Gamboling about Telegraph Avenue will inevitably land the inquisitive meal-seeker near that street’s very own restaurant row. What ho, though, for the face of it has changed! What used to be Slurp is now newest addition Thai Noodle II, now with added roman numerals and a few less scribbly, paint-blotch works of art mounted on the walls. This intrepid Clogger is happy to report that the new location’s scheduled to open tomorrow; and if not tomorrow, sometime in the following week at the latest.

Thai Noodle II will serve the same steaming plates of cheap deliciousness, but it’s doing a few things different from the original. Late night hours differ from those of the Shattuck Avenue location: Thai Noodle II will be open until 12 a.m. from Sunday to Thursday, and until 2 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. We are genuinely excited by the prospect of shoveling down Thai food bonanzas at one in the morning, especially with school winding down, papers dragging on, and the onset of the F-word. And we don’t mean f*ck.

A quick peek through the window tells us that the decor is much more svelte than the original’s: dark wood furniture, low lighting, and a sleek new stainless steel grill … thing. Plus, walls done in magenta and turquoise! Then again, a burlap sack would be more svelte than the original. Here’s to glaring fluorescent lights and slapdash decorative tastes.

So, uh, how about that new Mexican restaurant in the Asian Ghetto, guys?

Image Source: Danica Li

More entertaining are the lengths to which the Temple has gone to publicize the affair and stave off the elimination of their venerable Sunday institution. The Facebook group alone has almost 800 members, the Youtube video is here, and apparently there’s a MySpace page in the works, too.

Anyway. While we wait in breathless suspense, have your post with a side order of crunch time procrastination.

Image Source: Kenn Christ under Creative Commons
Save Sundays at the Thai Temple! [savethethaitemple.com]

Pretty cool, right? Price said he got name-dropped by Oakland emcee Big Dan at the show (”Hey everybody, you know who this is? That m*therfucker made ‘Wake It Up’!”) — whereupon he was accosted by fans who wanted his autograph and a picture and all that good stuff. Cal was a while ago, but here’s what he got up to when he was here:

* played upright bass in the campus chamber orchestra
* studied contemporary electronic music at the Center for New Music and Technology
* played gigs around town with small jazz combos and a salsa band
* wrote a ton of Latin papers while making beats on the side

Post graduation, Price became a full-time hip-hop producer. Now an established player on the scene, he’s still pretty downbeat about his prospects in the Bay Area–things are looking bleak because there aren’t that many Bay Area rappers hitting the big-time jackpot, and because the inflating numbers of amateur producers are exerting competitive pressure on producers like Price. Recently, the man packed all his worldly belongings in preparation for a move down to L.A., where he hopes the scene will be sprightlier. Fingers crossed, man.

Image Source: joehughes under Creative Commons
Priced Out [Easy Bay Express]

1. Design a logo
2. Win ticket to private reception held by the Center for Japanese Studies, where Clint Eastwood will be speaking

The logo must be in black and white and should include the text “Resident Faculty Program” in there somewhere, seeing how the design is for the Resident Faculty Program, which is looking mighty underpopulated at the moment, if we do say so ourselves. The deadline’s Dec. 5, so get going! Once done, the submission should be emailed–along with your name, of course–to ResFacContest@gmail.com.

For more details, check out the project site.

Image Source: Public Domain
Marketing and Web Requests: Contest to Design New RF Logo [ASC]

Reports say a Wal-Mart employee died just a few hours ago, trampled to death by raging Black Friday bargain-seekers in New York. Shoppers tore down the front doors of the Wal-Mart at Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream, N.Y., knocking down the unidentified 34-year-old worker. Three other shoppers and a pregnant woman were taken to the hospitable for minor injuries.

According to eyewitness testimonials, the waiting shoppers pulled the doors from their hinges in their rush to get into the store. The surge, the NYT solemnly reports, endangered children, who had to be grabbed by their parents so as to not get lost and/or trampled upon in the mad stampede. Jeez. People really are nuts for their tech gadgets and Guitar Hero game kits.

Image Source: r_b under Creative Commons
Wal-Mart Employee Trampled to Death by Customers [NY Times]

Who? you ask, squinting in confusion. Aspiring reporters and future magazine editors will be thrilled to discover–indeed, should already know–that Chernin is President and Chief Operating Officer of News Corporation. News Corp., as it’s known by industry insiders, is the world’s largest media conglomerate. It owns the Wall Street Journal, 20th Century Fox (as in the film studio) and HarperCollins (as in the publishing house). He’s also the chairman and CEO of Fox Entertainment Group.

