FRAGRANT SMOKE AND SERIOUS MATTERS

The bar we to which we normally go because the karaoke joint is filled with screaming white women singing badly was closing early. Different person behind the counter than normal, and only one customer left. So it was an early evening. The burger place had been much like normal, however.

We spoke about recent events, particularly the disastrous loss of the Forty Niners on Sunday to the Seattle Seahawks. A complete rout. A debacle, a humiliating defeat, a totally miserable cringe-worthy performance, total abasement, humiliating, pitiful, and ghastly. The Seahawks wiped the floor with the Niners, destroyed them, smashed them utterly. Naturally this pleased us, because it is exceedingly good to live in a city filled with disappointed sports fans. Who really should take the team's horrible performance personally, as a reflection on them and their faltering limp and spongy manhoods.

Okay?

In a word: they sucked.
Suck suck suck suck sucked!

And I say that as a man wearing a football themed garment proudly promoting a team that has never once lost a game. Primarily because it's an institution which does not do sports but graduates Talmudic giants. So can we please stop talking about that stupid game and that rotten miserable team and instead talk about something meaningful like Bava Kamma, Bava Metziah, and Bava Batra?

Hmmm?

In other news, night time San Francisco is getting more surreal. While I was smoking my pipe and waiting for the bookseller to arrive, a woman asked me about my briar and offered to sell me cigarettes in Cantonese. Did I just encounter a freelance tobacconist from the mainland? I should have asked her what type of ciggies she had. I'm rather fond of Ng Yip San (五葉神) and Diamond Brand Lotus Cigarettes (鑽石品牌，荷花煙仔).

While waiting for our bus we saw a wheelchair cross the intersection blasting some serious funk music, and a woman carrying a huge stuffed sloth larger than the one currently on my bed. This is what San Francisco is all about. Soul and stuffed animals.

Also, I finally realized where that voice in my head came from every time I read another late night Trump tirade. It's Raoul Duke (Johnny Dep) stating that his name is on the list, he has his attorney with him, and they must have a suite! Terrible things were happening, buy us some golf shoes, it's impossible to walk in this muck otherwise we'll never get out alive!

Doctor Gonzo was merely drugged out of his gourd, not senile and gibbering.

But that way of talking is the perfect match for it.

Adderal and pineal gland extract.



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PENGUINS, HERRING, AND LETTUCE

Today I could have done my laundry, visited my bank, and paid bills. But because today is Penguin Awareness Day for 2026 today, I didn't do any of that. It's Penguin Awareness Day! Let us all waddle in celebration of our sphenisciformic fellow citizens. Of whom there aren't that many, because they aren't native to the North American continent, but we appreciate them never-the-less. Or at least, I do.

The proper celebratory food to enjoy on this special day is "one herring whopper, hold the mayo". Per Bill the Cat's friend. Sadly, American fast food franchises are not on board with this yet, so it's still unavailable. And in any case it should be 'hold the lettuce', not mayo. If you're in Holland, like many civilized people, herring is do-able. Americans have not yet wigged on to good food yet.

A herring would turn up its nose at crap like lutefisk and surströmming, the first of which is regrettably present here, and extremely popular in some parts of the country.

There are no penguins in Greenland, but perhaps they have herring there, in addition to lutefisk, which might be the only reason to want the place.

J. D. Vance does not eat herring.
He is a very flawed man.
Possibly a Texan.

In any case, like our president, Vance probably prefers hamberders. Now, hamberders are a very fine food, to be sure, and far be it from me to criticise the beloved iconic national dish of the entire Deep South, bless their hearts, but the hamberder cannot possibly compare to the herring whopper with or without something held.

Hamberders are poor folks food, eaten when you're drunk, in a hurry, tired from a long day working, or you lost the plantation because them damned Yankees burned it down, dang it. The herring whopper is fine dining, enjoyed in a leisurely fashion, while you are laughing riotously at the funny bits in Gone With The Wind.


Hold the lettuce. Always.
Rabbits hump in it.



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A QUESTION OF PERSPECTIVE

There's a video of ICE agents detaining a man forcefully because he has an accent. Which, as they're strong-arming him, they explain is the reason for grabbing him. An accent.
No other reason. They make that absolutely clear.

I have an accent. My family has been here since Nieuw Amsterdam days. We went overseas when I was two. Since returning for college regular American have told me to go back where I came from. So, do I trust a bunch of blinkered inbreds with bulletproof vests and tactical gear who think they're above the law? Mmm, no. Not any further than I can spit.

