for 21 July 1999. Updated every WEEKDAY.

Subject: My coolness is
cooler than your coolness!
Fuck you!

Arf arf. Just kidding!

I lived on Rondel Alley (the
nasty pit behind Esta
Noche/Pancho Villa) for M
years, and I have to admit I
was one of the (N-1)wave
hipsters. But luckily for me,
I saved face by moving out
before the Nth-wave of
hipsters moved in, before I
had to make fun of them to
maintain street cred. Whew!
You hit it exactly.

Gentrification does suck, but
"we all" take part in it
willingly, consciously or
not. The cool edge of living
in marginalized areas
(mainstream-culturally-
speaking, the Mission is a
complex soup) is that you're
living on stored coolness and
spending next month's social
rent money, as it were, in
that the cool factor goes
from zero (it really is just
a moderately dangerous
working-class neighborhood)
to some value X (your
coolness goes up, leveraging
off the working-class
UNcoolness) to-X (too many
damned yuppies) as too many
of your cohorts swim
downstream with you. Buy low,
sell high.

I know because I took part in
two other early waves of hip
neighborhoodness and didn't
notice the pattern until into
the third (duh): Boston's Back
Bay ('78 to '82), and SF's
Lower Haight ('83 to '86). I
wasn't cool, just a computer
nerd needing to escape when I
stumbled into obvious
threads.

Now I live in Tucson, as in
Arizona, in a post-gentrified
neighborhood (is this better?
well the bodies are not just
buried — they're turned
to fertilizer). I bought a
house with money I made on an
Internet business we built in
the Mission (our offices were
literally above 16th and
Mission). Whee!

Irony comes out the tap when
you turn the faucet here, but
we just let it run down the
drain these days.

Tom Jennings
<tomj@wps.com>

So much math! No wonder you
made it through the
post-gentrification process
with a house to show for it.

Thanks for telling me all the
cool places you've lived. You
weren't the only one. My
interest in said anecdotes
(n) grows exponentially with
each telling (x) — i.e.,
I enjoyed your letter n to
the xth power.

Stumbling into obvious
threads,

Polly

Subject: Was I an Advance
Guard Yuppie?????

I'm a native "white" San
Franciscan who also hates the
yuppie invasion and who
decided to bail to the
redwoods of Sonoma after
viewing an apartment for rent
in a garage in the Sunset for
US$800 (now cheap) with thin
drywall separating it from
the owner's power tool wood
shop in a crowd of other
desperate people begging to
fill out a credit check. Now
I live in a beautiful cabin
with a detached studio for
$525, but I have to drive (an old
BMW motorcycle) 45 minutes
each way to Santa Rosa to a
really low-paying job ($9
compared to the $15 I was
getting in the city). So
I had to get side job
in a little print shop doing
typesetting on an old Mac for
this old redneck, who is a
really nice boss, who feeds me
Italian food his wife cooks
every evening after she puts
in a full day at her lousy
job (they're nonyuppie seniors).
Her son is a cell-phone
toting yuppie — two SUVs,
$300,000 house in Petaluma,
PowerBook mobile Internet
connect, BMW limousine, pond
in yard.... Anyway, I'm an
anarchist who in the '80s
lived marginally — I pushed
a friend all the way down
Valencia Street in a stolen
shopping cart one drunken
evening. I was stabbed by a
Latino street gang in 1981 in
front of the York Theatre at
3 a.m. on my walk home
from a jazz show at the
Precida Park Cafe. Basically,
I used to stay out all night
and play, drinking and dining
in cheap Cambodian
restaurants in the
Tenderloin. I was an antiwork
situationist drifting on
Lambretta motor scooters all
the way down Third Street to
places never colonized by
advance guard yuppies (except
me?). But I won't move back
to SF until all the yuppies
leave (but can I visit?). I
just bought an iMac —
pretty yuppie!!! I liked your
cartoon very much (emailed to
me by nonyuppie SF friend).

Jim
<SEMAJGIL@aol.com>

You just bought a pretty
yuppie? I thought pretty
yuppies generally got their
money by kissing butt-white
ass at Harry Denton's, not by
selling their bodies to
"native" San Franciscans.

But thanks for the anecdote
about pushing your friend
around in a shopping cart.
Without it, I never would
have known how utterly
cutting edge you once were!

My interest in you (n) grows
with every passing hour (h),
except the hours when I'm
napping (s) or watching
rented movies (r) or eating
glazed doughnuts (d) or
drinking heavily (b)!

Unfortunately for you,
> s + r + d + b. Therefore,
my interest in you isn't
growing at a very rapid rate.

Pilsner, crueller, Ferris
Bueller!

Polly

Polly,

Here in Ann Arbor, Michigan,
the transition is complete.
We have been malled. Our
downtown is the restaurant in
extremis, with coffee shops
and trendy boutiques. Just
wait — someday the market
will actually not go up. Boy,
will they (the yuppies) be in
a pinch then, missing
payments on the Beamer and
having to drink Folgers to
maintain the buzz.

