Hawaii
By Dave Donnelly
Thursday, June 13, 1996
Much to see, do
at S.F. street fair
THE San Francisco weather was once again splendid for the Union Street Fair, an annual event where booths occupy the middle of the street for several blocks and thousands stroll up and down, eyeing and buying edibles, potables and arts & crafts, all the while enjoying the eclectic live music being performed - everything from rock to jazz to synthesizer to steel drums to string quartet. Sitting in my accustomed seat at the Bus Stop, an ancient watering hole at the corner of Union and Laguna, I had a picture-window view which was tops for people (i.e. "girl") watching. Just outside the Bus Stop was a tent where I purchased a T-shirt for colleague Charles Memminger to go with his "I Hate Mayo" World Wide Web page. The shop was called simply "No Mayo," and all it sold were shirts with that emblazoned on them ...
Bob Mulcrevy
THE two-day Union Street Fair, held traditionally on the first weekend in June, was, I believe, the 15th or so I've attended in a row. It go so crowded this year that after jostling from elbow to elbow through the streets and shops, I beat an early retreat and cabbed to Seal Cove to visit Irish barkeep Michael McCourt and cohorts. The place is already becoming legendary, and I did my part to help it along. Former Irish publican Bob Mulcrevy, with whom I houseguested for much of the trip, and I made a memorable entrance on one visit. We hired a pedi-cab driver to bike us into the double door in the back of the eatery and deposit us directly at the bar . Maitre d' Tommy Ryan, another onetime isle resident who worked here at Murphy's, greeted the driver with grim visage: "When's the last time you were in jail?" he asked sternly before he, McCourt and owner Ralph Maher broke up. Ryan had to mop up tire tracks, but the grandiose arrival gave them another story to tell ...
AA and Yeh
ANOTHER Cove arrival which brought a few laughs came when Perry's bartender Mike English, a 15-year Alcoholics Anonymous member, showed up at the door and the first people he spotted were Ryan, McCourt and manager Joe McWilliams, AA members all, and a columnist through whose beard no drink has passed for nearly two years, sitting at the end of the bar. English did a double take and quipped, "Gee, for a moment there I thought I was in Delancy Street." (That's a well known AA spot) ...
Emerald Yeh
ONE evening I enjoyed a Northern Chinese dinner with former isle newscaster Emerald Yeh and her husband at one of their favorite neighborhood eateries. Emerald is now anchoring KRON-TV's mid-day news show and doing consumer reports both on the evening news and in a new S.F. Chronicle column on Sundays. Also joining us on a busman's holiday was Chronicle restaurant critic Michael Bauer, taking a night off, and Sandy Michioku, new head of the Asian-American Journalists Association. I'd given them the lowdown on my serious illness a couple of years back and all professed happiness that I now seemed healthy and had a hearty appetite. Then I opened my fortune cookie. With forboding I read, "Man can cure disease but not fate." Thanks a lot, Cookie Man ...
IN the midst of Italian North Beach, Mulcrevy and I wandered into a fairly new Irish pub, O'Reilly's. "If you can name the seven Irish writers on the wall mural, you're pretty good," Mulcrevy said. I ran down the row from left to right: O'Casey, Yeats, Shaw, Wilde, Beckett, Behan and Joyce. Piece of cake ...
Downtown
GIVING my beleaguered landlord Mulcrevy a break, I sampled a couple of downtown hotels, the Holiday Inn-Union Square and the Mandarin. The former is well-placed next door to Chinatown, and a $1 bus ride away from North Beach or Union Street. The latter has the best view, bar none, in S.F. and Silks, a dining room nonpareil. It's across the street from Tadich Grill and the hot new Aqua, nearby the newer and hotter Hawthorne Lane and a block from Harrington's and a dozen other eateries. Oh yes, Tahoe. That'll have to wait until tomorrow ...
Dave Donnelly has been writing on happenings in Hawaii for the Star-Bulletin since 1968. His columns run Monday through Friday. Contact Dave by e-mail at donnelly@kestrok.com.
Hawaii by Dave Donnelly is a daily feature of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
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