It’s 4 a.m., three days into the new year, and I’ve packed my bags to catch the Super Shuttle to SFO, having opted for the “three Irish coffees and no sleep” approach to an early getaway. The shuttle’s late, the moon looms full and high, and I sit curbside waiting and listening to the din emanating from just above me on the road to Coit Tower where a young couple scream at one another. “Get in the car, bitch” is his chosen, repeated refrain, but she’s content with the fresh air approach to high decibel conflict resolution. It occurs to me as this fracas continues that similar disruption would draw immediate response from New York City cops. This kind of observation has made me few friends in San Francisco, though, where they apparently take offense to any suggestion theirs is less than a big-time city. It’s got little to do with that; just different places is all. Anyone inclined to argue isn’t up at this hour anyway. My driver arrives thirty minutes late, indifferent and equally choked up about having to be awake and on the job. We head downtown toward the freeway on-ramp, giving me momentary hope that I might be his only fare. But it isn’t to be. A couple of tourists from a Tenderloin hotel get in first before we double back to Market for another guy. Then it’s off toward Dolores Street and the Mission to fill the remaining four spots with another three stops. The last to get in is an Asian girl who promptly nods off in the front seat next to the driver as we proceed down Army (Caesar Chavez for those preferring a less retrograde approach), onto 101 South and then a short few miles to the airport.
Just nine days prior I’m watching my father open a Christmas gift from my brother — a pair of 3/4 Adidas soccer practice shorts with shale-green stripes — when out of the corner of my eye I spot the $200 prime rib I’m cooking on the grill outside burst into flames. It looks like a still frame from either the Challenger or Columbia mission and I calmly bolt to the backyard to try and extinguish it. But the fatty exterior has other ideas and the engulfing inferno rages on even as I manage to remove it from the cue and onto a platter. After much commotion I subdue and wrestle the roast into submission, suspecting that I’ve ruined it. My concern proves premature, however, and I’m able to finish it off in my mom’s oven at 350 evenly-applied degrees with the torched and crispy exterior acting as a sort of juice-preserving shell. Despite ineptness in most other arenas I’m apparently still incapable of doing wrong where meat and fire are involved.
This streak of surprising capability extends to our Tahoe cabin, where I find myself a few days later repairing a leaky feed to the archaic Sears washing machine, doing similar with a bathroom sink, then insulating pipes in the upstairs crawlspace to prevent further winter bursts. I’m a two-day fixture at the local Ace Hardware. It’s a tour de force of masculine adeptness and I’m feeling like I could hunt a bear if there were a shotgun in the house. Fortunately there’s only a modest flat-screen TV, and, hey — somebody’s hooked the cable back up! It’s amazing how enjoyable ‘Law and Order S.V.U’ can be on the heels of successful home repair .. an entirely different deal from the normal viewing experience. Later I go out for dinner, managing a bar seat and another solid meal despite the sold-out restaurant with fretful owner turning back potential patrons. I cap the evening with reasonable losses at a casino just past Stateline.
Everything’s falling apart despite falling nicely into place. Or maybe it’s the other way around. The trip back is almost two hours faster than the one up. Wash, rinse, repeat.
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