Today I need to share with you the two best bits from the Mexico gigs, both on the second night, Sept 13.
ITEM ONE: Here is a video of Noel directing the crowd to do the poznan, which is the Manchester City football club's special celebration dance. Liam's been having the crowd do it the whole tour, but this time he talked Noel into doing the explanation for the first time.
So much to observe here: - Liam: "I've seen you do it," probably referring to this memorable occasion when Noel definitely did not do it.
- Noel greeting them in Spanish.
- Noel: "Not asking you to do the okey-cokey." 😅
- Noel explaining the correct process very clearly and efficiently, which is not something one would ever say about Liam's approach.
- But best of all: Noel saying "The big man doesn't ask for much," and then pausing to laugh at the utter and profound absurdity of this remark.
ITEM TWO And here is Noel miming that Liam should throw his sombrero to the crowd (having already thrown his maracas and tambourine), and Liam handing it to him so HE can throw it. This is also the first time Noel's thrown anything on the tour AFAIK.
They're just having so much fun together and being so charming about it. Incredible. Not in our WILDEST DREAMS did any of us in the fandom dream anything like this was possible.
After suffering a 29-point loss in Game 1 of the best-of-three first-round WNBA series, Golden State had the top-seeded Minnesota Lynx on the ropes in Game 2.
The Valkyries held a double-digit lead going into the final 10 minutes before a charged-up crowd at SAP Center in San Jose.
But in the end, it just wasn’t meant to be for the expansion team.
Minnesota completed a furious fourth-quarter comeback to defeat the Valkyries 75-74 and advance to the second round.
Cecilia Zandalasini’s fadeaway jumper at the buzzer to win the game and send the series back to Minnesota bounced off the rim.
Monique Billings came off the bench and scored 15 points to lead the Valkyries. Zandalasini and Janelle Salaün each had 14 points. Veronica Burton had 13 points, nine assists and six rebounds.
Starting center Temi Fágbénlé was a late scratch with right-knee pain.
Napheesa Collier had 24 points and seven rebounds to lead Minnesota. The Lynx will play the winner of the Phoenix Mercury-New York Liberty series.
“The first thing I said was ‘get your (expletive) heads up,'” Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase said. “I just told them how proud I was to have that place rocking tonight. To have that Ballhalla mentality, to be able to go toe and toe with the No. 1 team, I was so proud.”
Golden State was ahead for a majority of the game and led by 14 points going into the fourth quarter.
But like a movie on replay, the Lynx star power proved, once again, to be too much for the Valkyries.
The Lynx opened the final period with a quick 11-0 run that forced Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase to call a timeout three minutes into the period.
Golden State quickly responded with a shot clock-beating stepback jumper from Zandalasini and a transition 3 from Kaila Charles to rebuild the advantage to eight.
But it was all downhill from there.
Minnesota’s steady offensive attack flourished as it played through Collier. Forwards Bridget Carleton and Kayla McBride each scored timely buckets as the Valkyries defense couldn’t stop Minnesota’s paint penetration.
McBride gave the Lynx the lead with 2:48 left on a bank shot floater from the left slot. Later, point guard Courtney Williams hit a pull-up jumper that pushed their lead to three with under 30 seconds remaining.
After a Billings basket and a stop, the Valkyries got one last chance to win the game but Zandalasini’s shot fell just short.
Minnesota outscored the Valkyries 15-6 from that point to seal the win. Entering Wednesday’s game, the Lynx 0-76 when trailing by at least 14 points entering the 4th quarter since the four-quarter era began in 2006.
As they did in Game 1, the Valkyries got off to a hot start.
Golden State hit five of its first six 3-pointers to take an eight-point lead into the second quarter. Kate Martin came off the bench with just under a minute left and scored a cutting layup and a rainbow 3 from the corner to give the home team an immediate boost.
The Valkyries carried their momentum into the second quarter. Despite a slow start, they grew their lead to as big as 13 behind an inspired quarter from Billings.
The former UCLA standout scored four points and was instrumental in keeping Collier to just 10 first-half points.
Golden State hit 7-of-11 3-pointers in the first half. Every player who entered the game before halftime except for Carla Leite recorded a basket to help the Valkyries take a 41-28 lead at the midway point.
Minnesota cut the Valkyries’ lead to as little as eight in the third quarter, but Golden State kept its foot on the gas to maintain a double-digit lead going into the fourth quarter.
BENICIA — A water line was damaged Wednesday in Benicia, leading the city to call for an immediate reduction in water use.
The city issued a “stage 4 critical water shortage alert,” which requires a 40% cutback in water use citywide. It applies to all residents, schools, businesses, community organizations and other facilities.
Residents can conserve water by running dishwashers and washing machines only with full loads, limiting showers to no more than five minutes, and stopping all non-essential water use. No car washing or pool filling is permitted under the alert.
The incident happened near Goodyear Road and Morrow Lane, and is unrelated to a similar incident in 2023 near Interstate 680 and Gold Hill Road, the city said in a news release.
Public works crews are assessing the damage and working with contractors to make repairs.
The city, meanwhile, will rely on its secondary water source, Lake Herman. Water from the lake “may occasionally have a natural, earthy taste or odor due to organic compounds,” but it is safe to drink and “meets all state and federal water quality standards,” the city said.
