MW Mobile Blog

For friends, family and the random search engine visitor. This blog started as an experiment in mobile blogging from my Palm TREO 600, 700, Prē, HTC Evo, Samsung 5, Pixel 3, Pixel 6 Pro. Now it serves as a simple repository of favorite activities. Expect bad golf, good fishing, great sailing, eating, drinking, adventure travel, occasional politics and anything else I find interesting along the way including, but not limited to, any of the labels listed here...

Saturday, September 30, 2017

San Francisco Mayor's Cup Charity Golf Tournament

   Representing the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance at the Mayor's Tourney 
 I was pleased to participate the San Francisco Mayor's Cup Charity Golf Tournament at TPC Harding Park.

Mayor Ed Lee welcomes sponsors at breakfast
This annual event, created and promoted by Mayor Ed Lee, supports a variety of great charities and causes including The First Tee of San Francisco, The Asian Law Caucus, and San Francisco Mayor's Women's Golf Council.


Lisa Villasenor and I represented the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance as a sponsor of the event.

 

The tournament is 4 person team scramble. Lisa and I were teamed with Mike and Jay of CourseCo and Boundary Oaks.


It was a fun day, helped by shots of Patron provided by an unnamed female member of our foursome. As far as the golf is concerned, our group made judicious use of paid mulligans and "magic putts" to post a a respectable 62. I think we finished 3rd in the "Co-Ed" flight.  Some pics from a fun day:

Lisa  stripes one off the tee
Found a fellow Cubs fan. We shared a celebratory shot for the World Champs
Jay's approach shot while Lisa looks on
I believe Mike's approach was inside Jay's
Mayor Lee presents the trophies:

The winning Co-Ed team. I'm not saying they had a ringer, but that's

Winning teams shot 54. 
A beautiful day ending with a spectacular sunset over a great course


Thursday, September 28, 2017

SFMOMA - Edvard Munch


I've always liked Edvard Munch's work, and didn't want to miss the well reviewed touring exhibition at SFMOMA. The exhibit is best viewed with Sigrid - my personal art guide and consultant - who arranged timed tickets for our ongoing 25th anniversary season celebration.  As part of that continuing celebration, we arrived early to explore the expanded & renovated SFMOMA facility...


... and enjoy a tasty if overpriced lunch in the sculpture garden

Cheese, pate', prosciutto with Rose'
Thai coconut curry chicken and noodles w a Norwegian Stout
The Munch exhibit is fascinating and well curated, offering a perspective on the life that shaped his art and the contemporary artistic influences he both absorbed and influenced himself.


I won't attempt to review the exhibit as that is simply beyond my ken. Instead I'll include a few of the images that caught my eye (non-flash photography is permitted) and refer the reader to ...

 

SF Mike on the Civic Center Blog:
"A major Edward Munch painting exhibit, on loan from his namesake museum in Oslo, has just opened at SFMOMA and it's well worth visiting. Even though there doesn't seem to be a single happy person on display in any of the 47 paintings, the effect is not depressing, possibly because the colors throughout are so gorgeously vibrant, including the 1907 The Death of Marat ... 

Directly before his eight-month, 1908 hospitalization for anxiety, binge drinking, and brawling, he painted a number of commercially successful variations on The Sick Child, dying of tuberculosis. "As part of his recovery, Dr. Jacobson advised Munch to only socialize with good friends and avoid drinking in public." Munch followed Jacobsen's advice and though plagued with illness all his life, he managed to survive to age 81, dying in Nazi-occupied Norway in 1944. He also continued painting to the end and it's all great."
 

Charles Desmarius of the SF Chronicle:
"Munch’s significance lies neither in his oversensitive soul nor his painterly inventiveness, but in his unique ability to combine the two. He returned again and again to the same themes, and often to the same image. One could argue that makes him a formal experimenter — testing and revising art for art’s sake — or that his romantic heart could not bear to leave behind loves and moments that might die without continual regeneration. He did not have to choose...

There are ghostly pictures like a “Self-Portrait with the Spanish Flu” (1919), ominously psychosexual ones like his hovering presence in “The Artist and His Model” (1919-20), and a cartoonish throwaway that could be a magazine liquor ad, “Self-Portrait With Bottles” (circa 1938)."
Munch was an artist both a product of and ahead of his time. Perhaps the work that best exemplified this was his startling and prescient work entitled (as I recall) "Clinton Trump Second Debate":



Go see it. You've got another week. 

Monday, September 25, 2017

25th Anniversary Season Begins


It's a big one - 25 years - our Silver Anniversary.  Balloons, flowers, cards, gifts, and splurging on a nice dinner are in order for this celebration. I actually count our time together from 10 years earlier, when we decided to move from Kansas City to San Francisco. But I digress.

