I heard about Margaret Murray before I met her: strange rumors about her being a kept woman in LA and a sad, true story of her apartment burning down in San Francisco.

Of course I wanted to befriend her. In the early ’90s we played together in combustible “super-mini-groups”—Job’s Daughters and Heavenly Ten Stems—and I had the chick-bassist slot for two months in (then-named) Caroliner Open Wound Chorale before quitting. Margaret took my place. Grux, the singer, used to stomp on my foot to indicate section changes, and I never defended myself. So I was secretly pleased when Margaret punched him on tour (though, she tells me, she loves him).

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In the late 1980s, Terri Manning and her sister, Barbara, lived in one of San Francisco’s painted ladies near Golden Gate Park. This lady, a huge, rambling Victorian with peeling paint, opened its door to touring bands, local musicians, artists, and whomever else needed a place to crash or a home-cooked meal. The Manning sisters’ generosity came naturally to them. In the mid-1970s they grew up as part of a commune in the Sierra foothills and played pranks on the swami when they decided he was morally corrupt. …more

I met Eric Larson (a pseudonym) in a Bay Area writing workshop around ten years ago. He’s had the most intriguing job of anyone I’ve met in that often-myopic fiction-writing world—he’s a Death Row attorney, primarily for clients at San Quentin State Prison, paid separately on contract for each case.

Here are some questions I’ve always had about a career I’ll never have: …more

Dave “The Fugitive” Jansen, 30, is a professional mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter with Oregon’s Team Quest Fight Club.  Our talks took place prior to his World Extreme Cagefighting (WEC) bout in Las Vegas against Ricardo Lamas on August 18, 2010. …more

The last time I saw Lucinda was around July 4, 2003. Marching around with sparklers in her back yard, drinking beer and laughing, she showed no ill-effects of being a California parole officer. Lucinda, 41, is now a California state investigator of lifers, and an aspiring roller derby vixen. Her boss approved this interview; but, due to the sensitive nature of her job, we changed her name. …more