Nothing particularly surprising there.
And other than eating at the dimsummery where they know me, I did not spend much time on Stockton Street. It was windy, and I do not need to do any grocery shopping today.
The single middle-aged pipe-smoker (me) does not purchase very much food; for one person, even with several meals at home, there's not much that is required. There are only so many fascinating new ingredients that one can play with.
If I were a householder, I would probably freak out my kin, however.
"What is it?"
"Something black and fungoid. Try it!"
"No way. Damn you, why can't we have burgers for once?"
And so, once again, there would be more for me, and I would make loud vulgar smacking sounds as I enjoyed my own culinary genius. The others at the table, ESPECIALLY the wee ones, would look on resentfully, while thinking of grey cow meat between sponges.
Can't really do that as a single man; it echoes a bit.
On the other hand, everything with hot sauce is distinctly possible.
Everything.
In San Francisco, most of us who are not involved in a relationship, or not eating with family, dump buckets of saucy stuff on our food. We maintain little condiment ghettos where the packets of soy sauce or mustard (and ketchup, for the aforementioned grey cow) we didn't use yet live.
Someday they will be needed.
After the next earthquake and tidal wave we'll trade them for penicillin and women's stockings. Plus apples and chocolate.
I figure that with two or three extra bottles of Sriracha, mayonnaise, plus a jerry can or two of cooking oil and soy sauce, I can be the next gangster kingpin of San Francisco.
I'll make a killing.
I have been single for about five years now.
On the plus side, I always get to eat porky substances with hot sauce whenever I want. Within reason, of course, not late at night; dimsum is strictly a daytime thing. And I also get to wander the streets of Nob, Russian, and Telegraph with a pipe in my mouth admiring the fading late afternoon light, or the fog slithering in from the ocean.
Altogether very poetic.
[Actually, given the beastly weather, the wandering around amounts mostly to huddling in a doorway out of the wind while watching tourists shivering from a distance. San Francisco in the summer is a frigid grey place, with bitter winds.]
On the minus side, well, there's no cuddles.
That's kind of a downer.
"You know why the sea is salty? That's from the tears of thousands of sharks, who just want to be hugged!"
Still, porky substances, rice, hot sauce, and a pipe.
All over the city there are people who just wish they had that luxury. You know, married men, young mothers, high school seniors, gay men in complex multi-partner relationships, stubborn little girls, Indian computer programmers living in a house-hold of judgemental fratboys, medical personnel with images to uphold.....
DUDE...!
I haven't seen any shitty movies in years, either.
Two people can have such wildly different ideas about new releases that often they are not at all on the same page regarding Hollywood films.
I like The Big Lebowski, Apocalypse Now, and Monty Python And The Holy Grail, whereas deeply meaningful and sensitive stuff leaves me drained.
I saw King Of Masks over thirty times.
Now that's a real man's movie!
On the other hand, Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List, Good Will Hunting, The Shawshank Redemption, and The Talented Mr. Ripley never even got one trip to the theatre.
I did see The English Patient, Pretty Woman, and The Piano.
No intention of watching them ever again.
My idea of a perfect date, either with a new love (hoohah!) or someone longtime near-and-dear (yes, I'm giggling as I write this) is steamed fish for two, with rice, and some stir-fried bivalves with black-bean sauce, plus yauchoi, at a noisy Chinese restaurant -- I know just the place, four or five them in fact -- followed by a long stroll in the frigid summer twilight.
Both of us will be well-bundled up for warmth, and while I smoke an afterdinner pipe filled with a nice English flake, she'll enjoy either a cigarillo or a Davidoff Short Perfecto. Or maybe her own pipe.
Occassionally we'll see cats or raccoons.
The fog will shroud us all.
Afterwards, perhaps to the Caffe Trieste for a warm beverage.
The single person cannot eat a whole fish; it is usually too much.
That's actually a very good argument for romance.
Yes, this post is mislabelled.
Sorry for the tangent.
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