I took last Saturday and Sunday off to attend a model horse show with Alex. There haven't been many shows this year; he attended BreyerMidwest in the spring, but I wasn't able to take that weekend off, and the host who usually holds the majority of the semi-local shows has been taking a year off from it to do other things.
This one was held by a regular shower in the local community, and it was nice to have a show to attend!
It definitely made for a long day: we got up around 5:00 to get the car loaded, and then take Bella over to my mom's house for the day. We managed to get on the road by 6:30 or so (just slightly later than hoped, but did include getting coffee). After a couple hours' drive through mostly rural areas, we made it, just a bit after the 8:00 setup start.
The show itself was fun, but long, and a liiiiittle frustratingly disorganized. (The host kept changing things in the weeks leading up to the show, and continued changing things day-of.) Still, running a show includes SO many moving parts, and so much to keep track of, it's just a whole lot to do, so I appreciate anyone willing to do it!
Alex did pretty well - 21 NAN cards (the cards awarded to the top two places in each class of a NAN-qualifying show; serves as a "ticket" for that model to be entered into a relatively prestigious annual show) and 28 "Western Conference" cards (which appear to be an attempted regional "competitor" to NAN, which I have never heard of, despite it apparently having been a thing for 10 years... these "tickets" are awarded up to third place.)
Alex's biggest win was:
This is a custom that he did a few years ago. :) It was first in the custom Morgan class, and then went on to win the sectional champion for custom light breeds! (Got a ribbon and the 3-D printed dog. The show holder is very into German Shepherds, ha.)
This custom does extremely well for him, and deservedly so! The finishwork (done in pastels rather than paint) is extremely well done. (It's that much more exciting that it does so well, since he was the artist.) He never seems to believe that it does deserve it, though!
By the end, we were just extremely tired. The biggest divisions took a long time to get through, and we didn't end up finishing the last of it until 9:00... and then had to deal with the drive back.
I felt really bad making my mom stay up that late to wait for us to come get Bella. We made decent time on the way back (via a different route), and managed to get there just after 10:30 to pick her up, so not really much later than mom and Taylor would have been staying up anyway.
Mom said that Bella was very good. (She still hasn't really met Jaspurr; he came downstairs once, and as soon as Bella hopped off the loveseat to approach him, he bolted back upstairs and didn't come back down.)
Their excitement for the day was mom taking Bella on a neighborhood walk and finding...
A huge snake shed! Broom for scale, lol.
There is a huge bull snake somewhere in the neighborhood! :D
1. I got my covid and flu shots today. Since I didn't have any meetings or other time-sensitive things this morning at work, I just stopped in the same medical offices where I'd made my appointment for next week and asked if they were doing walk-ins, too, and they were. Had to wait about ten minutes or so, but otherwise it was over pretty quickly. Carla hasn't been able to get hers yet because she's sick. D: (First test said not covid, but she's going to keep testing throughout the duration to make sure. So far I am not showing any signs of catching it, but we'll see. It is hard to avoid each other in our smallish house, though at least since it's summer all the windows and doors are open and the fans going all the time, so there's a lot of air circulation.)
2. Molly just loves this scratcher/ball toy. Sometimes for the scratcher, once in a while for the ball, but mostly just to lie on. It's apparently very comfy.
Silvio Roberto Belini Jr., 47, of Brentwood, was taken into custody at an undisclosed address in Brentwood, according to Antioch police Lt. Bill Whitaker. Detectives also served a search warrant and collected evidence related to the shooting.
Whitaker did not release any additional information about the case, which he said remains under investigation.
The shooting was reported around 1:30 p.m. on Sept. 5 in the 3500 block of Lone Tree Way. Officers arrived to find a 44-year-old woman suffering from apparent gunshot wounds.
The woman was taken to an area hospital. She was expected to survive, according to police.
Anyone with information related to the case can contact Detective Arturo Becerra at 925-779-6937.
Displaced from Chase Center after the arena was double-booked for the Valkyries’ first-ever home playoff game, Golden State instead commuted down the Peninsula to the South Bay, attempting to export the Ballhalla mystique to SAP Center.
For the fans who made the trip, things felt pretty similar. But not quite the same.
Either way, they weren’t going to miss the chance to be a part of a historic occasion.
Golden State Valkyries fan Angelica Villanueva, cheers along with fellow fans as they dance during a block party outside the SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., before Game 2 of the WNBA playoff game against the Minnesota Lynx on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)
“I’m a season-ticket member, and I wasn’t going to miss our last game of the first round,” said Marci Glass, who lives in San Francisco. “We had our one playoff game here, I was absolutely going to come down for it.”
The Valkyries threw a block party on Barack Obama Blvd. and brought plentiful black and violet decorations down to San Jose in an attempt to create Ballhalla South. The vibe wasn’t identical to what a fan would find in San Francisco, but it was pretty close.
Other things were definitely a bit different.
“It’s definitely less wind,” said Dani Jimenez, also a season-ticket holder. “But I love this block party. It’s amazing. I definitely came out early for it. I love all the booths, the setup, DJ’s spinnin’. This is great. It’s really cool.”
Golden State Valkyries fans Gioia Garner, left, Deani Jimenez, right, have a good time as they head to the SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., for Game 2 of the WNBA playoff game against the Minnesota Lynx on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)
The new location provided an opportunity for South Bay fans to experience the Valkyries in their own backyard for the first time, evoking memories of when the San Jose Lasers sometimes called SAP Center home from 1996-98.
