TICKING PEOPLE OFF SINCE I DON'T KNOW WHEN

Years ago many of the essays on this blog were pro-Israel, to the great joy of many readers. Who of course no longer come around, because I voted for Obama and uttered some critical words about Bibi Netanyahu and Geert Wilders. One of them (Zvi) commented: "Your actually a nasty little man, do you know that? An unpleasant narrow and opinionated antisemite. Why don't you just die?"

[Others who I have no reason to ever deal with again: Abe, Akiva, Alon, Amit, Ari, Avigdor, Barry, Baruch, Bea, Ben, Benji, Bentziyon, Bert, Berny, Chayim, Chris, Dan, David, David, Dove, Drorit, Eli, George, Haim, Hezzy, Ivan, J.J., Jack, Jack, Jack, Joshua, Justin, Kovel, Mark, Mathew, Melody, Melvin, Miriam, Mordechai, Nachman, Nancy, Pavel, Pinchas, Randy, Reuven, Rivki, Robin, Robin, Robert, Robert, Robert, Ron, Shanie, Sherman, Shimon, Shloime, Shlomo, Shlomo, Shmuel, Shoshana, Simcha, Susan S. in Jerusalem, Toviah, Thyme, Yaakov, Yank, Yerach, Yevgeny, Yoisif, Yosef, Zach, Zeb.]

I still unfondly remember being called a "goy well trained in Christian Talmudic criticism".
That's a high point, along with being a 'self-hating Jew, like many liberals'.
As well as "extremely neurotic" and "woke".


"Your actually a nasty little man, do you know that? An unpleasant narrow and opinionated antisemite. Why don't you just die?"


A charming sentiment. One of the people who is still a Facebook friend accused me of having turned on her and the gang several years ago. Which isn't accurate, I simply got tired of being too liberal for the die-hards, too Jewy for the end of times crowd, too Goyish for the Russian lady and her pals, and too Nazi for the lefties. One cannot please everybody.

A very similar pattern bubbled to the surface on several mailing lists; I am no longer a member of any mailing lists. One which I rather miss at times is the Suriname Mailing List, which had its moments, but then I remember the flood of sickening anti-American spew that came through regularly, from people in the Netherlands who didn't know bupkes about this country ......

I've changed. I no longer tolerate ignorant rear ends so much.

I haven't visited the East Bay in nearly a decade.

I refuse to become involved.

I am too pissy.



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MULTI-FACETED

Just spent half an hour unhappily re-reading comments under some of my blogposts from several years ago. One of the best (worst, weirdest) was this: "Maybe, like many liberals, you are a self-hating Jew. The world has no use for your type.". See, this is why I no longer associate with some people and swear a lot in other languages now.

The problem with blogs is anybody can read them (unless you've set them to 'private'). Facebook, on the other hand, has security features that can be tailored. Over the years I've tailored. Heavily. As well as defriended and blocked.


FACEBOOK MEMORIES

Two years ago:
"Someone today accused me of panicking over corona virus. I had to correct him. I was not panicking, but trying to make him and his kind panic. Because this is the best thing that ever happened to the toilet paper industry. For whose product demand is usually, static."

Three years ago:
"When I grow up, I'm going to be just like Pepe the King Prawn."

Five years ago:
"Blog stats: seven perverts, and two culinarists. Same old same old, panties, breasts, and curry."


For your information, I am not Jewish. I am a Dutch American, my ancestors were severe Calvinists who came over several generations ago. And I speak Dutch fluently. There may indeed be a strong element of 'own-group-dislike-or-even-hate' in much of my weltanshauung, because all reasonable intelligent people will evince a "good-lord-my-people-can-be-real-dickheads" self realization. But 'self-hate' is too glib and simplistic a term. I do not hate myself.
I realize that I would not have liked my teenage or early twenties self. He was a bit callow.


One Facebook memory from over ten years ago still perfectly expresses my current self:
"The BDS movement (no, that isn't "bondage, domination, and sadism") had a table outside of Safeway yesterday. Apparently they don't like tobacco smoke either. Sweetheart, I am at least thirty feet away from any operable commercial doorways and windows, so I'll smoke wheresoever I damn well want. For fast relief of that bitter pent-up feeling that's making you so bloated, please consider pissing up a rope."

