Sean Hannity's First Radio Job Was in California. It Didn't Go Well.

1. Sean Hannity got his start in the Golden State

Fox News host Sean Hannity speaks during the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in 2016. (SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

I try to avoid cable news as much as possible, but there was a Sean Hannity story this week that I was glad to have heard.

It turns out that the Fox News host got his start on-air back in 1989 at KCSB, a community radio station in Santa Barbara. As reporter Valerie Hamilton explains, Hannity was causing waves even on that first show.

2. Does someone have Noah's number? We're due for a doozy of a flood

Flood waters inundate Sacramento in 1862. Scientists warn that events like the Great Flood of 1862 could occur every 50 years by the end of this century. (Sacramento History Museum)

Fun fact: Back in the winter of 1861 and 1862, it rained for 43 days in California. The governor of California had to attend his inauguration by rowboat.

Not so fun fact: A new study out of UCLA this week says a biblical flood like that could happen as often as every 50 years going forward. And just for good measure, extreme droughts are expected to happen more often too.

3. Things got real at the Richmond City Council meeting

A screenshot from KCRT of Richmond Mayor Tom Butt walking out of a City Council meeting on Tuesday. (KCRT Television)

Sometimes, city council meetings are interminable experiences that you can't wait to get away from. Other times, something bonkers happens.

Tuesday was a bonkers kind of night in Richmond. As KQED's Ted Goldberg witnessed, Mayor Tom Butt exchanged some heated words with Councilwoman Jovanka Beckles and then just up and left the meeting.

And then they took to Twitter.

4. You can thank Burning Man for the giant penny bear in San Jose

"Ursa Mater" aka "Mama Penny Bear" on the Playa at Burning Man. "It's battle tested," says Robert Ferguson. "You're out in the desert in wind, blowing sand, heat, rain. And people are at it, 70,000 of them. At the end of the day, it comes home intact, you know you have something that's going to be able to be in the public eye." (Courtesy of Lisa Ferguson)

It was a sad weekend for the Burning Man community with the death of the festival's co-founder, Larry Harvey on Saturday.

But if you need a Burning Man pick-me-up, go visit the giant "Mama Penny Bear" statue in downtown San Jose. It's literally a 12-foot bear made out of hundreds of thousands of pennies that's part of a unique deal between Burning Man and San Jose to relocate art from the desert festival to the city's streets.

5. These Muslim students are rallying for their rights

Yasmine Nayabkhil, 12, speaks before cameras and reporters in support of an anti-bullying bill at the Sacramento capitol on April 23, 2018. The Council on American-Islamic Relations organized the event. (Farida Jhabvala Romero/KQED)

This week, hundreds of California Muslims went to Sacramento to ask lawmakers to support legislation that would help prevent bullying of Muslim students, which is on the rise.

Many of them were students, and I was blown away by these young people who told KQED's Farida Jhabvala Romero and lawmakers about the harassment they'd faced.

"I did get my hijab pulled off a few times, and to them it’s just pulling off a headscarf, but to us it’s pulling off our identity," said Shad Alnashashibi, 15. "To them it’s nothing, but to us it’s almost everything."

Yasmine Nayabkhil, 12, said she was picked on and called a "terrorist" in elementary school after she decided to start wearing her hijab, or head scarf. She sometimes ended the day in tears. "It obviously didn’t make me feel good inside. It made me feel really hurt, especially since I’ve known these kids in my class for over five years," she said.