mindplunge

A busy weekend ahead

Tomorrow I’ll be in the Bay area. First we are going to visit the acupuncture school in Oakland and see if it’s any good. Afterwards we’re invited by David to go to the Green Festivals in San Francisco.

A speaker at the Green Festivals is Chuck D. of Public Enemy, one of my teenage heroes but unfortunately he spoke today… too bad. I’m sure there are lots of other things to do and I’m looking forward to what Joey Shepp has to say about The Green Web: Advancing Sustainability on the Internet. Could be interesting.

I’ll have my camera ready and will have some pictures up by Sunday!

Finding a Parking Spot – GottaPark.com

Parking in the City (SF) can be brutal and gottapark.com could help you out. The idea is simple. Here’s how it works:

GottaPark will help you find and reserve parking. We are reaching out to private residences, commercial businesses and other organizations interested in posting their parking for rent through our site. You can then use GottaPark to search through the available parking spaces and reserve and pay for the ones you want.

You can now easily reserve parking before you leave home, even weeks ahead!

We are reaching out to the community to find individuals and businesses willing to rent out parking on their property. Each parking provider chooses the dates to make their space(s) available and the price to charge.

GottaPark then allows you to search through the list of available spots for the dates you are interested in and select the one that best suits your needs. Once you select a parking spot to reserve, you will be asked for some information about the car you will park as well as your credit card information. We will then charge your account and provide you with a printable confirmation of your parking reservation, including a map to your spot. The parking providers will also be notified about your reservation and will be provided with your license plate number, but it is still recommended that you bring a printed copy of your confirmation with you when you go to park.

It is very important that you provide the correct license plate and vehicle information, since that is what the providers will use to confirm that the correct car has parked in their spot.

Why San Francisco Is No. 1

San Francisco is this year’s best city for young professionals because of its ability to attract and retain talent. It does this by offering long-term job opportunities, plenty of singles and impressive starting salaries.

The City by the Bay outshined the rest of the field in attracting alumni from the nation’s top schools. More of the class of 1998 from Harvard, Stanford, Rice, Princeton, Duke and Northwestern picked San Francisco as home, 10 years out of school, compared with any other metro. These are graduates with the skills to work virtually wherever they want, and this measure is an indicator of where high-caliber professionals have decided to settle, based on a combination of job and lifestyle factors.

San Francisco weekend

Last weekend A. and me went to the City to celebrate my birthday. We stayed at hotel Fusion in downtown San Francisco. The thing I love about the City s that you will discover new things every time you visit. As A. always says: Never a Dull Moment, and it’s true. Even though the weather wasn’t cooperating well we still had a great time. Yesterday I decided to put my photo page up again. I only uploaded 13 pictures since I only want to show my quality pictures (cough, cough). Let me know what you think!

Another reason for putting up the gallery page is that I want to pick up the camera more often. With the recent discovery of Vimeo it got me inspired to take more pictures. Eventually I want to start making videos but that’s something for the future.

Tips for ‘n00bs’ moving to the Bay Area

Y Combinator has a news section were users can submit stories, articles and even questions. More about Y Combinator later but I found this post about a guy moving from LA to the Bay Area. He wanted some advise on where to live. There was a wonderful response from a person who lived all his life in the Bay. His tips for fun are so true! Read his response:

It really depends on how much money you have. The Burlingame, San Carlos, San Mateo corridor is nice; consider renting (in this market, at least). Access to the stores you’re talking about but about 15-20 mins from The City and with enough culture to tide you over. Within reach of 280, which is a better way to go south than 101.

A few other FYI tips, just for fun:
People up here don’t use ‘the’ in front of freeway names the way you do in LA. It’s not “the 101″, it’s just “101″. No harm in using “the” but you’ll tag yourself as an ex-LA guy immediately.

• San Jose is pronounced “sanno-ZAY”, despite the proper spanish pronunciation.
• You say “Santa Cruz” the way you say “Santa Claus”. Emphasis on the Santa.
• “Concord” rhymes with “conquered”, rather than “con-CHORD”.
• If you don’t want to sound like a newb, don’t call San Francisco “Frisco” or “San Fran”. Locals routinely call it “The City”, or sometimes “SF”. No one will think you’re talking about San Jose or Oakland.

It’s more outdoorsy up here (despite LA’s surfing/skating reputation). Marin and the East Bay (hey, that’s Pig Latin for “beast”!) have huge regional parks. Mountain biking was invented here (in Marin, north of the GG bridge). So was cafe culture (in SF).

Go to Pier 39 once. Locals don’t go there. (Hell, I’ve never been to Alcatraz, and I’ve lived in NorCal my whole life.) Cool, insider neighborhoods in The City are Potrero Hill, Noe Valley, Cole Valley, among others. SOMA is still dicey, however hip its reputation.