I rolled into San Francisco mid-morning and didn’t have to be at work till noon, so I took the BART rather than a cab. I hadn’t done the SFO train for a while and it’s pretty efficient these days, I recommend it. Anyhow, it was a good thing I did, because I emerged from the subway to the sound of drums and the prancing of majorettes, in fact some extremely major majorettes if you know what I mean, today was the big Gay Pride weekend. My pictures didn’t come out that well, so here are some mental snapshots: the drum majorettes, all pizazz and rhythm, I think they were really girls too but well anyhow; this dude with a Ford Pinto entirely covered in spangles (windows too, driver too); and the gaggle of gay cops, some of them were ultra-tuff-looking but my fave was the chubby lady motorcycle cop grinning ear to ear on her huge gleaming hawg. It was a real treat for me because I was standing behind these two big loud-voiced guys that cheered wildly at every float and marching band, and gaily heckled the cops; not the marching-in-the-parade cops, the keeping-order-by-the-curb cops: “You go, girl! Shake that bootehhhhhhhh”. They even cheered the unglamorous police commissioner waving determinedly in her dowdy convertible. By coincidence, on the way down to San Fran I read God and Country, an excellent New Yorker piece that, while also about America, is definitely covering a different tribe than the one turning out for the parade. It’s hard to believe these tribes share the same country. Anyhow, we had fun at NetBeans Day, but I think they had more over at the parade.
