I left my heart (and mind) in San Francisco...
I've been back from San Francisco for nearly a week and have finally unwound enough to sit down and capture it all in a few sentences. What is it about that place? Why does it have to be so fucking magical? It's like a juicy, voluptuous hooker, offering up her charms on a silver platter. Jesus!
To be honest, I've been kind of in a downer funk since I got back, not only because of a blow-up my boyfriend and I had on Monday night, just hours after we got in, but also because, well...you know how it is when you get back from there; everything in D/FW is so damned anti-climactic! So before I ramble on too inanely, I'll plunge right in:
I got in on time last Thursday morning, taking the "Quake City Shuttle" into town. There were three other hotel drop-offs before me, and imagine my amusement when I see that practically all the employees of the big downtown hotels – the Westin St. Francis, the Hilton, the Renaissance Parc 55, et al – seem to be on strike over retirement and health benefits. It was perfect, like, "Welcome to unionized San Francisco, muthaphukkahs!" That was cool, except I can only imagine it wasn't too much so for the people having to stay in these places, because the picketers had every entrance to their hotels blocked, and here they were on their bull-horns and beating their placards together, causing quite a racket. And it probably wasn't cool for the hotels, either, since they apparently lost a lot of business that weekend. Luckily, the place we were staying in, the Palomar, was a smaller boutique hotel and everybody there was totally mellow and helpful, and not in a striking mood. All the rooms had leopard carpet, too. Need I say more?
I can’t even begin to put into words how wonderful it was seeing Miss Wayne and Ricky. Both of them look so healthy and happy – just like us, they've put on some weight, and living in the city has totally made them blossom. Wayne had a job interview the morning I got into town, but got back in plenty of time to meet me at the apartment. We squealed and screamed like two teeny-boppers at a Beatles concert, much to the amusement of Vladimir, my Russian shuttle driver with the Marlboro Red dangling from his mouth. I fell in love with their apartment in seconds, too. Oh my god. It's on a hill, right under Twin Peaks, at the intersection of Diamond and 20th, and their living room window faces that and another row of houses up another hill. Christ, it's so goddamned fabulous that I was rendered speechless. It's about the size of my old place over on Wycliff, and they pay $1600 a month, but I'd think that someone moving to San Francisco would dream of a place like this at that price. They also have a covered deck, which was to die for and where Wayne provided me with a taste of the finest Humboldt County has to offer. It was positively electrifying. You almost need it to calm down from the over-abundance of sights and sounds in that city.
With that, we chatted and relaxed on their new sofa for a while, drinking some kick-ass coffee and enjoying the fruits of the fields. Wayne caught me up on their life in SFO and I caught him up and everything that was going on here. Anyway, after we were well and truly blissed-out, we headed down the hill to the drag. Castro Street hasn't changed all that much since I was there back in 1991 - or 1985, for that matter - with the exception of a few chainshops ("The queens love their Diesel, Girl!" as Wayne explained to me). We had lunch at this new Thai place, followed by some more strolling 'round the hood, then headed back.
Cautiously, Wayne asked me if I would rather take the bus, and I said, "Nah, I need my exercise." He hooted and said, "Honey, you'll get it here." He wasn't bullshitting. It was a total cardio workout, going up that hill to his house. I'll bet most people living there have really tight buns, if this bastard of a hill was anything to go by. My heart was racing by the time we got back to his place. Naturally, our mighty return called for some champagne, which we killed two bottles of during the rest of the afternoon, careful to leave some for Ricky. We sat around for the rest of the afternoon, playing this rather addictive local game of watching the fog roll in and out over the TV towers on Twin Peaks. Not a bad way to spend your time.
Did I tell you how much Ricky rules, too? He was all excited because I'd never smoked a "blunt" before and insisted Wayne wait until he got home before we smoked one. Oh my. It's heavenly, and potent as all get-out. We'd planned to watch the debates, which came on at 6 p.m. Pacific time, soon after Ricky got home, but we were a little too gone to concentrate by the time they got underway, needless to say. So around 8, we walked back down to Castro for dinner at a tasty bar and grill called Harvey's (after Mr. Milk, of course), went to the store for some half and half, and were sure to take the bus back up the hill this time around.