If anything, I am also a Japanese office lady red panda who releases her pent up work frustrations by getting drunk and belting out death metal at seedy karaoke joints.
I like to think that I am a somewhat flexible person.

As well as muppet-prawnlike.



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GLIMMERING AT THE EDGES

Lunch was exceptionally good. Roast duck and charsiu pork over rice, a srong cup of milk tea, at a place where the owner is hardworking and likable and the waitress on duty yesterday was kind, considerate, and attentive. Despite being Toishanese, everyone who works there is fluent in HK Cantonese. They are very pleasant people.

Unfortunately, some of their customers aren't. There was a bad-tempered woman yelling on her phone in one corner, and a group at a main table engaged in animated conversation dominated by a fellow I recognize and, when I consider him at all, dislike.

He's what can best be described as Toishanese thug-buck. Loud, loutish, often punctuating his speech with 'magahai' and 'lou mou' precisely like English speakers use the 'F' word.
He has a considerable lack of charm.

Kind of like the engineers at FungWing Bunco, who bitterly resented the fact that I was white and had a relationship with a person of the other gender. Chinatown boys, still mostly able to speak Cantonese, but Americans of the geekoid variety. Not able to translate career flourishes into normal life. Often such people have mothers who think the sun shines out of sunny-boy's rear and blame society (and white people) for his lack of success, and inability to form normal relationships with women who adore and worship him as he deserves.

Toishanese thug-buck is not able to speak much English; so the resemblance is not linguistic. Someone like me (white, AND able to speak English) has only a limited use in his eyes, and he distrusts me because I am flexibly communicative but he cannot grasp me.
Fortunately his welcome at several places has worn rather thin.
People like him would become red guards decades ago.
They resent their present boundaries.


He didn't stay very long. Neither did the crabby auntie with the cell phone (and the dour looking husband thing). After they left the place was quieter and sunnier, and the people at the main table engaged in what seemed like thoughtful conversation.

I don't go there very often (the menu has certain limitations) but I really hope that they survive these times and thrive.


The weather is warmer than a week ago. Waverly Place afterwards was extremely enjoyable.

Some of the residents there recognize me (remarkable, because all of us Caucasians look alike), and will nod when they see me, and little children sometimes look at the pipe I'm smoking with curiosity as they pass with their mothers. I'm fairly certain I have never heard anyone cussing (炒蝦拆蟹，講粗口), although I have heard opera there on certain days.
No one has ever accused me of ruining the world with my presence there.
Or poisoning their precious lungs by smoking my pipe in public.
The red guards and thug-bucks are elsewhere.
No suburban Karens either.



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SUCH INDIVIDUALISM!

On Facebook, several posts by people I know, or in groups of which I am a member (this is what passes for social life these days) are strongly indicative of bad life choices. But the people involved are happy, and it's far too soon for them to have regrets and contemplate joining a monastery or nunnery, so I shan't say anything negative.

I'm relying on their mothers and busybody neighbors for that.

Or medical professionals at their yearly checkup.


Suffice to say that a Lord Of The Rings tattoo is not something I would get. Whether in full colour or simply black outline with Elfish script. Gandalf with or without a balrog.
Nor would I huff Molto Dolce in a bright blue churchwarden pipe.


If I were to smoke Molto Dolce, or get a Starbucks beverage with low fat, fruit syrups, sprinkles, and wipped cream, then perhaps Gandalf would be a wise choice. The bright blue pipe would be icing on the cake, and I might also go for strap-on fairy wings.

But more power to them. I support their 'self expression'.
Bad decisions show their brass balls.



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WETTER TOWARDS THE BOTTOM

If you know me, you are familiar with my sense of adventure, and tendency to occasionally do things from which a rational man or woman might justly shy away. Especially when it comes to tobaccos. From personal experience I can say that a full Latakia mixture smoked in a war zone is delicious! As well as quite probably a temptation for people you do not want to meet face to face. The bus had broken down on the road to Marbel, it was a hot day, I was younger then. And I had a nasty prickly area on my thighs. Smoke keeps bugs away. Okay?

In like manner I tried a whole range of nasty aromatic tobaccos over a four or five year period, on weekends working with The Heckman (a cigar smoker). Who left the company over a year ago for his sanity's sake. Discovery!

