TRANQUILITY AND A SHOVEL

About ten minutes after I had given the Indonesian Chinese lady in the downstairs front apartment some fruits and fresh produce (and so making sure she's still with us), my landlady was knocking on my door to hand over some food so that I'll be strengthened and fed before the procedure tomorrow morning. I'll point out that she is older than me, but I shan't tell you by how much. One does not speak of a woman's age, and I don't want to talk about mine. We also discussed the possibility of quitting tobacco, because nicotine hampers the body's healing mechanisms in addition to being inflammatorial to blood vessels lining.

Yes, okay, I'll not smoke from midnight till four days hence when I see the surgeon for a follow up. Shortly afterwards, in all likelyhood, I'll be filling a pipe and lighting up. Because I'm incorrigible, and a bad-tempered fossil even under the best of circumstances.

The problem will be avoiding overly strenuous actions when I'm back at work.


Can one even be called 'alive' if one does not throw heavy cinderblocks at rightwing dillheads? Asking for a "friend", you understand, as violence toward the fascists of the world is not my thing. I am a peaceful even-tempered liberal murderous psychopath.

Far be it from me etcetera etcetera.

Om, shanti shanti, om.

Why, I just want to be alone in my garden with the gladioli and the chrysanthemums. Yes. Butterflies and hummingbirds. Sunlight. Daffodils. Smelling the roses. Lovely fragrant roses. Dense thickly overgrown rose bushes with inch-long sharp thorns that rip the living flesh off, the wargrade biohazard of plants, weapons of very painful mass destruction, aimed at religious freaks and dunderheaded rightwingers.

There are savage hamsters armed with razorsharp claws and teeth there.
Lego blocks to maim the unwary strewn damned well everywhere.
And juicy pineapple chunks for all their pizza!
Ham and anchovies!

A veritable pox upon their cattle!

Yeah, it's a darn good thing that I've taken off for a week. I shall be scarcely bearable, and putting up with the senile rightwingers in the backroom while I'm avoiding tobacco and not smoking my pipes would be impossible.



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WILD OLD PEOPLE

A site I do not want to visit advertised itself on my computer, with a slogan indicating senile passion possibilities and a picture that showed a smiling younger hugely bosomed woman. Good lord. How does she feed herself? Something that big in certain departments needs two pound of raw meat every meal. What do investors really think of older male Americans? Did some entrepreneur convince them we run around slobbering over ambulatory watermelon plantations? I am offended! Enormously!

Nurse Ratchett, I am ready for my tea now.

Just wheel me out to the municipal garbage heap so that I may smoke my stogies without disturing members of generation dingbat; they're offended by tobacco. And they think of my kind as unrestrainedly hormonal and lust-filled. Besides ruining the planet and supporting al the wrong causes, our generation was responsible for 'I love Lucy', 'The Honey Mooners', and two decades of plastic and horrible music. All of which left us addled and sex-crazed.

One major reason to not click on that site is that inevitably it would lead to being robbed of my life savings by fully breasted Slavic women, fully breasted Japanese women, tottering Carol Dodaesque Filippinas, hot Mamba Latinas, and both French and Nordic arguably female persons without a shred of decency in their impossibly voluptuous bodies.

There's a scene in a Hong Kong movie where our hero, a short pudgy fellow, is slow dancing with a tall overly busty Shanghainese lady. That came to mind, as well as that time a friend married a girl from overseas who as soon as she arrived in the United States ran off into the great American outback and was never seen again.

One imagines his wife roaming the vast forests hunting down possums and beavers for dinner. She's dreamed about that all of her big-breasted life, growing up in the slums of Slovakoganggat, kicking tin cans and helpless tourists who strayed away from the group. Blood dripping down her jaws onto her overly generous frontage, trails of ichor gleaming eerily behind her in the permanent semi-dark.


Nurse Ratchett! Nurse Ratchett! I want my tea!


When I stepped outside for a smoke much earlier today a shaggy person, male, no breasts, staggered off the doorstep where he had been sleeping. Quite as feral as the ladies on those Eastern European websites, considerably less cannibalistic and dangerous. And very likely not at all interested in senior bachelors.

Red Virginia flake from Jeremy Reed. It's what all calm and not male enhancement pill crazed mature adults smoke. In a very nice Dublin & London Peterson long shank.

Nurse Ratchett? I do NOT need any valium today.
Nor any restraint devices.
Just tea.