Friday morning, I was so excited that I woke up early, wrote in my journal, and caught myself playing the Twin Peaks game again. Wayne and Ricky started to stir, came in and made coffee, and after that, we enjoyed a most blissful and perfect Friday morning. The kind of morning one should always have on their first day - and every day - of vacation.
Joe got into town around 12:30 p.m., so Wayne and Ricky accompanied me – bags and all – down the hill and on the MUNI to Powell Street, right around the corner from the Palomar, located on 4th at Market. Joe and Ricky got along like a house on fire, and after an hour or so of commiserating in the hotel room, we went to lunch at a Thai place near Union Square, and spent the rest of the afternoon walking around there. By three, Joe and I had to get back to the hotel to decompress and get ready for Joey's rehearsal dinner, being held at Joe's ex (and Joey's mom) Chris' place across the bridge in Richmond, over near Berkeley.
Once we’d crossed the Bay Bridge and were heading north, Joe pointed to the left and said, "Hey look, there's the Laci Peterson Marina." That's my sick Bear – no one makes me laugh like him; no one makes me cry like him, either. Is that what love is? Anyway, you should see Joe's son. Sigh. He's totally fuckable, born in 1970. He has the same intense eyes and forehead as Joe, so it's little wonder Joe got a lot of pussy back in the day. Joey's been through his share of angst, maybe a little more than the rest of us - but he seemed to have his shit together to me; he's a journeyman electrician and martial arts afficionado. You can tell he doesn't miss a thing, either - his eyes, like Joe's, take everything in. He and Joe had been estranged for years - Joe and Chris split up when Joey was two or so - but they'd been talking on the phone every few months or so recently. So when Joey got on the phone with his then-fiancé (now wife) Lisa and asked him to come to the wedding, there's no way Joe’d have said no. He'd balked at the idea of going to the rehearsal dinner, but I'd gotten on his ass about that and that Thursday, when I was already in SFO, Joey and Lisa had called to insist that he come. I'm glad we went. Everybody I met was super-nice; Joe's ex Chris and her husband Dan are super-cool and have this adorable little house, and Lisa's family was really nice, too. Anyway, it was a super laid-back affair, with plenty of wine and pizza and goodies. Joey looked really happy, too. I hope he has better luck with his marriage than both his parents have had.
Saturday morning, Joe and I went to a diner for breakfast and walked off all our calories in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's bookstore and around Union Square, where we went into Nordstrom's to see if we could find a tie for Joe. Both of us hadn't done so much walking for so long that we came back around noon to rest up. We left at 2 and head back across the Bay Bridge to the wedding at the – thank you, Jeezus – Unitarian Universalist Church in El Cerrito, in the hills overlooking Berkeley. This was the same area that got ravaged by fires back in the early 90's, I believe. You can see how dry the grass is on the hills and it's kind of scary to think of how these awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping homes could go up in flames in a mere instant if someone, god forbid, were to throw a cigarette butt out their car window. The church itself was really nice – with a banner hanging outside that says, "We honor ALL marriages" (yay!!!), and the ceremony itself being held outdoors. Apparently, on a clear day, from the church patio you can see Berkeley below, the Bay stretched out in front of you with Angel Island and Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge, and the San Francisco skyline, but we were a bit shrouded in that day. Just the one wisp I did see of the Golden Gate Bridge through the fog was enough to get my heart rate going, though. Man, it's places like that where you stand and think, "Fuck me, there's definitely Something - with a capital 'S'– that's bigger than all of us." Even better was the fact that the ceremony was performed by Lisa's friend, a young man who'd obviously been busy performing gay marriage ceremonies back in the city. I told him that it was a really nice ceremony – there was even a Jewish moment with the couple drinking wine from the glass and Joey stepping on it to break it through the cloth – and he snipped, "I only did this for Lisa." I didn't know what that meant exactly, but I was like,"Cool. Whatever. Thanks."