David A. Dorney
<dadroc@csi.com>

Imagine! Ghost towns filled
with empty Pottery Barns and
Gaps and Hold Everythings,
brightly colored tote bags
and cherrywood sock
organizers strewn about like
the empty echoes of an era
long past.

Wait. Can echoes be strewn
about?

Confused dork requiring
Folgers,

Polly

I might have known someone as
bitter as you would find a
way to work self-loathing
into a diatribe about
yuppies. But seriously, I
think you're pretty right
that that's why everyone
(including people like me:
young, upwardly mobile urban
professionals) hates them. I
mean, that's why I hated my
housemate last year. But it's
not that they make me feel
better because they're
shameless; in fact, I kind of
envy that dumb bliss that
comes from believing without
any nagging feeling that Dave
Matthews may just be the
Second Coming. (Said roommate
is out promoting bands that
sound like the Dave Matthews
Band.) I just can't stand it!
Why does he get to be so
happy being in such poor
taste while I just get to be
bitchy and unhappy and
contrary?

Channing Moore
<channing@iabervon.mit.edu>
Cambridge, Massachusetts

Why does everyone think I'm
bitter? Self-loathing is the
ugly aftermath of bitterness —
shouldn't that be crystal clear
by now?

Damn it, would you kids quit
fidgeting and writing notes
and pay attention long enough
to learn something? Sheesh.

I must be a crappy teacher.

Polly

Whatever! I just recently
moved across the river from
Minneapolis to St. Paul
because my girlfriend and I
both made a good chunk of
money from selling our houses.
We had bought them a long time ago
for next to nothing in a blue
collar neighborhood of
Minneapolis. Now every
suburban wannabe urban
hipster is coveting property
in that neighborhood since
the housing market is so
tight and suburban houses are so
expensive. So we bought this
old, really big semirestored
Victorian in St. Paul 'cuz we
have this stupid dream that
we'd like to fix an upper
even better and have a really
nice big house that we can afford.
We moved into this
neighborhood that according
to anyone white was the
ghetto (i.e., black
neighborhood) just 10 or so
years ago. "They" (and who
knows who they really are but
white people with a similar
mind-set and/or more time,
guts, or money than I or
alternatively the knee-jerk,
liberal, city government)
have been redoing this
neighborhood for some time
now, mostly because of all
the historic homes they have
here. We thought, since we
got some money, we could get
into something nice looking
with potential now and stay
for the long haul. And of
course, any lily-white fears
we had, because it is still
quite ethnically diverse
compared to the old 'hood,
were completely unwarranted —
everybody is friendly and
nice (and why wouldn't/shouldn't
they be?). Despite any crap
coming my way for this from you,
we really got it just 'cuz we
like the old architecture and
would like to be a part of
preserving historic houses —
unlike what they do in
Minneapolis where they all
seem to get torn down and
replaced with crap-hole
apartments nobody would want
to live in except the poor,
poor sods who have no choice.
And I'm not complaining nor
do I even like any of my old
friends, but what amazes me
is that all my white
"friends" and "associates"
either make comments about me
taking a risky step and
moving into the "ghetto" or
lambast me for being part
of the evil gentrification
process driving out the poor
blacks and Hispanics (it's
not like I forced anyone to
sell his house to me).
Isn't this a sign that these
whities are more afraid that,
with some good money coming
to them, these blacks are
going to head for the suburbs
to finally get some of that
stale living that for some
god-awful reason they
might want (and I think
this is just a fear — I
mean, who would really wanna
live in suburbia anyway)? I
don't know if you'd label me
a yuppie or an urban hipster —
I've been labeled both —
but I really don't care
to belong to either
demographic. Fuck, I just
wanted a house like that.
Does it always have to be a
race issue? Doesn't being a
good neighbor regardless of
race mean anything anymore?
Guess I'm not sure how my
rant fits your Filler, but as
an urban whitie do I
automatically get stuck as
either a hipster or a yuppie?

Joe B.
<jbreuer@rollerblade.com>

Hey, we all wish we could fix
an upper. Here are some tips
on walking that thin line:

To avoid being a hipster:

1. Dress how you like (but
listen to the woman's
advice). 2. Listen to the
music you like. 3. Say
whatever the fuck you want
whenever you want without
paying heed to annoying,
ultimately aristocratic,
repressed ideas of what is or
is not appropriate, correct,
polite, or whatever the fuck.

To avoid being a yuppie:

1. Don't use hair gel (this
one supercedes No. 1, above).
2. Check often to make sure
you're not becoming a bossy
asshole. Barking loud orders
on how you'd like your bagel
prepared, for example, is a
good sign you're slipping
into busy-guy dickdom
without noticing. 3. Maintain
some modicum of humility,
some sense of scale, some
concern for humanity, and some
suspicion toward
overconsumption, trends, and
$8,000 gas grills. 4. Talk
less, listen more, and never,
ever get one of those fancy
navigation systems for your
car.

