Dadisms

My dad, whose hearing, mediocre in its best times, has absolutely gone to pot.

1. My dad calls me on his cell phone. He has the speaker phone on in an effort to hear what I am saying. I have a fever of 100 degrees. My dad asks me a question. I start sneezing into the phone.

Dad: What?

Me: (continued uncontrolled sneezing)

Dad: I cannot hear you.

Me: (sigh)


2. My dad and I are going to a party. He points out he has put in his hearing aid for the occasion. I ask him a question, which he doesn't hear.

Dad: What?

Me: Is your hearing aid on?

Dad: I cannot hear you.

Me: It doesn't seem like your hearing aid is on.

Dad: My hearing aid is on.

Me: It doesn't seem to be working. Did you change the batteries in it?

Dad: What?

Me: Batteries. Batteries. Ba-tte-ries.

Dad: Yes, I just changed the batteries.

Me: Well, it doesn't seem to be working.

Dad: What?

Me: It is nooooooot wooooooooorking. You caaannnnnnnooooooooot heeeeeeear meeeeeee!

Dad: No, it is working. But I cannot understand you.

Me: Isn't that the definition of "not working"?

Dad: What?

Me: (rinse and repeat)

Dad: I can hear you are speaking. I just cannot make sense of the words. The hearing aid is working. The problem is that my brain is no longer working.

Me: (sad, so very sad)

Freecycle: Sometimes It Feels a Lot Like Christmas

So I have been a little shy to RECEIVE on Freecycle since the creepiness of last Spring, plus I am in super purging mode.

But then I went and banged my blender jar in the edge of my sink. And my beautiful blender jar, which has faithfully served me in so many capacities since EB gave it to me one Chanukah in the '90s... cracked and broke. Bummer.

And so I looked on-line. Total replacement blender? $60 plus the irritation of being unnecessary. Replacement jar? $30, half as irritating, but still filing under Bummer. Turned to Freecycle figuring, eh, what the heck. I posted my WANT. No bites.

Sighed. Waited a week.

I especially hate buying things in December, lest someone believe I am a willing participant in the consumeristic holiday shopping bullshit. So I figured on no blender until the new year. Bummer bummer bummer Fine fine fine. But in the meantime why not repost my hopes back on Freecycle just one more time.

And a woman replies,
Hey, I have a jar just sitting here because the blender shorted out a couple weeks back. Maybe it will somehow work?

And over the course of a few emails we come to find... we have the exact same blender. I go there. She comes to the door with the jar. Actually, her partner, their kid, their cousin, their grandma ALL come to the door to witness how totally random this exchange working out really is. And everyone is so very happy and the end result for me and mine? Hellllllla soup.

Baby, It's Cold Outside

Seriously. But even as global climate change is making us cock our dim San Francisco heads like confused dogs, there are always a couple born-n-raised True San Francisans things you can count on.

Whatever the weather,
1. True San Franciscans will still call it 'going to the beach' when we take our asses to Ocean Beach and sit in our cars, cracking a window (maybe), but definitely reading the newspaper and sipping on hot beverages from the thermos, never once getting out of the car and
2. If Mitchell's (Ice Cream shop, not to be confused with the Mitchell Bros' O'Farrell Theater folks) is open, there is gonna be a line waitin' on ordering a scoop or several.

Yea, I'm sure the cropping up of the fashionista organic creamery set has stolen some thunder from Mitchell's, but you cannot keep a serious San Francisco institution down. More venerable than Bi-Rite's Creamery (I'm not hatin, I'm just sayin), Mitchell's has been doling out ice cream from behind what appears to be two feet of double paned bullet proof glass to every ice cream fanatic regardless of age, ethnicity, size, dress label, income, taste bud practically daily since 1953. I have witnessed the most roly-poly, church-clothes-donning, maniacal-grin-wearing 4 year old muffin-heads practically invite an early heart attack in their 10 a.m. sprint to get from minivan seat to the Mitchell's line. I'm just saying, one thing you can count on is that there is always a line at Mitchell's, and it is usually thick.

So I was headed home the other day, and, as I mentioned, this whole past week has been cooooooooold. I don't mean my own wimpy 'It's less than 68 degrees!' cold. I mean, I get that I got cold in Mali during the summer, I got cold in Vietnam when the temperature dipped to under 92% F. I regularly get cold in NYC summers - and not from the air conditioning. I get that I am a visionary in terms of what a person can get cold in... But here I mean 'Baby, I really can and in fact I'm gonna stay cuz it's cold outside' cold. I'm talkin' 'Whadarewe,eastcoasters?' cold. 46 degrees cold. 'Wearing a wool hat and fleece everything and puffy jacket and I'm still cold' cold. So cold that, heading home, I was smugly prepared to shake my fleece-engulfed head at the brave/fool-hardy Mitchell's devotees. And it was so cold that my jaw was too tightly scarf-swaddled to drop at the sight of no one at the open-doored Mitchell's.

Whaaaaaaaat? Don't get me wrong. It is cold enough to stand in front of Mitchell's and throw some milk, sugar, cream, salt, and perhaps a vanilla bean into the air and have it land your mouth as ice cream. That is not what I am saying.

I am saying that apparently people are off doing just that on some other sidewalks in San Francisco this particularly frigid week, because there was no line at Mitchell's. I feel vaguely uncomfortable. And it almost makes me want ice cream.