I've smoked Clan; a very popular mixture.
Perfumed puke in a pouch.

And quite a few times I had a pipe in my mouth on a public thoroughfare in Berkeley.
Yes, I know!

Heck, I've even tried Ennerdale Flake, which tastes exactly like you would imagine urinal cake does. Some people (right effing perverts) smoke this habitually and probably live in mildewed basements in the Midlands or up near the Scottish border, underneath their widowed mother's apartment. They really should check up on the old bird, they haven't talked in twelve months.
She's probably mummified by now. Ennerdale has ruined their sense of smell.


On that note, I might eventually try some of this:

HOLLY'S NON PLUS ULTRA

A mixture of Virginias allegedly providing a "cool and mild smoke". It is further alleged to be "non-cased", though categorized as an aromatic, flavoured with "other/miscellaneous".
Sadly, this masterpiece of the embalmer's art is unavailable locally.

One of the reviewers on TR ('Charatan's Make') describes it as follows: "Imagine you have a full milk churn and you forget it in the stall. One week later you find it and blunderingly a piece of soap slips out of your hand and falls right into the milk churn. Now give this delicious mixture one more hot summer week and you have the sauce for this tobacco. 0 stars."

He's probably a farmer and I respect his experience.

Others casually mention "an overwhelming grandma's perfume flavor", "would rather smoke the powdered brains of my own children", "mind boggling", "interesting", and "slightly wetter towards the bottom".

And apparently it's tolerable.



Many otherwise normal people are slightly wetter towards the bottom. You would never know. It's not a major character flaw, and if you notice it would be polite not to mention it.



JimInks seems to like it. I suspect Pipestud does too.
Pipestud actually enjoys Royal Yacht.
But is otherwise normal.

TOBACCO INDEX


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THE "NEATNESS" NUT

When out for that first smoke of the day you grasp man's inhumanity to man. As represented by the evil dude who lightly placed a used mask over a pile of dog poo. When you try to move it to the curb with your shoe so that the street sweeping vehicle can dispose of it, you discover that doing so creates an unsightly situation. The fact is that it's bio-hazard squared.
Fortunately I didn't get any on my shoe, but I dodged a bullet there.

There was another identical mask on the pavement nearby.


Gee thanks, anonymous dog-owning psychopath.


One could assume, if one did not have coffee inside of one, that dog owners are a danger to the public. Just look at what they do with masks. But fortunately I did have my first cup already, and I am a calm equitably tempered man, so I bear the evil sumbitch no ill will.

What goes through their head?


"Oh that is so unsightly, let me put a doily (used face mask) over it so no one will have to look at it."


Twisted dang dingo. We need far more non-dog owning pipesmokers in this neighborhood to raise the mental health level and dramatically decrease the weirdness quotient. And it would have the added benefit that people carrying yoga mats would get far more exercise dodging the men with pipes as well! Like bicyclists, they think they own the road.

And joggers too! Jogger, bicyclists, dog owners, and yoga practitioners. Too many of them. All radiating a self-satisfied smugness. While wandering around civilized neighborhoods at the crack of dawn. "Look at us, we have virtue! And abundant healthitude! We put facemasks on piles of dog poo! Unique and creative!" Actually, it was probably just someone who hadn't had their morning coffee yet (because it might promote peristalsis), whose synapses weren't firing properly at that hour. And conceivably the type of person who straightens pictures in doctors' waiting rooms (they're seeking help for that). With which I can sympathize, to a certain extent. There's one picture at my cardiologist which is a minute fraction off-kilter, and one of the patient consultation rooms at the clinic has an illustration of a rose (next to the sign saying translators are on call) which has been irritating me for years, why hasn't anyone ever adjusted that, but it's too close to the computer and I don't want to get up and poke it lest at that precise moment the doctor comes in and it looks like I was trying to access the system.
A sane man worries about appearances.


Other than the facemask dog incident, today's early morning stroll with a pipe was extremely enjoyable. It starts getting light shortly after six now, and it was crisp, clear, and bright by the time I lit up. The smell of G.L.Pease's Embarcadero (red Virginia tobaccos with Izmir, pressed and sliced) in my briar was ethereal and induced contemplation, the caffeine in my veins had the synapses sparking full tilt, and there weren't too many people about.
A few dog owners, joggers, bicyclists, and yoga freaks.
No street loonies yet.

