REVOLTING WILDLIFE

This blogger does not like hot weather. It's uncomfortable, it attacks my legs and upper back, and it encourages people to dress horrifically. I mean, some men my age should never wear shorts because the world isn't ready for that. I'm not ready for that. Jeff, cover up those pasty damned gams of yours before you scare the horses or a dog bites them. And your calves. And those oedematous ankles.

Also try to sit in a way that does not show us the light at the end of the tunnel

When I came home yesterday I was convinced of two things. The first is that I am a saint, a veritable mahatma, and damned well need to be venerated, having put up with an enormous amount of senile old right winger gibbering, including one dude who wet his trousers without being aware of that. Dang I'm such a perfect Christian (without actually being Christian)! The second is that this is the year that we do the peripheral angioplasty. No matter what.

A peripheral angioplasty on the lower extremities is, according to the internet, an in-and-out procedure. Problem is that they might give me valium to keep me from twitching on the table.

Which means that they won't let me stumble out of there on my own steam till the valium has entirely worn off. They probably won't even tell me where they put my clothing until several hours afterwards, so any premature escaping will necessitate dressing horrifically. And no, I am absolutely certain that the senile old rightwingers previously mentioned were NOT on valium, dammit.

But they should have been.

Dude peed in his pants, godverdomme! And then continued blithely on, totally unaware of the spreading wetness. His car must smell educational and interesting. Why don't some of these crapulent old frowsts lose the way or wander off into the salt flats to feed the seagulls? Why aren't there big brutish seagulls that can get them down and peck at them like they're so much crappy day-old ham and pineapple pizza?

Why am I not licensed to administer valium and stun grenades?



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THEY ARE THE BORG, AND BAD AT THAT

Too much of yesterday was spent trying to pay a bill to a company that now requires an extra step of authentication, and has only robotic intelligence at the end of the help line. If that is the best that AI can do we humans have no reason to fear. The droids will never find us.


On the other hand, I also needed to do stuff down in Chinatown. Speaking to real humans, with flexible human sentience. And thoughtful responses. And facial recognition!
They didn't even ask to scan my retinas!

There was also a young lady at the bus stop when I got off at Powell Street with the loveliest and most radiant smile. Which changed my mood entirely. As one would expect.

Yes, she was Chinese American, and no, she wasn't one of the people with whom I needed to speak. Although that may change if I encounter her again. And manage to talk intelligently.

That's always an iffy question.

In all honesty I'm awful at small talk.

Years ago, after we moved to Valkenswaard when I was five, I was invited to another child's birthday party. I spent several hours hiding under the table where the draped tablecloth hid me and thus forestalled the need to talk with anyone.

That methodology, while memorable, is hardly the way to make a positive impression.
And sadly, the city is not littered with festive tables properly covered.
Possibly that would be a major civic improvement.
And I should probably suggest it.


Perhaps a strongly worded letter to the editor will do the trick.



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THE LIZARD PEOPLE

Passive aggressive? You betcha. While it's tempting to fight with maga-scum over the internet, it's also a complete waste of time. Do really want to have a conversation with a desperately lonely incel for whom spelling and grammar are foreign concepts? Most of the Magites who comment under Newspaper articles on the internet are simply troll-accounts anyway. Profiles with no friends, no hobbies, no interests, too much shitty beer next to their computer, and fond memories of when they were still a rising high-school football star.

People who often have dreams of Karoline Leavitt.

Or Sebastian Gorka. Oily and genderless.

There's a long-haul truckdriver criss-crossing this country with stanky aromatic tobacco in his corncob who harboured lust like that years before it became common-place. I sometimes wonder what became of him. He's active in several pipe-forums, where I would occasionally encounter him while lurking using an alter-ego (necessitated when Facebook banned me for a month because of the useful and pungent phrase "stupid effing white people").
A pathetic pudgy man. Bloated. A Christian.

In the main, I do not like my fellow citizens. Too many of them voted for Trump.

Bad taste and stupidity are depressingly common -- just look at the most popular beers, foods, and pipe tobaccos in this country, ghastly shite is over eighty percent of the market, nondeju -- and most Americans haven't read a book since the Obama presidency.
Sorry, colouring books don't count.


By the way: years ago someone asked me "what do you do with all those books?"
That person, mercifully, disappeared from my life. Wasn't in it long anyway.
One cannot always choose one's coworkers. Which is unfortunate.



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MUSHROOM POWER

According to the western version of ayurveda, you are supposed to drink mushroom coffee in the morning to wake up better, revitalize your aura, and kickstart peristalsis. It's mystical.
This confirms that some white people are out of their goofy minds.

There are several mushroom beverages advertised on the internet.
Minor celebrities have written testimonials.


As a complete non-celebrity, I don't have to do that. I haven't invested in the products, and don't have to busk them. So I suggest real coffee instead. It also peristaltifies.

Even better, a walk around the neighborhood with a pipeful of fine tobacco at the crack of dawn, more or less, AFTER that first cup of coffee, benefits your aura monumentally, and might also do things that are mystical. You should try it.

Minor celebrity peristalsis is overrated.

Cream of mushroom soup is not a substitute for coffee.

On the other hand, an intense mushroom broth with a splash of sherry and little juicy pork meatballs, with some hot buttered toast on the side, does sound rather nice right now.

