San Francisco Pillow Fight 2009 Photos

Filed Under Pranks, SF Bay Area on 2009-02-17, 02:21 | 1 Comment

I’ve finished going through the photos from the San Francisco Valentine’s Day Pillow Fight. There are some of the UNCCH before the pillow violence erupted as well as some photos deep within the carnage. The full set can be found on my Flickr.

Previously posted: San Francisco Pillow Fight 2009 and the UN

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An Absinthe Education

Filed Under Education, SF Bay Area, Video on 2009-02-16, 04:12 | 3 Comments

I’ve found myself drinking more and more absinthe over the past year or so. It’s a much more enjoyable drink than your typical beer or cocktail. We even had the pleasure of having the Absinthe Fairy Crusher visit the latest party at The Fishbowl.

However absinthe is a much misunderstood beverage. If you’re not familiar with absinthe, it’s production, and it’s effects, you might want to take a few minutes to sit and watch this great series of videos from Chow.com. Lance Winters from St. George Spirits, a local Alameda based distillery, talks about how to make absinthe, what to look for in a good absinthe, how he feels about absinthe, and his plans for future batches. Not only is it educational and entertaining, it’s also great cocktail party knowledge, especially if you’re planning on stopping by for our next gathering!

You’re Not Hallucinating: Forget all the myths and rumors about the green fairy

Tagged: absinthe

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San Francisco Pillow Fight 2009 and the UN

Filed Under Pranks, SF Bay Area, Video on 2009-02-16, 03:16 | 4 Comments

Every year in San Francisco on Valentine’s Day, thousands of people gather to confront each other with the softest weapons known to man. Many of my friends have joined in this battle, wielding pillows of all shapes and sizes. This year I decided that I would lay down my pillow and take a neutral stance as an embedded journalist. I went into Justin Herman Plaza alongside the The United Nations Commission on Costumes & Holidays (UNCCH), who were there to try to defuse the tense situation that seems to happen every year. The UNCCH inspected pillows to make sure they all conformed to international standards, while continuing to insist that they should seek other forms of conflict resolution.

UN Pillow Inspections from Ed Hunsinger on Vimeo.

The pillow militants surrounded us on all sides, and we all knew what was coming. There was no stopping a movement as strong as this one.

The Threat of Pillow Violence is Imminent from Ed Hunsinger on Vimeo.

The clock struck 6:00 and the feathers flew. The carnage was far and wide as an estimated 2,500 people swung pillows, battering others left and right. We stayed around the outskirts at first, but then decided that the story had to be told from the front lines. Along with my trusty cameraman, Steen, we braved feathery weapons to make our way through the battlefield. It wasn’t pretty, but then again Valentine’s Day isn’t always pretty either.

Embedded in the Pillow Carnage from Ed Hunsinger on Vimeo.

Tagged: Pillow Fight 2009, San Francisco

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Celebration and Explosive Sledgehammers

Filed Under Fire, Video on 2009-02-12, 15:53 | 5 Comments

Unfortunately we missed it this year, but next year you should grab your Thor costume and head down to San Juan de la Vega, Mexico in February for some explosive celebrations.

Every year on the Tuesday of Carnival (which fell on Feb 5th this year), the residents of San Juan de la Vega get together to “recreate” the great battle of their patron saint (San Juan de la Vega of cours) and the government. The story is that this Juan was a bit of a Robin Hood character and stole from the rich to give to the poor. During Carnival, there is a little bit of a recreation of the story of some thieves stealing gold, but not all making it out. The captured thieves are then offered up for a ransom that exceeds the amount of gold stolen. Money is collected, but apparently not all goes according to plan and there is the resulting battle with the government. This isn’t a small recreation though. Tons of potassium chloride and sulphur along with many thousands of people gather to set off these explosive hammers.

The explosive recreation of the “battle” used to take place in the main square of the city, but due to damage to buildings (I can imagine!) it has since been moved to a soccer field where there aren’t any windows to break. Surprisingly with this large number of explosives and close proximity of exploders, there are very few injuries. In 2007 there were 17 reported minor injuries, and 50 in 2008.

There’s a translated article (thanks Babelfish) about the 2007 celebration if you want to read more about the reason behind it all. There is also the original article for those fluent in Spanish. And an article on last year’s celebration: English / Spanish.

The above video is from a previous year, and here’s a video from 2008:

And thanks to avidd, there’s also a humorous Instructables based on the top video entitled “Physics experiement with exploding sledgehammer”.