But this was a different level, an elevated environment befitting the first-ever WNBA playoff game in the Bay Area.
“I live in this area, and she invited me to join her,” said Jane Krejci, Glass’ aunt, who lives in Monte Sereno and tagged along to her first Valkyries game. “It’s a great game and lots of enthusiasm and support for these young women who are just excelling. It’s thrilling. As an old woman, that’s great to see.”
Not everything was perfect. Though SAP Center’s capacity is very similar to Chase Center, seats had to be assigned in different locations.
Valkyries' Monique Billings (25) warms up before playing against the Minnesota Lynx during Game 2 of the WNBA playoffs at SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. (Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group)
“My seats are pretty close to where they would be in Chase,” Glass said. “I’m about eight rows behind the visitors bench in Chase, and that’s true here too. Some of my friends who have season tickets, their ticket people are all spread out in various places. I think it was a bit of a mess, honestly, trying to get it adjusted. But mine are pretty good.”
Different didn’t always mean worse. Some seats had better sightlines at SAP.
“We’re actually usually right behind the hoop, so we’re just a little bit off (this time),” Jimenez said. “So it’s actually a little bit of an improvement. I’m excited.”
The main theme was making the best of an imperfect situation, which the Valkyries have excelled at on the court this year. Despite losing All-Star Kayla Thornton to a season-ending injury and having a number of other players miss significant time, Golden State rallied to become the first expansion team to make the playoffs.
Valkyries' Veronica Burton (22) walks onto the court during warmups before playing against the Minnesota Lynx during Game 2 of the WNBA playoffs at SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. (Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group)
When the front office had to pivot to San Jose, they were thrust into a similar scenario. The ultimate result seemed to pass the fans’ test.
“Throwing this block party, having the seats – they worked with us,” Jimenez said. “I saw that there was a group where they were doing a bus ride down. I know that was organized separately. And I know that my partner worked with her rep to figure out things.
“I love a good party. That’s definitely a perk. It’s a good time, so I’m happy.”
Golden State Valkyries fan Angelica Villanueva, along with fellow fans, dances during a block party outside the SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., before Game 2 of the WNBA playoff game against the Minnesota Lynx on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)
Defendants charged in the felony vandalism case stemming from a June 2024 pro-Palestinian protest at Stanford University pleaded not guilty Wednesday to all charges at the Santa Clara County Superior Court in Palo Alto.
The 12 defendants — mostly current and former Stanford students and alumni — were arraigned last May and are accused of causing between $360,000 and $1 million in damage during a takeover of university administrative offices, a figure student activists have called an “exaggeration.”
On the same day of the protest, some of Stanford’s historic sandstone buildings were defaced with profanity-laced graffiti, and a pro-Palestine student encampment was forcibly dismantled following the takeover.
For nearly two hours before Wednesday’s hearing, Judge Thomas Kuhnle, the district attorneys and defense lawyers were absent from the courtroom.
When they returned, Kuhnle denied a motion to reduce the charges from felonies to misdemeanors without discussion, and no plea agreement was reached. A preliminary hearing is now set for Sept. 29 to determine if there’s enough evidence to go to trial, which means the activists could face felony convictions.
The charges are linked to when the students barricaded themselves inside university offices during a campus protest demanding that Stanford divest from companies linked to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. The protest was part of a nationwide wave of campus movements in 2024 calling for divestment from Israel-linked companies.
The courtroom Wednesday was filled with supporters, though the atmosphere was subdued compared to earlier hearings.
An increased number of sheriff’s deputies were on hand at the courthouse Wednesday, and the public was repeatedly reminded of a standing order banning demonstrations, broadcasting, and photography on court property, including the parking lot.
During the May arraignment, supporters rallied in the courthouse parking lot and were threatened with arrest. On Wednesday, supporters wearing keffiyahs left quietly without incident.
Stanford’s handling of pro-Palestinian activism has drawn sharp criticism from both pro-Palestine advocates and groups alleging antisemitism. Following the hearing, Stanford Students for Justice in Palestine renewed calls for District Attorney Jeff Rosen to drop the felony charges.
“Students are on the right side of history in standing against genocide and injustice,” the group said in a statement. “While DA Rosen risks placing himself on the wrong side of history by pursuing unjust charges that waste judicial resources.”
Rosen has defended his decision to pursue felony charges, saying in April: “Dissent is American. Vandalism is criminal. Speech is protected by the First Amendment. Vandalism is prosecuted under the penal code.”
Earlier this year, the DA declined to charge Dilan Gohill, a student journalist arrested while covering the protest.
The latest development in the court proceedings over the Stanford protest comes as universities across the country face mounting scrutiny over their response to pro-Palestinian activism.
In a separate lawsuit, Stanford’s student newspaper and two non-citizen students, independent of the university, filed a federal lawsuit in August in San Jose against Trump administration officials, challenging provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act that they say were used to suppress political speech critical of Israel.
In the course of dealing with silly body stuff with which I will not bore you, my sleep cycle got turned upside down again, so I am busy with various attempts at precessing back to a more manageable situation.
