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Yesterday's action where the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Area Rapid System took the step of interrupting or blocking cell phone service has increased from the first blog post on this, the one in this space, charging that BART's act was not legal, to a much Twitter-tweeted matter where BART's action was consistently said not to be legal. While BART charges that the action was legal, but has not given concrete evidence to support the claim as of this writing (and this blogger has called BART), a look at recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) actions shows that BART's response to the feared protest was not illegal. According to sources, BART's complaint about what this blogger installed rests on the idea that it did not use a cell phone jamming device, but simply turned off the cell phone antenna system serving certain San Francisco BART stations. That was not my point. My point is that, according to a number of online sources, BART's attempt to int...

HI Your Fit Day Friends ! Hey! Do you still want to get that sexy summer bod? Or, maybe you're on the rebound from a joint injury... Or, maybe you're just looking for that cool piece of equipment that is super fun and will get you fit and lean in a short amount of time... Or, you just like toys! OK! So, remember I told you that I would find ways to work out to keep me in super duper shape before my pending hip surgery? Well, I had this super idea that I could design running shoes with springs on the bottom that would take the impact off my joints and it would be less painful to walk and super fun to use, as well as keep my booty in shape. But then I said, "Hmm! Why invent the wheel when somebody else has done the work for me? Why not ask the Kangoo Jump people to help me?" So that's what I did. And I think these Boots were made for YOU! Boots Not Just Made For Walking! My first try with the Kangoo jumps was back in Jun...

Time to take guns away from Oakland's youth. 3-year-old Carlos Fernando Nava died as the result of a stray bullet fired from the gun of one Oakland Gang Member to another. The flood of news about this tragedy just plain ruined my Wednesday. Oakland murders are not something this blogger likes to mention, but this was the exception. We really have to take guns out of the Oakland equation. What I could not stop thinking about was that 10-year-old boy of about four years ago (from memory), who was also hit by a "stray" bullet near 51st and Pleasant Valley, miles and Worlds away from East Oakland, but still in Oakland. How many Oaklanders young and old, must this happen to before we actually do something to stop this? Who's next? Me? You? Who's next? Oakland must take action. And I hope those who were against Oakland's Gang Injunction Program re-think their position after this incident. We have to take Guns off Oakland's streets...

The controversial proposal to build a new, expanded Safeway Rockridge Oakland complex has gone on for something like five years and three major design changes. The last time I weighed in on this design, it was because the product was awful. This time that's changed, as has the economic climate. I talked to Ken Lowney, of Lowney and Associates Architects about what I think is an exciting new design that adds up to be a net plus for Rockridge. It also has the added advantage of having been created by a person in Mr. Lowney who actually lives in Rockridge. Because of that, "it's a very personal project for me," he says. As the video shows, the new Safeway Rockridge Oakland is a far cry from the original plan. It actually fits and conforms to its surroundings, and provides a gift in the form of a triangular over-look cafe on the corner of Claremont and College Avenue. But that's design; my background is in city planning, and my specialization is in urb...

http://ping.fm/yOnXO vegan deviled eggs. Notice half are already gone!!! Yum!

Sushi Girl is a "grindhouse" style movie best, which this blogger is dying to see, and is best described as a dinner over a naked chic that ends badly. My objective at the Sushi Girl Red Carpet held at Comic Con 2011, was to find out how badly the movie ends! Getting an answer out of Jeff Fahey, Tony Todd, and Mark Hamill was as hard as the abs on its lady star, Cortney Palm. But I did learn that, according to Mark Hamill, Sushi Girl will make Tony Todd a "really big star." Todd plays the lead role, a guy named Duke, who he says has the kind of "switch" in his head such that if you say the wrong thing, he will "just snap," but who, Todd says, is "charming." In other words, Tony Todd plays a lovable sociopath. Unlike the epic, must-see Bellflower movie meetup , this was a standard Red Carpet, which was fine, but the problem was once you got into a talk with, say, Mark Hamill, a PR rep would come by winding her hand as if...

There's a lot going on in Oakland, but I'm figuring out that, frankly, this city of mine isn't as socially connected as it likes to think it is.  There are only a handful of bloggers, a small group of people who read them, and few, considering the total population, who use Twitter to tweet or any camcorder to vlog. In short, a lot of information about what happens in Oakland goes without matching content.   Just saying - though I'll say more about this later. One small Facebook Page group of people is growing organically. Called " Terrorized by CEDA Oakland, CA ," it has about 198 "likes" and it's not going to reach massive proportions unless someone connects Oakland's Economic Development boss, Walter Cohen to a sex scandal; I'm just kidding, of course, but you get the idea, given media today, and my opening paragraph. A problem at the Community And Economic Development Agency CEDA, first reported here and at Oakland Focus by Gwilly...