PAUL BOUTIN - San Francisco's city attorney is investigating more than $10,000 paid retroactively to Ruby Rippey-Tourk, mayor Gavin Newsom's former appointments secretary and mistress. Rippey-Tourk "received more than $10,000 in sick pay while undergoing substance abuse treatment after she left City Hall," according to an AP report. Ten grand makes a scary headline in Fargo, but here? Come on, I spend that on Zipcar. What can you get for 10K in the city?

• Six weeks in a condo.
• The minimum Apple hardware required to show your face in public South of Market.
• Down payment on a Scion.
• 30 days of detox at St Helena
• Two speaker slots at a tech conference.

This latest wrinkle in Gavingate will most likely iron out clean. San Francisco government is famous for its generosity toward substance addiction. More important, Newsom's already made enough money from PlumpJack that he needn't stick his impeccably manicured fingers in the city till. With Ruby and Gavin both claiming to be in recovery, the juicier question is: Do they ever go to meetings together?

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