Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant

The Bye and Bye at 10th and Alberta serves "vegetarian pub food" and I had a pale ale and a bowl of brussel sprouts with brown rice and chunks of braised tofu in a hot sauce. The hot sauce would have been good on chicken or a nice juicy steak, but it wasn't bad on tofu. The restaurant featured a nice patio secluded behind a tall wood fence with lattice work and vines. It was a young hipster crowd. The bartenders had those full color tatoos that covered their arms. The girls wore capris or linen pants. I saw two young men greet each other with a kiss on the lips. Gretchen and I sat with Tamara, a real estate agent who likes to travel, and William, who buys and sells apartment buildings. Tamara talked about her trip to Laos. She met a young Buddhist monk in the city, a boy of 17 named Jit, and she traveled with him by boat up the Mekong River to his village in the remotest part of the country, where she spent several days working and eating and bathing with the native people. William had traveled also, backpacking through Europe, and Gretchen talked about the experience of adopting 3 children from the former Soviet Union. They asked me what I did for a living, you know, "what do you do?" the question I hate at parties, because it is such a conversational dead end. "I'll tell you," I said, "if you promise not to talk shop." Usually when I tell people I work for the garbage company they want to tell me their garbage horror stories, or wax rhapsodic about the drivers and how hard they work. I'd rather talk Pac-10 football and eat hummus and chips with Doug.

William had a thing at 8 so he excused myself, and I jumped to my feet and shook hands with everyone and left. I wanted to go home. It was extraordinaly nice of Gretchen to invite me, but I was way out of my element. I remember a line from Hannah and Her Sisters, "It was the worst night ever, the worst time since the Nuremberg Trials. We did everything but exchange gun shots." This was no where near that bad, but it wasn't anything I'd do again. Modern life has all these artificial ways to meet people and "network." I'd rather exchange gunshots than "network."

Before I went to the dinner I stopped at Colwood golf course and chipped and putted and pitched for a few minutes. I holed out another chip, with the pro watching from the clubhouse. It always cheers me up when I hole out a chip. It reminds me that while anything is not possible, a great deal still is.

Tomorrow night I serve beer and soda at The Ross Coleman Invitational. Everybody likes the bartender and the pizza delivery guy. I'd have to say that these were my two all-time favorite jobs. When some little old lady starts snarling at me about her trash can, or I get another memo about excessive bathroom breaks, they start to look pretty good. If I ever get out of debt, I'm going to downsize my employment and play more bad golf.

After brussel sprouts and brown rice I have an incredible craving for a nice ice cream bar with a thick dark chocolate coating on the outside. I think I'll walk over to Winco after the poker game, if I don't fall asleep in my new thinking chair. You know you're getting old, when thinking always gives way to sleep. Good night now.