TOBACCO INDEX


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I HAVE TENTACLES AND SPIKES TOO

My weekend, which is longer than your weekend, has begun. Which means I'm already wondering where in Chinatown I shall have either lunch or a tea time snack tomorrow. It's a rather important question. I like the people who work at my favourite haunts, but a number of their regular customers I am distinctly on the fence about. Part of the difference is the staff has known me for a long time, talked to me more, and is well aware that I can read Chinese.
Whereas to their regulars I am just the white guy infesting "their" place.


This came to the fore last week, when I swung into a place for milk tea and a pastry, and there were lots of people already there. The staff insisted "sit, sit". The question was "where?" This table? No, these folks are staring rather coldly, despite there being at least three empty seats at the long central table. Here? Nah, the three old geezers at this table for six really don't like company, and, erm, I'm white. They're the type who have always blamed whitey for whatever was wrong with the country in the sixties and seventies. I know these men. What about this seat at a table for four where there's only one other person? Um, I don't think so.
The old guy sitting here is sputtering with indignation at the idea.

And now everyone is looking at me. The place is crowded. There are a lot of people here.

That's okay. I'll come back in a few hours when all of them have gone home for dinner.

This has been kind of eating at me for several days.

We white folks are sensitive.

Well, I am.

[The place with the distastefull late morning to mid afternoon regulars is in fact one of my favourite places. The people who work there are really nice folks, the pastries are exquisite, and though it bustles at all hours, for the last two hours there are usually only one or two other people sitting down and having a snack. The distant daytime waitress who no longer works there changed enormously when I ordered in Cantonese, and was obviously able to read the menu. Literacy may not make me a fellow villager, but I ceased being something horrid at that point. And I like the venerable old gentleman who translates for his fellow exiles who hangs out there late in the day. We have a friendly nodding acquaintance.]

I'll probably end up at the place where one fellow goes with his elderly mom for noodles in the middle of the afternoon at least once a week, who always looks at me with distaste when he sees me. The two of them should've cleared out by four or four thirty.
And the staff there is very considerate, and respect me.

[One of the people there worries that I don't eat enough. She's seen me there when my health was much worse. The three old geezers who really don't like company and probably blame whitey for a bunch of things also go there fairly often, but they clear out by four. Which is my tea time.]

One other place, where I like to have the bittermelon omelette with rice for lunch, has two or three eccentric women regulars who often look askance at me. One of them years ago acted like my being able to speak Chinese was some kind of evil treachery. She informed the staff at various places when I came in of that, so that they'd be careful. I'm fairly convinced she had a screw loose (as do the other two), but I haven't seen her around in three years. Maybe her bearings became permanently unmoored, and she's been committed.

[My being able to read and speak usually pleases restaurant and bakery staff enormously. It makes communication so much easier, and there is no need to answer impossible white people questions. I already know what things are.]

One of the places I occasionally frequent has an old lady behind the counter who really enjoys it when other customers are startled at my speech. I think she enjoys the frisson of a freak.
Which I obviously am.

Yeah, that incident at the crowded place last week is still eating at me.
I seriously like their pastries, the milk tea, and the staff.
Probably won't go there again before five.
Don't need the aggro.


OK, I know I'm a mutant.
Please act normal.
Or try to.



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A TEAM WE COULD ALL CHEER ON

It's no secret that I have not supported the local team, and had not evinced any interest in them or how they were faring in their quest to get to the super bowl.
And I'm glad that whole opera is over.

But I could be persuaded to change tack.

If a team were to be organized called 'The Colma Dead People', I'd probably cheer them on. Hail their noble endeavors, purchase one or two clothing items in their colours, and speak laudatorily about their skillful sportive præstations.


Host sportsfans, and provide pizza.
Yay team!




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VULTURE FEEDING

A message on a forum of which I am a member states "It appears that my brother, [ --- ], has again made a comment which Facebook considers to be one step over the line. He's asked me to thus handle things for a while, until the air is cleared. So I have to do this for [ --- ] even though he won't even let me live in his new house."

