hey bless my soul i went and got some photos posted at the photo page of this ‘yere blog. knock yourself out (but make sure you pronounce the first “k” in “knock"). No wait, here’s a few to get you started:
Zach on Mother’s day. He’s a good’un.
Zach enjoys painting. Zach enjoys painting Zach.
and finally, bowing to popular demand: a photo of the tramampoline.
wordosity will ensue. drive friendly.
Let’s do some ol’ fashioned blogstering here and catch y’all up on a few Mother’s Day Weekend delights that might have skipped yer focus, seeing as how you were not hanging out with me the whole time to keep your knowlege-levels all bulging and fierce like mine am. SO:
Friday night was distinguished by Zach greeting me at the door with delerious cries of “1-2-3! 1-2-3!” And in fact that’s just what he meant, because NetFlix had just delivered TMBG’s latest compilation of juvenile smartiness-enhancing music videos. It is fair to say that, since about 45 minutes since I walked in the door on Friday night, I’ve had songs about zeros, fours, and especially sevens and particularly especially 11s-and-12s stuck firmly in the tarry matrix of my worn-out haid.
Saturday morning Z and I took a stroll on Clement, where we encountered wonders and miracles! Anyway, we encountered weird groceries and action figures, which is almost as good… We made our first stop at Heroes Club, where Z took care to inform me which guys were good and which were, um, not good. (Mostly they were not good, except for spiderman and one smiling astroboy; even Batman was Not Good because he was all frowny). After a few surreal minutes amidst the mannikins, we wandered further on down the street and then crossed over to take a gander at New May Wah, wandering a few aisles to see if anything caught our eye (mental note: what will I make with a can of sweetened mangosteens in syrup?). Among things I did notice were the following:
* The slogan of Orion Choco-Pies is “It’s NOW!”. I like that. Very anxiety-producing.
* One particular corn puff snack comes in flavors that include “Karl Cheese Flavor.” Karl is actually shown in cartoon form on the front of the bag and you can totally imagine how cheesy he is.
* “It’s So Wonderful" Candy comes in three flavors: Orange, Lemon and Ube!
We also made a side-trip to a fishmonger to mong at some fish. Z was intrigued but a bit put-off by it too. I can’t say as I blame him, but they did have some really nice looking ahi for $15/lb so I might go back on my own at some point.
Saturday afternoon had been originally built around our going to a nice pikanik with some nice friends of Kel’s who have a big crazy pickanik in the park every blame year since, um, for, okay, well this was gonna be the 11th one anyway, you do the math. We packed up sausages fer grillin’ and fruit salad for coolwhippin’ and the adorable childboy for running around with dogs, and we drove out to the meadow where the festivities were to be held. We did see the signal red-n-yellow balloons and a lot of folk with kids and dogs and grills and such, but not anybody Kel knew. We took a little walk and came back, and Kel’s friends were still MIA. Dang! So we wandered over to the powerboat lake for to watch the RC powerboats wipe out in spectactular roostertails (turns out they get’em back by casting a line out past them with a tennis ball on the end, and just reel it back in - clever, those geeks can be). We also visited a little concrete island in the lake where lots of little turtles haul out to get some sun, and happened to see one of these too which totally freaked us out. It’s massive. It’s reptilian. AND IT’Z IN YER BOATLAKE!
The big reptile made us hungry so we got some hot dogs at a stand, and then goddamn it we went back home via some noodling around maneuvers so Z would fall asleep, and then everybody got a nice comfy nap - and if that’s not a decent stand-in for a pikanik with strangers, well, you are probably doing one of them wrong.
Saturday night was an actual date night (DATE NIGHT, cue theme song) - the first we’ve had in over a year. Z got left at cousin Bex’ place, and we hit the road to go 3 blocks away for supper at B Star Cafe which was really very nice, except for Kel’s meatball jook, which was SPECTACULAR and I will order it forever until it or I cease to exist. Afterwards we wandered a little, checked out Park Life (great art, fun books, scary music) and Green Apple and then got a beer or two at the Plough and Stars before grabbing a very rich slice of cake at a Martha & Bros and finally wandering aimlessly back to pick up Zach, a mere 2.5 hours later .... but man it felt like a solid 3 hours and fifteen minutes of child-free relaxation. Par-tay. Zach and Bex had a great time together and I think it’ll be a regular thing, eventually… I hope so, anyway. One date with the wife every 13 months is a bit rough on Daddy.