There are also videos of ICE agents slamming people to the ground, clobbering them, breaking down doors, shoving an elderly man who looks non-white out into freezing temperatures, and breaking car windows to drag screaming people out.

Did I already mention that I have an accent?


The last non-American in the family was three generations ago. My family served in each World War. And in Korea. And in the Civil War on the Union side.

But I have an accent.

Some of my best friends are lily-white Americans with very Waspy surnames who don't have accents. And I'm ashamed to admit it, but because they are lily-white with Waspy surnames, lacking accents, they are a little suspect. They could travel to Kansas or Iowa, or even to the place where my maternal grandfather was from (in Indiana) without raising eye-brows, being questioned about their backgrounds, or being told to go back where they came from.

I also am lily white, with a Waspy surname. If I keep my mouth shut I'm fine.


No, I don't worry that if I visited Kansas or Iowa, or Peru, Indiana, I would be stomped by a xenophobic Christian member of the Elks Club the very moment I asked for hot sauce (!) at the local diner, I am not that paranoid. But there is probably no hot sauce there anyway.
And no reason to visit.

Initial cursory internet research into restaurants in Peru, Indiana, indicate that options for Chinese food, pizza, or Indian, may be a bit limited.


There's plenty of hot sauce in San Francisco.



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THE EARLY AMBLE

Didn't smoke a pipe at all yesterday, it being a holiday so my apartment mate was at home, and I didn't feel like going anywhere other than the Pakistani restaurant that she suggested where we had an excellent lunch. But this morning I jazzed myself up with some coffee and stepped out with a pipe and some Rattray's tobacco. Day off, feet recovered from workweek.
And I'm perky. Oh lordy yes.


Rattray's various Virginia offerings are suitable for smokers of any age and either gender.
So I'm surprised that I don't run into more people who recognize the fabulous smell.
Or any of them, really. Must be the time of day.

People who wander around this neighborhood early in the morning are probably more familiar with the odour of their dog's digestive tract terminus than anything refined.

There's just no accounting for tastes.

When I wake up, I usually want a hot caffeinated beverage, followed by a smoke while wandering around the neighborhood enjoying the fresh air and the birds tweetering.
Dog poo is the last thing on my mind. I'm normal.


Mind you, I like dogs and get along well with them. It's dog owners I find problematic. They're too needy and always want attention, and that whole crotch sniffing thing is a bit much.
Cats are much more civilized, and sometimes they gift you a dead mouse.
It's a token of their near-parental concern.
Encouragement, in a way.
Eat better!

A cat will never insist that you go duck hunting, will not drag you out of bed to poo, and won't bark at birds, travelling salesmen, or other creatures. Nor will it slobber and act drunk.
It may lie on your keyboard, for want of an old-fashioned typewriter.
Or sleep in a shaft of sunlight on your chest.
Sober common sense behaviour.
And indolence.


There is a cat in the picture above. The reason you cannot see it is because it isn't jumping around and barking at a chipmunk. Nor did it use any part of the pavement as its toilet.

When my apartment mate leaves for work I shall shut her bedroom door and open a few windows, so that I can smoke indoors while doomscrolling, safely away from people out toilet-walking their ambulatory four legged or two legged poo-factories.
I am not what's wrong with this country as some of them think.
If there were a cat, it would not object.
Or bark at me.



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THE CHAMBER OF THE MAD KING

So, because Norway didn't give him a Nobel Prize for peace, he's doing everything in his power to provoke World War Three and force Denmark to give him Greenland. And his cabinet, knowing full well that if they play their cards right, they'll have orgasms beyond belief, are prodding him in several directions. And they keep feeding him hamberders, despite knowing what it will do to the fatty deposits around his aorta and his brain.
As well as being bad for his blood pressure and sperm count.

Oh, the humanity!

Meanwhile, there are reliable reports that his wife finds him repulsive, that he smells like roast beef gone bad, very bad, and keeps audibly farting. And did anyone ever mention cankles and tiny puffy bruised hands?


Maga still worships him.


Maga has very low standards and many members who aspire to his level. If they do, maybe they'll get treatment. As well as hamberders. Hamberders would be so nice. It is those evil foreigners and Denmark who are hogging all the hamberders, so unfair, and why are those lutefisters sitting on top of their hamberders? Do something!

And then there's Tommy Turberville, who is too stupid even for that.
There is strong evidence that he can't spell 'hamberder'.
Or even locate Greenland on a map.
It's not Mississippi.

There are many good reasons not to visit anywhere between Treasure Island and Staten Island. The berserk obsession of the brainless Christian savages in the interior with sperm count and hamberders, both washed down with crappy beer, is just one example.


