Mission Mission

Our new favorite thing to do at Bender’s: Examine the dozens of funny confiscated (or donated or maybe discarded?) IDs encased in three custom-made tabletops across from the food counter. Some are funny because the pictures are funny. Some are funny because the names are funny. Some are funny because the quality of the forgery is funny. At the very least, you’re sure to at least find one that looks like someone you know.

Our new second favorite thing to do at Bender’s: Eat burgers at the bar’s free Sunday afternoon backyard barbecue.

Previously on Mission Mission:

You Heard it Here First (and then the Chronicle caught on): Bender’s Bar Great for Low-Key Nights Out

Bars of the Mission: Bender’s Bar

Photographer Deb Zeller, who books shows at the Make-Out Room and runs Playing in Fog, just published these photos of some cute puppies she met in Guatemala. Aww! A bunch more here.

Previously on Mission Mission:

Funny Photo of Puppy All Tarted Up for Carnaval

Puppy Pals Reunite at 16th and Mission (Video)

Tonight from 6-9pm, Little Tree Gallery is serving free Trumer Pils, in conjunction with some art or something. Further details via funcheapSF here.

Photo by tom ferris.

This here is an outtake from Be Afraid: San Francisco’s Parking Stencils of Doom, a photo essay by Telstar Logistics‘ Todd Lappin set in the Mission District. In it, you get to see one of DPT’s stencil technicians in action!

Photo by Telstar Logistics

Asked where to get good Chinese in the Mission, Drew answered:

For good Chinese takeout I go to Hung Yuen on 22nd between Bartlett and Valencia. Their trilingual (Chinese-English-Spanish) menu is very amusing, and the food is quite good. You can even watch Hung Granny making the pot stickers by hand.

Link. I’d like to meet this Hung Granny. I think I’ll go right now.

I love the gypsy jazz band, Gaucho. I also love Django Reinhardt. This week I have been commuting to Rohnert Park for a three week summer intensive. Hasn’t been fun. But this morning, I decided to listen to a compilation of Django’s while I daydreamed about the business that I’m planning on opening in the Mission District. And then I remembered how much I love Gaucho, but how I haven’t had time to see their free weekly show at Amnesia. I used to go every week and drink Death & Taxes, and talk about Albert Camus, like I was in a Woody Allen movie. I think I’ll go right now, now that I’m unemployed and broke.

In May, we broke the story of Dolores Burrito, a Mission-style burrito place in Berlin. Our friend Anna was very excietd to hear the news (“OMG!!!!! oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!!!! how excietd am i???? sooooo excited!!”). She finally went:

Well, it was obviously not going to be like a tacotruck burrito … but, they had Anchor Steam!! (if there’s that then maybe there’s sierra somewhere in berlin, too, and then allan would have won yet another bet). Anyway, it was kind of complicated to order – six different steps, but you could get everything from guac to sour cream. Don’t know why they don’t just have a super-burrito option. They have 5 differnt types of spicyness and the most spicy was spicy (rare for German!). The types of meat you can get are not really authentic but everything tasted good. And it’s a little pricey for Berlin. But overall it’s a really cool place to hang out when you get a certain kind of craving and it does fill you up like a taco-truck burrito.

I can’t wait to try this place out! Note: Malcolm M. swears you can’t get Sierra Nevada in Berlin because of German beer purity law, but Allan suspects otherwise, because how can they not have Sierra Nevada?! It’s fucking good!

So if anyone knows of a place where they do…

Previously on Mission Mission:

How to Eat a Mission-Style Burrito

Chopped, Screwed Mariah Carey Video Features El Farolito Chile Relleno Burrito

I don’t know, man. And that website they mention is kind of boring. Zzzzzz.

Photo by hailtothethief21. [via Mr. Saucy explains it all]

Previously on Mission Mission:

Live From New York: Wheatpaste Hillary in an Obama ’08 Hat

The Water Front screens tonight at the Roxie as part of Laborfest‘s International Working Class Film & Video Festival. Some publicist was supposed to drop off a screener, but they didn’t, so here’s the boilerplate:

This powerful film by Liz Miller tells the story of the destruction of Highland Park, Michigan, the birthplace of mass production and good paying union jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers. The destruction of this industrial powerhouse leads to corporate schemes to save the city by privatizing the water system. Homeowners start receiving bills for thousands of dollars and face the shutoff of this basic necessity. Some bills reach $10,000. The film follows Vallory Johnson who turns her anger into organizing a grass roots campaign for affordable water as a basic human right.

The literal criminal destruction of tens of thousands of homes in the Detroit area is a stain on the history of the United States. Obviously there is no oil in Detroit, just human beings.

Link to official site. [via funcheapSF]

Mission Mission pal Michelle D. recently (kind of) went to a concert at Million Fishes Arts Collective:

[I]t has the most intimate, living room feel that i’ve experience in a venue, granted i didn’t stay for the music. i was almost intimidated to go inside, because it felt like i was intruding on a private party, with a smallish crowd murmuring conversations that got absorbed into the couches and the living room aura. perhaps that’s also part of the reason i didn’t stay — i felt like once the music started, it might feel too intimate a setting to be able to relax in anonymity and leave when i so pleased without turning heads.

For the record, Michelle was trying to see Ash Reiter, but Ash had already left the stage by the time she arrived. Anyway, is she right? Is Million Fishes the homiest place to see live music here in our humble purlieu?

Photo courtesy of Million Fishes.