Pop Corn

The I'm Just Sayin' Shuttle Service took an excruciatingly long commute to the South East Bay last night for an exceptionally entertaining night in a cornfield maze.

Participants were Alert Reader Paul Day, his BF Fred, Shilpa, Barney, and me. Barney was quite keen to go as—as I was unable to report earlier—he will be leaving us and returning to his native New Zealand in a few weeks’ time. And this is such an American thing to do, and he does love his “American Adventures.”

While there was lots of fun scaring each other and strangers, it was not a "haunted farm" with spooky sets or ghosts. (Shoeless Joe Jackson was no where to be seen.) The "scares" were mostly "startles." But fun-EE. (And mostly by the PeeDee.)

PeeDee works on the east side of the Bay so he took BART down to Fremont, where he wound up waiting in a strip mall in an hour because the IJS Shuttle hit so much traffic. A couple of margaritas later, and he was good to go.

We arrived at the Ardenwood Farms just as the sun was setting. It had been a hot day in the City, and a hot drive down 101, and according to my car’s thermometer, it was still 85 degrees as the sun set. It was a beautiful autumn night and perfect for a dark night in a corn maze.

Only one thing was missing, which, prepared as we are, was readily remedied. With the leftover cups from our night out at Fisherman’s Wharf, we handily prepared our whore’s coffees from the trunk cooler, which is now just referred to as the “car bar.”

The maze was pretty overrun with large groups of kids, but the maze sprawled over five acres and had ample room to get lost and isolated.

It started out a little spooky, with lots of jumping out at each other as we wound through the dark, but then it just got slap happy and silly, and ever so much fun. I heartily recommend going, and especially at night. And especially with a whore’s coffee.

Amidst the maze were a series of helpful hint signposts featuring ten trivia categories, ranging in difficulty from “genius” to “special” (not the real category names). The questions were multiple choice and a correct answer would give you the correct direction (left or right). However, it should be obvious which was the right answer even without reading the you’re a moron Tiny Tots category as the correct direction would always be the one only listed once. If the questions are all three-choice multiple choice (a), (b), or (c); and only one answer is right, and only one binary direction is right, then the two answers with the same direction must be wrong.

But I was being far too logical (i.e. actually using logic).

Logic was not on the menu as the final trivia category was always a biblical question. That was so disturbing we decided we always had to answer the bible question, or make up our own (“How much did Mary Magdalene charge for a quickie behind the stables?” “How often did Mary do laundry? (c) Never, Jesus never got dirty.). Shilpa always preferred the Tiny Tots questions (“What vegetable does popcorn come from?”).

We loved the maze:


And had no trouble cracking ourselves up. Alert Reader Paul Day led the Corn Row Runway Walk Competition, but I still think Fred was the winner.

At one point we came across two guys who work for the maze. One guy was wearing a mask and scaring kids. The other one had entered with us and I recognized him from the ticket booth. We loved these guys for several reasons: (1) one guy was kinda hot, (2) they were both rather lit, and (3) they were also drinking whore’s coffees in the maze!

Deep in the maze was a bridge over a crossing passage. The top of the bridge gave a wide view of the rest of the maze, and its sprawl over many acres was quite impressive (but sadly impossible to photograph in that light).

Inside the maze itself, it was very cool (in temperature). On top of the bridge, the air was back up in the 80s. I should also note that while we had a flashlight, it was unnecessary as the clear sky and the nearly-full moon were more than ample. And the waxing gibbous was perfect for the night’s atmosphere. (And reminded me a lot of my old Full Moon Walks.)

During our hour-long foray, we did encounter some of the same people more than once. Our favorite though was about 45 minutes in, passing a family and hearing a kid say, "Look! It's the latte people."

We exited the maze about a quarter past 9:00, and were too late to make it to the adjoining pumpkin patch, which had just closed (the maze is open to 10:00). Barney, of course, made a bee-line to the parking lot for a smoky treat. (It should be obvious that smoking is not allowed deep in a dry cornfield.)

I took this pic to add to the others.

