This night, there was a comedy open mike. I asked Lieu if the poetry slam crowd had approached him.
"Yes, but I turned them down."
"Why?"
"Poets don't drink enough."
That's a sure sign of a collapsing society! The two bartenders were young, pretty women, with one white, one Chinese. The Basement also has a hunky Swedish guy to attract the ladies. Leaving The Basement, I reentered the Tenderloin proper and promptly saw a young yet haggard white woman, in tight jeans and no shoes, just socks, flashing for a black man leaning against a frail, half dead tree. Seeing me, she smiled most crookedly, ran up, turned around, pulled down and leaned over to display her cheeks. Trying to panhandle from me, an older black woman screamed at this exhibitionist to shoo her away. With yuppies and hipsters invading the Tenderloin, it's hoped that scenes like this will gradually disappear from San Francisco, but if the economy collapses, and it will soon enough, you will see this spread all over.
Ah, California, you will turn bone dry and shirk off your weeping children by the millions! Announcing the state's first ever mandatory restrictions on water usage, Governor Brown reminded us, "For over ten thousand years, some people say twenty thousand years, people lived in California, but the number of those people were never more than 300,000 or 400,000, as far as we know, and they lived much simpler, and they were able to move when a drought occurred, or fires occurred. They could cope. Now, we're embarked upon an experiment that no one has ever tried, ever, in the history of mankind, and that's 38 million people, with 32 million vehicles, living at a level of comfort that we all strive to attain." Weaned from abundant resources, we will have to strive to attain less.
In a country where political speeches, elections and even terrorist attacks are but elaborate theatrical productions, California is the longest show running, designed to convince everyone everywhere, and even Californians themselves, that here is the epitome of the American Dream, and that it's surfing along just fine. Just outside the spotlight, however, are all sorts of frightful omens. The next act will be a scream.
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