The big problem is you'll
still be white no matter what
you do. White people are lame
animals; there's not much to
be done.

White and ashamed,

Polly

Dear Lie creators and women
puppeter's,

The article on how to judge a
man on his cd collection fucking
sucks goat balls you guys or
girls don't have a fucking clue
about what you are talking
about stupid stupid stupid stupid.
I don't know if you have ever
heard of a little thing
called having an open mind
towards music and apreciating
musicianship and talent and
the respect given to an
artist. You people fill these
women's heads with these
fucking stupid THEORY's and
then men sit around wondering
why women are so complicated
when women are not that
complicated they are just
fucking blind sheep following
a hearder who is head to toe
full of shit and leading them
to a cliff of stupidity to
jump off of and get more
stupid THEORY's. You want to
write an article for women
here is one for you "how to
judge a guy for what kind of
person they are" or "shut
your fucking mouth and make
me a stake" or here's the
best one yet you should
really publish this one on
your page or ym or one of
those other lie spewing rag's
"who the fuck said men have
to pay for everything" or
"who said you could spend my
money and I can't spend yours
bitch: After all men and
women are equal right so get
off your fat lazy non cooking
ass and you clean the
gutter's" now that is a story
I can dig.

Sincerely,

A guy who thinks whoever wrote
this article is a fuckin moron or
a BIMBO.

Now, truth be told, we get a
lot of letters that are quite
similar to yours. But few of
those letters not only
completely obliterate the
need for a response, but
pound home the points we'd
like to make with such
accuracy that any response we
did offer would seem
downright redundant. Thank
you for making our job so
much easier!

And, thank you for bringing so
many social problems to light
in one fell swoop!

You do have a calling! Ignore
the obvious signs that
indicate otherwise!

Encouragingly,

Sucksters

Teens in Trouble

i fdont wany any more of your
suck fagit bull shit this
will be the warning you get

todd stockwell
<highondope@webtv.net>

Are you aware that other high
school students are now
routinely incarcerated for
sending messages like this?

Word to the wise.

Filler

I was just in SF a few weeks
ago and picked up a few of
the local weeklies to read
about the "problem" of
yuppies moving into the city
and raising the property
values. My reaction then is
the same as my reaction now:
Huh?

For decades our cities have
been suffering from white
flight and an eroding tax
base. Now the problem seems
to finally be reversing
itself and high-income people
and jobs are moving back to
the cities. Tax revenues are
rising, cities are safer and
more pleasant places to live
than they have been at any
point in our thirtysomething
lifetimes, and some people
see this as a bad thing?

Certain neighborhoods go in
and out of fashion as time
goes by. Where were all these
protestors of yuppie scum
when the real scum were
moving into middle-class
neighborhoods and forcing
decent families to move to
the suburbs? (Answer:
probably not even born yet.)
There will always be
low-rent, low-income
neighborhoods for
working-class people.
Sometimes people have to move
around a bit because their
street becomes too expensive.
Why is this worse than people
having to move because their
street becomes too dangerous?

I guess I have to conclude the
same thing that the SF Bay
Guardian concluded in its
article about the yuppie
protest march hoax: In San
Francisco (and the rest of
the United States), some
people will protest anything.

Jim Kasprzak
<jimcat@panix.com>
Summit, NJ

Good point — although your
"There will always be
low-rent, low-income
neighborhoods" sounds like an
unholy cross between Jesus
Christ Superstar ("There will
be poor always, pathetically
struggling, look at the good
things you've got!") and a
little "Let them eat cake"
conservatism.

It's perhaps more significant
to observe that some people
won't protest anything.

Getting our Bible from Andrew
Lloyd Webber and our big
ideas from reader mail,

Sucksters

The Shit

"Gary's Trajectory," A Wanderer in the Perfect City, Lawrence Weschler, Hungry Mind Press, 1998 The Parallax View, Alan J. Pakula, Paramount Pictures DVD, 1974 Rogues to Riches: The Trouble with Wall Street, Murray Teigh Bloom, Putnam,1971 Actual Air, David Berman, Open City Books, 1999 Tibor Kalman: Perverse Optimist, Peter Hall and Michael Bierut, editors, Princeton Architectural Press, 1998 Canary-wing parrots, Dolores Street, San Francisco Super Shitty to the Max, Hellacopters, Man's Ruin Records, 1998 Request magazine (any issue after June 1999) On the Road to Vietnam, Bob Hope, Cadet 4046 vinyl, 1964 The Flying Ballerina, Drums and Tuba, TEC Tones, 1998 Dino, Nick Tosches, Delta Alpha Publishing, 1999 The Soft Bulletin, The Flaming Lips, WEA/Warner Brothers, 1999 Big Red soda