Weekend Recap
I come from a little bunghole hicktown. Yes, while those of you who are from Fremont may object and say, “What’s with the hometown hate, Shih? What’s with rejecting your roots?” It’s not about hate; it’s just what it is…Fremont is a little bunghole hicktown, complete with an obsession over arts and crafts and do dads and knick knacks.
This weekend Reg and I drove Michael back to Fremont. Michael had spent the last 10 days visiting, and left us with such fine quotes as, “I’m a PARTY animal,” “You can’t go outside without pants. People will think you’re inappropriate” and my favorite, “You have to put it in your mouth and suck on it,” which was declared vehemently over and over while he thrust an Altoid in my face as I giggled uncontrollably.
I had told Reggie that Fremont doesn’t have a whole lot going on and that it’s fairly hickish as, for example, the entrance of my road features a goat farm and a horse stable (the cows have since been relocated). I don’t think he believed me until we turned onto my road behind the pickup sporting a “Cowboy Up” sticker in the back window, and I pointed out the “Goats 4 Sale” sign hanging proudly on a crumbling shed.
The tour of the town took less than an hour, as I showed him: 1. The gym; 2. My high school; 3. The bustling town “center” featuring all the big commercial chains (Barnes & Noble, Jamba Juice, Target, etc) whose arrival meant that lil’ Fremont finally had a place on the map. While driving around town, Reggie said, “Blankets. You guys really like to make blankets.” They’re quilts, I said. It’s our thing, man. He asked me what I usually do when I go home, and I told him that I usually go to the gym in the morning for a couple of hours, then eat lunch, then go to a coffee shop to write, then go to the gym for a couple of hours, then surf the net until it’s time to go home. Outside of heading out to San Francisco, Tahoe or doing something outdoorsy like hiking, there’s really not much going on. I will admit though, that the local community college flea market that comes around 1 weekend a month is usually the highlight of the month. I will also admit that I don’t try very hard to find more interesting things to do when I’m at home. Being at home makes me lethargic.
On Saturday we went to the gym, but I have this severely sprained ankle so I just hobbled around and did some weights. Afterwards, we went to a Chinese restaurant for lunch and then drove around trying to decide what to do. We ended up driving in a huge circle (from Newark down to Milpitas because we thought we would go to visit my cousin, then up towards Pleasanton because we considered going to see a movie at this really nice theater, then turned around and went home when it was deemed no one was really interested in any of these activities). We went home and took a nap, then headed over to Santana Road, which is this upscale area with shopping and restaurants, much like the Grove in LA. We met up with my aunt and her family for dinner at this Italian place, then headed over to the V Bar at the top of the Hotel Valencia (?) for mojitos and a virgin pina colada for Michael. There was a high school reunion going on (Pioneer Class of ’85) so I walked in and tried to convince everyone to crash it with me. No one else was as excited about this adventure as I was so we headed to the outdoor patio instead. I did make Reggie promise he would crash a reunion with me at some future date.
Sunday was my nephew’s 1 month anniversary of his birth, which is a big deal in Chinese culture. I think. I don’t know. They held a banquet at this restaurant, and we got through it okay; many people had heard through the grapevine that I was dating a black guy, so while there were many glances over, everyone was fairly polite and well-behaved, though at the beginning of the meal, my grandmother, who likes Reggie, did ask that he not use his chopsticks with his left hand. We explained to her that he’s left-handed and can’t help it. I asked my mom if it was a sign of bad manners to use chopsticks with the left hand, kind of like it’s rude in some cultures to eat with your left hand because that’s the hand you wipe your ass with. She said, no, you’re grandmother’s just anal.
We were supposed to leave Sunday afternoon but my mom asked if Michael could stay with us for another week, since she planned to come down for Labor Day anyway so he may as well stay. So essentially, we drove him up just to drive him back down with us. We were on our way back to LA when my dad called and was disappointed that we had left already, as he had wanted to have dinner with us. It was a nice gesture since things have been strained between my dad and I this year, so we turned around and had dinner before leaving again.
Only 4 bathroom stops and 1 po-po sighting before we got back into LA just after midnight.