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SMALL UNPLEASANT THINGS

There is a fine line between enough cheap chocolate to make one happy, and just a little too much where it gives one an edge of digestive discomfort and affects one's mood adversely when it wears off. The science is still iffy on that, much further investigation is required. Do not expect a scientific paper; there isn't a large enough test group. Subjects would need to be recruited and their endocrine peculiarities charted, plus ages and weights.
And it's my chocolate, which I don't feel like sharing.


Maybe I should write up a proposal and buck for an endowment.


By the way: the less said about little aggressive dogs and their distaste for pipe smoking Dutchmen, the better. Stop yipping at me, you little bad tempered pooh factory. Both of you. What the heck is your problem? The dogs at work don't behave so. Are both of you just little turdy hosers? Meanspirited? Probably owned by vegan anti-tobacco fiends.

This is the start of my last day as a human, they will be airlifting me to my home planet soon where I will resume my insect-demon form and plan the invision. Oop, sorry, what I meant to say was that on Thursday extremely early in the morning I'll be having an angioplasty of the right leg, which if all goes well will improve my life immensely because I will not be cussing out my pedal extremities quite so much. Also, my friend the bookseller is flying to New York as he does every year to visit the old sod and indulge in kosher pickles, so the next late night tea and Jameson's pubcrawl won't be till December.

An angioplasty is where they stick a long wire down your leg artery and twiddle it to puff up a little balloon at each obstructed area to flatten the plaque into the wall. Technically an in-and-out procedure which doesn't take very long, but they'll be putting me under, because they don't want me twitching on the slab or talking, or, heaven forefend, doing a play by play.

Unregretfully I realise that I am not a pleasant creature, despite my loveable appearance and the anime backpack I often sport. Which holds pipes, tobacco, and extra pens, paper, matches, and tampers.

I'm still upset about that little tyke at the dumpling place who kept raising Cain. A very unpleasant child. As so many of them are. Probably a demon in disguise.
Undoubtedly too much sugar and spoilage.

Someone should take his parents out and spank them.



The bookseller and I discussed pinball, music, the fragrance of grilling meat, kosher pickles, bottles of wine and champagne, and my friend and fellow member of the pipe club, Neil, who supplies the charcuterie for the monthly meeting. Absent this past Sunday because he was in the hospital having valves replaced. Whom I hope is still a pipesmoker when next I see him, not because of the pâté but because I'm quite fond of him and enjoy his company. If he has to stop indulging in a bowl now and then it would be very sad, because of the pleasure it gives him.

Maybe we can just meet for cheese and pâté.
At least for the first few months.



Red flake in a Charatan after dumplings, while wandering around to Financial District. Capstan in an old Dunhill billiard while waiting for the bookseller to get off work.
Then two cups of tea. I have teabags in my coat pocket.
I'm a regular boy scout in that regard.



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PUDGY BRAT WORLD

The dumplings were indeed handmade, but the skins were weak and several of them broke. Such luscious interior fluid! The place was too bright and small for my to lift my plate to my lips. And I really wish the hot sauce had been better. Plus that little white kid having a tantrum may have amused his parents -- oh isn't he precious, the little darling -- but did not add to my or anyone else's eating pleasure.

Still, I enjoyed my meal. Good stuff.
Family-run looks like.

Did I ever indicate, subtly or otherwise, that I am not fond of tourists and their brats? Or just brats in general? Especially white brats. The kids of mah and pah Kettle, as wells as Chad and Janet. Basically anyone who could be a relative of Karen.

Honestly I just don't like people very much.
Alas, the planet is full of them.


Unless you make your own dumplings, you'll have to crawl out of your hole occasionally and associate with screaming brats because that's where dumplings may be found. It adds to the ambience, I've been told.

Also, humans are intimately involved in the production of every single ingredient in the average dumpling. They don't just grow on trees. Sad but true.

Almost everywhere in Chinatown there might be Caucasians with uncontrollable offspring. Some of the white people are very large. Those probably hail from the Deep South or the Midwest. The benefit of lard. And bless their hearts.

We like special people in this city.

And we also like dumplings.

Contradictorily.



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NOT PLAYING WELL WITH OTHERS

While outside with my pipe earlier I saw some one parking her vehicle underneath a sign that told them explicitly to abstain from parking there, this morning till nine o'clock, for street cleaning. That car was still there upon my return. Must be an out-of-towner, unused to the idea that public thoroughfares need the occasional sweep. Either somebody from the hinterlands or a New Yorker.

