TWIRLING, TWIRLING, TWIRLING

For over two decades the bookseller and I periodically end up strolling over Nob Hill at three in the morning. This is part of a tradition that goes back precisely to when I moved from North Beach to the back-end of the hill, where the pigeon population befouls the sidewalks.
But pigeons and slopes are only incidentally part of the tradition, and not really fundamental.
The tradition predates the pigeons and their poo.

It started when we regularly met after he got off work in the evening, at an eatery where I hung out chatting with the owner, and the bookseller would have a bite and join us for some red wine.


Now, you must understand that in North Beach, people know wine.
At least they claim they do, and they pay attention. Plus there is a large variety of fascinating red wine all over the place. So the chance of some fairly decent red plonk being offered is extraordinarily high.
And it is perfectly reasonable to expect a drinkable libation.

What Mikey serves can best be described as 'Chateau Du Bubbling Limburger Cheese'. Swill, and rather vile. Sludgy. Toxic tasting even at the best of times, and perfectly rancid during hot weather, when the box in which it come bulges alarmingly.

To the best of my knowledge no one has ever gotten toasted on it.
Which may well be the original point and purpose.
Mikey is a very cynical restaurateur.


[I'll omit telling you where his place is, because I do not want to scare you away. At least one television food maven loved it, and despite a strain of culinary cynicism a mile deep that has reached the second generation, Mikey and his folks are good people. Truth be told, it's more viticultural barbarism than a food-related condition.]



Pacific Avenue is both serene and beautiful in the very early hours after midnight. There are parts with trees and beams of fractured streetlight, and some interesting choices of housepaint are on display. Colours you would not expect in a city-scape. Deep blood reds, pinks, oranges, and lime greens, though the dominant hues are mustard, muddy, and something that a pigeon would love.

Narrow alleyways, steps and stairs, wavy pavement, Dickensian basements, and art spaces with strange things in the window.

At three A.M. the only other creatures to share the city are tipsy young men -- few enough, and often trotting off to an assignation involving something misguided of the feminine gender and/or a bottle -- plus the occasional loony and raccoon, cat, or very large self-confident rodent.
The raccoons have regular routes, and aren't willing to share food.
The cats skulk, looking furtive and guilty; they're weird.
Once a startled rat fell out of a tree.
We had kicked the trunk.

The rat did not expect that, and we did not expect the rat.
Had we shared a language there would have been apologies all round. Instead, all three of us looked stupid for a few minutes, ere pretending that no, it didn't happen, you're imagining things, figment dear fellow, please look somewhere else now la la la.



At some point soon the tradition may have to change. The owner of the last place we stop at is a riotously misbehaving type, and the fuzz will shut the bar down eventually, for any one of a number of infractions.
It is most certainly NOT a well-ordered establishment, having in the last four years become the very pit of inequity.

We are mature individuals, we do not need craziness.

We used to go there for a quite last drink after hours.
Now we go there as social anthropologists.
I can't believe what I just saw!
Good freaking lord.

It didn't used to be like that. It was once peaceful.
But the proprietor has discovered tequila.
Life will never be the same.


Truth be told, the rot was written on the wall when the karaoke
machine was wheeled in. Karaoke encourages licentiousness,
screaming, egomania, and twirled panties on top of tables.

Well actually, that last part is pure wishful thinking.

But the prospect keeps us coming back.


It hasn't happened yet, but every week we see something entirely new, and nearly unbelievable. One of these days, it just may be panties!
One can but hope.


We are mature individuals.



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