Might have just invented a new wake-up ritual.

Bugger minor celebrities.



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FEASTING ON HARDSHIP

Lunch, lottery ticket, shopping, teatime, and buying bakchang. That last spur of the moment, because the dragon boat festival is coming up, this Saturday, the 31st. of May, 2025 (端午節 'tuen ng jit'). Bakchang (肉粽), known as 'jung' in Cantonese, are a traditional food (一種傳統食品) during 端午節。But that was not why I bought them. The person selling them spoke Mandarin. Usually the aunties selling 粽 speak either the hometown dialect or regular city speech. And they were more pointy than what I'm used to. So they might taste different.

Why not? Try 'em!

Oh yes, tradition and all of that. Tradition is very important. Cultural maintaining, transmitting, and continuing. Precisely why I eat at the same restaurant on Wednesday and have my tea and a pastry at the same bakery. Which is micro-level tradition.
It's important, AND a neurotic habit.

Besides, I like bakchang.

There's even a song about them in Hokkien (燒肉粽) which speaks of hardship, heart ache, suffering, endurance, and so forth. Everything that Hokkiens like to weep operatically about.
The Cantonese are different. Instead of lyrically moaning about all that, they'll cuss, swear, vituperate, and harangue up a storm. It's probably more effective, albeit just as theatrical. And why not buy these? No one selling them on the street is living well, they're doing it to make ends meet. An honest decent product, at a ridiculously low price.

Glutinous rice, fatty pork, a salted egg yolk, and either lok dau or faa sang.
Eat with a drizzle soy sauce, dollops sambal also can.

There's nothing high-fallutin' about such food.
But it has soul. It satisfies.

I'll probably have one tomorrow morning before picking up my refills.



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BEEHIVES AND FRENCH DIPS

My apartment mate came wandering into my room to feed the turkey vulture some of her breakfast; a hot apple turnover with cold vanilla icecream. Which is one of those American things that while I like it is not something I would ever think of eating unless someone gave me the idea. Her tastes, in all likelihood, were formed by the Woolworth's lunch counter,
That being the nearest thing to a soda fountain when she was growing up.

I knew what soda fountains were, my mother had spoken fondly about them, and I had encountered them in books, while we lived overseas. But I never experienced them myself. They had disappeared by the time I came back to the States. My memories of Woolworth's were buying a Peterson System Standard briar pipe at the tobacco counter.
It was only about twenty five dollars. An enormous amount.

The Woolworth's lunch counter was still there for over a decade longer. I can remember having coffee, a toasted French dip sandwich with fries, and a smoke there.

My apartment mate also really loves rootbeer floats.
Again, something I might have if suggested.
But not indulge in otherwise.

The Woolworth's in Chinatown was small and pokey compared to the big one downtown at Market and Powell. They have both been gone for a long time now, and you can't even tell where they were. The bakeries with lunchcounters no longer exist either. And you can no longer light up after you've eaten unless you step outside and associate with the bums and drug addicts who were once invisible.

Oh heck, boba tea hadn't been invented then, and young ladies were innocent virgins into their eighties. Okay? It was a different world. Barely after the sock-hop and poodle skirt era, hippies still smelled of patchouli, and their moms all had beehive hairdos.


There are extra apple turnovers in the kitchen. I may have one this evening. Probably not with vanilla icecream, though there is a tub of that in the freezer.

I haven't seen a French dip in aeons.



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RANDOMLY SLAGGING TENNESSEE

For a long time I thought some selfish bastard had let his dog do there. But a closer look indicated that someone had dropped their fried food. I still don't know exactly what it was, though. Probably something American, and as I am not a tourist visiting from Iowa I did not recognize it at all. What I'm fairly certain of is that it did not come from any of the six or seven nearby restaurants. Which all serve Hong Kong Chinese food. It could have been an attempt at the typical Dutch unidentifiable fried object -- no discernible bones -- but it looked way too oily for that. So I'm baffled. Who brings fried food into Chinatown? There's better stuff than frito-muck widely available. There's even popcorn chicken for the Anglo teenagers, for heaven's sake.


And I know the nearby restaurants. I've eaten at all of them. One of them even today, and another one is my regular Wednesday luncheon place. Both of them do fun porkchops, by the way. Both of them are day-time restaurants, so chops for dinner are, sadly, out of the question. But breakfast, can do.

I'll blame the owners of the four door from Tennessee parked in that block.
They could be capable of anything. I've heard about Tennessee.
The only source of genetic diversity there is mutation.
Or half-human cryptids. And congressmen.
Sometimes lost Midwesterners.
Get them drunk first.

Yeah, okay, I've never been to Tennessee. I've deliberately avoided all the interior states. I'd probably starve there. It's basically grits and greasy fried possum from Sparks, Nevada, all the way to Boston, right? Washed down with ice tea and a menthol cigarette.

And just like whenever I visited England I would have to bring my own sambal. In all fairness, if I ever visit France again I might have to do that too, and in Scotland and Ireland that might be the only thing edible in any case. Turnips and sheep offal.

According to commentators on a food site I visited recently, they don't have decent bacon, maple syrup, or diabetes anywhere in the British Isles. Those are all American problems. Which they thoroughly despise. Apparently they only eat at McDonalds because they're forced to. Really, they'd rather eat fish and chips. That's real food, and healthy!


