(no subject)

1:30 AM- Powell Street Plaza was full of perhaps 20 cop vehicles; innumerable officers being handed out zipcuffs, as helicopters buzz overhead. (This is all rather surreally scored by the sound of the Charlie Brown Christmas Special theme, floating over via Mukak.) As I am rebuffed by the police from entering PSP, and as I need to deposit a check in my Chase account... Berkeley it is. Coming back along Shattuck, I hear someone cry for help. "I'm coming," I call out, pedaling faster as I brace myself for the sight of a bleeding protester. There was a raw block of Ramen noodles lying on the ground next to her; as I ask her situation (she said she has arthritis in her back; also mentioned cutting herself, and being weak from cold), she apologizes for "that shit I said." "I just got here." "Oh..." She then asks if she can hold my hand until the ambulance arrives; I agree; we chat oddly for a few moments until help (a fire truck, not an ambulance) arrives. Actually a relief to help someone for problems not caused by protesting; a local bookstore I was in had a "protest museum," including a spent tear gas shell and a rubber bullet. These are our times.

(no subject)

1:30 AM- Powell Street Plaza was full of perhaps 20 cop vehicles; innumerable officers being handed out zipcuffs, as helicopters buzz overhead. (This is all rather surreally scored by the sound of the Charlie Brown Christmas Special theme, floating over via Mukak.) As I am rebuffed by the police from entering PSP, and as I need to deposit a check in my Chase account... Berkeley it is. Coming back along Shattuck, I hear someone cry for help. "I'm coming," I call out, pedaling faster as I brace myself for the sight of a bleeding protester. There was a raw block of Ramen noodles lying on the ground next to her; as I ask her situation (she said she has arthritis in her back; also mentioned cutting herself, and being weak from cold), she apologizes for "that shit I said." "I just got here." "Oh..." She then asks if she can hold my hand until the ambulance arrives; I agree; we chat oddly for a few moments until help (a fire truck, not an ambulance) arrives. Actually a relief to help someone for problems not caused by protesting; a local bookstore I was in had a "protest museum," including a spent tear gas shell and a rubber bullet. These are our times.