Somewhere in some book or other, a character said something about the phrase for having a hangover in a certain language was "my eyes are not opposite the holes." It's not a hangover, but when my sleep schedule is deeply out of synch and I'm trying to do stuff connected to the outside world's schedule, I kind of feel like my life is not opposite the holes.
How's your life matching your hours of access lately?
So a little while back, for. my birthday I got various tasty things to nibble. One of them was salmon skin and salted egg crisps, with curry leaves in the mix, and some spice. Extremely tasty. When I got down to the bottom of the bag, there were a lot of little shards and crumbs that were particularly spicy. A mental note was. made for possible future uses.
Today was a future use. There wasn't a fresh vegetable in the house, but I wanted something with both softness and crunch, and wanted it to be in something that had umami plus. The last of the bread gave me toast. There was some braunsweiger (liver paste, Nueske's in particular) which went onto the toast, cut pretty thinly. (I am from people who like thick slices of braunsweiger on toast or bread, and normally I do too, but this was a special application, part flavor and part structural adhesive.) Then I spooned out some of the fragments from the bottom of the bag of salted egg and salmon skin crisps, laying them on top of the liver paste and pressing them in with the back of the spoon, and had it open-faced.
Big win. Big tasty win. Especially the way the curry leaves went with the braunsweiger.
Must remember this and make it again.
Part of the idea for this one was looking at the braunsweiger and wishing I could magically make a banh mi from the place in Global Market appear. So some of the taste combo came from that. Lettuce or bok choy or other green or variously colored thinly sliced vegetables, with vinegar or not, would have been great, but there was no such suppy in the house, alas. Although hey, there is a little new kraut in the back of the fridge which should get eaten up. Hmmm. Although we are out of bread now. Hmm. I wonder how it would be on top of ramen noodles. Pity that the boiled eggs are all et up.
Do you have any tasty kludged-together food that you are fond of? What gave you the idea?
(My term for kludged-together food is "cream of refrigerator soup," which explains the tag. No actual soup was generated in this particular instance.)
Good (insert your local time of day)! Hope all is doing well!
How has writing gone today?
Do you have a piece of fiction you've written 10+ years ago that you want to revisit? It doesn't necessarily need to be in the sense of wanting to rewrite it or write a sequel.
What I’ve Read My Happy Marriage Vol 1 & 2 – Akumi Agitogi A manga in a slightly fantastical Taisho-era Japan setting. Our beautiful humble kind and gentle main character has been send to the garden by her family to eat worms -aka, she’s been displaced from her place of comfort to the role of a servant by an evil step mother and half sister. She is relieved to discover that the arranged marriage she was set to is, in fact, perfectly arranged-- the self-contained and stoic male lead is actually soft and squishy, adores her, and wants to take care of her. It’s very much an id-fic style indulgence, and I enjoyed it a good deal. It was a bit slow. I started it because I found the anime and was a bit curious, but on review, I think the anime might be a better go.
Harriet Tubman: Live in Concert – Bob the Drag Queen – I really enjoyed this book and it was also a very strange book. It’s technically a fantasy, in that it involves an impossible conceit: Harriet Tubman (among other historical notables) returning to the modern world, and in Miss Tubman’s case, wanting to engage with the modern Black American through music and performance. But, it’s literally just a conceit – the main appeal of this book is a personal exploration of the Underground Railroad’s most famous members, in their own voices. The characters are personal and the meaning of freedom is both pragmatic and spiritual. They are all conversations with a modern viewpoint character, who is not actually Bob the Drag Queen. He’s a gay Black music producer who had some rough patches in his journey, but achieved enough success that Harriet Tubman asked to work with him.
I’m charmed by the book – it’s history as personal story, and I enjoyed the main character’s emotional roller coaster of awe, humiliation, and self respect. The book does not shy away from difficult self reflection, and I think the audiobook was pretty fantastic.
Unnatural Death by Dorothy Sayers – A Lord Peter Wimsey mystery from 1927 - Sayers is great, the characters are well sketched out, the mystery is plausibly tricky! I think the main heroine of the book is the newly introduced Miss Climpson – she channels her natural nosiness for justice and seems to have a wonderful time doing it. (There’s a wonderful passage where Lord Wimsey laments that the England’s greatest investigative resource - nosy older women - is being squandered and divided amongst the populace. He’d have a crack set of smart women ferreting out murderers as a public service, if he could just persuade the police to hire them!)
I’ve read Sayers out of order, so I do miss Harriet Vane, even if she wasn’t written into the book yet. I did find that this book, like Strong Poison and Have His Carcase, focus a good deal on the cleverness of the means of murder, and how medical knowledge shapes the understanding of the crime. However, I know about hemophilia and I about air bubbles in injections killing people, so I feel a bit cheated when the first thing I think of is meant to be a big revelation. However, these stories are so fun to read, and Sayers is so generous with the intelligence and dedication of her side characters, that I don’t mind going for the ride even if the destination is no surprise.