Ummmmmm.


I had returned to Chinatown a few hours after lunch (something a British expat in HK might eat) to smoke my pipe while waiting for my friend. Some of the homeless people who had appeared after dark were real iffy types. The kind of hoboes who refuse all help, and have substantially lost whatever minds they once had. One of them had built himself a fort out of carboard boxes, another one had constructed a teepee. Which is all understandable, because it gets cold at night.

A tourist family gingerly stepped around things, while people reading their text messages stepped right into them. Unspeakable things.

The karaoke joint was filled with lost souls in torment.
Miss Vivien's was empty when we walked in.
Guiness, Jameson's, and tea.

The same two goth white chicks who had passed me earlier got on the bus at the stop after ours. They had spent hours haunting Chinatown.

I hope they had a good time.



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THOUGHTS INSPIRED BY A CAT

My apartment mate has gone downstairs to feed our landlady's cat. And I think I've realized why they get along so well. They're both dysfunctional. Well, they are also both Cantonese Americans, which does not mean dysfunctional, necessarily, but I believe there is a higher degree of on the spectrum type characteristics among that ethnic group for their gender. No, I shan't state that aloud in the presence of either woman (or any other Cantonese American female), because I do not want something thrown at me. My experience is that they aim well, with great force. And don't ask.

As a Dutch American, descended from New Amsterdammers, I am naturally at least one hundred percent normal. Despite my family tree being more like interlocking shrubbery than an actual tree. About which we shall not talk because our interrelationships and cousins of cousins are none of your business.

In their cases, it's generations of salt smugglers, gamblers, and counterfeiters fleeing to the Southern borderlands to get away from snooty Northerners and imperial authority.
That, inevitably, concentrated certain genetic material.


I also have unique theories about people from the British Isles and their lack of tastebuds, as well as the French and their skunk-like body odour, but we shan't go there.
This is a clean blog, family friendly.

My first experience with Vietnamese drip-coffee years ago was at a place where everyone spoke Cantonese and the staff were all women. That was back in the day when every Vietnamese restaurant had a stack of State Express 555s Virginia straights no filter, smuggled in from HK or Singapore. You'd purchase coffee and a bánh mì, plus a fresh tin of ciggies, and then after eating you would dawdle over the coffee with your smokes.

This is mentioned in follow-up to my previous post in which I more or less expressed the desire that there be a Vietnamese coffeeshop nearby. Ideally with sandwiches with generous shmears of pâté in addition to the meats and pickled veggies. As well as sliced Jalapeños.

The lovely Virginia straights in their yellow tin are probably entirely gone, which is very unfortunate, but part of the old atmosphere can still be recovered. And this city is, thank heavens, totally filled with brilliant dysfunctionals.



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AND A CRISP NEWSPAPER

Quite a while ago a fellow pipe smoker mentioned a breakfast noodle preparation that he had eaten for lunch quite fondly. Which is what was lodged in my head this morning when I woke up. I rarely, almost never, eat noodles for breakfast. But from Central China all the way to the borders of Indo-China it's not unusual, however. Good stock, plus meat and noodles of any type, scallion or chives, with or without peanuts and a hard-boiled egg.
Plus, if I were doing it, chilipaste.

But I don't really eat breakfast. When I was still a teenager my preferred "breakfast" was one or two cups of strong coffee plus going out to smoke my pipe. Not the American or English breakfast, not the Dutch breakfast my classmates presumably had. And since returning to The States the only times I've really had breakfast is when I've been up several hours already and have had my coffee and the first smoke of the day.

Although I have enjoyed left-over pizza the next morning, which is hallowed by generations of college boys preparing for class. And I have sometimes headed over to C'town for dimsum, which is the Hong Kong lazy morning breakfast of choice.

Coffee, reading the news, pipe.
Breakfast of champions.

Intellectually I am fond of the idea of breakfast. Hot pork noodle soup with a view of a canal, birds tweeting, Spring weather, no one walking their dog at that hour, because any defecating pets will take away from the enjoyment of peace and quiet, plus quite possibly a crossword puzzle and a pipe afterwards, with a small cup of strong fragrant coffee. This is a cocktail of different geographies: Central China, Amsterdam, and Utrecht, plus Valkenswaard, Paris, Berkeley, North Beach in San Francisco, Manila, and Hong Kong.

If it's Vietnamese drip-coffee, this would be an entirely imaginary place on Nob Hill. One which doesn't exist yet, but I'm kind of hoping for an amazing confluence.
Tables in a dead-end, awning, smoking allowed.

Plus space heaters at the corners.
It's cold in the morning.

Maybe croissants.



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THE HEADLAND

Something on the internet reminded me of the area where I grew up. And though not a native of the place, my ancestors over five centuries ago came from that region. So there are still meaningful ties to to it, even though I've been back in the United States for decades.

Imagine a flat marshy boggy moorlike territory sparsely populated by smugglers and people only marginally sane. Plus painters, poets, and folks speaking gibberish.

If I had stayed there I'd probably be fat; eating fries everyday is one of the few things to do there. In addition to smoking, and consuming too much beer.