There was another Fremont Halloween attraction advertised online and we thought we might make it there before the pirate-themed carnival closed. However, this attraction was on Shilpa’s street.

Shilpa has some serious boundary issues with her parents, and felt oppressive guilt for being in the neighborhood and not spending time at home. We, sensitive 'mo's that we are, gave her nothing but harassment for this, and made her guide us to a drive-by so we could see the Home of Shilpa. We passed her elementary school on the way, where I presume she was also an Alert Reader.

She panicked as she approached her parents’ house. She was racked with guilt for not going inside, but I couldn’t reason why. And one point she said she thought it was bad manners. But I think it would have been worse manners to show up after 9:00, while they are in bed, unannounced, drunk, and with a carload of mo’s that will never marry her (her mother does not approve of drinking or homos). She was afraid of being “caught,” but we forced her to let us take a picture in front.

We stopped short of rolling (toilet-papering) her house.

We stopped for dinner at Shilpa’s favorite Indian place (with “Indian Chinese food” if you would believe) and we recklessly abandoned Phase One of South Beach, which we had begun a mere 18 hours earlier.

I may have had nan and some rice, but WOW was it worth it. OMG. That dinner alone was worth the nightmare commute to Fremont. Shilpa, of course, got all sorts of looks as the one Indian girl with a gaggle of crackers, in an Indian restaurant in an Indian neighborhood. But wow, again with the food. I’m kinda having a moment just writing about it. Masala Grill.

Unfortunately as the driver, I had to minimize the evening’s drinking and stay awake for the long ride home. The passengers, however, were ready for their food coma.

But with an iPod full of Halloween-themed and 80s tracks, it was a fairly lively trip back.

Although I think at this point they were just tickling PeeDee. I don’t know. I was driving.

Flickr photoset

Gone fishin'

Saturday night.

After too many phone calls to friends who were either on dates, at the theater, or sitting around with other friends playing the most annoying game of “I don’t know. What do you want to do?” ping pong, I dipped into my if “I were a lushy, dishy, witty, sit-com character, what would I suggest?” persona and came up with a plan.

“Let’s get roadies and go to Fisherman’s Wharf and make fun of the tourists.”

We stopped at Safeway and stocked the cooler in the trunk with ice, Absolute Mandarin, and Callistoga, then cruised for parking down by the wharf. We stopped in Walgreens for a package of coffee cups and lids to make our whore's coffees.

I parked on a corner, and while mixing our drinks, a patrol car pulled alongside us and stopped at the intersection such that the officer’s window was perfectly in line with our open trunk. Considering the mania, panhandling, and pick-pocketing surrounding us, they seemed to merely shrug and go on their way.

This being the wharf, one presumes they had (ahem) bigger fish to fry. Or crabs. Whatever.

As lovely as Daly City was, we needed a cocktail to launch ourselves into the Saturday night.

With all the barkers, huddled foreign tourists, teens and twenty-somethings on vacation or dates, newlyweds, and package tourists, we were not wanting for entertainment. Yes, yes, sometimes we lowered ourselves and forwent "clever" for "bitchy" but with the array of "fashion" parading by, you would too. The most popular attire seemed to be either (1) matching outfits identifying family units/seniors social clubs or (2) the ever-popular "I'm wearing a SF-embroidered fleece because where I come from August/September is considered summer." Although truth be told, it was a great Summer San Franciscan evening, warm air and no fog in sight.

Of course, my companion and I sometimes have the same tastes in eye candy and would eye-lock the same guys from time to time. It also became a game of "bad boyfriend," picking out the guys on dates/married who would either (1) openly ogle her and smile/wink while holding their girlfriend's/wife's hand; or (2) the same sort of chap, but ogling/engaging me.

I love a parade.

I celebrate the wharf for proving the tourists a place to feel like they are on vacation, and for keeping them away from the rest of the City in the meantime. But at the same time I held some pity for them, fearing that they might be thinking this was their big Saturday Night Out In San Francisco, and that this was what SF is really like.

Not so much.