This one had a some real marks of 1927 on it, tho. Sayers has a certain respect for the cleverness of her murderers that makes you almost root for them, but this one leans hard into the stereotype of “doing gender wrong makes you dangerous.” The murderer, a tall commanding and “mannish” nurse who uses her medical knowledge to kill and her strong personality to isolate other victims by manipulation, reads as lesbian. (Hard to tell how much is deliberate with these things – patterns of thought reveal bigotry you didn’t know you harbored.) The point is driven home when she isolates a younger woman to be her particular friend, to move out to a remote farm and do all her housekeeping, and to eschew the company of any other person, but particularly men. It’s obviously a bad relationship whether they are lovers or not, but it’s structured so all the evils of it are attached to the characters’ deviation from their gender’s expected role in society. To a reader unfamiliar with gay tropes of the era, it might fly under the radar; but I’m not and it hit and I feel a bit queasy about that section of the book. Caveat lector.
My friend has a term called “the shot dog factor” – whatever you post on the internet, there’s always a chance that someone will come into your comments acting like you shot their dog. The risk is never zero. But you can shave off the worst likelihood with placating asides about what you really actually mean. Sayers, writing for herself, in a different century, has no fear of her dog getting shot. Sometimes I think that’s all the difference.
What I’m Reading Whose Body -Dorothy Sayers – I appear to be in a mood. This is the first one and hinges on joint mysteries of a body found in bathtub and the disappearance of an upper crust Jewish financier. Since it’s also from the 1920s, it’s got some… choice language about Jewish people, tho the characters are all generally about as non-antisemetic as one could hope from upper crust English people in the 1920s.
Worn – Sofi Thanhauser. I feel bad, because I held out such hope for this audiobook, but the narrator is mournful throughout. Lots of the work of modern fabric creation is, in fact, worth of mourning – we depend on the exploiting the labor of underpaid people across the globe who deserve fair compensation; fabric creation depletes natural resources at a devastating clip – HOWEVER, not all of it needs to be talked about in sepulchral tones! I’ve heard Gregorian chant that was less of a downer. Slow going.
Lent by Jo Walton – continues beautifully and complexly and sadly. The book club enjoyed the first half and the Big Twist in the middle.
What I’ll Read Next The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin for book club Witness for the Dead by Katherine Addison Monsters and Mainframes? I feel due for a Pratchett.
Willow: I'm just saying you might wanna rethink the stereotype before someone turns *you* into a toad. And while you're at it, why don't you try removing that broomstick from your-- Dawn!
Dawn: Hey. Don't stop the invective on account of me.
Cupertino has become the latest Bay Area city to ban RVs and oversized vehicles from parking overnight on city streets — a new ordinance that many believe will help alleviate nuisance areas while others have expressed concern about those displaced.
Despite arguments by some councilmembers that the city had not conducted enough outreach to alert those who will be displaced by the new restrictions, many thought the ban was long overdue.
“We’re having a challenge which every city is having,” said Councilmember Ray Wang in an interview, asserting that Cupertino has seen an influx in RVs as nearby cities have enacted restrictions on parking for RVs and oversized vehicles. “If you’re the last city with (a ban), you’re the one left holding the bag.”
Currently, the city has a 72-hour limit for vehicles parking on public streets, though vehicles were only required to move six inches to avoid a violation, said Cupertino Mayor Liang Chao in an email. “This is a loophole in the current law that we must fix.”
Even though municipal law already restricts sleeping in vehicles, according to Cupertino Interim City Attorney Floy Andrews, some RV residents had parked on streets permanently, clustering in two locations in the city, triggering residents to voice concerns about safety and congestion.
“The issue with the current ordinance is that it allows the vehicles to park substantially and indefinitely day and night,” said Andrews at a September 3 meeting. “This creates a nuisance. It impacts residents and businesses. It fails to prevent … individuals from living in vehicles.”
After months of deliberation, the City Council settled on prohibiting oversized vehicles – such as RVs and campers – from parking on public streets citywide from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. Cupertino households are allowed 20 free permits annually, which would be obtained online and allow permit holders to park a vehicle on city streets for 72 hours.
Additionally, the policy would ban “vanlording” — renting out vehicles like RVs and vans for human habitation.
The new Cupertino ordinance bans all overnight parking for oversized vehicles without a permit, and does not designate any areas in the city that are exempt from the ban. While the city has a safe parking program for cars, there is not a similar program for RVs and oversized vehicles.
Although some residents and councilmembers who spoke at the council meetings said that RV restrictions in other cities had pushed people into Cupertino, others expressed concern that some of those living in RVs might be people working and attending schools in Cupertino. Chao noted that given the high cost of housing in Cupertino, some who work in the city might choose to live in RVs.
Councilmember J. R. Fruen acknowledged while some living in RVs might not be in dire need, many are likely members of the Cupertino community “down on their luck,” and might be families whose children attend school in the city.
“It’s very clear that we haven’t done the outreach on this situation to ensure we’re not constructing a Cupertino of cruelty and to ensure … that the streets will be cleaner and safer for all concerned,” said Fruen in an interview. “I think the public has the right to its right-of-way, but we also have to ensure that the people that are most vulnerable there aren’t swept away.”
At an earlier City Council hearing on the issue, Fruen asked that along with the ban, the city create a plan of outreach to those living in the RVs to connect people there with services.
The ban passed unanimously Tuesday and will go into effect in a month. City staff expect the policy to cost $51,000 in the first year due to expenses associated with the online permitting system and new street signs communicating the ban — a process that may take months to roll out.
After a year, the City Council will return to the ordinance to assess its impact. “Any policy is an evolving process,” said Chao in an email. “The council has adopted a version that we think make most sense at this time and we will review its effectiveness and its impact after one year.”