Prior to his meteoric rise to prominence, Chernin earned his B.A. in English literature from Berkeley in 1974. His appearance is scheduled for the Maude Fife Room, 315 Wheeler Hall, from 5 to 6 p.m. on Dec. 1.

Image Source: whatcounts under Creative Commons
News Corp.’s Peter Chernin to inaugurate English department’s alumni conversations [Berkeley News]

The morning after the presidential election, the city opened its online application for a program to help homeowners with the cost of solar installation by shifting that cost onto their property-tax bills for the next 20 years. Within the first nine minutes, 40 applications were immediately received. Bam!

So who won out? The city went with a first come first serve method of selecting the winning homes–in this case, the first five applicants in each of Berkeley’s eight City Council districts.

The program, which will cost $1.5 million, was nursed through its planning stages and delivered into the real world by Cisco DeVries, Tom Bates’ chief of staff for about half a dozen years. The plan was approved in the form of Measure G by more than 80 percent of voters two years ago, a measure that asked everyone to do their part in reducing greenhouse gases by 80 percent by 2050.

More numbers! Each system will cost about $28,000 to run, with homeowners paying about $182 monthly on their property tax bills. Sometimes, sir, it pays to be a lean mean green machine.

Image Source: shootina710is under Creative Commons
Spots for Berkeley’s solar program snapped up in 9 minutes [Oakland Tribune]

The Big Game weekend’s almost here, with bonfire revelers at the Greek Theater scheduled to start torching at 7 p.m. tomorrow night.  The UC Rally Committee–Berkeley’s oldest student organization and protector of thy holy university traditions since 1901–held a Stanford tree whackathon on Sproul Plaza yesterday, wherein they cut logs subtly painted over with blaring red Stanford logos to teensy pieces.  Sledgehammer symbolism, anyone?

For those of you who missed the melee, pictures follow after the cut.

The family, after a hearty day’s work.

Image Source: Katie Strausser

Last we checked, Berkeley was trailing UC Santa Barbara by a few hundred voters. In fact, we still are trailing UCSB by a few hundred voters, according to the Ultimate College Bowl website. But a new report from UCSB’s newspaper, the Daily Nexus, informs readers that it was all a terrible mistake, because UCSB didn’t win–Berkeley did.

It’s not that 10,499 voter registrations somehow managed to beat out 10,857 through some contractual loophole. It’s that the number is patently misleading. Via an extension of the voter registration period to one week after Nov. 4, our tally shot up by an additional 3,000 voters.

As it stands, Berkeley pulled in 12,392 voters, or 36.52 percent of its student body, while UCSB registered 11,353 voters, or 53.85 percent of its student population.

That means, fingers crossed, we can look forward to a free show from Death Cab–a sure score to shore up a campus dearth of concerts, an area where Superb has majestically underwhelmed this year (and let’s be honest–where hasn’t Superb underwhelmed this semester?) But calm your thrilling hearts–the UCSB report also notes that the free concert isn’t really free, requiring as it does tens of thousands of dollars in fees and financial accommodations.

UCSB still gets a free concert from Colin Meloy, lead singer of the Decemberists, for registering the highest percentage of their student body. Good on them.

Image Source: barackobamadotcom under Creative Commons
UCB Gives Concert to Berkeley [Daily Nexus]

Yes, you say impatiently, but how does that directly affect us? And will the results be visible at all the next day?

Actually, not so much. Many of the projects are contracted out to community organizations that aren’t within walkable distance of campus. There’re still a few around here, though:

* A City of Berkeley Project will involve posting No-Smoking signs around the Berkeley area.

* People’s Park is the famous park right by Unit 2, which serves the community through beauty and food (NB: begging the obvious joke). Project: Volunteers will be gardening, either beautifying an existing garden or creating a new garden. If it’s refurbishing a current garden, there will be weeding and planting new plants. If it’s creating a new garden on top of a concrete area, volunteers will put in the new soil, place boulders, and do some planting.

* The Downtown Berkeley Association is dedicated to sustaining a downtown that is economically vital, culturally exciting, and personally enriching for Berkeley residents, workers, and visitors. The DBA is a non-profit membership organization that represents over 800 businesses, non-profits, financial institutions, and property owners. It’s unclear how the DBA would deploy its volunteers, but we imagine it involves buffing that one downtown phallic statue thing until it glows.

* The Prisoners Literature Project is a grassroots organization that sends free books to prisoners in the United States. The project?  TBA.  Quite mysterious, Watson!

Image Source: askwhat under Creative Commons
Berkeley Project Sites List Fall 2008 [Berkeley Project]