Balls and Walnuts
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New critters
Friends of ours from the old days, the pre-Jake years, know us as critter-keepers, lovers of snakes and lizards and frogs and anything else with cold blood. Our collection has waned in recent years because moving is bad for pets and we’ve been moving a lot.
But now we’re settled.
And today, I saw something I couldn’t resist.
Makes Lola’s look like the 7-11
Here in Bako, I’ve found an Indian market, two Chinese markets, a Middle Eastern market, a Vietnamese market. I was beginning to despair of ever finding a market like Lola’s in Santa Rosa, where I could always find a quick and tasty meal for dinner, whether it be perfect tamales or a savory hunk of carnitas. The other day, I mentioned this to my medical assistant. Today, she brought me an ad for Pro’s Ranch Market.
Pro's Ranch Market, the Caesar's Palace of Mexican Groceries
Wandering Pro’s Ranch Market, I felt the same way I do whenever I visit Powell’s Books in Portland: I could spend all night here. I was already running late, though, so I hadn’t the time to look over the outdoor cocina, barely skimmed the offerings of the indoor cocina, and generally did a poor job exploring this wonderful place. I did notice at least four types of homemade mole (and chose the Oaxacan mole, which I hope is mild!), three different styles of chorizo, and a huge tray of pig snouts. In the pastry section, I rejoiced at finding a sweet potato pie. Yes, we’ve already tried it. Yes, it’s delish.
Un-adventurously I bought chile relleno and tamales, the sweet potato pie, wedding cookies and bunuelos (flour tortillas deep-fried and dusted with sugar and cinnamon). I goggled at the various organ meats and fresh yogurt and enormous slabs of flan and bushels of dried chiles . . .
I’ll let you know how the chicken in Oaxacan mole comes out.
D.
The next big thing
I love it when the creeps look creepy.
This guy must be the town dentist.
With dragons like these, who needs blow dryers?
Kill this bad boy and you’ll feel like you’ve really accomplished something. Something more than, say, killed another 120 hours playing video games.
D.
Where the weekend goes
Hmm. Let’s see if I can reconstruct this.
Kindness: an ambiguous case study
After rounding on my patient this morning, I had breakfast at a downtown coffee shop. I took a seat at a counter next to a gaunt black gent with a nice wooden cane and a dapper fedora. First thing I noticed, the waitress took my order before his, even though he’d clearly been there before me. When she took his order, I heard him say, “Would I have enough left over for the blueberry muffin?” She told him no, he nodded, and that was that.
It set me to thinking whether I could pay for his breakfast without him knowing. The “without him knowing” part — this wasn’t so much “random act” B.S. but a desire not to embarrass the guy. The cash register was about five feet from me, seven or eight from him. Would he hear me if I explained to the waitress that I wanted to pay my neighbor’s bill, too? I was confident I would finish my breakfast quickly; I always do. Old and bad habit from internship and residency: I bolt down my food.
Before I had much time to consider, the waitress brought over a wrinkled, greasy paper bag and plopped it in front of the man.
“I didn’t want this to go!”
“Take it and leave. You were panhandling our customers so you can’t eat here.”
“This is rude.”
“It’s rude for you to panhandle out front. Our boss says you panhandle here, you can’t eat here. Take it and go.”
He asked to speak to the manager, but the manager wasn’t there. The senior waitress came over.
From the conversation that followed, I learned that one of the customers entering the restaurant had given the waitress at the register some money to cover the guy’s breakfast. So even though his breakfast was bought and paid for, they weren’t allowing him to eat there.
When the waitress told him it was rude of him to panhandle, he said, “It’s never rude to ask for help.” Then he launched into an odd bit about how “all of you are happy to take Obama’s bailouts, but I’m different somehow.” Which I thought was interesting.
After he left, two of the waitresses involved apologized to me. Didn’t help; I still felt like they had handled the situation poorly. What, did they feel like they’d be encouraging him if they let him eat at the counter like a normal human being?
Another woman came in, placed a to go order. They packaged her breakfast in a crisp, non-greasy paper bag. Hmm.
And what about the guy who paid for his breakfast? I understand the logic: “I’m going to pay for his breakfast. I don’t want to give him cash for drugs or alcohol.” On the one hand, the charitable party didn’t have to give the guy money. On the other hand, doesn’t it taint the act if you make the assumption that you have to pay for the guy’s meal, or else he’ll use the money for drugs or booze? Shouldn’t we be treating people with more dignity than that?
I’m not sure what to make of the whole thing. Restaurants do have the right to refuse service, or at least they claim that right. Clearly, the fellow who ponied up the breakfast money put them in a bind. If they refused the money (really the only way to refuse service), they might offend the donor. On the other hand, they wanted him out of there as fast as possible. So they took the money and proceeded to do as little as possible for the older man.
It left me with a bad feeling for the place. I won’t return. This man was well dressed, he didn’t smell, he wasn’t dirty. I would have eaten my breakfast next to him and never suspected he was down on his luck. He wasn’t bothering anyone and it wouldn’t have caused anyone any grief if they had treated him with respect. For that matter, it doesn’t make me think less of an establishment if there are panhandlers outside.
Seems to me there was more than a little vindictiveness in their behavior.
D.
Come it ran dumb axe of cents less kine, Ness
I’ve learned that Bakersfield is famous for three things:
and the creator of this bumper sticker slogan.