We stood around drinking champagne as we waited for the pictures to be snapped and for the big buffet that Chris had prepared. Joe had thought that since Chris is a vegan that it would all be vegetarian, but there was a balance of everything that went very well with the red wine we consumed. Toasted, we bid farewell to everyone after the reception, headed back to the city around 8:30 and crashed kinda early. I guess we were still on Dallas time, although every morning when Joe would wake up at 7:30 California time and start making noise, I'd get a bit irritated. Girls do need their sleep!
Sunday morning, we ate breakfast at the Mason Café near Union Square, came back to the hotel for a fresher-upper, and then took off in the car; first on a mission to find the restaurant we’d be going to with Wayne that night – the Stinking Rose – and then it was off through the neighborhoods of San Francisco. We got caught in Chinatown traffic, drove through North Beach (where the City Lights Bookstore is, down near the Tenderloin), and drove down to the Wharf for a stroll through all the seafood stands, a self-portrait with Alcatraz in the background, and lunch at the In and Out burger, which has the best damned hamburgers and French fries in the entire Western world (Joe turned me on to them when we were out in Las Vegas). After that, we walked around some more gawking at all the ticky-tacky outdoor souvenir stands, and took off in the car again, this time north on the 101, across the Golden Gate Bridge into Marin County, driving around Sausalito for a bit, and heading back north for the Stinson Beach/Muir Woods exit.
Joe – having lived in L.A. – always said that the bad thing about living in California is that if suddenly you came up with the brilliant idea of heading out to some beautiful spot, so did 50,000 other people. It's true. The last time I went to the Muir Woods was with Danny, back in 1991, and this was at the end of a Tuesday or Wednesday, with hardly a soul around. This time, with the weather being so nice that weekend - by San Francisco standards, with temperatures in the mid-60’s and slightly overcast skies - everyone and their dog was out at the Muir Woods that day. We didn't go in; the main parking lot was packed, and so were the four overflow lots, and people were parking up the rest of the windy road. So on we went up Highway 1, towards Stinson Beach and Point Reyes, where you see the sign, "No Gas Stations For the Next 26 Miles."
Once again, as we drove along the very edge of America, it was one of those "Something-with-a-Capital-S, bigger-than-us" moments, with the cliffs right next to us and the mountains ahead plunging down to the silvery-blue sea, covered slightly by the mist. The beauty of the California coastline is practically surreal, like a painting. We stopped off at the Muir Beach Overlook and that was definitely the coldest, windiest portion of our trip. After that, we came back south and back into the city, to get ready for our dinner at the Stinking Rose with Wayne. Ricky, not being a garlic fan, didn’t come. So Wayne met us at the Palomar (oh my god, that fucking MUNI rocks – ten minutes from the Castro to downtown, where by car it'd take you half an hour to deal with figuring out all the one-way streets and where to park and whatnot. This is how we learned San Francisco Travel Tip #1: If you must rent a car, rent it in the city and not at the airport) and we went off to North Beach, where we consumed copious amounts of garlic. I had the best vegetable lasagna I've ever had in my life, while Joe had the rabbit (sumptuous and tender as a cotton-tail), and Wayne had this awesome ravioli. We had a really good white wine to complement the meal, and unfortunately, there was no room for dessert – the Stinking Rose's famed garlic ice cream. We headed back to the hotel after dinner, where Wayne came up for a bit and we walked him back down to the MUNI station and bid each other a fond farewell until hopefully Thanksgiving, when he mentioned that they might be coming in for a few days – on their way to El Paso to see Marty and Albert.
Of course, even byes for a brief moment are hard, and Christ, how I wanted to rush down the stairs with him and say, "Take me with you, please!" Joe and I strolled hand-in-hand back to the hotel together, where back in our room you could already smell the garlic. I was already a little blue about having to return home the next day. Earlier that day, as Joe and I had been driving through the different neighborhoods and all, and hitting some crest at the top of Snob Hill, I was overcome by emotion at one point and said out loud, "Why does this city always have to feel like such a perfect fit, aside from the state income tax and outrageous cost of living?" Joe said, "Well, Baby, maybe you should start looking out here. I'm too old to start over again."