Which lets us know that once again Facebook got its knickers in a twist over a well-thought-out and balanced statement made by an intelligent and mature individual of considerable erudition, and very well-read besides.

Probably, and I am just guessing here, something to the effect that calling for the assasination of Vladimir Putin was the first time that ass-kissing clown Lindsey Graham said anything intelligent. Do it, flush the bits of Putin down the drain, and pour some bleach after.

Or maybe he said something that could be loosely interpreted as "intercourse" the accursed Russians/Saudis/Trumpites/Fox News and Tucker Carlson/Lukashenko/The Disgusting and Reprehensible Serbian Fascists Who Should Be Wiped Off The Map And What A Pity We Never Completed The Job During The Clinton Years.

One doesn't like to be reprimanded for what is, as rational people would realize, a perfectly reasonable utterance. Facebook, as a social collective, AND as a company, does not quite qualify as "rational".


I also think that Putin should be assassinated. Surely there are people in the Kremlin who have read Roman history?

Furthermore, I fully support the statement "intercourse the Russians/Saudis/Trumpites/Fox News and Tucker Carlson/Lukashenko/The Disgusting and Reprehensible Serbian Fascists Who Should Be Wiped Off The Map And What A Pity We Never Completed The Job During The Clinton Years."

Or harvest their fatty inner thighs to feed the turkey vultures.
The turkey vultures are hungry, and need sustenance.

It's the Christian thing to do.
They're all dickheads.




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AND JUST THE RIGHT AMOUNT OF SUGAR!

Kind of like what an alien would think chocolate tastes like. Dry, stale, and pale. This was the apartment mate's judgement of a snackie poo that I had picked up at my favourite Chinatown grocery store. My remonstrance that it had "lovely packaging!" fell on deaf ears. She's Chinese American. She knows cynical bullpuckey when she hears it. My protestations that it had "lovely packaging" were obviously precisely that. 朱古力味奶油餅。Jyu gu lik! Wow!

Because, of course, I had bought it because of the packaging.

Sort of enchanting and bewitching.

It's not too bad.


There are times when her taste buds and my tastebuds don't point in the same direction. For instance, she says that carrots taste "soapy". Which never struck me. And I like chilies, in quantities that would give her nightmares. Sriracha is one of my favourite vegetables.

She wants me to bring the chocolate things to work with me, but these things are too good for those effers in the backroom. They don't deserve alien chocolate!

Besides, Chinese tastes and western tastes don't entirely coincide.

She's very American in some regards. Native born.

We'll just have to agree to disagree.

I'm from outer space.



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THE UPDATED BASKET OF REPREHENSIBLES

Honestly, I thought that the current list was up to date. Because 'M' alerted me to the contrary underneath a recent post, I had added to it. But Charles pointed out grievous ommissions.

So I've updated it again. Second time in less than twenty four hours.
This is worthy of TWO illustrations!

The current list of shithole states and places, barring further candidates joining, is as follows: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.
Plus Los Angeles, Orange County, Philadelphia, and San Diego.

The Big Mac Daddy of shitholes is, of course, Texas.

They are the gold standard of shitholery.
Any more shitholish it cannot get.
They go up to eleven.



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AN EXCESS OF JOY

A friend overseas takes issue with some of the things I've posted recently, writing: "watching Americans "make this all about them" and use the situation to attack their perceived narrowly national political "enemies" (who in all cases constitute about half of their fellow Americans, no matter from which side this is being done) just makes me sad.
I mean, if doing this gives you joy, zei gezund. you are part of a very large and inclusive club. and I suspect I have more excess joy to spare than you do. but it still makes me sad for you, because I like you."

Well now. I love the idea of him happily skipping through fields of wildflowers over there in the Shomron without a care in the world, wearing his tie-dye mumu and playing the Grateful Dead on his headphones, overflowing with an excess of joy.

Because joy is what it's all about.


On a forum for screaming leftwingers, the Indians, Pakistanis, Brazilians, and Argentinians are also filled with joy. Joy that Vladimir Putin has given the West a black eye, and joy that we're powerless to stop him. Also, absurdly, joy that Nato will soon be forced to give up the Falkland Islands and return the Islas Malvinas to their rightful owners. I note, by the way, that much of the non-Western world abstained from censuring Russia. They don't want their supply of smetana to dry up. That would lessen their joy.