This disturbs me. I went out to check moments ago.
Yep. The vehicle is still there.
Anarchist.


Have I ever mentioned that, being of substantially Dutch ancestry (despite over three and a half centuries of my folks being in the States), and having lived in the Netherlands from two till eighteen, and therefore naturally given to pettiness and red tape conditioning (we Dutch pretty much invented red tape and all the little petty-fogging rules and regulations that make living in civilized society an exercise in neuroses and minutiae), as well as having been a pencil-pusher most of my adult life, AND being on the spectrum, such cavalier disregard for the norms and values of people who can write citations while tootling around in their little parking control golf carts around at an ungodly hour does not sit well with me?

We have parking rules in this city.

WHICH MUST BE OBEYED!

What is this world coming to? Darn heathens!

Before you know it, that driver will casually toss a paper on the sidewalk, remove tags from matresses, NOT exercise caution when the contents are hot, and start eating fresh pizza before removing it from the box first. Society will collapse because of behaviour like that.
And soon all of them will be fending off armed Mad Max style dystopians and people knocking at their doors demanding to talk about Jesus.


No wonder this generation is on our collective lawns.



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SENATOR BEDFELLOW

The following despicable politicians have no spine, no ethics or morals, and no actual reason to stay alive: Catherine Cortez Masto, Dick Durbin, John Fetterman, Maggie Hassan, Tim Kaine, Angus King, Jackie Rosen, Jeanne Shaheen. Very likely bribes from the Republicans or the insurance companies were so huge that they couldn't resist, equally likely is that Republicans had real dirt on them worse than the Epstein files.


Basically, the shutdown is ending because Fetterman and the other senators can be bought. Remember that when your insurance goes through the roof.

Hope they're happy with their new friends. Because the Democrats would probably lynch them if they showed up in public. Very justifiably. Scum.

They should end up in the gutter shooting unclean substances into their veins and swilling cheap liquour before blowing their brains out.


If we ever end up having a violent revolution in this country, it's people like Catherine Cortez Masto, Dick Durbin, John Fetterman, Maggie Hassan, Tim Kaine, Angus King, Jackie Rosen, and Jeanne Shaheen who will be the reason for it. Their heads should be on spikes.
Democrats must be ruthless. Not chickens pandering to Mike Johnson.

Everything I've read about Fetterman indicates that he's an unprincipled kiss-ass opportunist and a bigot. So that he caved is not surprising. And given that he stands so often with the Republicans, his membership in the Democratic party is a sham and highly suspect.
There is little evidence that he has values that are not dictated by expediency.
Maybe I should read something else.


But I doubt that there is anything that doesn't make him seem loathsome.



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RECOVERING NICELY, THANK YOU

It will be unseasonably warm today, which I do not relish. I had looked forward to putzing around in comfy clothes rather than loose garments, playing with my ceramic pumpkins before heading out to have lunch and milk tea. Yet here we are. Mid-November.
Weather more suited to the red-state hellzones than San Francisco.

This is extremely disappointing.

During the night I dreamed of Valkenswaard. Perhaps because yesterday afternoon the judicial member had complained about his big prostate and his weak bladder. When I was growing up in Valkenswaard things like prostates and bladders had not been on the horizon. Little boys are notorious for being able to urinate with great force and precision, why it's astounding, and many of them take great pride in their urinational achievements.
And can't understand why it isn't a competitive event at the Olympics.

Well, they did then. Decades ago. Now they have video games, which are kind of similar. And for little kids growing up in the United States, school sports programmes often take the place of micturation in grammar and high school, which pleases their parents immensely. Little Johny is off at baseball practice instead of drinking vast volumes of liquids with his weird friends. Good. Soon we'll send him to bible camp where he will learn all about clean living, which we failed to teach him, and the traditional roles of the opposite gender, which will stand him in good stead when he joins a nunnery or becomes an office drudge.

The opposite gender seldom engages in kindergarten pissing contests.
They didn't get the memo. Unlike the judicial member.
Who probably has it memorized.

Do elderly American men discuss their prostate and their weak bladders with their wives? Is it common to do so, or do only their medical consultants and baby sitters get to hear about these things? "Honey, my urethra is farklempt again. Call a priest."

