Tuesday, April 24, 2007

DAY NINE

San Francisco was truly a difficult city for me to leave. I had found some community although I'd only been there
for a short time. I got up about 5:30 a.m. and I was waiting down at Fisherman's Wharf for the bus by 6:15. I
watched trolleys go by, and joggers; whistled to the birds and took a picture of the boats at dock.

The bus came and then the train ride to Bakersfield. Still no cacti. Just bunches of palm trees which the woman
from Norway who befriended me told me are not native to California. The bus ride to Los Angeles was mostly a view
of freeways. Toward the end, traffic jammed up a tad and our driver made for the nearest exit and took a back
route by the beginnings of L.A. Chinatown. Norwegian woman and I grabbed the skycap service. It wasn't even 4 p.m.
yet but I was done in. She was returning home to La Hoya from a long weekend at Yosemite where it had snowed. She
had a Mac Book which I was fairly impressed with and she showed me some of her photos which were also rather
impressive.

The train was an hour and four minutes late. I sat upstairs on the right side and I did get to watch some ocean
go by. Unfortunately, there was a drunk in the rail car. He came complete with peroxide blond woman who was
desperately in need of Alanon. They were fighting about driving. She insisted he was drunk and she was going to
call the police on him, stay somewheres else, refuse to give him the car keys. He engaged in rather colorful and
vulgar language but did not offer any original thinking on the matter. The conductors kept walking up and down
the aisle until they finally got off one stop before San Diego. There was also a young 20 something kid who thought
that he had to share his annoyance with the lateness of the train with the Amtrak crew as well as with the many
people he called on his cell phone. And the car salesman who was phoning his boss to say that his sister had died
in Florida and that he was on his way there "now." [via San Diego?] When asked what time the funeral stuff was,
he hesitated slightly before saying "eleven o'clock." He wasn't overly convincing to me, but then again I had been
in management so it very well could be that I am just a hard sell.

I got in after 9 to the hotel via taxi and immediately went downstairs to eat. The waiter was from Tijuana although
he and wife and four kids also have a house in Chula Vista. We started talking then and he told me that T.J. is
very dangerous with drugs and that his two sisters want the family to move to San Antonio. We talked for a very
long time and he charged me half-price for my meal.

There was some good-natured teasing of co-workers going on in the kitchen. It was in Spanish. Funny stuff it was
and it got me laughing. Now I am totally done in and I suppose I will have to turn in.

Still no farking cacti.


sapphoq n friends

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