The one thing that would have been the same would have been my consumption of sambal, an essential condiment originally from Indonesia (the former Dutch East Indies). My handle on the Indonesian language would likely have been far better. Here in San Francisco there are far fewer people who speak it, and most of them don't really speak it habitually.

Many ex-Indonesians ended up in that area after the war.
For many of them it must have been a shock.
So much colder. And so much flatter.

DE KEMPEN (IN GREEN), BISECTED BY THE BORDER

Borders don't mean much to the natives. They're just something to smuggle stuff across.

And break laws on whichever side of that you find yourself.


The key difference is that you could find sambal in the shops to the north of the border, and if I remember correctly cheaper butter, booze, and tobacco, to the south. The food is better to the south. Nowadays life expectancy is ten years higher than the United States, but our average is pulled down considerably by the red states and their beastly habits and healthcare.
Literacy is also considerably higher over there.
In several languages.

The Kempen region is in its own way distinct, but not particularly unique. It's more or less a subcultural variant on the common Netherlandish pattern. In the west it fades gradually into Antwerpian mode, in the east it eventually becomes Limburgian, with better food and much greater tongue-jumble, at times quite blitheringly unintelligible.


*    *    *    *    *

This afternoon I spent a pleasant half hour at a bakery nearby in Chinatown, listening to Toishanese and Cantonese discussing Jung (粽), which are made of rice and a variety of other things wrapped into a conical tamale using bamboo leaves and steamed for several hours. The version most common here (a Canto area of the world) are made with glutinous rice, chunks of streaky pork, a preserved egg yolk, and peanuts or lok tau (綠豆), and quite stellar with a drizzle soy sauce and sploodge sambal. Great for a snack or lunch.

In both the Netherlands and Indonesia they're known as ba tjang (bacang), from the Hokkien pronunciation. Not uncommon in the big cities, mostly unknown out in the countryside.

Much like the United States, in other words.


Teatime was followed by a smoke.
An old Dunhill shellbriar.
Aged Virginias.



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EVERY LITTLE VOICE

Sometimes (rarely) this blogger is pleased to let another opinionist guest-post here. So it is with great something that I disseminate the memorial day message of someone whom half the country admires and adulates: Donald Trump. Being truly presidential. Oh boy.


"HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY TO ALL, INCLUDING THE SCUM THAT SPENT THE LAST FOUR YEARS TRYING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY THROUGH WARPED RADICAL LEFT MINDS, WHO ALLOWED 21,000,000 MILLION PEOPLE TO ILLEGALLY ENTER OUR COUNTRY, MANY OF THE BEING CRIMINALS AND THE MENTAO INSANE,THROUGH AN OPEN BORDER THAT ONLY AN INCOMPETENT PRESIDENT WOULD APPROVE, AND THROUGH JUDGES WHO ARE ON A MISSION TO KEEP MURDERERS, DRUG DEALERS, RAPISTS, GANG MEMBERS, AND RELEASED PRISONERS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, IN OUR COUNTRY SO THEY CAN ROB, MURDERERS, AND RAPE AGAIN, PROTECTED BY THESE USA HATING JUDGES WHO SUFFER FROM AN IDEOLOGY THAT IS SICK, AND VERY DANGEROUS FOR OUR COUNTRY. HOPEFULLY THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT, AND OTHER GOOD AND COMPASSIONATE JUDGES THROUGHOUT THE LAND, WILL SAVE US FROM THE DECISIONS OF THE MONSTERS WHO WANT OUR COUNTRY TO GO TO HELL."


Yep. That's it. Feel the warmth.

He represents you.

And of course he also represents all the Republicans in Congress.
The finest wildlife that America has to offer.




Little irrelevant editorial update: Some Republican voters think coal, oil, and gas, are renewable resources. Okay. Renew them.




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IT'S JUST WHAT YOU DO

Today I explained the types of pipe tobacco to three different people. Four general types. Old school Burley blends which gramps smokes wearing his bib overalls driving the tractor doing the back forty. He's grumpy and mean and we're all hoping he has an accident soon. Virginia blends and flakes, like Tolkien and Sir Bertrand Russell enjoyed. Stealth tobaccos you can smoke in the teevee room late at night and your Cantonese apartment mate won't even notice. Smoked slowly they are very enjoyable. Then there's English or Balkan blends, which are rich and have a fragrance that will have her busting out of her bedroom to tell you to go huff that stinky garbage over at the abandoned church with the rabid animals and winos damn that smells, you rancid pervert. Clark Gable and William Faulkner liked those.
And aromatics, which are impure and suggest foul vices in addition to tutti-frutti.
Hotter, wetter, and they leave your bowl gunked up.

For a long time I was a rancid pervert, now I'm more like Bertrand Russell.
But I still like how perversion smells, and thoroughly encourage it.

Then there's the pipe itself. What does it say to you? Does it suggest an engineer working in a hot climate, lowering the blinds so that the reflected glare on the pumping station blueprints and geological service maps spread out on the long table don't blind people, with flies flitting about sucking up the perspiration buzz buzz buzz? Or maybe a posting where the jungle starts beyond Yaumuklam, where tigers lurk in the tall grasses and the previously stationed resident died of malaria, and you anxiously await the post delivered every six weeks?

Packets with jars of Oxford marmalade, the weekly journals, Old Farmer's Nerve Balm, black tea from Taylor's of Harrowgate, and tins of Rattray's Jocks Mixture pipetobacco.

