so in accordance with jon's post about the bay area, let me tell you a little story.

so we're at the laun-dro-mat doing the awful weekly chore that is laundry. mind you it's about 6:30 on a saturday night. it's not our usual time but hey, my skivvies needed a wash. so we're sitting there for a while and the only other people there were a group of 3 gay men (and yes, the fact that they were gay pertains to this story). so in walks a crackhead. she asks what time it is because she wants to make sure she has time to warm up her blankets before the cold hard night sets in.

one of the guys was checking on his laundry in the dryer. the dude and the crackhead were talking about something but all i could hear was the dude say "i think i'll pass, but thanks anyway". i just assumed that she was asking for some money.

so the guy walks up to his friends and says, "she was trying to sell me some porn for $2 but i told her no". his friend responds, "well what kind of porn?". to which the first guy responds, "pshh...straight". but they all agreed that $2 was still a bargain. after all, there had to be a man in there somewhere right?

so after they leave the crackhead comes over to jon and i, and asks for a quarter so she can dry her blankets. i'm not the type to hand out money to every homeless person in san francisco, but i'm not really going to deny someone a warm blanket. jon ends up giving the woman a quarter and she puts it in the dryer.

now after he gave her the quarter and i got a closer look at her face , it dawned on me where i recognized her from. about a month ago it was raining and i had to take the bus home. i started the walk up the gigantic ass hill towards alamo square park and noticed a woman at the top of the first hill. she was blowing snot rockets. i was hot and tired and cranky and not in a mood to be fucked with. she walked up into a building and disappeared (so i thought) so i decided against crossing the street. when i got to the top of the hill she was waiting there for me with her sob story.

she hadn't had anything to eat all day. she hadn't changed her clothes in a week. her clothes smelled and were dusty (because oh my god there's so much dust in san francisco). can she have some money? i gave her my usual "no, i don't carry cash" response. she says, "now that's not right. i know you have a credit card and you could walk me to the corner store and get me something to eat". i said, "oh really? nope. i don't think so". she gave me some more bullshit about how i don't know how hard the streets are and how hard life is and how fortunate i am. by this point i had the half smirk/half smile just-leave-me-the-fuck-alone look. and she says "i've seen that smile before and let me tell you it hurts. it hurts that people judge me everyday". i walked away tempted to hand her a tissue and tell her to wipe the white powder off her nose.

so we're back at the laun-dro-mat and i explain to jon who she is and we have a good laugh. then she comes back over. with the porn. and offers it to us for $1. apparently it went on sale in the span of 3 minutes. we kindly deny her offer to which she responds, "oh, you don't watch these kind of movies huh? you too good for this huh?". i told her we make our own movies.

ahhhh....san francisco living.