Monday morning, we took it easy as we ate breakfast at the eek-a-mundo Carl's Jr., and went back to the hotel to pack and get ready for the trip home. Our flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 2:06 p.m., but a miracle occurred. After we turned in the rental car, we took the airport-train thingy to our terminal, where the American Airlines ticket agent said all the flights to D/FW were delayed because of storms, but she was going to put us on the earlier flight – which was already delayed – anyway. This worked for me. I'd been hoping we could get on an earlier flight. This turned out to be the perfect one, because guess who was on our flight?
"Did you ever see Dallas from a DC-9 at night?"
I shit you not. Jimmie Dale Gilmore.
I nearly pissed myself, recognizing him immediately. He and his female traveling companion were both very gracious and nice. I was apologetic as I went up and said, "Hi, I'm sorry to bug you at the San Francisco airport, but are you Jimmie Dale Gilmore?" He was totally cool, extended his hand, and said, "Yes, how are you? What's your name?" I told him, telling him how I liked his work." I probably should've spouted off the radio station connection, but didn't. Not my style. We parted ways and Joe was like, "So, did you say, 'Mark it eight, Dude?' to him?" and I was like, "Goddamn it! No, I didn't!" How did I ever blow that one? Looking back, I'm glad I didn't say that to him, but that's my favorite scene in "The Big Lebowski," or at least one of my top three favorite scenes, anyway, and I wonder how many people say that to him already? I was hoping he'd be at the baggage claim at D/FW so I could talk to him some more, but I think he lives in Wimberley, near Austin, and probably had to rush to make that connection, so oh well. I was just glad to be home.
Meanwhile, I can't stay away from my daily browsing of the jobs and apartment listings for the San Francisco Bay Area on CraigsList.Org. I always knew there was some reason for me to save money. I didn't see one Bush/Cheney sticker or placard when I was out there, either. Surely that counts for something?
To be honest, I've been kind of in a downer funk since I got back, not only because of a blow-up my boyfriend and I had on Monday night, just hours after we got in, but also because, well...you know how it is when you get back from there; everything in D/FW is so damned anti-climactic! So before I ramble on too inanely, I'll plunge right in:
I got in on time last Thursday morning, taking the "Quake City Shuttle" into town. There were three other hotel drop-offs before me, and imagine my amusement when I see that practically all the employees of the big downtown hotels – the Westin St. Francis, the Hilton, the Renaissance Parc 55, et al – seem to be on strike over retirement and health benefits. It was perfect, like, "Welcome to unionized San Francisco, muthaphukkahs!" That was cool, except I can only imagine it wasn't too much so for the people having to stay in these places, because the picketers had every entrance to their hotels blocked, and here they were on their bull-horns and beating their placards together, causing quite a racket. And it probably wasn't cool for the hotels, either, since they apparently lost a lot of business that weekend. Luckily, the place we were staying in, the Palomar, was a smaller boutique hotel and everybody there was totally mellow and helpful, and not in a striking mood. All the rooms had leopard carpet, too. Need I say more?
I can’t even begin to put into words how wonderful it was seeing Miss Wayne and Ricky. Both of them look so healthy and happy – just like us, they've put on some weight, and living in the city has totally made them blossom. Wayne had a job interview the morning I got into town, but got back in plenty of time to meet me at the apartment. We squealed and screamed like two teeny-boppers at a Beatles concert, much to the amusement of Vladimir, my Russian shuttle driver with the Marlboro Red dangling from his mouth. I fell in love with their apartment in seconds, too. Oh my god. It's on a hill, right under Twin Peaks, at the intersection of Diamond and 20th, and their living room window faces that and another row of houses up another hill. Christ, it's so goddamned fabulous that I was rendered speechless. It's about the size of my old place over on Wycliff, and they pay $1600 a month, but I'd think that someone moving to San Francisco would dream of a place like this at that price. They also have a covered deck, which was to die for and where Wayne provided me with a taste of the finest Humboldt County has to offer. It was positively electrifying. You almost need it to calm down from the over-abundance of sights and sounds in that city.
