Author: CoolDMZ

"X-ray vision to see in between / Where's my kimono and my time machine?"

Dinner at the Dump

Taking the back entrance into Tahoe Park, where the CoolDMZ clan resides, my wife and I keep noticing the banner advertising the Power Inn Business & Transportation Association’s self proclaimed “unique and lively event” Dinner at the Dump. Why work so hard to convince people not to conjure up the smell of a landfill when sampling your catered surf and turf? Why not just have a tour of the dump and let everybody have a free grab at some of the many usable items others have discarded but are usually protected against scavenging? Why not just put Jack Gallagher on top of a pile of concrete waste and have him do jokes?

Speaking of scavenging, big trash pick up day in my neck of the woods was last week, and my wife reported that while walking home with the kids, she came upon a woman scavenging somebody’s pile of garbage. Now, hey, we’ll all been there. One man’s broken chair is another man’s broken chair. But this woman fended off Mrs. CoolDMZ’s friendly smile with the following: “Back off! I got kids of my own.” Which reinforced my wife’s theory that ghosts of the Gold Rush still walk the streets of Sacto. Mostly the streets around the downtown bus station.

(On a side note, check out the redesign of CBS13/UPN31’s site. It’s a pretty good design, many notches above UPN 31’s previous one.)

Also I Lost My Porsche

I decided that crime blotters are fair game for The Sac Rag. Here is a gem from the CSUS log:

September 16
Theft – LIBRARY – A man reported that upon returning to the bike he’d locked to the bike rack at 9:30 a.m., he found that someone had opened the lock and replaced his new bike with an old bike.

The same thing happened to my car once. Oh right, like a guy as important as CoolDMZ really drove a Mazda. Come on!

Proud to Be a Tomato

I missed about four days of blogging, but this morning when I was going over the Bee there were three stories that made me very proud to be a Sacramentan. There is the big sports story, of course: The Monarchs are the queens of the WNBA. Hooray professional basketball champions!

And then of course the City of Sacramento is trying to blanket downtown and midtown in free wireless internet access. (Imagine hundreds of Sac Rags all over the central city, only much more specific: Boulevard Park Rag, for instance.)

But the most important and pride-inducing story for me: the 2004 world champion chili chef lives in Elk Grove. I’d just like to point out to Mrs. Kathy Hipskind that I am free any night of the week to come over for a bowl, and that I will definitely bring the corn bread and RC Cola.

Hmm, three Sac Bee links this morning. I wonder why he’s so pro-Bee this morning? I wonder why he’d ask a leading rhetorical question like that? I wonder if we’ll find out an answer to those rhetorical questions later this week. Stay tuned…?

“We’re not that kind of people”

Interesting front-pager today in the Bee about a dispute down in Franklin over a proposed church building. A tiny church (5 people) wants to expand to a whopping 30 and has bought a house in a residential neighborhood to meet in because it was all they could afford. Overvalued much?

Well, local residents won’t have it. They are trying to get the county to deny the church’s permits to use the house based on a local covenant that restricts “noxious or offensive trade” from being carried on in the neighborhood. How dare they worship their god with music and ritual! Won’t somebody think of the children!?

Only problem: the “noxious trade” clause is clause 2. Clause 1 just happens to be “Neither the whole or any part of said premises shall be sold, rented or leased to any person or persons not of the White or Caucasian Race.” Class move, Franklin!

Crepes: the New Sushi?

Heckasac and Postcards (kudos on the ballsy post title) are discussing the encroachment of a third Crepeville franchise on the grounds of Cafe Melange. Much great discussion at both blogs. (Especially that one commenter on Postcards who notes that what is really needed is a good Jewish deli. One of the only things I miss regularly about not living in Los Angeles anymore is the abundance of deli goodness.)

Before we started The Sac Rag I commented elsewhere on the net when I noticed that two fine foreign food establishments–Shandiz (Persian) and Royal Hong King Lum (Chinese)–went sushi right at the same time. And speaking of deli’s, Max’s at Market Square is of course now a sushi place. At the time I was convinced that sushi was to Sacramento’s eaters what the Kings are to Sacramento’s “people who only pretend to care about basketball.” Not sure what that means but plenty of you out there can figure it out.

Not to mention: I’ve only eaten at the Davis Crepeville but doesn’t Crepeville use crappy cheddar cheese in its crepes? For shame.

“You in Line” at Tortillas?