Okay, then, Sunday: We were planning on doing a hike out at Pt Reyes but we reevaluated at the last minute and did some of the 49 mile drive instead. Oh, first we started off with blueberry pancakes, but of course you expected that of me, right? THEN the drive - out to the beach to start (first exciting attraction: accident with car upside-down! whoo-hoo!) and then to Ft Funston (scroll down to that log-ladder and realize as I did that I’d have to carry Z all the way back up it) for some fresh air and hang-glider-watching action. Then down around Lake Merced, up to Noriega Street, and out to Polly-Ann for some frozen dairy luncheon (I had a cup of turkish coffee and lychee, and then a swirled soft-serve cone for dessert), which Z seemed (...seemed... ) to enjoy very much.
We let Zach fall asleep on the drive home (added bonus sight: 9-11 Truth March!) and I tried to put him down for a nap but as soon as he hit the horizontal he started pitching a fit about watching more of his new favorite DVD. I was reasoning with him very effectively and I think he’d have calmed down if he hadn’t suddenly horked up his whole ice cream lunch on the couch, his clothes, some blankets and towels we had lain down to protect everything, and a fair amount of floor space besides. HAPPY MOTHERS DAY because kel was asleep and I dealt with it on my own as best I could.
Once I’d ignited the couch and steam-cleaned the child, it was time to go shopping for supper (with a stop first at the Arboretum , because it’s just such a nice day outside that we might as well see what’s growing). We wound up getting some trout that I grilled in the new electric grillpan, which I LOVE, and it came out great - a little crispy-brown on top and nice and juicy and soft throughout, with grilled onions and a little lemon-wine reduction… With that I served some asparagus with shaved fennel, and rounds of well-fried mushroom polenta. It was deeee-licious. Dessert was a handful of baked goods, including a huge brownie and a hand-dipped moon pie, and then we put the boy to bed and I read my novel instead of catching up on Survivor. I didn’t feel like turning on the television. Sometimes a weekend is full enough without it, you know?
Pictures, maybe, later. For now, enough. Later, maters.
It is a wise fish who knows it is wet. some kind of famous damn proverb.
It was a humorless ride on a well-packed limited bus. Most of us were office and retail drones, jealously husbanding whatever strength we had left for the home stretch, cautiously entrusting each other to make it an easy ride for us all. Among us were a scattered handful of tourists - tall slim eurotypes, well-dressed with good skin and clear, cynical eyes. A pair of them took the floor in front of my in-facing bench, holding gracefully to a single steel pole and exchanging silently voluminous glances back and forth that made me feel crass and underdressed.
I was reading a fat paperback and, optimistically, had omitted to insert the ‘buds to my iPod, in view of the apparent discretion of the ridership. It was a nice change to immerse myself in the white noise of the bus engines instead of stuffing my ears with syncopated plastic plugs. Of course, it was not to last.
At Kearny there boarded a ragged man. He was tall and his belly swelled out dramatically above teetering legs and below a narrow chest and shoulders; a silvery van dyke spilled down from his grizzled chin over a ratty red sweatshirt, the beard seemingly as much spittle and food as hair. In the side pocket of his crusty cargo pants he’d secreted a plastic bottle that had once held soda but clearly, by the fumes that emanated from his every pore, now contained some low form of spiritous liquors. But his eyes were bright and cheerful and he came on board as if he were arriving at a frathouse reunion. To say the least, he did not fit in - and the least was the least that he said.
Swaying dangerously, he waded through the other standees, causing the elegant tourists in front of me to raise their eyebrows judgmentally. The shabby man didn’t go much further, stopping just a few feet past us on the other side of the long bus’ articulation, which was itself equipped with a pair of seats to either side. On those seats, opposite me and to my left, were sitting a young man and woman with stolid business-ready grimness etched deep on their features, clad incongruously in athletic garb: fresh sweatshirts and running shorts cut high on the thigh, their faces now gone from dour preoccupation to horrified revulsion. I hadn’t barely noticed them before, but the shabby man who now teetered beside them trained his bleary focus on them directly. “Heh - how ya doin’?” he cheerfully inquired, but received no response. “Ay com’ on, we’re all in this together, right? Right? He wouldn’t take “no answer “ for an answer. Each word he spoke filled the air with boozy vapors. The woman in the running shorts locked her grimace even more firmly in place, her eyes glowering with disdain and aggravation, even as the shabby man kept tossing off conversational gambits. “Y’r goin’ runnin’?”