With that, we chatted and relaxed on their new sofa for a while, drinking some kick-ass coffee and enjoying the fruits of the fields. Wayne caught me up on their life in SFO and I caught him up and everything that was going on here. Anyway, after we were well and truly blissed-out, we headed down the hill to the drag. Castro Street hasn't changed all that much since I was there back in 1991 - or 1985, for that matter - with the exception of a few chainshops ("The queens love their Diesel, Girl!" as Wayne explained to me). We had lunch at this new Thai place, followed by some more strolling 'round the hood, then headed back.
Cautiously, Wayne asked me if I would rather take the bus, and I said, "Nah, I need my exercise." He hooted and said, "Honey, you'll get it here." He wasn't bullshitting. It was a total cardio workout, going up that hill to his house. I'll bet most people living there have really tight buns, if this bastard of a hill was anything to go by. My heart was racing by the time we got back to his place. Naturally, our mighty return called for some champagne, which we killed two bottles of during the rest of the afternoon, careful to leave some for Ricky. We sat around for the rest of the afternoon, playing this rather addictive local game of watching the fog roll in and out over the TV towers on Twin Peaks. Not a bad way to spend your time.
Did I tell you how much Ricky rules, too? He was all excited because I'd never smoked a "blunt" before and insisted Wayne wait until he got home before we smoked one. Oh my. It's heavenly, and potent as all get-out. We'd planned to watch the debates, which came on at 6 p.m. Pacific time, soon after Ricky got home, but we were a little too gone to concentrate by the time they got underway, needless to say. So around 8, we walked back down to Castro for dinner at a tasty bar and grill called Harvey's (after Mr. Milk, of course), went to the store for some half and half, and were sure to take the bus back up the hill this time around.
Friday morning, I was so excited that I woke up early, wrote in my journal, and caught myself playing the Twin Peaks game again. Wayne and Ricky started to stir, came in and made coffee, and after that, we enjoyed a most blissful and perfect Friday morning. The kind of morning one should always have on their first day - and every day - of vacation.
Joe got into town around 12:30 p.m., so Wayne and Ricky accompanied me – bags and all – down the hill and on the MUNI to Powell Street, right around the corner from the Palomar, located on 4th at Market. Joe and Ricky got along like a house on fire, and after an hour or so of commiserating in the hotel room, we went to lunch at a Thai place near Union Square, and spent the rest of the afternoon walking around there. By three, Joe and I had to get back to the hotel to decompress and get ready for Joey's rehearsal dinner, being held at Joe's ex (and Joey's mom) Chris' place across the bridge in Richmond, over near Berkeley.
Once we’d crossed the Bay Bridge and were heading north, Joe pointed to the left and said, "Hey look, there's the Laci Peterson Marina." That's my sick Bear – no one makes me laugh like him; no one makes me cry like him, either. Is that what love is? Anyway, you should see Joe's son. Sigh. He's totally fuckable, born in 1970. He has the same intense eyes and forehead as Joe, so it's little wonder Joe got a lot of pussy back in the day. Joey's been through his share of angst, maybe a little more than the rest of us - but he seemed to have his shit together to me; he's a journeyman electrician and martial arts afficionado. You can tell he doesn't miss a thing, either - his eyes, like Joe's, take everything in. He and Joe had been estranged for years - Joe and Chris split up when Joey was two or so - but they'd been talking on the phone every few months or so recently. So when Joey got on the phone with his then-fiancé (now wife) Lisa and asked him to come to the wedding, there's no way Joe’d have said no. He'd balked at the idea of going to the rehearsal dinner, but I'd gotten on his ass about that and that Thursday, when I was already in SFO, Joey and Lisa had called to insist that he come. I'm glad we went. Everybody I met was super-nice; Joe's ex Chris and her husband Dan are super-cool and have this adorable little house, and Lisa's family was really nice, too. Anyway, it was a super laid-back affair, with plenty of wine and pizza and goodies. Joey looked really happy, too. I hope he has better luck with his marriage than both his parents have had.