The railway ended in Dung Fat City in the lower foot hills. If you went further up, the climate was healthier, and tropic fevers ceased to be a problem entirely. And your tastebuds gradually recovered.

After the rainy season ended you would often have Abdoul fry up some preserved goat for breakfast; it went so well with daliya porridge, and would remind you of English bacon. Sometimes butter of sorts would be available. Sometimes only sheep tail fat.

There were days when you couldn't stop thinking about Gwendolyn back in Devon.
But she had married Bertram, and it all seemed so long ago.

There were also days when someone you vaguely knew told you they were going hiking up on Tam, and you would never see them again.



Today on the bus back to civilization one of the savage women brought her bicycle on board. The driver tried to tell her he couldn't allow it, there were safety regulations and such, but he got distracted by the French speakers who just couldn't grasp the concept of either cash, OR la carte bleu. They weren't having any of it. They seen enough of the tattooed natives and their colourful habits to last a lifetime, mère sacrée et bon sang, and they were going to get out of there no matter what. The food was awful, and there was no coffee!

And none of them spoke the common tongue.
It was very frustrating.


Sometimes it's like the last helicopter out of a fallen city.



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THEY'RE ALSO CALLED CATAMOUNTS

Sometimes I hate my job. It's not because of the actual nature of my work OR my employers, but the defectives that cluster there. "The traffic is slow out there", I will say, observing the traffic outside. Which is slow. "What?" So I repeat it. "The traffic is slow." "What?" "The traffic, outside, is slow." "What?" "Slow it is, the traffic." "What?" "Slow out there the traffic is." "What." "The traffic out there, it is slow." "What?"

You will no doubt understand why I sometimes don't say much. Or avoid conversations.
With some people. Who weren't paying attention when brains were being handed out.

Also, my back was hurting when that discussion happened.


And then there was the time where I had to explain that Mexico was not north of here.


I've also clarified that mountain lions do not necessarily live only in the mountains, and no, we're not going to rename some of them because of different habitats. I really must be commended for not addressing that interlocutor as "senile old fart".
It's Marin. People are special there.

We don't have pythons here. Yes, in Florida, which here isn't. Bobcats are not hoppity boppity pussycats. There are no monkeys native to North America.

Most of these men are college graduates. American college graduates. So don't assume either literacy or intellectual curiosity. Not even from the retired member of the judicial branch, because he's rather a dullard and often proves himself an ignoramus.

The neurosurgeon refers to them all as fascists and idiots, and refuses to get roped into conversations with them, but I do not have that luxury.

"No, Donny, these men are nihilists, there's nothing to be afraid of."


It's like dealing with the living dead.



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A TYPICAL CANTONESE EXAGGERATION

Oldest brother is in the hospital, which means I get to hear all about sick Cantonese Americans. And little weird cheapnesses. The sick Cantonese are something I'm already quite familiar with, having been a patient of SF Chinese Hospital for over six years and also spending nearly a week in the ICU ward there, and little weird cheapnesses, well, that too. We Dutch are known for that. So it's a matter of "professional" curiosity in a way to hear about how other cultures manifest their weird little cheapnesses. If they have that.

What I also got to hear about was foul smells. The passengers on several of the city bus lines. There are reasons why I seldom venture out of this quadrant; I don't like people, the entire rest of the city is filled with them, they dress funny, smell bad, and eat too much.

Oldest brother is NOT at Chinese hospital. I don't know which hospital he is at, but to get there takes public transit in all its nightmarish glory and splendour. See, the main reasons why I chose a healthcare plan (CCHP) which allowed me to choose the clinic in SF Chinese Hospital as my primary care provider was that A) it was easy to get to, barely over six blocks away, more or less, and B) there is tasty food right outside the door. I've heard enough tales about people carting food into the hospital and patients escaping for a pork chop and some fried chicken to know that half the hospital battle is working up an appetite again.

I mean, roast duck and roast pork can be found in three directions in one block of wheelchair running away. Plus fried noodles and cake and hot milk tea.
All of which are aides to recovery.

And I can buy smuggled-in ciggies (no tax stamp) within spitting distance. So I'm guessing oldest brother isn't a smoker, which is why he's in a hospital elsewhere in the city.

He'd have to venture into the badlands for a smoke. Some sleazy liquor store two or three blocks away. They'd spot him immediately in his hospital garb, and probably charge double for the desperation. Back in the day, there would actually be a news and candy stand with a wide variety of cigarettes and cheap stogies in the lobby of most hospitals, and in larger institutions they might even have three or four kinds of pipe tobacco. The old days.

It's a complete jungle out there now. Gangs of elderly thugs in wheelchairs roaming the wards, threatening to run over your toes unless you give them all your lunchmoney. Frail invalids in pajamas, with crutches, running craps games in the parking lot. Decrepit old fossils right outside the emergency room passing cigarettes to each other.

Rabid tamanduas and pangolins lurk in dark corners.
Tribals raid each other for heads.


The ghost of famous poet Su Tung-Po roams the nearby hills, sent there because he had fallen into disfavour at the court and it was hoped he'd get malaria or typhoid and die.



