OCCASIONALLY ANCHOVIES

When I returned home the plaintive query came wailing from the other room: "fatty inner thighs?!?". The turkey vulture who often sleeps with other creatures and my apartment mate seems to believe that night-time San Francisco is a smorgasbord of yummy carrion. Sadly, it isn't. Stumbling wrecks on the cusp of death, yes, as well as yuppies drunk and insensate, likely to play in traffic or otherwise arrange their own blessed exit. But there are very few actual corpses wandering around. We tend to clean those up, lest the tourists have bad dreams.

Of course, if they go to the Tenderloin, they'll have bad dreams anyhow.
All "doomloop tours" start and end in the Tenderloin.
It's an ancient tradition.


There was a rather cute little woman on the bus talking to a coworker in Mandarin. After he got off, she looked a bit less cute. More tired and pensive. My apartment mate would not have considered her cute in the slightest in the first place, as she has a dislike of the sounds of Mandarin. When she was still a little girl growing up in Chinatown you never heard that language, it was Cantonese from Bush Street to Northbeach. When I first started infesting the neighborhood it was also still that way. But in the last two decades, more Mandarin speakers have arrived.

Spofford Alley (新呂宋巷 'san leui sung hong') and Ross Alley (舊呂宋巷 'gau leui sung hong') are still entirely Cantonese speaking. And other than the Christians (four whole shop fronts for their mission), solidly Mah Jong focused for the most part. Plus two flower shops, two barber shops, the Lim Family Association, and a Hakka social club as punctuation. A friend grew up on Spofford and still lives there. Another one lived above Ross, and for the past few decades has been further up hill, but still comes down to the neighborhood almost every day. They are both considerably older than myself. 我重係年輕人 ('ngo jong hai nin hing yan'; I am still a youngster).

Side note: because I still persist in walking, I still walk. Otherwise my arthritic hip and knee on the right leg side would stiffen the hell up and prevent me cussing up a storm late at night when I amble down the alleys smoking my pipe and observing the wildlife. My former regular care physician looked quite crestfallen when he realized that my main incentive to walk a lot was so that I could smoke. Being able to cuss keeps me limber.

Plus, as you would expect, a man needs to eat, and purchase foods that make him happy. Which requires walking, looking at produce, browsing for exciting condiments or dried stuff, finding interesting looking sauces and pastes ..... mesti punya sambal! 一定要有辣椒醬！


The bookseller, whom I meet once a week in this neighborhood, rarely incorporates sambal in his cooking. But does rely on a bottle of Sriracha to keep his food exciting. Chili sauce is an excellent source of fibre and vitamin C.

His taste in dried fish is more baccalà than haam yü, but he is otherwise quite normal.
Good food, good drink, and good reading material.
Occasionally, anchovies.



CORRECTION: The voice came from her room, but the turkey vulture was actually on my bed, with a panel of other roomies arrayed nearby looking at him with gimlet eyes.
Two amphibians, a skunk, a flattish lizard, a feisty rooster, and a hippo.
He has expressed an interest in eating the newest roomie.
A small black bat named Bartholomew.



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