It's my suspicion that a sensible woman would call emergency services and a good divorce attorney at that point. His obsession with football players and junkfood orgies was one thing, but lordy she doesn't want to hear about his renal crises. That's NOT what she signed up for. He was half-way human when he still had a job, but since the factory closed and he retired, he's been kind of off his rocker. Spends half the night staring at the toilet as if it's a mortal enemy. Goes outside with the dog and howls at the moon.

Drinks sixpacks to wash down the turmeric pills because he heard it does great things AND if he's drunk he doesn't care where he relieves himself. Subscribes to mens health mags.
The gym to which he belongs has complained about him.


When I was growing up in Valkenswaard I had no idea about the life American men in the suburbs lead. I still haven't drunk sixpacks habitually, nor stumbled home drunk out of my gourd after howling with the dogs all night. I think turmeric pills are ridiculous snake oil (and almost certainly do not shrink your painfully enlarged prostate, old man). The only things a sixpack of American beer are good for is either washing out your kidney stone (stop eating so much crappy junkfood, idiot suburbanite) or throwing at the ICE agents raiding your neighborhood to arrest the people repairing your roof.

The judicial member is not a pipesmoker, nor a speaker of Dutch. Just a typical suburbanite rightwing American male sitting on his duff watching televised sports and whining about his better half and his lower half. In both cases the plumbing is past its prime.

I am so glad I don't live in Marin County. I just work there.
My ken of suburban living is via senile delinquents.
With whom I otherwise wouldn't associate.
Aaargh, fttt! And p'tooie.



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SOMETHING UNDER PRESSURE

Make no mistake: I am very fond of my apartment mate. But she's on the spectrum. So am I. But her more so. Which means that I just listened to twenty minutes of something that went wrong several weeks ago (which I had already heard before, I remembered all the details) in full detail. Which was not pursuant anthing at all. Now she's on about the most common car colours. And a pink custom paint job.

Everytime I get home from work I'm a bit bushed and need time to recover. This isn't helping, especially because at work today during a break in the game I got to hear about someone's problematic prostate, which had required medical intervention -- it's surprising how many of those people have prostate issues, maybe it's political -- and please understand that I do not regard prostatatic thingy as a diverting subject of conversation, ever, but I had only myself to blame, because for entertainment purposes I've been timing the old fellows when they rush to the loo. Three minutes. Sometimes it's five. Or ten.

If you want to know more about the prostate, and how it's your friend, do visit the Wikipedia article about it. It's quite fascinating, you'll love it. Especially the bit about fibrous tissue, and enodscopic view angles.


Or you could invite me to your next boyscout meet, and I'll tell the little fellows all about it. With family-viewing suitable diagrams and schematics. Bright attractive colours!

Remarkably, the fellows over in the North-East corner (pipe club) did not discuss prostateries at all. Instead, the absence of cold cuts, fancy cheeses, and pâté was mentioned. Neil, who normally gets those for us, is in the hospital with heart valve issues.
We all hope he recovers and will be back soon.
That has nothing to do with pâté.

The condition of their prostates is unknown to me. I have not asked. They have not out of the blue volunteered any information. I know more about their pipes than their prostates. One of them likes Dublins and sleek billiards, another has a thing for Oom Pauls, and Nick has some Rhodesians of which he's very fond.

I think there were equal numbers of Balkan lovers and VaPer huffers.
Not a single aromatic. That lack was not keenly felt.


There was brief mention of dermoid cysts.
We shall speak no more about it.




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SALT OF THE EARTH

You know, I already disliked the Midwest. Then a cleaning lady got shot to death in Indiana by some suburbanite hosebag. Adding even more to my inclination not to visit. Which was already below zero. When foreigners talk about the insanity of our gun culture, they're right. Much of the territory between the Oakland Hills and Staten Island is filled with insane hardly literate gun-loving violence freaks.

Kind of a biblical homicide wonderland.


Old Bill wearing his bib overalls on the tractor out doing the back forty. Everyone hopes he dies soon because he's a cheapskate and a mean old bastard, and Buckaroo over there is thinking of sabotaging the station wagon to make sure of that, but Daisy Belle drives it to town regularly to take her chihuahua to doggie play dates, so he's holding off for now.
Every generation in that family are actually Bill's kids. Every single person, all seven generations living in that old farmhouse.

It's been that way for well over a hundred years.
They wrote an X-files episode about that.