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SHANGHAI BINGE

The best place for yellow croaker and snow cabbage is probably Hong Kong, not Shanghai. But only if the restaurant is Shanghainese. Noodle soup, or a gently braised stew. Either way. Snow cabbage (雪菜 'suet choi') is basically salty pickled mustard greens. It also requires bamboo shoots (竹筍 'juk suen') and good quality dried ham (金華火腿 'kam waa fo teui').
In addition, of course, to the yellow croaker (黃魚 'wong yü') which is the essential part.
Plus chopped scallions.

And making this dish shows why a good clean stock is essential. Clean sweet flavour and clarity contribute considerably. The fish chunks are dusted, poached in hot stock, with a dash of sherry or rice wine for added flavour, simmered briefly with slivered ham, bamboo shoot, and well-rinsed snow vegetable added. Or the fish could also be cornflour dredged and fried on medium till golden, and then inundated with the soup. It stands up well either way.
Adding one or two stalks of mustard cabbage (油菜 'yau choi') is good.
Scallions to garnish.

Mostly fish. Noticeable quantities ham, bamboo shoot, and snow vegetable, in balance with each other. Clean good quality stock, and colourful minced scallion.


The whole thing goes well with typical Shanghai preference hand made wheat noodles, but because I am a total barbarian (can't even speak Shanghainese) my tendency is to use broad rice stick instead. Plus, of course, an oily chilipaste for added whoomp.
And I might use a little 酸菜 ('suen choi') or 榨菜 ('jaa choi') too.

Excellent for an all-night jag watching the first season of Shanghai sands (上海灘 'seung hoi taan'; The Bund). You'll need sustenance at some point. Plus packs of ciggies, because the mechanics you are watching it with are all chainsmokers who normally spend the evening playing cards and turning the air blue. You started with red braised porkbelly (紅燒肉 'hong siu yiuk') just after dark, then pizza past midnight, here it is dawn and you know it's going to hit ninety degrees at least. Last bit to eat. You are dehydrated. Could have been worse.
You might have played mahjong all night. Then you'd be dehydrated and broke.

Instead of cooking it yourself, you could order take out. Just like the pizza. There are some good Shanghai eateries not too far from the garage in Yautong (油塘). The problem is they open around ten or eleven at the earliest. You'll be asleep by then.


You know, I don't think I've ever seen scallion oil noodles (葱油拌麵 'chong yau pun min') here in SF. It's probably not offered anywhere in Chinatown.
Might have to make that myself.



AFTERTHOUGHT: Shanghainese also do yellow croaker won ton (黃魚餛飩).
As well as spring rolls. 黃魚春卷 ('wong yü chun kuen')
Probably nowhere in San Francisco.
Haven't looked.
幚麵。



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BLOWN FUSES

This time it was Stephen who came across as vague and possibly out there. I had mentioned lunch -- fish burger and fries (香酥魚柳包 · 薯條 'heung sou yü lau baau, sue tiu') at a place which does a much better version of that than McDonalds could ever manage, with a lovely cup of Hong Kong Milk Tea (港式奶茶 'gong sik naai cha') which they certainly don't do in this country -- and for the life of him he couldn't figure out what it was, what a toasted bun might be, whether it was edible or not, and where on earth the place was which I had mentioned.
I clarified three times that it was two doors from a place he knew (where I had first seen him half a decade ago), it had been there for many years, and I knew he had been there.

He's spent his entire life in the Chinatown environment. He grew up here. He returns to Chinatown every day, he has an office here. But he's of an age when the transformers sometimes go kablooey.

While we were talking, Robert (who is as old) was obsessing over chicken feet.
Dear fellow, man does not live by chicken feet alone.
No matter how scrumptious.

I have eaten chicken feet and enjoyed them.
But I will not dwell fondly upon them.
They're okay. Okay?

Good thing I had already finished my pastry before either gentleman showed up. And took my pill. Last week I forgot to take my amlodipine besylate till an hour and a half afterwards, and the feet twitching kept me up for an additional two hours longer than I wanted.

TRANSIT SYSTEM ELECTRICAL FIRE

Some medications have warnings that they may cause drowsiness, dizziness, or confusion, don't operate machinery or get pregnant if taking them. Consult with your doctor, and avoid certain things. Do not combine with this, that, and the other, and do not overdose. I suspect that both of them are considerably more medicated than I am, and it may be interfering with all their synapses firing. Plus both of them have hearing issues, and even if they were not taking pills up the wazzoo might be as just iffy as they are.

The train crash-landed past the runway where the waterbuffalo roam.
A few feet further and they would slide downhill.
There's a soft sand beach there.
Plus killer crabs.

You'll get tangled in seaweed if you don't have a rigid and systematic approach to your medicines, to which you adhere as if your life depends on it. Your sanity certainly does.



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ALL HAIL THE MAJESTIC BIRD

This morning the turkey vulture "found" my wallet, and scurried to the edge of my bed to play cards with Lenny, the tentacled monster who lives there. Even though he has been informed that Lenny cheats. Naturally a voice came from the bear in the other room warning them against shenanigans with the big person's leathery thing and the paper monies therein.
They cowered. The senior teddy bear's authority should not be disregarded.
Since then, for several hours, it has been quiet.

But they have plans. Surely the bear will nap. Or go on vacation?

