[evgen]

The original question was about the bay area and not necessarily SF itself. You have identified several downsides to living in SF, but few of them apply to the bay area as a whole. In fact, one can walk down the list to see that most of them are very specific to living in SF.

* [...] fine dining in San Francisco is, if you properly exclude Yountville from your definition of "San Francisco", simply not as good as NYC or even Chicago.

Let's revisit this one after Michelin hands out stars for Chicago in November. I am betting that just the south bay will have more than the entirety of Chicago. (Seriously, other than Alinea you really don't have fine dining in Chicago :)

* San Francisco doesn't have world-class museums.

The SF bay area has a lot of good museums and several world-class ones for specific niches -- the Monterey Bay aquarium is easily the equal of the Shedd and The Tech in San Jose and Computer History Museum in Mountain View are some of the best technology museums in the world. For art we have fewer impressionists, but much better asian art.

* It doesn't have a noteworthy theater scene, or (to my knowledge) excellence in any of the performing arts.

This is one of those odd things where I would have said the same thing about Chicago in comparison to San Francisco. SF Opera is not the Met, but more than a few people would put it above the Lyric Opera in most rankings. SF tends to fall down a bit when it comes to plays (ACT being the local exception to this general rule) but does better than most places when you add musical theatre into the mix. Comedy is really the only performing art that Chicago seems to do better than the bay area...

[dzlobin]

Seriously, other than Alinea you really don't have fine dining in Chicago

Moto, Schwa l20 blackbird publican avec

Those are just off the top of my head.

[tptacek]

Avenues Topolo Everest Graham Elliot Bonsoiree Trotters Nomades Tru mk Nomi Vie... is this even an argument worth dignifying?

[dzlobin]

Agreed.

btw, since I know your tastes lie close to mine, are you coming to Lincoln soon or what?

[evgen]

It was a joke :)

OTOH, I could easily put together a similar list of great restaurants in the bay area if you happen to visit. Let's wait until a reputable third party provides a basis for comparison before we continue poking each other with the trolling stick.

[tptacek]

I'll admit that I don't pay attention to opera and that you may have me there, but the Chicago Symphony Orchestra trounces SFS in every ranking I can find (CSO tops the Philharmonic in some credible reviews, so this isn't a fair fight).

You also can't say "SF tends to fall down when it comes to plays" and then in the same sentence say "comedy is the only performing art that Chicago does better in"; Chicago has a vibrant theater scene, and while it isn't NYC, nothing is.

So, where does that leave us?

Opera: SF > Chicago

Theater: Chicago > SF

Comedy: Chicago > SF

Symphony: Chicago > SF

Look, I get that we're trolling each other here, though. San Francisco is a bad place to see new comedy, but it clearly has credible opera and symphony. It's not a ding on San Francisco that "you can't hear good classical music".

[evgen]

I think that in the midst of various edits I lost track of the point I was trying to make in that section about performing arts. I was not conceding theatre, just aiming to point out that there are some very good theatrical companies in SF and a batch of mediocrity. In SF the patronage scene seems to go like this: Opera > ACT > Ballet > SFS > other theatrical companies. I am not sure why this is the case, but people with bluer blood than mine have deigned it to be so.

It seems that in most of these performing arts rankings you have NYC at the top, LA a long way down the scale for a lot of things (mostly as remnants and/or supporting players for the movie biz) and below that places like Chicago, SF, and Boston fighting it out for third place in various categories.

Yes, you will see a better comedy show in Chicago, catch a better opera or weird performance art piece in SF, and probably hear a better symphony in Boston. Either way, I would say that SF is far from the performing arts wasteland you originally suggested...