San Leandro Bytes

San Leandro Company Outfits Penguin With Wetsuit

Kudos to Oceanic Worldwide and their marketing staff for creating a special wetsuit for a penguin at the California Academy of Sciences. If this kind of press coverage generates more sales for them, their marketing specialist, Teo Tertel, is a genuis.

Coverage from CNN, KTVU, etc.

Oceanic Worldwide is located at 2002 Davis Street in San Leandro.

Century 16 Bayfair New Owner Brings Commercials to Movies

Back in August 2006, Texas-based Cinemark bought Century Theatres, the owner of the Century 16 Bayfair movie theater at Bayfair Center.

Century Theatres was unique among most movie theater chains in not showing television-style commercials before the feature movie presentation. Alas, that time is gone. So now when you head to see a movie on the big screen, you get to pay $9.25 to see your movie with some commercials thrown in. It's too bad that Ray and Joe Syufy sold the San Rafael-based Century Theatres to a company that won't honor its tradition of not showing television-style commercials.

Two Cheers for Stark

We're lucky in San Leandro to have one of the most progressive representatives in Congress, Pete Stark. He's often in the minority, specially in this congress, but he at least stands for his principles and constituency.

I wanted to highlight two pieces of legislation in which he's taken the right position. One is H.Res. 921 which condemned the recent attacks against Israel and ratified Israel's rights of self defense, while being completely silent in the rights of the Palestinian and Lebanese to rise up against tyranny - a right articulated in the preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Pete Stark was one of only 8 representatives to vote against it. Even Barbara Lee did not have his courage.

He is also a co-sponsor of H.Con.Res 450 which calls for an immediate cease-fire, multi-party negotiations and an international peacekeeping force.

If you, like me, believe that human rights are an essential part of the progressive agenda, please write to Stark and thank him for his stands.

State of Emergency for Storm Damage to Bay Trail

Perhaps declaring a state of emergency is the only way to get federal funds to clean up the mess caused by the storms, but it does seem a bit extreme for damage to 1.5 miles of the Bay Trail.

Is it really an emergency?

FOr more details, see the ANG newspaper article.

Abstinence Crowd Comes to San Leandro

This sign hanging over E. 14th Street between Estudillo and Davis in San Leandro, advertises an April 30, 2005 abstinence workshop at the Creekside Community Church.

While few condone adolescent sex that results in pregancy or sexually-transmitted diseases (STD), supporters of abstinence should familiarize themselves with the results of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, a federally-funded study that tracked more than 10,000 children from 7th to 12th grade for about eight years.

The study shows that those who pledge abstinence are almost as likely to contract an STD as those who do not make an abstinence pledge. In addition, those who pledge abstinence are more likely to engage in oral and anal sex and are less likely to use condoms when they begin engaging in sexual activity.

At least part of the explanation appears to be that virginity pledge programs preach abstinence to the exclusion of information regarding condoms, contraception, and sexual health. Predictably, supporters of abstinence pledges, including National Abstinence Clearinghouse, dispute the results of the study.

On the positive side (for parents at least), those who pledged abstinence begin engaging sexual activity 18 months later than those who didn't pledge abstinence and had fewer sexual partners.

Caveat emptor to those who would blindly encourage their children to pledge abstinence. Teenagers appear to be "saving" their virginity by engaging in oral and anal sex. I'm not sure that's a good thing.