My encounter at the fine taqueria Tortillas (unfortunate name, but great burritos. It would be like a burger place called “Buns” or, I suppose, an Italian restaurant named “Tomatoes”) tonight with the fam’ was vintage Sacramento. To get there on a workday for early dinner you have to brave the Northbound Howe Ave. rush hour traffic, which is no picnic, but man that pork burrito is worth it. We roll into the joint and are the only ones in line. Now, a family of four basically either has to eat PB&J at home or designate one parent to order food for the group in order to acquire a meal with no fuss, so as I’m standing in line with the baby in her carrier, my wife is taking the toddler (2 1/2 y.o.) to the restroom, I’m conferring with her on what those two ladies would like to eat.

Literally in the middle of that sentence, while I’m standing maybe 3 feet from the cash counter, in busts this very typical Sacramento woman. She gives me the “you in line?” but with that voice that’s maybe twice as loud as it needs to be. “Uh, go ahead” I grumble, and she barges past me and proceeds to order a takeout order for 2 or 3 in that same voice.
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Sports! Sports! Tacos! Sports!

At The Sac Rag, we don’t just bring the snark, we bring you The News You Need. Tonight, if the Sacramento River Cats win their Pacific Conference Championship Series Playoff game against the hated Tacoma Rainers, everyone in Sacramento wins a FREE taco from Jimboy’s. If that’s not a reason to catch Pacific Conference Championship fever, well then I just don’t know anything about public health scares. The taco can be consumed on Saturday. Go Cats!

Speaking of sports, The Sac Rag is now seeking a local blogger to cover prep football. From Del Oro to Sheldon, from River City to Ponderosa, local prep junkies want to know the scoop, and they want their scoop snarky. Inquire at cooldmz-at-gmail.com or through our Contact Us page.

UPDATE: 2-2 in the top of the 5th… Come on taco!!

UPDATE: Uh oh, 3 runs for Tacoma in top 6. Let’s go Cats!

UPDATE: Smell the grease… 5-4 Rainiers going into the last frame.

I Don’t Feel Overvalued…

I know the overvaluation of our local housing market is not news to most people who care about that sort of thing, and I don’t generally like to obsess about this stuff, because I realize that although I am technically sitting on a big pile of potential cash or potential financial ruin, it is also still the place where my shirts and underwear and bathroom are for the time being. But this caught my eye. #11 with a bullet! Whoo hoo!!

But seriously. There are no cities in California outside the top 53. Hey, can we blame people though? But look closer: I am no urban/ecomonical expert, but how is San Francisco the least overvalued metro area in CA? From what I can tell {PDF file}, the most recent median price for Sacto is $377.4, and the most recent median for SF is $726.9. In other words, the other factors about SF would have to account for that difference and also for Sacto being almost twice as overvalued. What am I missing?

But again, I don’t really care. I’m just median-bashing. I’ll leave the rest of the discussion and the obvious factual errors I’m overlooking to the comments box.

Flickr: Photos from Big Fun

So the State Fair is over. The CoolDMZ clan didn’t get a chance to go, though we were thinking about it this fine Labor Day weekend. To see what you missed, or to help jog your memory if you had too many deep fried delicacies and blacked out, check out these Big Fun ’05 tagged Flickr photos that I found via Get in the Sac.

A few Administrative tidbits: Contrary to popular belief, comments on The Sac Rag are not moderated, but merely checked by humans in order to obliterate spam. Fortunately, comments by people who have previously commented can be automatically accepted, it turns out. In case some of them are coming back ever, which at this point is kinda 50/50. Also, comments on The Sac Rag reflect the respective opinions of the commenters, even if the commenters are Sac Rag contributors.

50 Years of Horror

Well, moving on… Did anybody else see the head-to-head 50 year anniversary specials on KCRA and News10 on Saturday night? One thing it proved to me is that local news shows see horrific local tragedies and think it’s their time to shine. The parade of memorable moments from both stations seemed more like a “Here’s to the worst things you’ve lived through” marathon. But as usual, with a local angle. For example, here is News10’s page dedicated to its top stories of the 70s and 80s. Explosions, crashes, disasters, murder, and Elvis. One of the most horrifying segments my wife and I witnessed was the capture of a kidnapper, caught on tape by News10. During the report, police on the scene discovered, in real time, another missing girl in a cardboard box in the creep’s trunk. Live on the TV news!
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