One of my key survival strategies is that I can and will take over the conversation, rather than letting others dominate it and blather.
Little White Nipple Guy is sort of the exception. When I absolutely cannot avoid interacting with him, I'll throw out little prods and pokes to help him realize his full potential as the big loud gibbering elephant in the room. Which, being a man with loose wires, never fails to bring out the flower within. This is all I can do for him.
[One or two readers will realize that I am quoting Any Lau here. And I'm sure situations like these are exactly what Andy Lau was referring to. Have you ever read his lyrics?
He's the wild sugar-crazed fruitbat of Canto-pop.]
One thing I often return to is the idea that your briar pipes are rather like your favourite boxer shorts. Yes, they look dashing, and howdy Jeebus are they comfortable! But they benefit from a good cleaning regularly, and should probably not be worn day in day out. Hence keeping a number of them in rotation, and making sure that you use plenty of pipe-cleaners.
Surely you don't want swamp on a stick four inches from your nose?
So you will understand that during my Weekends (Tuesday and Wednesday, as well as Friday), the pipes in my coat pocket when I head down to Chinatown in the afternoon for something to eat and a cup of hot Hong Kong Milk Tea will be carefully chosen. There are several that are specific to C'town usage, especially 'The Pipe For Watching Rats in Spofford Alley'.
[There are also pipes I will never bring to work, for fear that they will be jinxed by doing so. They could acquire associated moods and memories which might spoil the pleasure of touching, feeling, seeing, or smoking them.]
I sometimes say that pipe smoking is perfect for neurotic people.
Please do not feel free to riff off of that thought.
We've already explored the concept.
Extremely thoroughly.
My friend Neil has a number of pipes that remind him of events and places from years ago, as well as the tobacco he smoked then. Using those pipes brings back those memories, and he'll pensively speak of them at times.
Some pipes, some tobaccos, pull my mind back to summer evenings near the St. John's church in Valkenswaard, or rainy days at the train station in Tilburg, Indonesian restaurants in Den Haag (oh boy, maybe I should cook something with garlic, chilies, and tamarind, this evening), or even watching a man with two live cellphones nearly get run over on Sansome Street.
One pipe always reminds me of an old gentleman requiring an ambulance and Cantonese speaking emergency medical technicians on Grant and Clay in Chinatown, similar to a memory associated with 'The Pipe For Watching Rats in Spofford Alley', when Spofford was still a long trench with plank walkways (that was when the city was revamping it to make it more attractive for the tourists; the inefficient project benefitted the local rat population immensely). Ambulance technicians had a hard time moving a stretcher down narrow stairs onto the walkway, then carrying it gingerly through the obstacle course to Washington Street in the rain that night. The city should have been sued for letting the digging go on for so long and at so slow a pace. Doing so was extremely irresponsible of them.
It may actually have been murderous.
Nearly a year later almost no progress was evident.
But they finally gassed the rats.
[Rats, everybody agrees, are bad for the tourist trade. As well as bad for business in general. Though they immensely entertain pipe smokers, who might thoughtfully observe them for half an hour late at night.]
My plans today involve laundry (see aforementioned boxer shorts), lunch, and wandering around the alleyways for a while. A Virginia mixture which will remind me of good weather several years ago, down near the Pyramid, the fresh green of new leaves on the ginkgo trees, and the quietness of the Financial District on Sunday afternoons.
Then home for a long nap.
Tomorrow I'm taking a small Peterson Canadian from the early sixties (the confluence of different stamping on the shank suggests that era) with me for after my doctor's appointment, and I plan specifically to have bittermelon omelette over rice for lunch in Chinatown later.
The days are sunny now, but it is still too cold for normal people.
It will probably rain again later in the week. Bah.
I'm looking forward to warmer weather.
TOBACCO INDEX
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4 comments:
I've found that cigarette brands tend to remind one of certain eras in life. Newports are the remnant of my days in high school, furtively sucking on a cigarette before the bus arrived to take me to school.
Camels were university. Slightly more sophisticated. Coffee rather than Coca-Cola. Beginning to appreciate beer other than PBR.
Marlboro Reds? That unfortunate redneck I dated specifically to rebel against my highly educated family.
Gauloises were for when I was peak wannabe French, complete with skinny scarf and beret and peacoat.
After that, I settled for what was cheap.
Nostalgia can be fun, tho.
Most of us remember Camels fondly. Either that or the commercials informing us that "more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette, in fact, doctors all across the country, in all branches of medicine, when asked ... "
Gauloises were an indulgence at the Caffè Mediterraneum during my Berkeley days. Sadly, they are no longer available in the United States.
It's tragic that Gauloises are no longer available in the States, so that young wannabe French people cannot so effectively pollute their lungs whilst reading Sartre and Camus and wearing peacoats.
I forgot to mention that I had a Rothmans phase when working at an art museum. That was quite pleasant indeed.
Ah yes, Rothmans Internationals. For a while I liked three castles, non filter. There were also State Express 555 non-filter, when I first lived in North Beach. Every Vietnamese business had them at low price. But they were good.
There you are, on a gun boat in the Delta ...
Where, of course, I never was, and never would have wanted to be.
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