I have a nasty suspicion that when I return from the bathroom there will be miniature brass poles with slinky weasels and ferrets twirling suggestively under my bedside table.
Sydney Fylbert knows that he is the best bird everrrr!
Which should be appreciated, by gum.
He is deserving!

Lenny, for a consideration, will be his enabler.

Yesterday the control monkey (Arabello Oyster, a small dark purplish gorilla) gifted me with several containers of medicated foot powder, as a possible bribe. I need to do something about that nasty bird! Which I shan't. I rely on the authority of the senior teddy bear.
She always knows exactly what the beasts are up to.

Naturally, when I leave for day I shall take my wallet with me. Which will flummox their plans. It's my money, I shall need it when not wandering around smoking my pipe. Food, groceries, milk tea. Despite Sydney Fylbert's entreaties, I do not intend to hunt for, harvest, or bag up any nice fatty thighs while out. He is convinced that there is a lot of tempting human carrion wandering around out there, upon which he could feast if only I was more amenable and whacked my fellow citizens, whom no one would miss, go ahead, take the cleaver!


I fear that the authorities, including the senior teddy bear, might object.


Besides, a sane and stable pillar of the community with plenty of gravitas (and perspicacity) such as myself has an image to maintain. I can not just go around whacking useless old fossils, what would people think of me?



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MENTALLY ENJOYING SHANGHAINESE FOOD

Arrived at my usual Tuesday spot late for lunch, about which I feel somewhat guilty, because I do not like rushing restaurant staff. But I got out of there after my porkchops only a few minutes past closing time. When I went past on the bus forty minutes later, after smoking my pipe, their doors were still open. Three hours later I was nearby again, enjoying another smoke while waiting for the bookseller.

At that time, Chinatown had changed completely. More loonies, including a man angrily outbursting while sitting on the curb at the end of an alleyway, someone talking to himself and barking further down, and a gentleman garbed in what seemed to be a suit of armour made entirely of cardboard boxes. Plus some fellow who wished me to know that he had been threatened by a black man with a knife not too far away several months earlier. My guess is that the black gentleman must have had a good reason; I likewise sometimes wish to impress upon goofy Caucasians that they had best push off. So things happen.

One familiar face passed. We greeted each other.
He seemed a bit down and preoccupied.

From the karaoke bar the sounds, audible a block away, did not bode well. Have I ever mentioned that white people should not sing? I feel that Kahn Souphanousinphone's example should tell them something. He is not a man to emulate. Tell you what.

The only white guys who can sing well are drag queens.
For crapsakes, emulate them. And take lessons.

Objecting to horrid singing is both a life-style choice and a personal philosophy. So we gave the karaoke bar a miss, and headed directly to Miss Vivien's, where there was no music, just sportscreens showing men without all of their teeth committing mayhem. When we left I was high as kite on two cups of strong tea, having wired myself with coffee before even leaving the house. And I realized I should have brought two pipes along.
What with being so sparky and alert.

One thing we discussed was Wong Kar-wai's oeuvre. A stellar director of shimmeringly memorable movies. We also talked about habeus corpus. Which our current slew of dunderheaded cabinetti apparently lack all clue about.
Also baseball, basketball, and hocky.
Which I know zip about.


I think one of the other passengers on the bus had suffered a colonic mishap. Or maybe it was intentional. Probably not the transitioned personage seated opposite.
Although that is a possibility. I've heard of such things.



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STRICTLY

Normally when out with my pipe in the very early morning I end up thinking that I should write an angry letter to the editor which I will never send. Something to the effect that "the frightful temperature at this time of year is inhuman, someone should do something, back in my day, it's the fault of all those cowardly weasels in congress AND the tariffs on China, why we used to have a decent climate until we started importing weathers from pissy turd-world countries like El Salvador, dammit!"

You can probably understand why this will never be sent.
No need to let the authorities know that I'm batshit.
That information is on a need-to-know basis.

And there is NO need to know.


That said, I suspect that Spring might finally be here. It's sunny, and not freezing at all, and was so even when I stepped out a few hours earlier. Which was rather disappointing.

Being grouchy while waking up with caffeine coursing through the veins, and my head is wreathed in fragrant whisps of aged flue-cured leaf, passing people pooing their dogs or rushing for the early bus, is part of being alive. Crucial.

Recently I have been remembering life in Valkenswaard an awful lot. That was when I was still not yet an adult. Forests. Fog. Hayfields. Grass. Gravel roads leading to vast expanses of heather. Marsh birds. Short trim high school girls before junkfood chains had conquered the world and people weren't so pudgy. And before the Dutch had become the tallest people on the planet, often making me feel like a freak midget whenever I run into Netherlandish tourists wandering around San Francisco today.

Even blond people were shorter then.

It's all that cheese, isn't it?

Can't be herring.


The last time I visited Holland I felt like a foreigner. Which I am, of course, seeing as we moved there from the States when I was a toddler and spoke English at home, but I am fluent in Dutch and speak like a normal person. So I should feel at home.
But if I were taller I'd blend in better.
In this day and age.



Dear Sir, Back in my day the coffee was better, as were pipe tobaccos and the weather.
And taller people knew their place, glandular damned freaks.
What on earth is the world coming to?
Sincerely.