OAKLAND — The city plans to name a street after a family-run construction company that has remained open for three decades in an otherwise neglected East Oakland commercial corridor along Hegenberger Road.
The business’ headquarters on Collins Drive is in the same neighborhood where Len and Lance Turner spent their childhoods riding dirt bikes and hanging out in the 1960s, when the Oakland Coliseum was built and opened.
That small side street will soon be renamed Turner Group Drive in honor of their contributions — a legislation approved this week by the Oakland City Council.
Beyond overcoming the odds of sustaining a construction firm in an industry dominated by major corporations, the Turner brothers are also notable for being two of the rare defendants to beat federal conspiracy charges in a 2017 criminal trial.
Federal prosecutors had accused the brothers, along with a then-Oakland councilman’s son, of a bid-rigging scheme to skim nearly $2 million from the U.S. Department of Energy involving a Lawrence Livermore Lab renovation contract.
The public corruption investigation in the East Bay spun out of a wide-ranging probe in San Francisco that targeted Keith Jackson, a former city school board member, and ultimately brought down state Sen. Leland Yee and Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, one of the Bay Area’s most notorious organized crime leaders.
The Turner brothers spent years rehabilitating Turner Group Construction’s reputation after jurors acquitted Lance Turner and failed to convict Len. Now, their family’s name will live on in East Oakland, with a commemorative renaming appearing next to the Collins Drive sign.
On Monday, the council unanimously approved the legislation, first proposed by Councilmember Ken Houston, a childhood friend of the Turners who was mentored by the late patriarch Ben Turner after Houston lost his own father as a child.
“They built their business on Collins Drive and stood tall when other businesses left,” Houston said in an interview. “It’s just a beautiful thing.”
A sign for Too $hort Way is seen along Foothill Boulevard and High Street in Oakland. Too $hort Way was officially dedicated in honor of the Oakland rapper Too $hort, born Todd Anthony Shaw, on Saturday. (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group)
The Turners, who in the aftermath of their federal trial shifted their business to training smaller sub-contractors, have been hailed around East Oakland as a local success story.
At times, the practice of renaming public infrastructure has raised eyebrows among ethics experts, especially when elected leaders commemorate family members or people they’ve done business with. Last year, then-Councilmember Treva Reid led an effort to rename the city-owned East Oakland Sports Center after her father, retired Councilman Larry Reid.
Houston, elected last November to the seat long held by the Reids, previously worked for the Turner Construction Group. While in an interview this week he insisted he was only an “independent contractor,” a resume he submitted for a city commission appointment said he was a “principal/employee specializing in residential, commercial properties, private and public” from 2006 to 2012.
Reached this week, Len Turner, a company executive, was overjoyed at the street renaming — bursting with memories of his childhood in East Oakland, where he grew up with five siblings and a Marine veteran father, Ben, who worked as a mechanic on Volkswagen vehicles.
Len ended up pursuing engineering, first making petrochemical valves and then picking up a knack for computers, which led him to a gig in Southern California as a designer for Disney.
He returned to Oakland in 2005, where his brothers were busy running Top Notch Builders, the family business founded 11 years earlier. Back then, it mostly subcontracting for a national corporation.
With Len’s help, Turner Group Construction built strong relationships around Oakland, including with Larry Reid, and grew into one of the Bay Area’s most successful Black-owned construction businesses, with government contracts in Antioch, Richmond, Oakland and Alameda County.
Then the feds came knocking. As Len tells the story, it was Reid’s son, Taj Reid, who first reached out to him about an out-of-state contractor, William Joseph, who was trying to break into the East Bay market.
The contact was actually undercover federal agent William Myles, a Connecticut man who made $9,000 a month working as what Len Turner’s defense lawyer described as “the utility infielder of the FBI’s national sting program.”
Federal prosecutors, relying mostly on Myles’ word, would later allege that the Turners agreed to submit a fake bid so that Myles could acquire an overbid contract worth $2 million and split the proceedings with his cohorts.
After officials from the U.S. Department of Energy paid them a visit with ominous questions, Len and Lance were soon hit with indictments in the sprawling case. It came as a shock to Len, who said he had never met Chow, the infamous San Francisco Chinatown gangster.
“It was horrible,” Len Turner said of the ordeal. “You almost think you’re guilty, too, because why else would the federal government come after you? But you need to fight through it. We had great representation, and the government had no case.”
Taj Reid leaves the Philip Burton Federal Courthouse in San Francisco, Calif., on Tuesday, April 18, 2017. Reid, the son of Oakland councilman Larry Reid, is believed to be part of a bribery and bid-rigging scheme according to federal prosecutors. (Dan Honda/Bay Area News Group)
The brothers’ attorneys argued in court that Turner Group Construction fully expected to beat out Myles’ cheaper bid, viewing him as an inept and unqualified contractor. Taj Reid, for his part, pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge involving the Turner contract bid after an earlier conviction for conspiring with a state official to accept bribes.
Still, jurors acquitted Lance Turner and could not reach a verdict for Len. Last year, prosecutors dismissed charges against Len Turner through a “non-prosecutorial agreement” that was never publicly detailed, records show.
Houston, meanwhile, said he attended every court hearing date back in 2017. Years later, he is convinced the brothers were framed. It is very difficult to beat a federal criminal case; Pew research showed that fewer than 1% of defendants were acquitted in 2022.