This post is, more or less, a delayed reaction to the classmate decades ago, in my first year back in the States, who told me "we shoot people like you where I come from", and the fellow at work (same time period) who said I should go back to wherever the hell I came from.

This morning I woke up feeling sour. This country is populated in a large part by high school bullies, all of them good Christians, and they keep voting for the scunge. Miles and miles of trailer parks, meth labs, and strip malls, where people play video games and go to church every Sunday for the witchburning.

In the afternoon on weekends they watch the game and scream obscenities.
A vast expanse of creatures from the black lagoon.
Monsters in many examples.


They've all got Jesus in their hearts.



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DUTCH DIETARY ADVICE

It is with quite some surprise that I just found out that the town where I grew up and went to grammar school had a fast food stand proprietor named "Pieman". Pee-man. No, it doesn't mean that in Dutch. Still and nevertheless. Desalniettemin en niet tegenstaande. Fast food in the Netherlands means fried. Potato, kroket, bamischijf, frikandel unidentifiable fried objects. You'd be surprised. Anyhow. Pee-man.

No wonder the Dutch invented the donut.
Which is not available there.
It's Dutch American.


My dinner just now was pan-fried pork with chilipaste and turnip cake. Sort of Chinese, sort of Dutch. Washed down with coffee, which is very Dutch. It's only English people who have beer with hot things, we Dutch want to be wide awake to enjoy the moment fully. Imagine a Dutchman in Texas. Chili con carne and stuffed Jalapeños? Black coffee.

Yucatán Peninsula? Wired to the eyebrows.

That's where Habaneros are originally from. Related to the Madame Jeanette.
I should point out that Madame Jeanettte makes a lovely sambal oelek.
Very nice. Perfect for curried goat. Try it, you will love it.
You may need some extra coffee with that.

ERGENS IN MOKUM

A friend moved to Amsterdam at the beginning of the year with her husband and kids. Largely because the Dutch are sane, unlike Americans, and believe in progress, unlike Americans, and don't have a whole bunch of wannabe gestapo running round beating up on people who look like they might not be Scotch Irish, or sound like it. FYI: sambal oelek (hot chili paste) is NOT Scotch Irish. It would probably give those kuffers nightmares.
Neither is coffee. That's why American coffee is so kuffing awful.


You know, upon sober reflection, I think we should kick all of those fascist troglodytes the hell out and give this whole country back to the Dutch Americans.
It would improve the food AND the coffee.



By the way: The epitome of Scotch Irish is McDonalds. And just look at what those kuffers have done to cheese! Or coffee! Or muffins! They should be burned at the stake for that!

We need taco trucks on every corner, is what.




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AVERTING CRISIS WITH SUDS

At the laundromat the little girl just could not believe that the snack machine was broken. She could see the sour gummies and the bag of Pepperridge Farm cookies! They were right in front of her! The universe could NOT be so unreasonable as to take her quarters and give nothing in return! This was wrong, very wrong, and you could see the state of denial and dismay forming. This was NOT how things were supposed to be. Sad.

Four years old andd already existence was playing cruel tricks.

She was exceptionally well-behaved. Very modulated, not tantrumic, and keen to help her daddy doing laundry. The complete failure of the universe to deliver rewards for swallowed quarters was freakish, but she did not pout. After helping him load the washer they went across the street and bought a packet of cookies from the store. When they came back she turned her attention to the drinks machine, and he purchased a can of sparkling water for them to share (probably because he know what too much sugar can do).

Turns out the "parkling wadder" was too "parkly"!

Judging by her uterances and comportment, she has the best parents in the world and will grow up to be a sparkling and pleasant member of society. An adorable little person. Intelligent and personable.

Yeah, normally I am not enchanted with little people.

So it turns out that uncle grumpy Dutch American actually did not mind the distraction of a lively little person in the laundromat while he was washing his grungies and trying to turn his mind inside out while waiting for the machine to finish.

[When there I often meditate and tune out other people and their noise.]

Also, I noticed that there was a person out of it outside, playing in traffic on the intersection. Whose stoned or batshit life was preserved through sheer good luck, low vehicle count, and the fact that Waymo robot taxis are programmed not to drive over random humans, even if they're far more random than is good for them.

He came close to the door several times, but though wide open it proved a complicated concept, and he did not come inside even though he could see the seating, and the brightness, and the neat comfy floors.

