AIDS Walk San Francisco starts up again!

Starts again! 

Please help me raise funds for AIDS Walk San Francisco! This will be the year to break all of previous years of fundraising. This year's goal is a memorable one, $2,025!

https://sf.aidswalk.net/edgar

Sunday, July 20th 
San Francisco, Golden Gate Park 

Who Benefits

Supporting Many Voices: Co-Beneficiary Teams Program 

AIDS Walk San Francisco recognizes that no one organization can meet all the needs of people living with HIV/AIDS. That is why the event emphasizes not one voice, but many voices; not just services in one city; but rather the Bay Area wide effort to bring this epidemic to an end. 

Through the Co-Beneficiary Teams Program, AIDS Walk San Francisco makes available the highly successful infrastructure used by its Teams Department to organize corporate and community involvement in the event. These organizations participate as fundraising teams in AIDS Walk San Francisco at no cost to themselves, and they keep a majority of the funds they raise. 

In 2024, through all of the hard work of Walkers like you, 100% of money raised by each of the Co-Beneficiary teams was able to be awarded back. We also were proud to give additional grants to each team as well. We hope, with the dedication and support from all of our participants, we are able to achieve the same success this year.

San Francisco Pride Parade Does Not Disappoint

 After two years of minimal and cautious participation in pride parade, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, this year's parade was close to full revival. Known as a world famous parade which is held every year in June in San Francisco,  this year was a welcome return to celebrating pride for the LGBTQ+ community. And what a great parade march along Market Street it was!

Marching with the UCSF contingent

Thousands of spectators attended as well as hundreds marched in celebration. As a march participant for my employer, we were at least 200+ strong. It was a bit overwhelming with the crowds cheering all marchers on. Once we march around the corner to head along Market Street, I got comfortable holding our employer banner, UCSF with Pride! It's my second year marching and it felt so gratifying and liberating!

This march was especially important as our transgender community has been under so much attack, it was definitely a reminder we need to be heard and be seen. We can't take anything for granted. We cannot go back in the closet, we've come too far to be put in our place. UCSF t-shirts printed, "PRIDE IS PROTEST". I think many spectators got the message as the cheers were loud and encouraging! I'm proud to be part of this event as we need to all be one when it comes to challenges to our community. All we want is to be accepted and be visible to the community and the world in general. 

Let's hope next year will be a bigger and more positive pride march,  I think it will be! 

https://sfpride.org/

10,000 people participate in AIDS Walk SF - 2018

Since 1987, ABC7 News has been a proud sponsor of the AIDS Walk.  Members of the ABC7 News team joined 10,000 walkers, special guests and our own Dan Ashley's band participated -- hoping to raise $1.8 million for the cause. - http://abc7news.com/3769280/

Billie Jean King in town for LGBTQ advocacy benefit ~ April 12, 2018

Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights in San Francisco, is looking forward to talking with tennis legend and gay rights activist Billie Jean King.

“I am beyond excited. For the first time in 57 years, I will be able to meet her face-to-face, and I’m sure I’ll gush appropriately like a schoolgirl,” says Kendell, who’s appearing in “Serving Up the Ace,” a benefit for NCLR, a legal LGBTQ advocacy organization, at Brava in The City on Thursday.

The program includes a conversation between King and Kendell and a screening of “Battle of the Sexes,” the 2017 movie with Emma Stone and Steve Carell about the famed 1973 match between World No. 1 tennis star King and ex-champ and hustler Bobby Riggs.

In her talk with King, Kendell says, “I want to find out how she had the fortitude to blaze the path that she did, when really she stood alone. At the time, there were very few other female tennis players beating drum about pay equity.”

Read more in the San Francisco Examiner

Honored to have had April 12, 2018 proclaimed Billie Jean King Day in San Francisco by Mayor @MarkFarrellSF. Thank you to @KateKendell and to all who helped raise funds for @NCLRights last night. #EqualityForAll pic.twitter.com/SRUj3q5jgu

— Billie Jean King (@BillieJeanKing) April 13, 2018

Dining Out. To. Save Lives!

I'm making it a point to help where I can!



Enjoy a night out at a participating Dining Out For Life restaurant on Tuesday, April 24 and you automatically support San Francisco AIDS Foundation! It's a win-win!

Double your impact and get a chance to win big through the Dining Out For Life sweepstakes! This year's packages include a VIP trip to Las Vegas, a week stay in the Russian River Wine Valley, four nights in Palm Springs, club-level tickets to a Giants game, and more!