“It wasn’t real,” Houston said. “It’s not in Len’s character, not in his fabric.”
Despite the community’s support, the Turners found themselves needing to evolve past the construction industry in the wake of those federal charges. They developed the Construction Resource Center, a program based in Richmond that trains small businesses on the messy world of government contracts.
LaSonia Mansfield, who sought guidance for her construction-site-cleanup business, had not known she would need a contractor’s license to operate — before the program taught her the “A to Z” of lasting in a crowded market. She likened the Turners’ guidance to that of a family, including another company executive, Len and Lance’s sister, LaTanya Hawkins.
“The bigger firms swallow us whole with the knowledge and back-office support they have,” said Carl Gordon, who runs Gordon Plastering in town. “With the Turners, I knew their help was coming from a genuine place.”
It is the least that Len Turner feels he can do, having stared down a high-stakes trial that changed his life forever.
“People always tell me, ‘You won, you won,'” he said. “Really, technically, I didn’t win — I just survived.”
Oakland city council member district seven Ken Houston speaks during the 2025 Inauguration Ceremony held at Oakland City Hall in Oakland, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 6, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
This is your check-in post for today. The poll will be open from midnight Universal or Zulu Time (8pm Eastern Time) on Wednesday, September 17, to midnight on Thursday, September 18. (8pm Eastern Time).
Currently working my way through an excellent book on Jūnshì lúnlǐ wénhuà 军事伦理文化 (The culture of military ethics) and started noticing that the author ping-pongs between Zhōngguó 中国 and wǒguó 我国 when discussing various aspects of the PRC's history and alleged achievements. Are you aware of any general guidance regarding how the decision is made to use one term or the other? Topical? Polical? Tone? I'll keep digging and let you know if anything jumps out at me.
BTW, one UVA colleague described how he had to teach first year PRC students that "my country" was not an acceptable synonym for China when writing literature essays.
I have to agree with Mark's UVA colleague that, in most cases, "wǒguó" 我国 (lit., "my/our country") should not be translated into English as "my country", although it is common for most bilingual speakers of Chinese to do so. On the other hand, Zhōngguó 中国 (lit., "central country"), should be translated into English as "China", and vice versa.
This is an issue that has bothered me for decades. Just when do Chinese choose one of these expressions over the other?
My intuition is that they tend to use wǒguó 我国 more when they want to be sentimental and patriotic, whereas Zhōngguó 中国 seems to be more straightforward, neutral, and political.
I asked my colleague, Jing Hu, a lecturer on Chinese at Penn, her opinion:
What do you think?
Would you ever use wǒguó 我国? If so, when / why?
I don't think that the distribution between Zhōngguó 中国 and wǒguó 我国 is purely random. Do you?
jing responded:
I’d never use wǒguó 我国 because I’ve been living in the U.S. for the last 22 years and now I am a U.S. citizen. And when I was a student in China, I didn’t have the “right context" to say that as a news reporter, or spokesperson, or researcher/analyzer, etc. You are right, Zhōngguó 中国 is straightforward and neutral and can be used by anyone — Chinese or non-Chinese. While wǒguó 我国 can only be used by Chinese who normally represent the Chinese government or officials… and normally in professional contexts such as government and news reports, business documents, something self-referential and from the perspective of China, such as "wǒguó rénkǒu zhèngcè 我国人口政策 ("China's population policy")… "wǒguó jīngjì fāzhǎn 我国经济发展" ("China's economic development")… "2024 nián wǒguó shēngchǎnle 3 qiān wàn liàng qìchē 2024 年 我国生产了3千万辆汽车 ("In 2024, China produced 30 million cars")… "wǒguó réngōng zhìnéng fāzhǎn hěn kuài 我国人工智能发展很快" ("China's artificial intelligence is developing rapidly")….
No, the distribution between 中国 and 我国 is not purely random.
SAN JOSE — The Olivera family has officially ended seven decades of ownership of an egg ranch in San Jose by selling the property for several million dollars to a housing developer that plans to put a residential project on the property.
A family partnership sold the Olivera Egg Ranch property for $12 million, according to documents filed on Sept. 16 with the Santa Clara County Recorder’s Office.
Chickens eat feed at Olivera Egg Ranch at 3315 Sierra Road in San Jose, February 2025. (Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group)
Robson Homes bought the 2.7-acre site at 3315 Sierra Road in the Berryessa district of east San Jose, county records show. Robson purchased the property through an all-cash deal.
The homebuilder has been interested in the property for years. In 2021, Robson Homes struck a deal with the Olivera family to buy the ranch, county records show.
Ed Olivera Jr. and his wife, Anna Olivera, in their live bird barn at Olivera Egg Ranch at 3315 Sierra Road in San Jose, February 2025. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group)
Edward Olivera Jr., the principal trustee of the family trust that sold the ranch site, said he became concerned in recent years about the increasingly volatile nature of the egg business.
The 2020 coronavirus outbreak, government-ordered shutdowns, egg surpluses, and the H5N1 bird flu virus variant, which were capped by soaring egg prices in 2024 due to inflation, underscored the uncertainties in the egg business in Olivera Jr.’s view.
The economic whipsaws were a big factor in ultimately deciding to complete the sale to Robson Homes.