Besides, there is just far too much Texas there. Like a huge cancer spreading across the continent, swallowing up vital organs and brain cells used for critical thinking.



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YOU WOULD HAVE TO DO ALL THE TALKING

My apartment mate proposed lunch at the nearby Pakistani place. To which I alacritously agreed, as it is very good. She also suggested inviting our landlady along, because she fears that she (landlady) might be a bit lonely. I kind of indicated that I was not entirely enthusiastic about that. I am not that social. What I didn't say was that having dealt with people for a few days at work, all day long, my social batteries are a bit low.

And normally I find being convivial a bit trying anyhow. I don't mind being around other folks talking and will interact appropriately when needed, but my role is primarily to prompt them at times, and listen.
Also unsaid: good lord woman, you are far more Aspy than I am, do you really think that's a good idea? And you would have to be the more socially interactive person in any case, as on my first day off I am very much a rutabaga.

We rutabagas are not well-known for being the life of the party in any case. At many cocktail get-togethers nobody says "oh look, the rutabaga is in the house, now the fun starts!"

In fact, there could be a whole bushel of rutabagas at the bar, and it would be dead quiet, except for the soft sound of shuffling as each root vegetable subtly ensures a greater distance from the nearest conversational threat.

Nice weather we're having. Yes. Sunshine.
My root tendrils enjoy warm soil.
And the earthworms.


Did you know that when the weather heats up in Spring there are more earthworms about?
I don't know what the increase in their population is when conditions are better. Someone should do a study. Is their reproduction a yearly thing, or can it take place a number of times over summer? Do earthdwelling segmented annelids reproduce with external ova clusters.
Or do they carry their developing young along attached to their external surfaces?
Yeah, the possibility of conversation stagnating is rather immense.
Small talk about earthworm sex is not conducive.

Perhaps if each rutabaga present quoted from Monty Python as approrpiate. I've had entire conversations where the whole time Monty Python was in play. Several occasions. The dead cabinet in the sitting room. Drawing room. Eh, you know what I mean. Vacations in Southern Spain involving Watney's Red Barrel and a lizard in the bidet. Dead parrots with beautiful plumage. Killer rabbits. Three questions. Swallows and coconuts.

These interactions were lively and enjoyable, but very many non-rutabagas are unfamiliar with Monty Python. An exception being rabbis and Talmudic scholars, quite a few of whom are surprisingly in tune with the Pythonesque gestalt.



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NOT ALL CUTE IS THE SAME

It turned out that the word "cute" upset him. I had applied it to a young lady who had left, and he acted shocked. I mentioned that the fifteen year old daughter of an Indonesian restaurant owner years ago was cute, and that disturbed him. So as examples, I brought up Shirley Temple (cute), Taylor Swift (cute), Marilyn Monroe (cute), and the waitress at an Indian place who had breasts like ripe mangoes but was an awful vicious piece of work.

His preferred cigar was also 'cute'. But I did not say so.

He may now understand that 'cute' does not mean exactly what he thought it did. This was in the middle of a discussion about lutefisk (horribly not cute), surströmming (un-cuteness in a swollen can), and hákarl (the not-cute that exemplifies utter non-cuteness).
Sometimes conversations veer horribly sideways.

Bikini briefs and raw herring are also cute. Not in combination, though. Seperately.

Trust me, cute is not that. Small tobacco pipes look cute. Hello Kitty is cute. Hello Kitty's grandpa smoking a small tobacco pipe can also be considered cute. A young lady wearing Hello Kitty briefs while eating Dutch herring might likewise be very cute. Demented, but cute. Depending on the circumstances it could also be extremely disurbing -- whose sick fantasy is this anyway -- whereas Grandpa Anthony eating herring that Hello Kitty brought him, yes, definitely cute, but also mmm, well, no.

A cute Scandinavian woman consuming lutefisk, surströmming, or hákarl is weaponized cute turned into a horror show. And as good a reason to question life and the modern world as any. I'm not interested in whether she is wearing Hello Kitty bikini briefs or not. Is that all she's wearing? I still don't want to be in the same room. Under any circumstance.

Don't be surprised if I walk away softly moaning.

The Dutch, as you should know, are quite fond of herring, but consider what the Germans and Scandinavians do to it a crime against nature. Which is how we got onto the subject.

At the end of the thirteenth century, Willem Beukelszoon from Biervliet invented a process for dealing with herring that allowed boats to stay out much longer instead of heading back to port before darkness fell every day. That meant that better sailing vessels were designed, which allowed the Dutch to trade between the Baltic Sea and the Mediterranean during the offseason, and eventually outcompete damned well everybody else at the time. Commerce! Shipboard cannon! Armed merchantmen and company ships, attacks on the Spanish and the Portuguese, and the establishment of a mercantile empire. Further technological and scientific developments. Plus spices, coffee, tea, sugar, and cigars.

