East Bay

Harold Camping lets out a hearty chuckle when he considers the people who believe the world will end in 2012. "That date has not one stitch of biblical authority," Camping says from the Oakland office where he runs Family Radio, an evangelical station that reaches listeners around the world. "It's like a fairy tale." The real date for the end of times, he says, is in 2011. The Mayans and the recent Hollywood movie "2012" have put the apocalypse in the popular mind this year, but Camping has been at this business for a long time.

Bay Area security officers, among the lowest-paid service workers, will receive a salary increase of 27 percent and an enhanced health care plan if a tentative five-year contract agreement is ratified in a vote Dec. 8. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom announced the tentative accord Friday, which was reached in negotiations Thursday at 11 p.m., and said he anticipates it will be a model of its kind nationwide. "It is a package that, I think, gives dignity to the work that is being done by the security officers, many of whom earn $23,500" a year in one of the most-expensive regions of the country, said Newsom.

Bay Area residents can take a virtual helicopter tour of the region's deadliest geological time bomb, the Hayward Fault, just by pointing and clicking. Unveiled Thursday by the U.S. Geological Survey, the online tour, which resembles an aerial overflight from an altitude of a few hundred feet, allows the viewer to see exactly how close a particular piece of property -- including his or her home, school, gym, favorite coffeehouse or commuting routes -- is to the fault. The images, which merge USGS data with Google Earth's celebrated online library of aerial photographic maps, are of such high resolution that a user can spot individual homes and, in some cases, people.

Dozens of flea markets call the Bay Area their home. Here is a list of some of them. To find more on the Web use your search engine to look up "Flea Markets Bay Area." Useful Web sites include www.antiqueandcollectible.com www.fleamarketguide.com and www.rummaging.com. EAST BAY ALAMEDA: Alameda Point Antiques and Collectibles Faire 7 a.m.-3 p.m. first Sunday each month. Alameda Point (formerly Alameda Naval Air Station at the end of Atlantic Avenue); (510)

The last time a major earthquake ripped along the Hayward Fault, San Leandro and Hayward were nearly leveled, but, in a shock to seismologists, the most populated stretch of the East Bay was relatively unscathed, according to a new map released Wednesday. The "shake map" of the devastating 1868 quake, which scientists now believe was about 7 in magnitude, provides a dramatic glimpse at the damage and size of the nation's 12th-deadliest earthquake. But it offers few clues to what a major temblor on the Hayward Fault would look like today because predicting when and where quakes will occur is still beyond scientists' reach.

Q: We're living in the Pacific Northwest but will be part-time residents in the East Bay. Our dilemma is furnishing and decorating a small condo. It has a living room, a separate bedroom, walk-in closet, bathroom and kitchen. We would like furniture that could be dual use; for example, we must incorporate a dining table that would seat as many as six in the living room. The main seating space in the living room must be used, at times, for a bed. Any ideas for handling a small TV would be very helpful.

The unlikely sounding combo of chicken and waffles - fried chicken atop a waffle served with butter and syrup - headed for the mainstream in the 1970s with the opening of Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles in Los Angeles. Recently, however, some Bay Area chefs have begun updating the soul food favorite. In the East Bay, brothers Anthony and Christopher Saulnier and chef Joshua Pearl of 900 Grayson jazz up the Demon Lover combo with spicy buttermilk fried Fulton Valley chicken paillards and a killer cream gravy.

Brandon Manning says he never saw it coming. One minute he was hanging out with seven seemingly friendly guys in a park, the next he said he was on the ground, the blows coming from all sides, a fist or foot landing hard enough to fracture six bones in his face. But it was the words accompanying the blows that made Manning, 24, think he was about to die. "Coon." And then, "How do you like this, you f-ing n-?" A week after the Jan. 24 incident, Richmond police officers arrested seven East Bay teenagers on suspicion of felony assault with a deadly weapon - a hate crime investigation delayed five days because of a police clerical error.

Damon Slough is a popular overflow parking spot for ballgames at the nearby Network Associates Coliseum complex. Most people who visit the neighborhood don't know it for what nature meant it to be -- the lungs of East Oakland. They've trudged over the Nimitz Freeway to take their seats in the Raiders' Black Hole but probably haven't noticed the thriving wetland on the bay shoreline a few steps in the other direction. They haven't seen the seaside arrowgrass or the pickleweed the elderberries or the egrets or tried to spot an endangered California clapper rail let alone a salt marsh harvest mouse.