Saturday morning, Joe and I went to a diner for breakfast and walked off all our calories in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's bookstore and around Union Square, where we went into Nordstrom's to see if we could find a tie for Joe. Both of us hadn't done so much walking for so long that we came back around noon to rest up. We left at 2 and head back across the Bay Bridge to the wedding at the – thank you, Jeezus – Unitarian Universalist Church in El Cerrito, in the hills overlooking Berkeley. This was the same area that got ravaged by fires back in the early 90's, I believe. You can see how dry the grass is on the hills and it's kind of scary to think of how these awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping homes could go up in flames in a mere instant if someone, god forbid, were to throw a cigarette butt out their car window. The church itself was really nice – with a banner hanging outside that says, "We honor ALL marriages" (yay!!!), and the ceremony itself being held outdoors. Apparently, on a clear day, from the church patio you can see Berkeley below, the Bay stretched out in front of you with Angel Island and Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge, and the San Francisco skyline, but we were a bit shrouded in that day. Just the one wisp I did see of the Golden Gate Bridge through the fog was enough to get my heart rate going, though. Man, it's places like that where you stand and think, "Fuck me, there's definitely Something - with a capital 'S'– that's bigger than all of us." Even better was the fact that the ceremony was performed by Lisa's friend, a young man who'd obviously been busy performing gay marriage ceremonies back in the city. I told him that it was a really nice ceremony – there was even a Jewish moment with the couple drinking wine from the glass and Joey stepping on it to break it through the cloth – and he snipped, "I only did this for Lisa." I didn't know what that meant exactly, but I was like,"Cool. Whatever. Thanks."
We stood around drinking champagne as we waited for the pictures to be snapped and for the big buffet that Chris had prepared. Joe had thought that since Chris is a vegan that it would all be vegetarian, but there was a balance of everything that went very well with the red wine we consumed. Toasted, we bid farewell to everyone after the reception, headed back to the city around 8:30 and crashed kinda early. I guess we were still on Dallas time, although every morning when Joe would wake up at 7:30 California time and start making noise, I'd get a bit irritated. Girls do need their sleep!
Sunday morning, we ate breakfast at the Mason Café near Union Square, came back to the hotel for a fresher-upper, and then took off in the car; first on a mission to find the restaurant we’d be going to with Wayne that night – the Stinking Rose – and then it was off through the neighborhoods of San Francisco. We got caught in Chinatown traffic, drove through North Beach (where the City Lights Bookstore is, down near the Tenderloin), and drove down to the Wharf for a stroll through all the seafood stands, a self-portrait with Alcatraz in the background, and lunch at the In and Out burger, which has the best damned hamburgers and French fries in the entire Western world (Joe turned me on to them when we were out in Las Vegas). After that, we walked around some more gawking at all the ticky-tacky outdoor souvenir stands, and took off in the car again, this time north on the 101, across the Golden Gate Bridge into Marin County, driving around Sausalito for a bit, and heading back north for the Stinson Beach/Muir Woods exit.
Joe – having lived in L.A. – always said that the bad thing about living in California is that if suddenly you came up with the brilliant idea of heading out to some beautiful spot, so did 50,000 other people. It's true. The last time I went to the Muir Woods was with Danny, back in 1991, and this was at the end of a Tuesday or Wednesday, with hardly a soul around. This time, with the weather being so nice that weekend - by San Francisco standards, with temperatures in the mid-60’s and slightly overcast skies - everyone and their dog was out at the Muir Woods that day. We didn't go in; the main parking lot was packed, and so were the four overflow lots, and people were parking up the rest of the windy road. So on we went up Highway 1, towards Stinson Beach and Point Reyes, where you see the sign, "No Gas Stations For the Next 26 Miles."