That improvement in fishing also meant that a larger population could be supported, and employed in industry rather than stuck on farms. The modern city was a direct result.

Our Scandinavian cousins, on the other hand, were perfectly happy sticking to exceedingly nasty variations of semi-controlled fish rot (lutefisk, surströmming, and hákarl, for example) and in consequence never amounted to much. Certainly a Scandinavian woman wearing nought but Hello Kitty Bikini Briefs might look darn cute, but the guaranteed presence in her vicinity of lutefisk, surströmming, or hákarl will keep civilized people away. Far away. Later they came up with Abba. The music of lutefisk, surströmming, and hákarl.
That alone should tell you something.



The Padron 1964 Principe (4 1/2" x 46) is a small cigar, and compared to many other Padron vitolas extremely cute. If you wish to wear it garbed only in bikini briefs I shall not criticize. But please be aware that more clothing will prevent hot ashes hitting your bare skin.
So that's advised. Fully clothed while enjoying your smoke is best.
Even after a shower. I worry about you people.



Lutefisk, properly prepared, is slimy and gelatinous, and distinctly whiffs of seafoods ten days past their prime. It is considered a delicacy. It may still have bones.
Self doubts, and stern disapproval of other people.
Ingmar Bergman films.




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THE SINCERITY

The other day an anti-Islamic activist went to Minneapolis to burn a Quran and demonstrate his love for ICE. He thought thousands, or at least several hundred, would be joining him, based on the favourable reactions to his proposed demo on twitter.

The demo fizzled and he got his ass kicked.

Right wing influencer Jake Lang tried to run away when confronted by protesters outside of Minneapolis city hall on January 17, 2026. Please note that he survived, and got medical treament for some very minor injuries sustained while being a dickhead. The greatest damage was done to his mental image of his penis. Poor baby!

Sadly, there was only one of him whose ass to kick. Many more racists and white Christian Nationalists should have gotten an ass kicking, but there wasn't enough ass to go around. Which is extremely unfair. Quite. I'm sure I shall be hearing about it from the rancid old bastards in the backroom at work today. I wish they could have been there.

From my point of view, having seen and enjoyed several videos of the event, the loud and contentious angry confrontation was extremely civil, almost placid, with the multiple sincere invitations for Jake Lang to go XXXX himself being uttered with vehement precision, clearly enunciated for his complete comprehension, and with an obvious desire to communicate. Undoubtedly he understood their message. Beautiful dialogue. Eloquent rhetoric.

At no point were pitchforks in view!

It's what this country is all about.

I wish to commend everyone involved for not smearing his entrails across the pavement, nor parading his head on a spike. So they were, all things considered, peaceful and clearly filled with genuine Christian love. Kudos!

You know, years ago, when I was still regularly involved in demonstrations and counter demonstrations, it was obvious that no matter what was said or thrown, as long as there was no broken plate glass, nor burning storefronts, blood on the sidewalk, and the coroners office had not been called, as far as the local police were concerned it had been a peaceful demonstration. And by those standards this was an extraordinary success.

Naturally I stand in awe.


Agains, kudos.




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THINGS ARE DIFFERENT THERE

Please imagine how disconcerted I am to hear that because I take acetominophen I am going to give birth to an autistic foetus. This per a medical expert, self-proclaimed, who warned me with grave tones about this. I thought I was simply dealing with the soreness in my upper back an hour after starting the day at work. First thing I do after getting to work is pop an extra-strength tab, knowing that it takes about two hours or so to take full effect.
Mid-afternoon, half a regular strength tab, to maintain the "high", if that's what it can be called, till I lock the door and head home.

So okay then. Autistic foetus.

I do not possess a womb.

And I'm male, straight, and past menopausal age.
But Marinites live in an alternative reality.


I've got a little row of medications I take every day for high blood pressure etcetera, half of which warn me not get pregnant while taking them, not to nurse an infant, and may cause dizziness. I can religiously affirm that I have done nothing which might cause any pregnancy since they were first praescribed, nor nursed any infants, and I haven't gotten dizzy either. So I'm baffled as to where the autistic foetus might come from. Is there something about Marin County I should know? Magic babies? Karmic aura pregnancy irrespective? Ectoplasmic womb fulfillment? Mad scientists hiding behind the shrubbery?


Autistic foetuses my ass.