So, to rediscover joy, I cruised into foreign news sites. Turkish drones. Drug smuggler arrested in Aruba. Obligatory corona tests. Excellent coffee is important for a good work environment. Mariupol without gas or electricity. What are we ordering online today? Manic crabs captured on underwater camera. Do Indians believe women make better politicians? We Muslims are treated like the sacrificial goat. Indian students stuck in Ukraine desperate for help. How mindfulness can make you a darker person. Why do so many babies and pregnant women in Africa die? Die Suche nach Moskaus versteckten Milliarden; Jachten, Immobilien, Geld – der Westen will das Vermögen von Russen im Ausland einfrieren. Warum das gar nicht so einfach ist. Coronavirus in der Schweiz: BAG meldet 23'023 Neuinfektionen und 132 Spitaleinweisungen, 7-Tage-Schnitt steigt leicht. Russen, die gegen den Krieg protestieren, gehen ein grosses Risiko ein – der Unterdrückungsapparat wird immer brutaler.

On the other hand, over in the Shomron, a blithe spirit is skipping gaily through fields of wildflowers wearing tie-dye and listening to the Grateful Dead.



Most of what I post on social media are pictures I've drawn. Like this one.

They do not make political statements, but colourfully reflect a quiet life mostly unconcerned with politics, the pandemic, tie-dye mumus, or wildflowers in the west bank. Instead, a cup of hot chocolate, skewers of chicken satay above glowing charcoal, a rabbit enjoying a cup of hot coffee and a smoke in his pipe, a butterfly, and Stonehenge. As well as a stuffed turkey vulture looking perky and rather pleased with himself.

I admit that I have not drawn a sprite amidst the wildflowers.

Joy, dear Jonathan, is gar nicht so einfach.



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THIS POST DEDICATED TO THE FOX DEMOGRAPHIC

Sometimes you wake up with a foul taste in your mouth, that tells you that you really shouldn't have given a blowjob to a zombie or a fundamentalist Christian the night before while doing mescaline and highly caffeinated smart beverages. Well, okay, that's not my experience, but you know what I mean. I suspect that very many people in the red states have that feeling now. It's a gradual experience. They're starting to slowly have existential angst, and a sinking suspicion that they were quite stupid five years ago.

They can't quite put their finger on it.

What was it again?

Oh yeah, they had an election. Lost their funding for schools and medical facilities, had to start eating canned petfood, then a pandemic washed over them, and their environmental pollution and degradation increased leading to higher rates of cancer and breathing difficulties.
More lead in the water. Toxic landfills. The local Wammart closed.
Rotating job openings at convenience stores.
No more taco bowls.

Also: the preacher had an affair and syphoned the church bank account, someone shot up the local mall, and several of the neighbors got arrested for domestic violence and making threats to local officials. Remember the lice outbreak at the highschool? Must'a bin the libs!

In trailer parks and retirement homes all across the country, people want the damned kids off their lawns, black people to stay in their ghettoes, and all them furriners to go back to Mesko. Their candidate promised them! It's only because of pesky reality that it didn't happen.

And the Ukranians, the Ukranians sabotaged everything!


But Boebert, MTG, and Qanon will save the day.

No more vaxxing, no more voting.

We gotsa convoy!



Yeah okay, I'm thinking Idaho, Mississipi, and Montana here. But it might be any of the shithole states: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Plus Los Angeles, Orange County, Philadelphia, San Diego, and Eastern Oregon.



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I'VE GOT A SUPPLY OF CHOCOLATE AND I KNOW HOW TO USE IT!

The apartment mate took a sick day today. Probably for her sanity's sake. Which may not be the best idea, because I'm here. Several weeks ago she said: "I always listen to you, even when you babble the most inane shit, old geezer." Which rather suggests that I am not the best choice of company if you wish to maintain your equilibrium.

Especially now while I'm hepped on the last of the Christmas chocolate.

She's currently asleep in her room.