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TRUE MODERN MARTYRDOM

Unlike many a great Republican stalwarts I have never watched Muslim decapitation videos while panting and drooling, nor been thrilled by carpetbombing documentaries. Nor do I look for Ukraine or Gaza massacres on the internet while chanting "America, America!" In fact, I am a peace-loving man filled with warm thoughts about kittens and I frequently chant 'om'.
As you should have figured out by now.

I mention this because two gentlemen of my acquantance are convinced otherwise. Danny believes I am "a f****** terrorist, you know what, a f****** terrorist", and thinks that the FBI should investigate me, and Jeff has ranted at me about the violence from my side and how we're destroying this country and somebody should DO something.! Mostly before devolving into a long petulant whining jag in the backroom while scratching his privates.

This was pursuant some of my recent paintings in which I explored an artistic theme as relevant for this day and age as the Cruxifixion was for the Middle Ages.

Which upsets them.

I would like to extend my warmest congratulations to Louisiana
for succesfully burning something far worse than a cybertruck.

Surely you can see the suffering of Christ in the picture above? Oh, the heartache!

And, just like all those Jesuses drooping from Roman timbers, it is meant to inspire you to be the best that you possibly can be. You have it in you. Aspire to greater things. Fill yourself with love for your fellow man. Feel the pain. Think about the children.

Just consider baby Jesus suckling at Mary's naked titty.
It's absolutely that perfectly relevant.

Sadly, the FBI under its current direction will NEVER consider Mary's breast, clothed or bare. They would be better if they did. It's more meaningful. Jeff would also be better so. It would take his fevered little mind off the suffering of his fellow Republicans.


Never once have I set fire to a Tesla, even though listening to Jeff go on for over an hour in the backroom or Danny saying stupid things and tunelessly singing might have driven lesser men to something similar plus strong drink. The closest I've come is lighting my pipe and swilling tea while trying to tune them and their filled incontinence pants out.


I am, by all rational accounts, a saint.



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HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM

Though she passed away many years ago I still feel different on my mother's birthday, which today is. This world now is a bit different than hers was, and San Francisco, which she fondly remembered, is naturally not the same. Things have changed. There are far fewer beatnicks writing poetry. She hated them. I have met their remnants, and I too loathe those people.
Crappy "verse", bad hygiene, overly much pretension.
Well, okay, they were fond of coffee.
That was good.

Probably indulged in three espresso lunches instead of the martini-sodden steak-orgies that were common business practice once. I would probably have sympathised with that, being somewhat distasting of the company of loud drunken wrecks at any time, but I would have avoided them just the same as I prefer my caffeine jags quieter, alone if necessary, and accompanied by considerably less crappy verse.


She got three masters degrees while avoiding beatnicks, hippies, and advertising executives. Old English, old Irish, and old Norse. She thought that Lord Of The Rings was kind of a great thing. Which is where we differ. I waded through over two thirds of the way in, and simply lost interest. And I can't stand Hobbits.

Her family background was military, with a number of officers among her relatives including her father. She herself signed up for the United States Naval Reserveduring the world war, and served again a few years later during Korea. I have , likely because of that, a soft spot for veterans, as well as the SF Presidio where my grandfather was stationed.


There are, to my knowledge, no hobbits presently serving in any branch of the armed forces. Which is a great pity. For one thing, the food would probably be better, and for another it would make men out of them.

Because the Presidio is now a park, you can occasionally find hobbits there.
Camped out in the overgrown areas, rabid, and drug-addicted.
San Francisco has always been into substances.



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PASTY AND FREEZING

Several years ago I strongly suggested to the pipe club that on Bay To Breakers (a yearly running event across the breadth of the city) they should contribute to the zaniness (nudity, funny costumes, beer) by participating as a team. The Naked Puffs. Running. Naked. With pipes. Surprisingly, there was pushback. One member opined that, as I was the person who suggested it, I should lead and they would follow.

I demured, explaining that I was always scheduled to work on Sundays, kindly think of my as the vicar of this parish, but I would be there in spirit encouraging them. Trot trot.
If I am not here at my usual post, it would quite upset the applecart.
And cause a revolution, what is the world coming to?
It's quite unthinkable, tell you what.

Besides, I look ugly running naked in the fog, and would scare the little children. You lot, on the other hand ...
I have been told that I am a veritable Adonis, and must run. It won't be the same without me.

Bay To Breakers was today. So was the meeting of the pipe club. The full quorum did not show up, so some of them must have been running. Jolly good, and bravo. Kudos.
Show the world what it's like to be a naked pipesmoker!
The children deserve to know!

I attended the meeting. I did not run. But I chided them for their laziness.
Did I already mention the applecart? I have an excuse. They don't.

You are all letting the side down. We expect better.


Also, a chap from Kansas City was visiting, new pipe smoker. Talked him through the history of pipes since Adam, answered several questions about briar, burl growth, famous brands, and stuff like that. So I don't really know what the lads all discussed, though Bernard, as an Afrikaner, authoritatively talked smack about the President's nonsense about South Africa and those claims of a genocide. This was before Kansas City came in, and while I was stuffing my face with excellent pâté and charcootered items.

Now that I think about it, none of us are young enough to get up and get naked at five o'clock in the morning. Cold winds, darkness, fog, and just generally nasty at that hour.
They should reschedule the race entirely so us old codgers can join.
Everyone's looking forward to that. Trust me.



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