Many people in Marin are spiritual and have third eyes. Their consciousnesses have been raised, and they've done their own research. Their past life experiences have made them wise beyond their years. They are, consquently, exceedingly irritating.


Somewhere in Marin there's a place where elderly hippies go to die when they feel their end is near. The local tribes don't talk about it, for fear that outsiders might harvest all the tie-dye.

Theories focus on hippie behavior during lean times, suggesting that starving or elderly hippies who have worn their teeth down to a point that they can no longer chew tougher foods gather in places where there is lots of tofu and subsequently die there.

Prolific big game hunter Walter "Karamojo" Bell discounted the idea of the hippie graveyard, stating that "bones and grateful dead tee-shirts were still lying about in the bush where they had lain for years", but he probably just wanted to keep it all for himself.



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EAT MORE BEANS

One of the things that stands out over the past several months is precisely how many Maga Americans have lost their jobs because of Trump. Including factory workers whose salaries actually depended on imports and cheaper labour elsewhere. Making America great again apparently now means living on beans and rice without medical coverage, precisely like a third worlder. The conclusion: make America Mexico again.

Missing in that now famous picture of one piece chicken, one piece boiled broccoli, a tortilla, and a breath mint (the $3.00 meal) are the beans to round out the nutrition and hot sauce to make it all passable. Perhaps cut back on the chicken, so you can afford those too?

How is that 'make America great again' going for you?

Now that those illegal Mexicans next door have been deported, you can finally move into their mansion. Perhaps they left some supplies in the larder. A bottle of Tapatio hot sauce and a BIG bag of pintos.

Don't count on your friends and neighbors for any help, they're Christians and don't believe in helping the poor. Instead, they're hoarding everything and giving you free advice.

Bootstraps! Tithing! Trad wife!

No avocado toast!

Your life, according to American Protestant Christianity, is supposed to be filled with hardship and suffering. It builds character, teaches you the error of your ways, and makes America great. Healthcare, nutrition, and functional literacy are luxuries and sinful.

And I'm glad you're finally starting to realize that.


I was worried that you were getting used to good things, and it was making you lazy.



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WE DIDN'T START THE FIRE

Maybe I pissed off a facebook friend by writing "That Israelis are upset over Iranians is so moving. I'm grateful that they aren't saying shit about what's going on here. Because heaven forfend" , followed by "at present I don't give a rats ass about Iran, okay?" Turns out that the FB friend doesn't care about Minneapolis. But has his knickers in a twist over Iran.

Please understand that Netanyahu and our alleged friends in the gulf have all asked Trump to back off, so the official line now is that the Iranians can go suck an egg. And given that that has always been the case, because we don't talk to the Iranian government, and bombing them will accomplish precisely nothing (unless we go completely overboard, in which case the top, having been erased, will be replaced by far worse people), none of us should care very much either.

Those Israelis should just shut the F up. We're not pulling their imagined sore nuts out of the fire on this one. We're far too busy arresting Anne Frank in Minneapolis and threatening to take over Greenland and destroy NATO for lebensraum and White Christian America.

It will be better than the Sudetenland.
Trust me. Murica!


Yeah, mm, okay, what the ayatullahs are doing is truly horrific, up to twelve thousand people may have been killed surpressing the protestors, but Minneapolis is in the United States.
Those people there are our fellow citizens being brutalized by Trump's goons.

Our people should be more important to us than any number of hypothicals elsewhere.

Unless they're Republicans and support Trump. In that case they can go F themselves.



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AN EVIL PLACE

According to Kristi Noem, people should be prepared to prove US citizenship. Because we moved overseas when I was two years old, I have an accent. Ever since I returned, people have called me a foreigner. Usually it's "real Americans" that do so.
In any case, I don't react well.

One time an HR director held up my paycheck for over six weeks because she was convinced that I was in the country under false pretenses. That accent. you know.

One side of my family originally came from the East Coast, another is from the Mid West.
I have absolutely no desire to see where they were from, because there are just too many people in the United States whom I do not want to deal with. That goes double and triple for areas that they weren't from, like the entire South. And ten times that for Texas.

Nah, I don't need to visit New Orleans, Charleston, or Miami. I'm good.

Also, I don't care how they make pizza elsewhere in this country, which is like totally unique dude and a tradition that outranks everyone else's pizza all of which ain't shit. Or their hot dogs. Kan me allemaal gestolen worden.

Kristi Noem represents the overwhelming majority of Americans.
Total Karen bitches.