I'm wired to the tits and arguing with a turkey vulture about fatty inner thighs. The crazed beast is obsessed. He doesn't realize that at the place which was taking care of him before I adopted him as a member of this household the only carrion he ate was dust bunny. He believes himself entitled to fresh corpse daily, and keenly wishes me to bash some of the ancient and decrepit fossils in Marin over the head and harvest choice body parts.

It will not happen. I treasure the old farts too much.

Care for some hot chocolate, little dude?



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IMAGINING SATAY PONOROGO

A friend who lives in a region where late night snackies are far more interesting than here in SF mentioned that because he was reading about the Ukraine situation he was left with no option for dinner except Burger King. Personally, I think he likes junk food. I've seen photos of that on his Facebook page often enough, as well as fried things and meaty things, that I recognize this as part of his regular and preferred diet.

At times I've asked him about the absence of sambal.

To me that is a singular lack.

Sambal is life.


Where I am, late night eating used to include Vietnamese noodle soup, Chinese food, Tacos, Portuguese food (if you're from San Francisco you now know the part of the city where I live), bacon-wrapped hot dogs, and one or two other things. Now, two years into the Trump pandemic, the only thing available after three in the morning is a donut.
And that donut isn't as good as it used to be.

The option of chicken satay with cashew nut butter sauce (instead of peanut sauce) is not an option here even during daylight.

In his area, it can be taken for granted. Charcoal grilled skewers of chicken, spicy sauce, chopped cucumber, sambal. Even late at night. No, he doesn't live in Amsterdam.

[Satay Ponorogo: marinate chicken breast chunks with mashed shallots, ground coriander, ground cumin, garlic, galangal, turmeric, candlenuts, palm sugar, and soy sauce. Thread onto skewers, gril over charcoal, brush with sweet soy sauce and coconut water regularly till done. Serve with a peanut sauce. Note that Central Javan food preferences are sweeter than you might think; there's palm sugar in the marinade, in the grill-wash, and in the sauce.]

On the other hand, when I left the house earlier the city looked dreamy. The fog was thick on Nob Hill, dawn was gentle rather than brazen. Where he lives, for fog he would have to go further eastward, to the Dieng Plateau. It actually gets cold there.

In some ways I envy him. We need a place for satay late at night. And slow-drip Vietnamese coffee. It would add magic if that were at the end of a walk.

A breakfast of champions.



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DISTANT THROBBING NOISES

The weather this year is peculiar. Scant rain, warmer than usual. The burning season should be interesting. Last year it started in May. It might be even earlier this time. As a crusty old grouch I welcome nature chasing transplantees back to the Midwest and the East Coast. Come on, guys, wouldn't you rather be surrounded by falling iguanas and ignorant goobers from Philly? It's your native environment! And they make better pizza there! You told us so.

Most of those people look a bit peaked. Drained. Wan. The complete absence of edible cheese pie, cheese steaks, grits, and barbecue affects them. They become malnurished and grumpy, and can't shut up about how much better it is back where they come from.

The poor sodding bastards.


It was "summery" when I stepped outside yesterday evening.

By the time I returned it was quite dense outdoors, the foghorns were lowing and all was silvery grey. When I left to smoke "the pipe for watching rats in Spofford Alley" it had not been so.

Every Tuesday an old friend and myself stop in the old neighborhood for burgers, then at a bar for tea, and at a karaoke place for a nightcap. We gave the Karaoke place a miss; we couldn't identify what tune was being massacred from half a block away, some guy was still bellowing "aaaaaay" when we were a block further in the other direction. No discernible lyrics.

That smoke was quite enjoyable.


On my street, other than porticos brightly lit to keep the crazies from squatting there, few apartment building lights were on. Probably just people on the internet.



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FRUITY DEPRAVITIES

Ever since I finally started seeking medical attention, which directly resulted in a coronary stent (冠狀動脈支架 'kun jong tung mak ji gaa') over three years ago, I've been heading down to the clinic at regular intervals, after which I usually get something which would absolutely horrify medical professionals (doctor, nutritionist, nurses and techinicians) to eat in Chinatown.

Today it was Japanese curry porkchop over rice (日式咖喱豬扒飯 'yat sik gaa lei chyu baa faan').

Breaded and fried pork chops with a rich curry sauce.
Delicious with spoonfuls of chili paste.