Tagged: Explosions

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San Francisco’s Western Addition: Then and Now

Filed Under SF Bay Area, Uncategorized on 2009-02-02, 01:31 | Leave a Comment

Having only been in San Francisco a few years, I’m always intrigued with how it used to look. Heather came across some great Flickr photo sets dating back to the 70s and 80s, one specifically dedicated to our neighborhood, Western Addition. We went through the photos and attempted to track them down via Google Street View. Here are the results (links open in new windows):

Page and Fillmore (one building is under wraps but we still found them):
1969 / Google Street View

Stardust Lounge (now a boutique):
1970 / Google Street View

Steiner and Sacramento (building is gone):
1977 / Google Street View

Baker’s Market (Green Chile Kitchen now):
1978 / Google Street View

Wash Dry (we think it’s the same laundromat):
1979 / Google Street View

Fillmore St:
1979 / Google Street View

People’s Temple (now a US Post Office):
1979 / Google Street View

Webster and Hayes (the store is gone but the building is still there):
1979 / Google Street View

Oak and Buchanan (looks pretty much the same almost 30 years later):
1980 / Google Street View

Laguna and Post (beautiful building demolished for Japantown):
1980 / Google Street View

Golden Gate & Scott:
1980 / Google Street View

Hickory St (you can see the old freeway that no longer exists in the background):
1980 / Google Street View

Jack’s Records (they’re still there):
1980 / Google Street View

Hayes and Fillmore (a new paintjob, but still a bunch of muni lines):
1980 / Google Street View

Twin houses:
1983 / Google Street View

McAllister St:
1983 / Google Street View

Steiner and Fulton (the street view car didn’t get nearly as nice a view):
1985 / Google Street View

Oak Street (anti-war banners for the 1st Gulf War):
1991 / Google Street View

Someone else can do the Mission.

Tagged: San Francisco

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Purple Tunnel of Doom – The Google Map

Filed Under News, Personal on 2009-01-28, 20:08 | Leave a Comment

I didn’t think I’d be posting more about the Inauguration, but the stories about the Purple ticket line and the infamous “Purple Tunnel of Doom” are gaining steam. The Huffington Post has a great round-up of info on it and I figured I’d share the Google map that I put together after the Inauguration because I wanted to see where exactly we were all day. Little did we know that we were actually under the Mall most of the day. Here’s a link to the map with photos and all.

And here’s a list of my Twitters from the Inauguration: http://tinyurl.com/edrabbitinaug09

Tagged: #inaug09, Inauguration

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Our Inauguration Experience in Photos

Filed Under News, Personal on 2009-01-27, 19:37 | Leave a Comment

I’ve been meaning to sit down and write up a blog post about our Inauguration experience (the good and bad), but I haven’t gotten anywhere close to finishing it. It’s rapidly approaching that point of no return where I know I won’t actually get it done, so I figured I’d post some photos for people that were interested in hearing about it. This is just a sampling of the photos I took. You can see the full sets on Flickr:
20090120-Barack Obama’s Inauguration
Out and About around D.C.
There are also some videos I streamed from D.C. here and some others here.

We woke up at 5am and were on the streets walking to the Capitol by 6am.

All the roads around The Mall were closed to vehicles so people were walking everywhere.

Heather yawns as we wait in line for 4+ hours in the infamous Purple Tunnel of Doom.

Things got pretty crowded.

We could see light at the correct end of the tunnel after about 3 hours. We started the morning in view of the light from the other end of the tunnel.

Last two people to make it through the police barricade as the crowd/mob surged towards the gate. I would have been the last one to quickly squeeze past the cops and barriers, but Heather got pulled through since we had locked arms to avoid being separated in the crowd. A quick (almost scarily unthorough) security pat down and we sprinted to get a view of the swearing in that would happen minutes later.

This is the Purple Gate you may have heard something about in the news.

Seen on the sidewalk. It probably would not have done them any good as thousands of people with tickets didn’t even get in.

We scored a spot right at the fence for the first block of Obama’s motorcade that would later join up with the entire parade. It was a long cold wait, but we got a chance to wave at the new President as he rolled by.

Secret Service is Serious Stuff.

Heather reacts to seeing Obama. She’s such a fan-girl. :)

Tagged: #inaug09, Inauguration, Purple Tunnel of Doom

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Streaming Qik from the Inauguration

Filed Under News, Video on 2009-01-20, 17:03 | 2 Comments

I was surprisingly able to stream a couple of Qik videos while waiting in line for and during the Inauguration of Barack Obama. I’m amazed that the cell networks held up, let alone allowed me to stream video. Here they are:
Walking down the loooong line for the Purple ticket holders:

Still waiting in line:

Catching part of Obama’s speech:

Tagged: #inaug09, Barack Obama, Inauguration, Qik

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Headed to D.C. in the morning

Filed Under Personal on 2009-01-19, 00:28 | Leave a Comment

We’re all packed up with warm clothes, electronics, and whatnot and ready for the shuttle to pick us up at 6:30am to head to the airport and eventually land in Washington D.C. for Obama’s Inauguration. The party has already started with the We Are One concert tonight. We tuned into the rebroadcast from HBO to check it out and were amazed at the size of the crowd, and then even more amazed when we realized the estimated crowd for Tuesday was 3-4 times that size. Heather also pointed out that I am in fact 1-degree away from Obama, as I have met John Legend, and John Legend performed as part of the We Are One thing. That plus a piece of paper with Abraham Lincoln will get me a burrito.

Rubin has been awesome enough to lend me his Canon Digital Rebel XSi for the next few days so I can take actually half-decent photos with something other than my point-and-shoot Canon SD450. Coincidentally this is also the camera I’ve been considering purchasing, so it’ll be nice to give it a test run.

In about 24 hours we should be at Kim’s place and in a day and a half I’ll be turning 29 and we’ll be getting a new president. Can’t wait for the madness that will be the Mall!

Tagged: #inaug09, Inauguration

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