Build Date: Wed Sep 11 09:00:09 2024 UTC
Berkeley is a place where you can be branded a "fascist" for supporting the "wrong" kind of rent control.
-- X
The Night I Met the President
2006-12-27 14:10:12
It was late at night on September 4, 1975 and my mom woke me up. "We're going to go see the President" she said.
We drove a few miles out to McClellan Air Force Base. I think it was after midnight when we got there. My mom flashed her military ID and we drove onto the base and out to the flight line. Some MP's waved us out onto the tarmac. There was a velvet rope line stretched between short poles that a crowd of about a hundred people stood behind, five deep. I wiggled my way through the crowd towards the rope but couldn't quite get to the front.
Air Force One landed and a walkway rolled out to the plane. The door opened, and down the steps walked President Gerald R. Ford and Governor Jerry Brown. President Ford looked a bit tired but Governor Brown had a bounce in his step as they worked the rope line.
As they reached my position I could see them both very clearly but my way was blocked by two blonde women who looked like fashion models. President Ford was almost past when I heard my mom yell from behind "How about a handshake for this little guy?" and she pushed me forward. Ford looked down and reached through the crowd to shake my hand. "Hi Red!" he said with a warm smile and suddenly he didn't look tired at all. Then he was off again.
Governor Brown shook my hand, smiled, and mussed my hair. Then the two of them got into a waiting limousine with some other people and sped away to the Governor's mansion.
That was the night I got to meet the President.
Rest in peace President Ford. Rest in peace.
T O P S T O R I E S
Another Nobel Prize-Winning Author Describes Drunkenness
This book won a Pulitzer Prize. Here's its famous paragraph on getting drunk... (More...)
'Why I'm pretty sure JD Vance had sex with a couch'
True or false? The answers await us in that magical land where all truths are revealed -- the internet. (More...)
In 2010 Dr. Cheng-Huai Ruan discovered a way to cause a patient with an abnormal heartbeat to get back into a normal rhythm by sticking a finger up the patient's ass. (More...)
WKRP in Cincinnati aired from 1978 through 1982. Howard Hesseman played Dr. Johnny Fever, a DJ from Los Angeles who was fired from his previous job for saying the word "booger" on the air. In the show Hesseman would do some dialogue, introduce a song, and start the song. You'd hear a few notes, but never the whole song. (More...)
SF Hippies Can't Get Their Act Together
The annual 420 Hippie Hill event in Golden Gate Park, where large crowds of hippies, wannabe hippies, and hippie poseurs drape themselves in tie dye t-shirts and gather on a hill on 4/20 to smoke weed, was cancelled this year because the organizers couldn't get their act together. (More...)
Mozart to be inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame
Joining such hard-rocking inductees as Abba, Chet Atkins, Nat King Cole, and Neil Diamond, the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame is proud to induct Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. (More...)
C L A S S I C P I G D O G
Yet another delicious SPOCKTAIL from the SMRL Beverage Science Labs! Check under the cap for your chance to win thousands of fabulous prizes! (More...)
When you've been up all night sampling other Spocktails and guzzling absinthe, you need a morning pick-me-up with some KICK. Time for a tall glass of Blurry Sharp Meltdown! (More...)
This week: another fine spocktail from the beverage researchers at SMRL! Drink it in peace, because WE DID THE RESEARCH! (More...)
The Deep Dark Underbelly of the Star Wars Myth, or Ramayana Remembered
It's a fact: Star Wars is a blatant plagiarism of an ancient Asian legend, and the long lines of devout Star Wars freaks are really unscrupulous Asian copyright busters. From Indonesia to Thailand to Nepal, videos are available for sale or rent before they're even released in the US and UK due to this nerdy camcorder-clutching bunch. (More...)
One of our star reporters was sent to Comdex by his employer. El Destino reports live from the biggest, geekiest trade show in the world. (More...)
Songs Of Love And Special Things
Well, dear reader, there's no denying it: Spring has sprung. The air is pungent with the fertile aroma of Romance. And you know what goes with Romance, don't you? That's right, Lover, porn. And not just any porn, but the kind you can sing along to. (More...)