The Brewing Network, an East Bay craft beer radio company, partners with Linden Street Brewery, Oakland's first production brewery in more than 50 years, to host the Winter Brews Festival. Seasonal and specialty brews from more than 30 local and independent breweries will be featured, as well as hot food (for purchase) and live music. Support your local breweries, and drink some beer, too - if you're into that sort of thing. 1-8 p.m. Sat. $25 (includes glass and five drink tickets)

Northern California's college baseball coaches came out of the rain long enough Tuesday to extol the virtues of strong pitching and defense. On Media Day at Stanford, they also honored Sacramento State coach John Smith, who will retire this year after his 32nd season. Opening games are less than a month away, and although it's not clear who the strongest teams will be in the Bay Area, the top players certainly will include Santa Clara catchers Tommy Medica and Geoff Klein, St. Mary's first baseman Troy Channing, USF pitcher Doug Murray, Cal first baseman Mark Canha and Stanford pitchers Brett Mooneyham and Jordan Pries.

Charlotte Strong Passed away on January 21st. She bravely and gracefully lived with cerebral ataxia for the last several years and died from complications related to this degenerative neurological disease. Charlotte Mendelsohn Strong was born October 7th 1925 in Globe Arizona where her father was a mining engineer for Phelps Dodge. Following graduation from Fremont High School in Oakland she attended UC Berkeley where she was a member of Alpha Delta Pi Sorority. Charlotte graduated from Cal in 1947 and at the conclusion of WWII reunited with a high school friend Richard Strong.

East Bay craft beer radio company, The Brewing Network, has teamed up with Oakland's Linden Street Brewery to warm up their listeners' late winter blues with a Winter Brews Festival on Jan. 30, 1-8 p.m. The festival will feature seasonal brews from more than 40 breweries, along with local crafted beers. Participants include the Bay Area's 21st Amendment, Russian River, Magnolia and Firestone Walker, among others, with food supplied by Emergency BBQ and Home Brew Chef. Admission is $25, which includes five 9-ounce pours.

California got coal in its stocking for the holidays as employers cut 38,800 jobs in December and the unemployment rate registered 12.4 percent, according to an Employment Development Department report that showed little sign of life in the state's labor market. Also, the November unemployment rate - initially reported as 12.3 percent - was revised upward to 12.4 percent on Friday. December's figure would have been even higher had not 107,000 Californians quit looking for work last month and thus fallen out of the calculations.

Harriet Ladene Hudson In Loving Memory June 12 1913 - Dec. 13 2009 Long time East Bay resident Ladene Hudson died quietly in her Rossmoor Walnut Creek home after a brief illness. Ladene was 96.5 years young and lived a rich and fulfilling life. She was born in Oakland attended schools in the East Bay and graduated from UC Berkeley where she was a member of Alpha Delta Pi sorority. While at Cal she met and later married fellow student Miles "Doc" Hudson who became a Berkeley dentist and long time Cal Rugby coach.

San Francisco: Mark Brittain , 153-yard 15th, Olympic Club (Lake Course), 6-iron. East Bay: Charles du Mee , 121-yard 8th, Skywest, 9-iron. Peninsula: Steve Rudee , 140-yard 7th, Green Hills, 3-hybrid; Evelyn Walker , 106-yard 8th, Mariners Point, 7-iron. Elsewhere: Carter Walling , 95-yard 6th, Pebble Beach (Peter Hay Course), pitching-wedge.

According to the folks at Oaksterdam University, it's high time to settle the debate over legalizing marijuana. We stopped by the pioneering Oakland cannabis college last week for the grand opening of its new 30,000-square-foot campus, where 500 students each month study policy, cultivation, law, science, business and other components of the cannabis industry. As it turns out, Oaksterdam is a far cry from Bill and Ted's Excellent University. While the crowd enjoyed cooking, hash-making and horticulture demonstrations, the live music ranged from Pink Floyd songs to reggae songs to reggae versions of Pink Floyd songs.

Turns out, BART is a tad breezy. Hundreds of riders learned that uncomfortable truth the hard way Sunday when they removed their pants on crowded, San Francisco-bound trains, as part of a national stunt sponsored by a New York performance art group. "It feels strangely normal," said Luke Jakobsson, a student from Castro Valley who rode BART from the East Bay in nothing but shoes, a Swedish soccer jersey and matching skivvies. "Although I'm not sure how I feel about the wind in my ass."