“I was getting kind of concerned,” Olivera Jr. said in an interview with this news organization. “What if something happens to me? No one has the knowledge of the business. I had it all. Still have it all. My family would be left literally holding the bag.”
A 25-unit housing development is expected to be built on the egg ranch site, according to San Jose city planning documents.
The great majority of the units would be two-story homes. A few units would be 2.5 stories, planning files show.
“The size of the units would range between 2,100 square feet and 3,335 square feet,” according to a February 2025 initial study of the project’s environmental impact.
Up to five of the 25 residences would include an accessory dwelling unit, according to the project proposal. The ADUs would be about 444 square feet in size.
The timeline for the project’s development and completion wasn’t immediately known.
The egg ranch closed in March.
“It’s tough leaving the business,” Olivera Jr. said. “I’m leaving the memories. It’s all tied in with my parents.”
SAN JOSE — South Bay officials are launching a pilot program that provides technology for small businesses to connect their security cameras directly to the police department so that crimes can be monitored in real time in a move aimed at mitigating retail theft, they said at a news conference Wednesday.
The announcement from the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office and the San Jose Police Department comes nearly two weeks after a smash-and-grab robbery at Kim Hung Jewelry store on Aborn Road in east San Jose drew international attention. Video of the Sept. 5 robbery shows a car crashing into the storefront before more than a dozen masked figures enter and begin breaking the glass jewelry cases; one of the robbers violently shoves the elderly owner of the store to the ground.
Relatives of the store owner said he suffered a stroke after the robbery.
The new anti-theft program is funded by a $100,000 grant provided by the District Attorney’s Office and will allow about 200 businesses to be equipped with the new technology, Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen announced.
“Organized retail theft gangs are terrorizing our community, and they’re not just destroying store fronts and stealing jewelry,” Rosen said at the press conference. “They’re destroying dreams, stealing livelihoods and making it difficult for mom-and-pop store owners to put food on the table for themselves and their children.”
The grant will allow the small businesses to connect security cameras they already have installed to SJPD’s real time intelligence center, which will then allow police to respond to incidents more quickly, Rosen said. The cameras will also allow officers to disseminate descriptions of suspects and their vehicles to responding officers, according to a news release.
“This is a game changer,” said San Jose police Chief Paul Joseph.
SJPD’s real-time intelligence center was launched four months ago and is currently connected to more than 20,000 public safety cameras around the city, Joseph said.
The district attorney’s office is contributing another $50,000 to install concrete planters in front of small businesses who do not have security cameras or whose police departments do not have an existing network connection, Rosen said. The planters will help block cars from driving through the front.
The $150,000 funding the program came from a consumer protection lawsuit against Google, according to a news release.
“This community — our community — watched in fear as a senior was assaulted,” said San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan. “We’re taking action to assure our community that they are not alone, and we are empowering them to help prevent these cases and ensure faster and more effective investigations.”
Joseph added that SJPD is working diligently to bring the people suspected of robbing Kim Hung Jewelry to justice. No arrests have been made yet, he added.
“We will not rest until we find them, but we’re here to do even more … help protect this business and other small businesses from future victimization,” Joseph said.
Rosen added that he has “full confidence that the San Jose Police Department is working day and night to find these individuals.”
“When they’re found and the charges are filed by my office, we will prosecute them quite vigorously and send them to prison for a long time so that they never do this again, and so that everybody understands (that if) you commit a crime like this, we’re going to catch you, and then we’re going to send you to prison. Period,” Rosen said.
San Jose City Councilmember Bien Doan, who recently reached out to the family of the jewelry store’s owner, said that the owner is “doing okay at this point.” Santa Clara County Supervisor Otto Lee said that the robbery caused more than $100,000 of loss for the jewelry store, not including medical bills or compensation for emotional suffering.
“Our work together is dedicated to protecting you from harm and ensuring that we feel safe within this community,” Lee said. “We are proud to say that Santa Clara County is a safe community, but it only takes one crime, one incident for us to feel very shaken in our confidence.”
Santa Clara County Supervisor Betty Duong added that the surrounding neighborhood is where immigrants have rebuilt their lives.
“I don’t just get to represent this incredible district. This is home, and these are my neighbors, and these are families we care deeply about, who have invested their dreams, their life savings, everything they’ve got, all their energy, all their endurance, into building a better community for all of us,” she said. “Public safety is the number one priority for all of us, and for me, it’s deeply personal.”
Retail theft has been a hot-button issue in California, with voters passing Proposition 36 in last year’s election to increase penalties for certain theft and drug-related crimes.
The DA’s Office and SJPD have also each created specialized units to track retail theft arrests and prosecutions, Rosen added, touting recent efforts that lead to the arrest of a group of serial thieves who had targeted Home Depot stores and others who stole Infiniti cars and drove them into storefronts.
“Bad actors who want to harm our city are always getting better at what they do, so our police department must do the same. We need to innovate faster than those who would do harm,” Mahan said. “This partnership is the future. It’s the way that we as one networked community prevent crime and catch criminals faster and hold them accountable.”
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Houston, elected last November to the seat long held by the Reids, previously worked for the Turner Construction Group. While in an interview this week he insisted he was only an “independent contractor,” a resume he submitted for a city commission appointment said he was a “principal/employee specializing in residential, commercial properties, private and public” from 2006 to 2012.