Also, I'm totally okay with the rest of the country never visiting the Bay Area. There's nothing here you want to see, we have no edible food, we dress funny, talk foreign gibberish, and everything is too expensive. Plus most of us aren't Christians by your standards.
And there is patchouli everywhere, oh suffering humanity!


Stay away.
For the love of Baby Jesus, stay away.


This whole place is precisely like the Tenderloin.
There are depraved criminals everywhere.
We'll kidnap your children.
Brainwash them.
Cthulhu!


The Symbionese Liberation Army, People's Temple, and The Grateful Dead are all examples of what can go wrong when nice normal Americans visit Northern California.
Really, you should head to Texas instead.
Grits.



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WAH, SMELL GOOD

Naturally, it didn't offer either cuisine. The American Peking Restaurant (美利堅京菜), in Wan Chai on Lockhart Road (灣仔駱克道20號地下), served what was essentially a huge menu of Canto standard restaurant dishes with an emphasis on 1950's fine dining.
Fried appetizers. Fried main courses. Sweet'n sour. Potstickers.
Hugely popular with the expats.

Seeing as expats are usually drunken Aussies, one was hesitant. Drunken Aussies are a plague very common in tropical Asia, and no amount of common sense or penicillin deals with that effectively. Just give it more Fosters till it passes out.

The travelling Dutch, English, and Germans are nearly as beer sodden.
Americans do shots and pick fights.


Dang, makes me wish now I had gone there.
It might have been very exciting.


It closed in 2018.

Among the popular items there were various dishes served on a sizzling iron platter with sauce or gravy poured over at the table, a very dramatic presentation which always smells wonderful from two or three tables away. There are a few restaurants here in SF that do it also. Teppanyaki (鐵板料理，鐵板煮食) is originally Japanese semi-western food, which caught on in a minor way, and is visually appealing and dramatic.
However, it often looks better than it is.

Two chachanteng where I eat occasionally do it. I love the fragrance of meat, onions, grease, and gravy when someone else has it, but really it isn't that good, and people order it probably because of the smell, theatricality, and as a special treat.

It's almost pointless without observers.


Sometimes other diners have food that when it comes to their table prompt one to think that that is what one should've requested oneself. Next time. And mentally that spurs one to go there again, even though one doesn't remember to get that dish.
One was subconsciously primed.

I still remember the porkchop someone else had two years ago.
It looked absolutely beautiful and delicious.
But I've never ordered it.



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THE SMELLS OF VICTORY

As a smoker, I've always been somewhat sensitive about possible stenches. Combine that with the well-known Asian opinion about white people being a bit whiff, and the times I've gagged on Patchouli or Aramis in office building elevators, plus the soggy dog odours on public transit when it's full of wet office workers during rainy days, and you can understand that there is a situation here. I worry: do I smell bad? Am I so rank that people gag?
Are little kiddies frightened by me? Do I offend shy young ladies?

Well, that last is a given, seeing as I'm an older man who smokes a pipe, eats meat, and am rather Anglo-looking. So I smell, and I probably support child-labour in the Congo and vote for Senator Bedfellow. All of which are manifestly horrible evils.

[Plus I growl. Which is neither here nor there.]

Never-the-less. This morning my apartment mate used too much cologne. Oh boy. Place still reeks like a rose garden crawled in here and died. And I've already had my first smoke of the day, so my nose buds should be dead to nearly everything right now.

Having an apartment mate whose sense of smell is below par is a blessing. I'm going to light up my pipe inside, fully confident that she won't notice a darned thing, even though she is a refined Cantonese female and therefore programmed to assume that we Caucasians are richly gifted in the compost heap fragrance department.

That said, I do need to do laundry.
Stinky stinky.

For obvious reasons I almost never go to Japan Town ten blocks away. I remember reading passages in James Clavell's 'Shogun' which were unflattering to our physical fragrances, and the Japanese are far more neurotic about that than even Chinese and South East Asians. They turn green.

Cantonese aren't. Any group that shops in places where salt fish is sold, combines shrimp paste with fatty pork at the drop of a hat, and has a fondness for deep-fried mystery objects to rival the Dutch, is not nearly so fastidious. Vocal, perhaps, but not obsessed.

One Cantonese smell that may startle the outsider is liniment for bodily aches, common for older people. Camphor and menthol, often combined with minty elements and cassia, rubbed on arthritic joints with wild abandon. White flower oil, rectify the bones water, and black devil oil (白花油，正骨水、黑鬼油 'paak faa yau', 'jing gwat suei', 'hak kwai yau'). All available at every herbalist and general grocery store, the dominant smell on the Number One California bus rocketing down Clay Street, and what everyone remembers their grandparents smelling like when they visited them in their pokey little flat above the bookstore on Jackson Street. Fresh, sinus-clearing, and pungent. Plus it's the perfume in high quality stick ink, so it also recalls the scholar's study, book rooms, and those written taoist charms used to immobilize zombies ("hopping vampires", 殭屍 'keung si') in a popular movie from 1985 (殭屍先生 'keung si sin saang') as well as diverse scrolls to keep the ooga-booga away.

