Among the reasons we don't live in Berkeley

Last night, Phil and I got around to the topic of French restaurants in the Bay Area. We had a moment of silence for departed favorite Creme de la Creme in Oakland's Rockridge area, then briefly discussed the notion of venturing to Berkeley for a French restaurant there. Then we mulled the inevitable parking issue, weighed the probability that any experience would be similar to our last three Berkeley eating experiences -- average food with a gourmet ghetto-justified price tag -- and decided that we'd take our chances at Oakland's Soizic Bistro or give Hayward's A Street Cafe another try.

Although I do like the north Berkeley/Solano Ave district, I must admit that the rest of Berkeley is largely hit-or-miss for me. It's not because of some car-first philosophy -- I can BART into Berkeley --  and it's not because I'm philosophically opposed to charming architecture and eclectic retail mixes and a university wreathed in old oak trees. I just get tired of the people. Berkeley is best for people who are not opposed to judging and being judged in a public sphere. Do you like it when people interject themselves into your conversation after eavesdropping, and tell you what you should do and why? Then you will love Berkeley.

Today's "At Berkeley Bowl, the Nuts Are Off the Shelf" (LAT) illustrates one of the factors underlying my ambivalence about Berkeley, viz this anecdote:

Michael Pollan, author of the best-selling book "The Omnivore's Dilemma," is a Bowl regular who calls the store one of his top three places to buy food in the world. Still, he knows there's easier shopping.

One time, Pollan was picking out a box of cereal for his daughter when a fellow shopper interrupted him. "He said, 'I'm watching Michael Pollan shop for groceries,' " Pollan recalled. "There was this note of disappointment that I was buying Fruity Pebbles. Berkeley is full of hall monitors. It's a small town, and people are looking into each other's baskets."

For others' takes on Berkeley and the Bowl, read the comments that accompanied the reporter's update that he's been banned from the Berkeley Bowl for life.

Comments

[Polly]

GOD, that article reminds of me when I lived in the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Grocery shopping on the weekends was a NIGHTMARE of Malthusian proportions. The combination of crowding and rich-people entitlement resulted in utterly appalling behavior--people "sampling" food (yes, that IS stealing, assholes, or do you expect me to eat the other half of the muffin you just tore to pieces with your flithy bare hands?), threatening staff with violence, having tantrums, etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.!

I was SOOOO much happier after I moved to Queens. Say what you will about the working class, but they don't act like everyone else on Earth was put here to wipe their arses.

[Shotrock]

In a perfect world, we could put all the right-wing Christian fundamentalists from Colorado Springs and all the left-wing nutjobs from Berkeley into a rocket and ship them all to another planet, where they could be one big intolerant, holier-than-thou, judgmental society together.

And the Berkeley eejits would last 5 minutes in Jersey before getting the crap beaten out of them.

[Julie]

When my sister lived in Berkeley, she saw people berate total strangers for not breastfeeding (one woman shouted back that her baby was *adopted*, hello) and once even saw someone give a mother flack for contributing to world overpopulation because she had more than 2 kids. Obnoxious.