There are two ways to get in on the fun:


• Visit a participating Dining Out For Life restaurant on Tuesday, April 24 and ask the Dining Out For Life Ambassador at that location to accept your sweepstakes entry.
• Enter online at doflsf.org, select an ambassador to support or donate directly to Dining Out For Life. Ambassador: Edgar Micua


Take your impact even further: Make a donation of any amount and our partner Tito's Handmade Vodka will contribute the same amount, up to a total of $10,000!


ENTER SWEEPSTAKES


Amici's East Coast Pizzeria Marina
Bistro Boudin
Chouquet's
Curbside Cafe
Parigo
PASTA POP-UP
Precita Park Cafe
Stock in Trade
The Castro Fountain

Twice. Ran. Secretary Clinton Committed.

I've seen this woman over the years as a state First Lady, to a very well respected Secretary of State, and eventually a nominated President in national political party. Nominated as a President for any political party as a first for a candidate who happened to be a woman.


She's not perfect, but totally qualified in all the positions she's held. This book to me was an honest, touching, and very fair assessment of her loss in the 2016 presidential election.


I appreciate her candor, reading about her upbringing, and understanding her path to where she is today is amazing. She may think it's privilege, but the bottom line is you have to do the work in the end. No matter who you are, she truly believes you can accomplish anything. Just as she has. Despite my own opinion that Donald Trump had no business applying for this job to run the country. He speed bumped into a lane really wasn't his path. But he did and his candidacy added another layer to Hillary's added challenges. It doesn't really seem to stop. But she presses forward.


I had an opportunity to meet and shake hands with my hero, at a San Francisco book signing event the following year. There were hundreds of us waiting in line for hours to get a glimpse of this amazing woman, president or not, she has character. When I shook hands with her, I was star struck and asked her a really dumb question due to my nerves and all those hours thinking of what to say to her when I met her. It was all based on a t-shirt a wore that day, it said, CHOOSE YOUR PARTY, and below were 3 boxes to Democratic party, Republic party, and Cocktail party being the one checked. I asked her what was her favorite cocktail and she obviously has had her head down for hours just signing hundreds of books and never really saw my t-shirt. She threw back my question and asked me what was my favorite cocktail, I was stumped. We barely were allowed to small talk or take selfies it was very restricted, but in the end even though it was surreal and a blur, it was all worth it.

So, goes this book about the 2016 elections and what happened, it was so surreal and a blur to this day, that I really thought it was a slam dunk and we would be grilling a Madam President who would hold press conferences on a regular basis, unlike our current president, I hear nothing really significant that would contribute to change for all Americans. What did the other half of the country really thought when they choose him to run our country?


In her last sentence in her book, she asks the question, "What do we do now?" I said. There was only one answer: "Keep going."


I couldn't agree more.

Disruptive. Political. Climate.

February is upon us and we are well into 2017 and yet there is still some unsettling energy in the American air. What is it? Obviously it's our recent election result that has dramatically changed the politic climate in our country.  No sooner have our newly elected president, Donald J. Trump arrival to the White House, executive orders are signed, new inexperienced staff members are in place, and a brash and combative White House Press Secretary takes the podium.

Personally, I have yet to fully recover from the election results; I've gotten over hang overs much more quickly than this situation and still find it still unsettling. With no time to digest these sudden and intrusive political announcements have I had a chance to really recover. It has been clearly disruptive. It's clearly not your politics as usual.  To get my bearings, I begin to try to combat this direct hit to help soothe the pain of political jolt.

I participated in a recent Women's March in San Francisco that drew thousands in the pouring winter rain in the city. But not one person flinched, many carried on in protest to our new President's policy announcement changes. Many marched for various reasons, dissent to resistance to government or specific issues that are at stake affecting their lives. For example, women's health, health funding cuts, gay and lesbian rights, and supreme court rulings that can be reversed like Roe v. Wade, a ruling that has held for decades for women having the right to have an abortion. I participated because of my own dissent, disappointment, and anger in some ways on American civil rights in general.

Women's March - San Francisco, CA
One of many protest signs

Women's March - San Francisco, CA
Started at City Hall, and ended at the Ferry Building

It felt liberating, celebratory, and at the same time civil. Seeing other protesters marching in peace and carrying signs that are thought provoking and resonate clarity of the sign holders thoughts about our new leader in office.


The climate has surely changed for many Americans, somehow though, middle America sees things differently. Living in San Francisco, California is clearly different in social, economic, and job opportunities compared to states say, in Arkansas or South Dakota. I should remind myself that those regions of our country are different and their thoughts and ideas are not as one with Americans to the west or east. I get that, but when I voted for our next President, I honestly had them in mind, and hoped they had the same thoughts, clearly this was not the case.

I'm hopeful that in 2017, we will be able to do a restart, reset, or start a dialogue that allows all Americans to meet in the middle. We need this to happen. Always the optimist. Let's see where we go as we head into spring.