[In that last usage, it might no longer be effective; as a Caucasian I'm the quintessence of ooga-booga, and I head into Chinatown regularly. Perhaps my pipe-smoking has denatured it.]

Add sandalwood smoke and cooking smells to that, and a Cantonese person would easily overlook the slightly fishy odeur of masses of white people.

Certainly my apartment mate puts up with it. And she's refined and ladylike. Albeit this morning reeking of roses. Over the top and good heavens.


Catonese women also seem to be fond of house cleaning with strong-smelling substances.
My apartment mate uses a concoction which contains fragrant herbal oils and alcohol, and the downstairs lobby is minty from the landlady's efforts. I would imagine that whole areas of Asia have a lingering nose-echo of antiseptic, lemon, and citrus-fresh chemicals.
In addition to salt fish, sandal wood incense, and old codger liniment.




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IT'S ALL ABOUT THE POETRY, MAN

When I got home I noticed the elderly gentleman who always seems out of it up ahead. I had seen him earlier wandering around the neighborhood, which he often does. He has kinfolk who take care of him I suspect because he's always clean and has different clothes, but most of the time he's definitely lost. I have never encountered him quite there. Not on the same planet.

He's moving much slower than before. Old age.

Whenever I see him I always wish him a good day. I'm not sure whether he speaks English or Cantonese best, so I've used both. His response is usually something mumbled indistinctly, and I've heard him talking to invisible people in Cantonese, mostly.

There's always an air of things not having worked out as planned about him.


The other elderly Cantonese person I've encountered twice today is Tat Yee, whom I've known for decades. The first time was after my tea, when I was strolling down an alleyway smoking my pipe and he was loitering outside a nearby drinking establishment smoking his. When the bookseller and I went there for whiskey and a glass of tea he was still there -- over four hours later -- which seems like a productive way to enjoy one's retirement. Things probably didn't work out as planned for him either, but he's coping with it differently.

My friend the bookseller and I are somewhat anomalous, comparatively. We have things going on. He hosted the young poets last week and fed them crabs. He's more culturally lively than I am, by a very long mile.

While he was telling me about that dinner, I came up with an entirely new form of sonnet; two limericks, each with a longer third line to make them four liners, followed by two haiku.
I bet I could irritate bucket loads of people with that.
More than I already do.


One thing I mentioned which fair upset him was the recipe for the tobacco mixture called 'Hobbits Weed' (two parts BCA, one part Lane's Very Cherry, and one part Sutliff 1M), which is three quarters vanilla aromatic and loved by Gandalf wannabees who own churchwarden pipes. Smoked at every damned renaissance faire between here and Tierra Del Fuego.

If you puff it around me I might recite sonnets to drive you away.


Tolkien was undoubtedly a very silly bugger.



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SEVERAL OF MY BEST FRIENDS

One of the things that keep me from arguing that Dutch Americans are the best thing that ever happened to civilization is that so many of us are working for the puffy-faced Orange anti-christ. I myself am Dutch American. And I do get along with several other Netherlandish Americans, some of whom are splendid people, despite occasional glimmers of caveman tendencies or an upbringing rooted in the peat bogs of the back country somewhere near Groningen. But that's very much like saying that not all Irish Americans are always drunken savages or even problem cases, some of them, perhaps the majority, are only moderate drinkers who can quote James Joyce or George Bernard Shaw, who weren't alcoholics.

Not all Scots are manky gits.
By no means!

Despite seeing killer rabbits when it's just a fluffy bunny. Silly buggers.


Basically, I'm trying to be a good Christian here, and attempting to demonstrate the tolerance for which my people are supposedly famous. As well as forgiveness for crazed individuals who despite their good beginnings have strayed into perversion and degeneracy.
May their eternal souls rot forever in hell.

Problem is, I'm having a damned hard time forgiving Christians.

Very many of whom are utterly repulsive.

And have a vicious streak a mile wide.

Exhibit A: Trump's entire cabinet. B: The Republicans in Congress. C: The Red State voters. Many of whom are racists, bigots, crypto-nazis, and good Christians. Ready to make our little brown brothers in Venezuela ready for Christianity -- as long as they don't come here -- and the poor benighted trolls in Greenland subjects, because we need lebensraum. As well as a Gaza-type resort in a place where there are no pesky Arabs.
The Greenlanders are not Arabs. God is good.
It was clearly meant to be.
Hallelujah.



