San Franciscans, as you will come to understand, are an opinionated lot. My friends and colleagues in The City By the Bay cheerfully gave me helpful suggestions for information to be included in the first edition of this book, and they were no doubt either gratified or disappointed upon reading it. (None said they were disappointed. I didn’t ask.) Nonetheless, I truly did appreciate their comments, their willingness to try new restaurants and to drive around the far reaches of the city with me, and to participate with me in my musings about what makes San Francisco tick. In these regards, I was especially appreciative of Fred Allardyce, Eleanor Burke, Helen Cohn, Jean Coyner, Robert Domush, Jaem Heath-O’Ryan, Allan Jacobs, the late Edith Jenkins, Faye Jones, James Keough, Sarah Keough, Andy Leakakos, Peter Linenthal, Ann Magennis, Ronda Nasuti, Les Plack, Candida Quinn, Ken Rosselot, Newby Schweitzer, Linda Sparrowe, Patricia Unterman, Al Williams, and John Zaugg. And for this current edition, I am grateful to the San Francisco Convention and Visitors Center, whose materials were timely and helpful. Marsha Felton, Diane Johnson and John Murray, Mary Duncan, Jim Iwersen, and Joy Eckel also made the task easier, so I thank them, as well.
With so much varied and detailed information, all guide books, no matter how current, suffer from suddenly outdated information or an error or two. So, regardless of all our efforts, there may be a mistake here and there concerning a business that has suddenly disappeared or a neighborhood that has changed perhaps almost overnight. If there are any such errors, they are, of course, mine alone. Some things are sure, however. There is an old joke among chauvinistic San Franciscans, that “one of these days there will be a big earthquake here, and the rest of the country will fall into the sea.” But as of the book’s publication, at least, the city was intact: the “big one” had not hit and San Francisco and the rest of the continent were still firmly attached. So, if other things have changed, as of course they must, or if something more expensive has replaced what once was, take it in stride. Just enjoy San Francisco for what it is—on that particular day. The next day it might be something different, after all.