 17th and Noe Market, has opened the new Golden Grill on Castro Street in the space formerly occupied by Dapper Dog. Among the menu items offered by Ze and his assistant Barrak are Middle Eastern selections, Niman Ranch burgers, Castro shawarma, New York style pastrami sandwiches, hot dogs and more.

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A well-organized social distancing line of customers waited their turn to shop at Cliff’s Variety on Saturday, May 2.

San Francisco Bay Times supporter Juan Davila wearing his mask on Castro Street, May 2

Round About - All Over Town

Photos by Rink

CASTRO STREETCAM presented by

The popular Lookout bar on the corner of Market and Noe has a clever approach to social distancing. From the Lookout’s balcony, a server lowers a bucket containing a bottle of lemonade margaritas and 2 cups with ice.

http://sfbaytimes.com/

Observing the six feet apart guideline, people relaxed on the lawn at Huntington Park on Nob Hill.

Signs stating “No Mask - Do No Enter” have been prominently placed at the Polk and Green Produce Market on Russian Hill.

San Francisco Chief of Protocol Charlotte Shultz sewed the mask worn by the statue of Tony Bennett in front of the Fairmont Hotel on April 25. Shultz planned the event that included singing of “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” by pedestrians in front of the Fairmont and other locations around town.

Grace Cathedral’s outdoor Labyrinth installation has been a popular site for walking meditations during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As Heard on the Street . . . What are you most looking forward to doing when the shelter in place lifts? compiled by Rink

Veronika Fimbres

Lenore Chinn

Troy Brunet

Paul Schmitt

Michael Micael

“To go out to the clubs and see how the socialization looks and feels.

I will order a cocktail and take it from there.”

“To see ‘50 Years of Pride’ – a show curated by Pam Peniston and myself, installed at City Hall.”

“Giving someone a loving hug.

A good hug can make you feel more connected and conquer separation anxiety.”

“Having an ice cold beer at the Cinch Saloon”

“A return to social closeness”

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