When I left with my clean clothes the daddy and his tyke were still there, and the random fellow was sleeping on the sidewalk.



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THE TROLL ZONE

Once you get past the bend near the fortress-like educational institution the city gets depressing as hell. Which means that to contrast with that the eating establishments are cheerier. I had finished my errands, and went out into the Sunset District on a journey of discovery. By mid-afternoon it starts gettin gloomy out there, and I was peckish.
I think the next time I do that I'll look up a likely chachanteng.

There are many crêpe places out there. I did not feel like crêpes.
I am not greatly enamoured of expensive pannekoeken.
Or yogurt. Fruit slushies. Bubble tea drinks.
Five pizzerias in two blocks.

The restaurant area peters out, and the fog begins. Grey buildings, grumpy liquour store owners who don't speak English, Dutch, or any other civilized language. Chiropractors, insurance offices, nail salons, and hairdressers. Slovenly looking teenagers.
Access and decess by request.


There's a hump in the terrain beyond which everything turns ugly.

Several people, seeing my tobacco pipe, looked disapproving. It was a very handsome pipe, black sandblast taper-stemmed straight billiard, in excellent condition. A classic example. They had no business scowling so. Their grandfather or uncle would have been quite pleased to own it. Back in the day.

Fewer nuts on the bus. But also fewer actual human beings. Some remarkable examples of large. Plain pallid faces, pale because of the lack of sunlight, and blah because there were no thoughts behind the vacant eyes.

When I said large, I meant extra large.
Slav-o-celtic bone structure.
Puce personalities.


On the other hand, there are Burmese and Vietnamese restaurants out there, along with Indian food places. Plus coffee. Lots of coffee. So it's not all bad.



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SNAKE WORSHIPPING HEATHENS!

A discussion on the internet had interesting things to say anent the recent election in New York City. I shall quote it unattributed.

Spouse of a preacher: "Accusing Mamdani, a Twelver Shi’ite, of supporting Salafi jihadism is kind of like accusing a Roman Catholic of supporting the Orange Order. But then the idea that Islam is no more monolithic than Christianity is apparently too much for some people to grasp."

Person with an umlaut: "A lot of people barely grasp the fact Christianity is not monolithic."

Opinionated Dutch American: "Then they haven't met my people. Who are convinced that everyone else is a heretic, an idolater, or an agent of the Spanish. Or, even worse, Anabaptists. Let us NOT even speak of Charismatics or Evangelicals!"

Opinion Dutch American again: "And then there's that sad Jehova's Witness downstairs, to whom I give fresh fruit or veggies every week (she's old), who is convinced that as a stubborn Dutchman I will go to hell (and probably ruin the place)."

Look, if you think that the Christian of a different sect next door sees eye to eye with you, you are daft and ignorant of your own subset of frightful heresy which must be expunged brutally with fire, swords, and modern weaponry. If he does see eye to eye with you despite being a different type of heretic, he too is ignorant, expunge worthy, and will end up in hell. Where both of you will discover that Opinionated Dutch Americans have taken over the place and hold sway. Hell is too good for you. We'll make that damned clear.


And NO speaking in tongues!



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THOUGHTS AFTER TEA TIME

The reason why there are no lobster space aliens on this planet is that the Cantonese women ate them all. They probably landed in Guangzhou or Hong Kong -- let's pick an advanced and civilized metropolis, one of them said and the others agreed -- and before they knew it hordes of crustacean-loving women descended upon them, clacking chopsticks and spatulas, and turned their spacecraft upside down and made giant woks out of them.

Cantonese women, it is well known, have deep and flexible stomachs. Unlike white people, who can barely eat at all. I know this because my apartment mate, a Cantonese woman, is afraid that I'm starving. Starving! "I'm full", I will say, such as for instance this past Monday evening when we we're belatedly celebrating my birthday (which had actually occured a few weeks ago), whereupon she looked at me reproachfully because I barely made a dent in the food on the table. Rice (飯 'faan'), steamed pork patty with salted egg (鹹蛋蒸豬肉餅 'haam daan jeng yiuk beng'), fried tofu and mushrooms (炸豆腐同蘑菇 'ja tau fu tong mo gu'), and pig knuckle with fermented tofu (南乳豬手 'naam yü chü sau').

It was all delicious. But too much. Only one of us is a Cantonese woman.
Once I translated the specials, she especially wanted the knuckle.
Fermented tofu makes a great gravy.

