Muni Diaries Live: Hot Night, Hotter Tales
All images by Kevin Wong/Right Angle Images
On Saturday night we packed the Elbo Room to listen to stories about the random, unbelievable, and hilarious things that can happen on public transit. We heard tales about the one ride that made you see life in the city differently (or at least made you never touch the hand bars again). Here’s how it all went down:
Comedian Kate Willett lit up the room with her story about how a passing comment from a stranger on Muni can make you realize that being in love with a girl is totally okay.
Storyteller Jesse James returned to our stage to recount his linguistic roots and how to use it to mock a cookie box.
We couldn’t get enough of behind-the-scenes deets from BART operator Kelly Beardsley. Did you know that some people press the operator button just to chat with him? We would too. Not that we would encourage that or anything …
Science writer Annalee Newitz fulfilled our geek dreams by sharing a story of how Muni is actually on the side of righteousness when an obnoxious driver gets in its way.
As with all of our shows, we invite brave audience members to come on stage and share their own Muni tales. This time, the audience storytellers pitted a poop story against a pee pee story (really, did I just write that sentence?) and Johnny C’s piss-sodden story won him a free dinner at PizzaHacker.
Everyone listened in rapture (and with our jaws on the ground) as TMI Storytelling‘s Gina Gold regaled us with her story of one very very special BART ride. You know it has to be a good one when the story starts with Gina on the floor of a Beale Street penthouse.
We thought that we only imagined a Muni Nirvana when the bus came on time, but San Francisco Chronicle columnist Peter Hartlaub showed us that utopia does exist, and it is on the 77X-Candlestick Park booze cruise, where nobody looks at their smartphones.
If you were at the last show, you know that Jesse James took the Muni Haiku Battle crown from James Nestor. He came back to defend his title for the first time against a formidable foe: BART Diaries maestro Ed Casey. A lot of friendly trash-talking had taken place on Facebook before the show, but it was all up to the audience judges to decide whether Jesse will keep his throne.
The battle was fierce, but Jesse prevailed, taking home the Muni Flava Fav clock that we crafted just that morning.
We are celebrating six years of collecting stories that can only happen in San Francisco from everyday commuters like you and from the amazing storytellers at our shows. Keep the juicy stuff coming! We’ll see you again this fall at the next show.