The man in the running shorts then did something remarkable: he turned in his seat to the lush standing behind him and answered the question. I couldn’t hear the answer but it was clearly just what the shabby man had wanted to hear. “Tha’s righ’? Fantastic! Fantastik! Tha’s great!! You know, I usta run track! High school champ!” with this he gestured with knowing dismissivness to his ruined physique, his filth-stiffined clothes, his general uncleanliness. “Hah!,” he laughed crudely, looking around the bus for confirmation. Finding none, he roared it again to the ceiling, “Hah!!”
By now I was fishing in my coat for the iPod again, unwrapping the ‘buds and readying myself to put a layer of sound between him and me. The sophisticates before me watched this operation with bemused approval. “Good zhoice,” the female half of them said, with a tacit, knowing nod from her confrere. All three of us glanced down to the voluble drunk. “I’d thought to leave them out this time,” I superfluously explained, “but it doesn’t seem such a great idea now.” The gym-short woman, beset by stench and blather, and further antagonized by her friend’s inaudible conversational goading of the drunkard short me a glance of icy rage. She couldn’t see anything to do but to ride it out for the time being. She wanted out, but she didn’t know exactly how to get there.
We were pulling up to the Powell Street stop, just three down from where he’d boarded, when the drunk snapped to attention. “Powell Street? Tha’s me! I gotta get out! Aw, I won’t have time to get to th’ door...” The bus was just creaking to a halt, the doors weren’t open yet - but there were a lot of people blocking the way. “Sure you can,” both the shorts-wearers assured him, a desparate hope barely masked in their voices. “Yeah?,” the sot looked fore and then aft, assessing his options. His past athletic prowess again aroused, he was rising on spindly legs to the challenge. “I won’ be able to make it back there,” he assessed frankly, looking back. “Try that one,” the shorts-wearers urged in an excess of helpfulness, pointing up the aisle in coincidental synchronization.
“Yeah, right,” said the driunk decisively; “G’by now have a good’en” - and with that he locked his wavering gaze on his destination and started pushing forward, bellowing “Comin’ Out!” to encourage those in his path to clear him some room as if they needed any encouragement. The frenchies in front of me wore a shared expression of relief and disgust as he made his odiferous, boisterous way past us.
He reached the doorwell as the doors began to slide shut on him, but he reclaimed some of his erstwhile athleticism in a diving reach to stop them. Repulsed as if by anti-magnetism, the otherwise apathetic commuters in his way leaped aside to give him access to the exit.
Laughing, roaring, tumbling, he blustered his way down the stairwell and out to a stretch of sidewalk lined with pricey boutiques and galleries and a five-star hotel. I glanced up to the french couple for a fraternal exchange of smirks; but they were having none of it, staring pointedly at their cuticles. The couple in the trackshorts were already spatting in the aftermath of their disparate responses to the wino. I didn’t need to put on the iPod anymore. People were going to leave each other alone from here on out.
A burst of hilarious laughter drew my attenion from those restful thoughts to the milling crowds outside. One man was its source - the newly-exited slob, who stood monumental at the busy bus stop, the foot traffic ignoring him as best they could. His arms were raised triumphantly overhead and his pants had fallen down; they lay in a heap at his ankles and his exhausted jersey barely covered the uppermost portion of a pair of wrinkled, overworn old black boxers that hung to mid-calf. He hooted his mirth to the impassive faces of the bus riders seated just a few feet from him on the other side of the impenetrable protection of a window. “Come on!,” he enjoined them. “Laugh!! It’s funny, isn’t it?!!”
And it was. So I, alone of all around me, did. Not only that, but it felt good, too.
Last night I waded crotch-deep into the swamp of popular culture. It was moist, clingy, and…
Last night I waded crotch-deep
|
|
|