Afterwards, sated, we waddled home. With tonnes of leftovers.
The refrigerator is packed to the rafters.
Mmm, pork patty!

This all came to mind because the gentleman whom I see occasionally at the bakery was there again with his little daughter. Emphasis on 'little'. Although she must be four of five by now. She will grow up to be a Cantonese woman, with an enduring hunger, with jaws that bite and the claws that catch. Someone for whom chopsticks are an extension of the soul. Clackity clackity! She'll clearly be still fairly small comparatively speaking when fully grown, but if a white woman could see how much she and her female kin will put away without effort, gaining no weight, she'd be insanely jealous. Then loose it when the small person exclaims "we've hardly eaten!"


Yep. The lobster aliens from planet Bisque stood no chance. They were gone before they knew what hit them. Next time, land In England, where there are no gourmands.



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NEW YORK NEW YORK

Over on Facebook the usual 'doom'ngloomantimamdani' folks who were screaming about the antiChrist made flesh, oh no, whatever shall we do, are oddly silent. Perhaps they choked on their bile. Or it's the end of times and fire is raining from their skies, their rivers are running with blood, and strange terrifying creatures are taking over their back yard.

Here in San Francisco, the sun just came out. The rain appears to have stopped. Time to do my laundry and bleach my 'Stalinist Mayhem' tee-shirt lily white.

New York City hasn't been the same since we let in all those damned non-Dutch speaking heathen English speakers. The ONLY good thing there is the pizza. And the museums. And the public library. For the rest, it's a shithole. For years I got to hear about the wonders of their damned bagels, why, these were manna from heaven the best thing ever all of you haven't had real bagels or corned beef sandwiches or sparkling selzer and "real" Chinese food plus bodegas, you poor schmucks you haven't even lived till you've eaten miserable hot dogs flavoured with nothing but onions mustard and stale cart water ......

And now the people that live there have just told you to go piss up a rope.

Who are the schmendricks now, you patzers?

It's time for all of you to wake up and smell the caffeinated beverage. The rest of us don't care about an overcrowded stinking metropolis with the world's largest sewer rats, cockroaches, and child-molesting real estate developers. Farshtey?

Exception being a very close friend who is heading there in two weeks, as he does every year, to eat well and spend hours at The Strand Bookstore. And the East Village. And Chinatown. And the Museums. Pilgrimage. Possibly schmalz herring.



MINOR POSTCRIPTVE RAMBLING

My plans today are, after laundry, eating lunch in Chinatown at a place favoured by families and elderly people, overwhelmingly non-caucasian, then grocery shopping, followed by milk tea, pastry, and conversation with deaf old geezers in an environment where Toishanese is the dominant language. Can't do that next week because I'll be getting ready to show up at a medical facility before the crack of dawn having fasted for twelve hours for a minor procedure during which they don't want me choking on what I ate the day before when they stick a breathing tube down my throat or whatever.

The good thing is I'll catch up on my sleep while I'm under, and should be up and walking again within hours. Though avoiding tobacco because nicotine is inimical to the restorative processes, which does not please me one bit. I will (probably) be not smoking for a few days afterwards. Expect some mighty peculiar and bitchy blog posts during that time. The last time that I 'quit' I lost several friends and we bombed somewhere. Besides mass protests and assaults on personal liberty. And food poisoning at various franchises.
Where I wouldn't eat if you paid me. Feh.
You've been warned.


Pizza and cheesecake help you heal. Very New York.
I've also heard good reports about hot dogs.
But only with onions and mustard.
Plus stale cart water.



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IT'S ALIVE!

Respiratory distress, hypoxemia, syncope. Over on a nursing website I saw mention of an elderly patient with all three of those on his admission chart. During a slow moment he asked if he could step outside for a smoke. No, I myself am nowhere near that. But if it had been possible I would have liked to have been outside the lab having a ciggie while inside they were trying to find a promising vein for a blood sample. Jabbity jabbity.

Tests:
1. CBC w/Plts (No Diff) (CBCO)
2. PT, PTT, INR
3. Complete Metabolic Panel (CMP)

They didn't even bother checking if I was alive! For all they knew, I could have been suffering from COPD, with a pulsox of 0%, HR similarly at 0, and RR also 0. At which point the chart would read that the patient is dead, the patient is not living, the patient is not alive, the patient is deceased, gone to meet his maker, he has kicked the bucket and joined the choir invisible, he's pushing up the daisies, and having breathed his last he is no more, and rests in peace.