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ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE

At this point all of us have seen videos, several videos, of ICE agents behaving violently and breaking laws. Which, if you are a conservative, probably thrill you, and if you are human nauseate you. All of this is applauded by Republican politicians and a great many True Christians. This is an unstable situation, and there might be pushback.
Which the government will neither expect nor respect.

A popular incendiary document encourages, supports, and predicts it.

And dammit, that's dangerous.


CITE:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
END CITE.


Nowhere in that document are Molotov Cocktails mentioned. So pre-emptively, the American people should be banned from owning Molotov Cocktails on the basis that we hold no truck with such Communist devices, which had been used to great effect in resisting the Nazis in hell-holes like Eastern Europe during World War Two, Delhi and Bombay during riots there, and Plaisance-du-Touch near Toulouse in France in March of this year against Elon Musk. Foreigners! Americans are NOT foreigners. We don't do such things. And we say 'baa'.

The ONLY legitimate use for flammable devices is to keep warm when it's forty two degrees Fahrenheit during the day, going down to mid-teens at night, snow on the ground, wind chill factor, and icy conditions. The human body does not survive long under those conditions. Individuals with higher body fat may retain heat longer, insulated or layered clothing provides some protection against hypothermia, and a person's fitness level and health affects survival time. Staying still leads to faster heat loss, movement may help maintain body temperature.

Fortunately there aren't many places in the civilized world with those precise conditions.

Here in San Francisco it's far from that. Temperate weather, and it's always sunny here. That famous mediterranean climate of ours, you know. Additionally, we would never use Molotov Cocktails ourselves (horrid foreign devices), because we are men of peace ("baa"), and, additionally, in California there is an ever-present fire danger. Which is bad.


Conditions right now are almost tropical! It's fifty plus degrees (twelve Celcius), and sunny! Beach weather! We run toward the surf in slow motion in our scanty red swimming togs, as David Hasselhoff and his girls have shown us. We are blessed.

We are suntanned pacifists. We often say 'baa'.
It is the mantra of happiness.
Christian!


Please never go postal, boys and girls.
Doing so is against the law.
Remember that.



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ALMOST MAMMALIAN, ISN'T IT?

According to my blog stats there are far more readers of my scribbles in Hong Kong than in the United States. Which is fine. Unlike Jonathan who lives in Israel, I have mostly given up on the United States, as many people in this country are illiterate neo-confederate bozos.
Who wouldn't know a text if it came up and bit them in the flabby grey rear end.

Here, I have a few pipe smokers and angry Dutch Americans.
There, it's probably the occupants of office blocks.
Desperate to look busy for a while.
After ten in the evening.
Boss still there.

The work culture in Tsim Sha Tsui (尖沙咀) is in some ways insane, dictating that while your boss, who doesn't want to go home to his wife and kids and dissatisfied mother in law just yet stays at his desk playing poker on his computer with the sound off looking grim, you stay at yours perhaps eating instant noodles (公仔麵) and shuffling stacks of paper occasionally.
All of you would far rather be at the karaoke lounge.
But that got you in trouble last time.

You're wired to the tits. Tea and instant coffee. Plus ginseng drinks.
And you miss that curvaceous lady at the karaoke place.

For some reason, you don't know why, you cannot remember if she sings well or not. It might be an awful screeching sound, but your mind is a complete blank in that regard.
Which is actually very American of you.
Almost redneck.

Please admire these curvaceous hills. Don't even think of what they may look like, try to continue looking like you're working on a spreadsheet. Serious. As if your mind is fully absorbed by the import-export numbers. Gently rolling hills.....

I'm off today, and while I too like looking at gently rolling things, I do not pursue it at karaoke bars, because I remain keenly aware of the horrid noises, and I'm probably too old anyway. So instead I will head into Chinatown (six blocks away) for lunch in a short while, perhaps the chachanteng with the Toishanese bint who seems to hold me in scant regard. Which I do not mind. She and I have little in common, and she probably thinks that I smell nasty because of my pipe-smoking. But the food is decent, and it's fairly comfortable there, plus it's located close to where I'll be puffing away afterwards. Quiet alleys. No out-of-town tourists.

No downtown office workers screaming that I'm ruining their lungs think of the children you horrid tobacco fiend it's people like you that ruined this country and you're probably a meat eater puppies kittens butterflies evil bastard! Cough cough cough.


You know, Americans.



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