Hot time in the old town

Yegads this is a good time to get out. Or come out. Whatever. The City is as hot as a June bride in a featherbed. The Bike to Work day on Thursday was just the start of a big weekend, all to be whitecapped, so to speak, by the annual Bay to Breakers race-parade thing, this year under the motto of "Show Me Yours." It's kitschy, yeah, but it's our kind of kitsch, and if the weather holds, maybe there won't be so much fog at the finish in Golden Gate Park.

Speaking of bikes, the Spandex crowd may want a heads up for the 2nd Annual Bicycle Film Festival in San Rafael on Sunday, sponsored by Access4Bikes and the Bicycle Trails Council of Marin. ... In the meanwhile, I'm heading over to MOMA for the Friedlander "Fragments of Americana" show, which closes its astonishing run on Sunday.  ...  The Dresdon Dolls and the Dirty Dozen Brigade appear at the Fillmore Sunday night, and that would make a nice capper to a day that begins with the B2B. Word is that East Bay Ray of the Dead Kennedys, Zoe Keating of Rasputina and violinist Meredith Yaynos are going to join Amanda Palmer and Brian Viglione, along with the usual gang of local artists.

On Thursday morning, while happily dodging two-wheelers at the U.N. Plaza at Civic Center, we dropped into the vastly underrated Farmers Market for stuff to make a late breakfast. What a town. ... There was noon ballroom dancing in Union Square, too. Wannabe-smoothies got the basics of Swing, Merengue and Salsa, East Coast and West Coast Hustle, Swing, Waltz and the ever-popular Cha-Cha, all under the auspisces of the SF Symphony and in anticipation of the May 31 Black & White Ball. What a town, redux.

Hey what's up with the late afternoon vibe around here, anyway? So the temps get above 75 and everyone turns into a New Yorker? Big backup on Market last week on account of a car accident, and you'd have thought it was the Triborough Bridge out there, what with all the honking and frayed nerves.

"Figaro" at the Berkeley Rep's Roda Theatre is getting rave reviews from People Who Should Know. The same people say "'Tis a Pity She's a Whore" at Berkeley's Subterranean Theatre is a little sketchy, but you get what you pay for. The big, bad, voodoo daddy of the play is coming to ACT later, so's you know ... Over at the Oakland Museum of California, "Birth of the Cool" was to open this weekend, alongside the very neat exhibit, "California Art, Design, and Culture At Midcentury." That's a mouthful, but it's also an eyeful.
Topics: Bay To Breakers , Oakland Museum of California , ACT , SF Symphony