At the very least, hold a mirror up to my nose to see if I'm breathing and have a reflection.

Oh wait. My exclamation when the needle went in proved that I'm alive.
Or at least it established sensitivity and sentience.

It was hallowe'en very recently. You never know what is roaming those dark San Francisco streets looking for a blood lab. But I suppose they're more worried about hopping vampires and drug addicts. According to Fox News those are all over the downtown.

After visiting the lab I had pork siu mai (豬肉燒賣) and pan-gilded turnip cake (蘿蔔糕 'lo paak gou') a block away, then decided to take the bus up hill five blocks to my polling place. The bus took a long time to come and was rerouted, because a fallen tree had blocked the street. Did I ever mention I hate walking up hill? Bum leg. Imagine that last stretch "illuminated" by multilingual cursing (mostly in Dutch). That same bus problem still hadn't been resolved later in the evening, so there was a longer wait than usual. I wished I had brought two pipes.

Tomorrow morning's commute will be surreal for a number of people. I shan't modify my routine, as I expect that by late afternoon it will have cleared up. Lunch, smoke a pipe, shopping, teatime, another pipe.

And I will periodically gloat to myself over the election results, which can be seen as a massive finger to Trump, MAGA, and Texas. Well-deserved.



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THE FABULOUS STATE OF KENTUCKY

Kentucky ranks higher in literacy than Texas, but lower than Florida. It's also higher than the national average. Which should give you some perspective, and tell you that as a nation we're not doing so well. Frankly, Scarlet, we're hosed.


"We’re getting calls about polls being closed. They are closed because we do not have elections today. Kentucky votes next year. You cannot vote today in Kentucky for the mayor of New York City or the Governor of Virginia. Sorry."
----- Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams.


Many people in Kentucky actually know how to spell words on one syllable. And sometimes (not often) two. In Florida they go up to three when feeling adventurous, in Texas they usually do so in fits of braggadocio and insane over-confidence.
And when they have faith in Jesus.

They do not always have faith in Jesus.
They've heard bad things about him.
It seems he wasn't a Christian.

This is a picture of Northern California scenery. In Northern California we frequently use, and write, words of four or even five syllables. Pinot Grigio is five. Cabernet Sauvignon likewise. Sauvignon Blanc is four, Roma Wines either four or three, and bourbon doesn't exist.


Sometimes we even go up to six (Acapella Goat Cheese)!


Something makes me think that neither the future mayor of New York (two), nor the next governor of Virginia (four), is on the ballot here. It's just a suspicion.

This isn't Kentucky (three).



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GATOR, POSSUM, AND SPARKLING WINE

During the first pipe of the day, smoked while walking around Leavenworth and Jackson, three things went through my mind: the passing of Dick Cheney, Mike Johnson's love of Hallowe'en parties, and a bloodtest which is required before a peripheral angioplasty of the lower dextral appendage may proceed.

Dick Cheney will be forever remembered as a great hunter with superlative aim.

Mike Johnson wasn't invited to the great Gatsby-themed Hallowe'en party, because he's a schmendrick, but he loves the concept. The frisson of over-the-top fin du siecle decadence while millions of his fellow-southerners go hungry is almost irresistible, and he hopes he wangles an invite next year. Oh, it's magic. The acme of madcappery and festivity!
He's got a suit! Next year! Nebbech.

I'm guessing so much coke was snorted that they could have knocked out a small town in Texas. Cocaine, as you know, is a fancy import, like champagne and caviar. Poor people, like all those Southerners now not getting supplemental nutrition benefits or medical care, have to make do with trailerpark methamphetamine, and sparkling wine.
Ginger ale and bubbly apple cider for the kiddies.
It's what Jesus would do.

Sparkling wine comes from California.
So this totally works for us.
Thanks, Mike.

You know, there's a theory that Mike Johnson is closely related to himself, like so many people where he comes from. Unfortunate, but it would explain a lot.



Perhaps I should lay off people from the South. Many fine people come from there, and they honestly can't be blamed for their very tight families. America has benefitted (a lot) from associating with them, and it's honestly been very eductional.
We have learned so much.

Grits. And where would we be without grits?

Dick Cheney spent much time there.
That accounts for his aim.



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