Once again, as we drove along the very edge of America, it was one of those "Something-with-a-Capital-S, bigger-than-us" moments, with the cliffs right next to us and the mountains ahead plunging down to the silvery-blue sea, covered slightly by the mist. The beauty of the California coastline is practically surreal, like a painting. We stopped off at the Muir Beach Overlook and that was definitely the coldest, windiest portion of our trip. After that, we came back south and back into the city, to get ready for our dinner at the Stinking Rose with Wayne. Ricky, not being a garlic fan, didn’t come. So Wayne met us at the Palomar (oh my god, that fucking MUNI rocks – ten minutes from the Castro to downtown, where by car it'd take you half an hour to deal with figuring out all the one-way streets and where to park and whatnot. This is how we learned San Francisco Travel Tip #1: If you must rent a car, rent it in the city and not at the airport) and we went off to North Beach, where we consumed copious amounts of garlic. I had the best vegetable lasagna I've ever had in my life, while Joe had the rabbit (sumptuous and tender as a cotton-tail), and Wayne had this awesome ravioli. We had a really good white wine to complement the meal, and unfortunately, there was no room for dessert – the Stinking Rose's famed garlic ice cream. We headed back to the hotel after dinner, where Wayne came up for a bit and we walked him back down to the MUNI station and bid each other a fond farewell until hopefully Thanksgiving, when he mentioned that they might be coming in for a few days – on their way to El Paso to see Marty and Albert.
Of course, even byes for a brief moment are hard, and Christ, how I wanted to rush down the stairs with him and say, "Take me with you, please!" Joe and I strolled hand-in-hand back to the hotel together, where back in our room you could already smell the garlic. I was already a little blue about having to return home the next day. Earlier that day, as Joe and I had been driving through the different neighborhoods and all, and hitting some crest at the top of Snob Hill, I was overcome by emotion at one point and said out loud, "Why does this city always have to feel like such a perfect fit, aside from the state income tax and outrageous cost of living?" Joe said, "Well, Baby, maybe you should start looking out here. I'm too old to start over again."
Monday morning, we took it easy as we ate breakfast at the eek-a-mundo Carl's Jr., and went back to the hotel to pack and get ready for the trip home. Our flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 2:06 p.m., but a miracle occurred. After we turned in the rental car, we took the airport-train thingy to our terminal, where the American Airlines ticket agent said all the flights to D/FW were delayed because of storms, but she was going to put us on the earlier flight – which was already delayed – anyway. This worked for me. I'd been hoping we could get on an earlier flight. This turned out to be the perfect one, because guess who was on our flight?
"Did you ever see Dallas from a DC-9 at night?"
I shit you not. Jimmie Dale Gilmore.
I nearly pissed myself, recognizing him immediately. He and his female traveling companion were both very gracious and nice. I was apologetic as I went up and said, "Hi, I'm sorry to bug you at the San Francisco airport, but are you Jimmie Dale Gilmore?" He was totally cool, extended his hand, and said, "Yes, how are you? What's your name?" I told him, telling him how I liked his work." I probably should've spouted off the radio station connection, but didn't. Not my style. We parted ways and Joe was like, "So, did you say, 'Mark it eight, Dude?' to him?" and I was like, "Goddamn it! No, I didn't!" How did I ever blow that one? Looking back, I'm glad I didn't say that to him, but that's my favorite scene in "The Big Lebowski," or at least one of my top three favorite scenes, anyway, and I wonder how many people say that to him already? I was hoping he'd be at the baggage claim at D/FW so I could talk to him some more, but I think he lives in Wimberley, near Austin, and probably had to rush to make that connection, so oh well. I was just glad to be home.
Meanwhile, I can't stay away from my daily browsing of the jobs and apartment listings for the San Francisco Bay Area on CraigsList.Org. I always knew there was some reason for me to save money. I didn't see one Bush/Cheney sticker or placard when I was out there, either. Surely that counts for something?
posted by No, You Can't Watch at 10:51 PM
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