And while I love the fresh, live crabs down the crab alley, the sandwiches they hawk are just scary—I don't think there is so much mayo in all of Minnesota, and they are served on impossible-to-chew sourdough. Those that dared bore the markings down their fronts.

Eventually, we had our "Honey, let's eat here. Just wait in the bar for a moment while I go to the restroom" performance down pat so we could take advantage of the cleaner restrooms on the strip.

At the far end of the wharf a fire dancer, well, fire twirler is more accurate, had the pedestrians enthralled. He was an entertaining performer (but clearly not a San Franciscan, if only for the fact he referenced his mortgage when asking for tips and no one in SF can afford a mortgage on a sidewalk fire-twirling income) spinning his fire batons in nothing but fur boots and a loincloth.

I will say, while his Sharon Meadow juggling act held the interest of the crowd, it was the looking good in a loincloth that held mine.

I'm just sayin'.

I had S's camera out and decided to grab a brief vid for the blog. Now sure, I'm a fan of good baton twirling:




but this guy's baton was. on. fire.




Marjorie.




I could faintly overhear the couple next to S. I don't think the audio comes though on the YouTube vid. I made some sort of obvious quip like "And you think I'm flaming..." and the guys next to her thought it was hilarious and repeated it in hushed tones. When I had started taping, there was a large burly guy with his girlfriend next to S. I assumed it was this guy I was hearing but they had moved on (I didn't look over as I was recording). S reported that it was a cute tourist gay couple who were excited to hear some gayness on the Wharf. I wish I had known as I thought we should have offered to take them out to the Castro with us and show them a real SF Saturday night.

Walking back towards Ghirardelli, fireworks erupted over the Golden Gate. (We still don't know the occasion. Barney could see them from the view from Club Jackson.)



After a couple of laps, and refills, we reached that giddy stage of laughing too hard and too much and left the street performers tourists for the shops and "attractions."

And the choices here. Why is this dreck popular? Really? There's a line for the Rainforest Café?

It's just like being back in India...wait, WTF? Why is there an elephant in a rainforest?

And the wax museum still draws such a crowd? (BTW, Barry Bonds on display out front looks like a deranged serial killer. I don't know if that means it is lifelike or not.) I do admit that I wanted to go to the Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum, because it evokes such fond memories of going when I was ten on a camping trip to Gatlinburg, TN.

And while I'm on the subject, for my Tennessee friends I describe Fisherman's Wharf as the Gatlinburg of San Francisco, so it should also be illustrative conversely. But Gatlinbug makes a lot of and is known for it's taffy candies. Why does Fisherman's Wharf have so much?


It was in maybe a dozen shops. Is that just a tourist-destination thing?

And there is so much crap to be had it was delightful. And not just exceptionally stupid tee shirts and your name on a grain of rice.

Just earlier that day had I asked RMJ (who was towards Fort Mason) if perchance he had seen any tiny cable cars, names on tiny license plates, or shot glasses with pithy expressions.

Investigating the snow globes.

Interrogating the snow globes.

Also in such a store did we see this ad for Levi's (always a tourist thing too. Is this leftover from when one could trade Levi's for an automobile in eastern europe?):

Relaxed, maybe. Booty, sure. Straight? I'm guessing no.

While I am still clinging to the South Beach Diet lifestyle, we ultimately succumbed to the chocolateer for a chocolate-covered oreo.


And S demonstrated that I am not the only bear she loves. Or offers cocktails.


That was not the end of the night, but it is the end of this post.

ironically, no cream

We like to get a running start on our evenings out with a cocktail at home.

And on the way.

Nothing makes a muni/cab ride more pleasant than a roadie.

But you don't want to carry a proper glass with you (well, "want," yes, but "wise," no), and open Solo cups are just messy and a little too tacky. Covered tumblers are great, but the best roadies are disposable (and preferably recyclable). So my response to my party's call for roadies:

Mix your cocktail in paper coffee cups and snap on the lid.

Looks like latte, tastes like vodka.



And on this cab ride, we Christened this togo the Whore's Coffee.