Author: Mark Alexander

A photographic record of the morning commute from my apartment to the Levi Strauss Corporate Headquarters, San Francisco October 2000. Taken with a Sony Mavica digital camera that used a floppy disk for storage (hence the poor quality).

I didn’t take the underground with this gig because the surface trolly would basically drop me at Levi’s doorstep. I would, however, often transfer to the underground on the way home.

Did I ever mention that on one of those evening commutes, while still on the trolly (coming as it was from the tourist destination Fisherman’s Wharf), Mark Hamill—Mr. Luke Skywalker himself—and his family were on board? AND HE FLIRTED WITH ME?!? I think I displayed an incredible amount of self-control and respected his privacy by not asking for an autograph. Were his family not there, however, who knows what would’ve happened? It might’ve been a story for the ages!

As promised, a story I promised some time ago…

I stumbled upon Rosie’s within months of arriving in San Francisco in 1986. I was in the Castro on a Saturday morning, looking for a place to grab lunch and as I walked down 18th Street I came across Rosie’s and it looked intriguing. I remember I ordered the California burrito, and from that first bite I knew I was in love.

San Francisco burritos (no matter where you get them) are a very distinct and unique breed. Some say they’re the best burritos to be had anywhere. Not having lived that many places over the course of my life, I can say unequivocally however that they are the best burritos I’ve ever had. I’ve found a few that come close, but fail to meet the San Francisco standard.

Over the course of the sixteen years I lived in The City, I must’ve conservatively eaten at Rosie’s 1886 times, based on 1-2 times a week for those entire sixteen years. I used to joke I would want a Rosie’s burrito to be my last meal.

Rosie’s in long closed (now longer than the entire time it was originally open), so I’ll never have another opportunity to enjoy a meal there, but it doesn’t matter. All I have to do is close my eyes and I can taste those delicious burritos. (To be honest, everything on the menu was excellent, but I gravitated toward the burritos more often than not.)

The owners of Rosie’s also had a burrito shop on Haight Street (the name escapes me at the moment)—which, for some reason I never knew of until I started going to Amoeba Records. I often ate there when I was in the neighborhood, but it wasn’t quite the same.