1998
Google founded – Paypal founded – Knight Ridder relocates to San Jose – A.P. Stump’s opens in San Jose – Spago takes over from Jeremiah Tower’s Stars in Palo Alto – Palo Alto girl band ‘The Electrocutes’ release ‘Steal Yer Lunch Money’ before changing their name to ‘The Donnas.’ – First nationwide HDTV broadcast – Tech Museum opens in new 132,000-square-foot building
Rat Here, Rat Now
The Logans had been married two years when they first heard the scratching sounds in the attic at night. They lived in what they now call “typical suburbia,” in a middle-class neighborhood on Vincent Court off Santa Teresa in South San Jose. “One night, we hear this sound in the kitchen,” LezLi Logan says, tapping her manicured fingernails on the coffee table to simulate the sound of little feet. George remembers the scene well. “I’m in my underwear, and I open the cupboard,” he says, “and there’s three of them in there, eating potatoes. “I grabbed my golf club, opened the cupboard and took a crack at them,” he says. “One of them lunged out at me and landed on the kitchen floor.” George scrambled around the kitchen after the rat, madly wielding his golf club everywhere it ran. “I put a few holes in the linoleum floor and some dents in the stove,” he recalls. Cecily Barnes, Feb. 18, 1998
Do You Know With Whom You Are #$%*!!?
District Attorney George Kennedy is known for both his profanity and his respect for the Queen’s English. This year Kennedy outdid himself, using naughty language and a near-extinct big-ass word in the same sentence (when asked about allegations that his office stymied a grand jury investigation): “Are you asking was there an inappropriate, crooked fucking fix by the district attorney’s office to spirit some individual out of the area … ?” Hats off to you, George, you’re a real fucking Renaissance Man. Will Harper, Dec. 31, 1998
