NO POINT IN BEING COY

Might as well get it out into the open: today is my birthday, I'm early sixties, there will be cake, but absolutely no wild abandon. As one commenter on my FB page said, a year closer to death. And seeing as I have a pipe tobacco stockpile which I intend to enjoy completely, I must live till I'm in my nineties. I shall be relying on the folks at Chinese Hospital to make sure of that; they'll hear from me if I don't.

Going down there later this morning to pick up some of my bloodpressure meds.

One question they ALWAYS ask us old farts is "when is your birthday?"

就係今日啦！

Yeah, um, okay.

They ask it because it helps them find us in the system, and it's also a good way to check our mental condition. Is the decrepit old fossil still (relatively) compos mentis, or is he/she starting to lose his/her faculties?

Ladies, I am still in full control of said faculties, more so than ever before, and they weren't any great shakes to begin with. Practice makes perfect.

And please don't expect philosophical insights on being a year older. If there weren't any deep thoughts before, there won't be any today either.


Several times I've had to impress upon my apartment mate that she should NOT purchase something scrumptuous to eat for my birthday. She's Chinese American, and considers food (and far too much of it) festive, and agrees with the turkey vulture that I am too scrawny. But there is absolutely no room in the refrigerator for left-overs (she's Chinese American), half the time I eat elsewhere, and I do only one main meal a day, plus if I eat too much I'll want to take a long nap. Getting older means your metabolism slows down. I am a lizard.
Besides, I don't want wastage.

Sometime next week I'll probably celebrate my advancing decrepitude with a burger or sumpin'. Is there actually a burger joint in SF which also has milk tea? As well as real cheese, not that queer substance Americans think of when burgers are mentioned?

No, a milk shake with it, as would be traditional, would wire me to the tits and put me to sleep immediately. Wait staff in this city are trained to put twitchy somnabulistic people out with the recycling, after rifling their pockets for candy and spare change. Every day there are bags of old folks sleeping next to the garbage, often in the black plastic bins for landfill.

You can hear arthritic creaking from the receptacles, if you listen closely.


The other day I watched an elderly gentleman at the next table chowing down on Hong Kong style French Toast, two slices of white bread, a plate of fried noodles, cheung fan, and a big bowl of plain congee. Jayzus, man, that's some serious starch only, right there. No nutrition whatsoever. Inevitable constipation; at your age you need to worry about that. I hope you have metamucil at home. What you need is meat and veggies, put some flesh on those rickety old bones. Your stuffed turkey vulture will thank you.

Early sixties is NOT old. I'm barely middleaged.

I still listen to Kool And The Gang.


[No, I don't like The Grateful Dead. That's senile old hippy music.]


There will be cake later.
She promised.



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