The official anniversary of our wedding was 25 years ago on September 25, 1992. We had just recently moved into our new condo on Green Street, and renovation work was continuing on our wedding day:


Found this picture of me with my dad, brother and the workmen putting the finishing touches on the wall covering in the same spot as the picture on the top of this post, shortly before heading to the wedding venue.


We've had a lot of anniversary toasts since, some in more exotic locations than others....


This year, we celebrated at Restaurant Gary Danko, one of the finest eateries in The City, and one we have managed to miss before tonight.


We'll be back...


Martini, lobster appetizer, a fine wine...


... seared foie gras (yes - available again while the batshit insane California ban is appealed yet again).  I had the bison, Sigrid had the lamb, we enjoyed a selection of celebratory sweets, and went home with morning breakfast cakes.


Suffice it to say we pretty much floated out of the place on a gastronomic cloud. 


It was a great way to celebrate 25 (35?) years of our life, love, and adventures together...

25th Anniversary present.
... not to mention visiting 45 countries together.

Looking forward to another 25 (35?) more years, and another 45 countries or so.

Saturday, September 9, 2017

Hurricanes and Sailboats - There and Back Again


I can't take my eyes off the devastation wrought by hurricanes Harvey and Irma in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico last week. Hoping for the best for friends and relations in Texas, across Florida, and the Virgin Islands - both now and in the coming days.


I guess it's simple human nature that the images that come out of these catastrophic events hit harder when it's a place you've been, recognize, enjoyed, and impacts people you care about.


UPDATE 9/11: While there is extensive damage across Florida, it is clear that civic preparation, media warnings, and a shifting/weakening Irma track kept the damage from being as bad as was feared. However, while Florida somewhat dodged a bullet, people should recognize that the British Virgin Islands took the brunt of Irma at it's peak strength. There were deaths, massive destruction, and a breakdown of society. From the Daily Mail:
"Escaped prisoners and hundreds of looters armed with guns and knives terrorise hurricane-hit islands as police from Britain and France are flown in to restore order.
Several people who were stranded on the island said looters had begun raiding hotel rooms and homes to profit from the natural disaster. Jos Smart, 26, and his girlfriend Julia Taylor, 30, reported being too afraid to leave their 'half-destroyed' hotel amid reports of looting and violence outside. Describing the apocalyptic scenes in St Maarten Jos Smart's father Ian said: 'They have not had any water for a day. 'They said the sounds were apocalyptic and they have likened it to a war zone. They are holed up in a half-demolished bathroom and their phone is running out of battery. There have been rats in their room looking for food. He added: 'At night time there were people knocking on their door, and so there are 12 hours of sheer blackness to get through with the terror of who is going to knock down the door."


In 2013 I had the opportunity to crew for Captain Jim on the Morpheus for a transatlantic passage from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean. It was a great "bucket-list" experience. The journey started in Sint Maarten - a Caribbean Island split between the French and Dutch. After outfitting Morpheus for the journey, we spent an afternoon at the famous Sunset Bar and beach abutting the SXM airport runway. Here a picture of the bar and beach from the jet as I landed, and a picture and video of what it looks like after Irma:

Then and Now


In November, I'll have an opportunity to again sail with the Morpheus as she makes her way back over the pond and home. Planning has begun, but as is often the case, nature has the final word. Saba Rock in the British Virgin Isles was our planned destination. This is what it looked like when the planning began:


This is what it looks like now:


Another considered destination is the Bitter End Yacht Club:


I know some of this discussion of yacht marinas and luxury resorts comes across as "First World Problems", but these islands depend on tourism for their financial livelihood. Lisa Minot, Travel Editor for the Sun, hits the nail on the head:

The only way to truly recover from Hurricane Irma is if tourists return to the devastated islands
"For the British Virgin Islands, St Martin, Anguilla and Barbuda, tourism is the lifeblood of their economies. Thousands rely on holidaymakers for their jobs and livelihoods. 
The graphic images of destruction are already having an effect. British Virgin Island local Emma Paull says: “We need the tourists to come back. Yes, we have been hit hard but we can get better. People are already emailing to cancel holidays booked for next year. 
“But we need the income to recover. Trees grow back, boats can be replaced, bars and restaurants won’t take long to repair. From the ashes, roses grow.” 
Thankfully, British holidaymakers have always been a hardy bunch. And returning to help support these idyllic islands is the only way we can truly help them."
Probably the best thing we can do (After contributing to Texas, Virgin Islands & Florida relief funds) is to continue to plan to patronage the area in the hope they can repair it between now and then. I've no doubt that they have the strength, spirit and will, but with the scale of devastation wrought by this hurricane, I'm just not sure there will be enough workers to get it done before complete our passage in December.

To Be Determined.

Anyone with the wherewithal should do what they can to help the people impacted by these catastrophic storms.