Friday, February 11, 2005

San Francisco "Tourism"

I'm at Midpines, but I haven't done the nature thing. Nearby Yosemite is the third most scenic place in the United States, I learn from European visitors. I'm stalling in advance of the Asia trip, not a tourist myself, so there is no hurry. I have plenty of Yosemite time.

I don't urgently have to be there, but the talk show is airing in Berkeley, and I can help out. I want to edit interviews and to pick up reading glasses. I drive four hours back to Berkeley. As a tourist to my own area, I stay at the San Francisco hostel, where I show them a passport, rather than my local driver's license.

The Dead Hensons have notified via e-mail about their show tonight at the Eagle in San Francisco. According to the Internet, this is a gay bar. I've never been to a San Francisco gay bar, even though I've lived in the area for five years. With my limited budget of San Francisco time, I should go. It appears I can walk to the Eagle after the talk show and before the band plays at 11:30 p.m.. (I saw a band once at a Minneapolis gay bar in the 1990's, where Cher was played between sets, and where there were mirrors above urinals. My friends in the band were paid well, and it was a cultural learning experience for us all.) How different is today's San Francisco?

As I walk past City Hall, there is a park containing one hundred homeless. I hear threats, yells of pain, and "I have a gram." The San Francisco homeless have shabby sleeping bags, if they have sleeping bags at all. If I was homeless, and at the park, I would want survellience cameras to deter violent crime, though based on the mental state of most of the homeless here, it is unclear if that would be effective. I walk quickly past this area to find the Dead Hensons at the Eagle, but the instructions I have written for myself are incomplete. So, I never find the Eagle Tavern or the accompanying leather. Gay San Francisco exposes itself plenty. No need to be a tourist here, I must think. At 11:45 p.m., I head back toward the hostel, using Van Ness Street to avoid the park.

Between my storage unit, the post office, the talk show, wandering around San Francisco, writing class and filling in on the radio for an hour on Friday afternoon, I wear myself out. The Chinese restaurant, three blocks from my old house, gives me a place to relax, and the special of oysters over rice tastes particularly good. Then, I drive another four hours back to Midpines to sleep for as long as I can. I can always get the new Dead Hensons' single.

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