Per my blood tests, I am no longer borderline diabetic. Not entirely out of the danger zone yet on that score, but the numbers are much better. And kidney function is healthy.
So I am full of piss and vinegar, as they say.

It's all that good clean living. Coffee, tea, hot sauce, slightly more veggies and slightly less ice cream, and avoiding sweetened pipe tobaccos. That's the ticket; no fruity pipe tobaccos!

Which is easy, because Captain Black Grape and Captain Black Watermelon never appealed to me anyhow, and cannot be sold in San Francisco or much of Marin County because they are, allegedly, targetted at children; an important pipe tobacco demographic.
You've passed the little imps and thugs huffing fruitloop cavendish in their Danish freehands, haven't you? Quite the public nuisance. If they start smoking a pipe before their teens, they inevitably stop going to church by the time they're twenty.
Or invading neigboring Ukraines.


Basically, the old crotchet is doing well.


As you would expect, I had two briars with me when I arrived at the appointment -- roughly forty minutes early -- but I exercised exemplary self control by not lighting up till after lunch.

Deciding which pipes had been relatively easy. Comoy made pipes for some reason always seem appropriate to the Chinatown environment. Which may have something to do with my dad and the California he knew before we went overseas.

My dad is also the reason I eschew fruity aromatics. "Son, good pipe tobacco does NOT smell like a Parisian bath house". No, I never asked him how he knew what a dubious establishment catering to skeevy types smelled like. Probably grape soda and watermelon candy. In direct consequence of his wise remonstrance, I smoke clean stuff that doesn't reek of hippie oils.

In another few hours I'll be heading out to have a last pipe of the evening in the Chinatown-Northbeach area. There may be zaniness and hi-jinx. Which I will cheerfully witness, but will in no way be responsible for. Whatever happens my legal liability will be zero.

There will be no evidence that I even encouraged it.

I'm a harmless old sort.



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NO AUNTIES EVER DO IT!

Thumper is going down to the vet today, to discuss the results of recent blood tests which were part of the yearly check up. Thumper is waking up with a hot beverage and a smoke, staring bleakly into the void while contemplating man's inhumanity to man and the reprehensibility of carnivores with teeth and claws and ravenous appetites towards rabbits.
Thumper is wondering which pipe(s) to stick in his pocket to smoke following his appointment shortly after noon, before or after lunch at a familiar chachanteng.

Wait. Rabbits don't actually have pockets.

Disregard the paragraph above.

"RABBIT RABBIT"

All smokers are Chinese, all of them are men. That, at least, is the impression one might get from a sign on a shop front in Chinatown. As a Caucasian, I feel that I can safely ignore the sign, as it clearly does not apply to me. The writer of that sign does not know that I can read it, and even though I'm standing right in front of it puffing on my pipe (a rather nice old Comoy made Gresham Giant, Canadian shape, filled with red and blonde Virginia), what I am doing must, logically, not be smoking.

各位叔叔們
門口16尺範圍
不准吸煙

"Uncles, within sixteen feet of the doorway smoking is not permitted". How very polite! Addressing recalcitrant old geezers as "uncles" is showing them proper respect.
And other than myself, there was no one else in front of the store.
I moved within seconds of reading the sign.
Despite the store being closed.
And thus unbotherable.

['ko wai suksuk-mun, mun-haau sap lok chek faanwai pat jeun kap yin']

I am charmed by the sign. But baffled by the sixteen feet.
What's so special about sixteen feet?

The sign is not near the hospital where my regular care physician's office is. The sign on the hospital warns that "this facility contains chemicals known to the state of California bla bla bla" precisely like a pack of cigarettes. As all hospitals do. Because our officials know that entering a hospital or holding a pack of smokes present dangers. You might get ill.
Bureaucracy says nothing about sixteen feet.
Must be an oversight.


It is traditional in some corners of the internet to post an illustration at the beginning of each month with the statement "rabbit rabbit". Uttering that, first thing in the morning, brings good luck or deflects the bad juju or something. It's a Waspy superstitious practice. I never actually thought about it -- being surrounded by Dutch speakers while we spoke English at home, I just assumed that it was the done thing -- but after returning to the United States I found out that not everyone was aware of that.

Anyway, that explains the picture of the bunny rabbit above.

You'll just have to imagine a carnivore slobbering.



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