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Cowboy Caleb recommends 
Tricycle Nights
photo by Tomsch
Some days, you feel like a dark cloud hangs over your head and there’s a constant need to look over your shoulder. The only countermeasure for such dreary days is to have whiskey for dinner, preferably alone.
On days like this, I slip away to a Japanese bar near my office. It’s run by a Chinese Malaysian chap named Nathan who spent too much time in Australia with his Japanese housemates. I love his bar. It’s one of those small but classy joints where nobody speaks loudly and you can hear the undertones of the music.
I have an bottle of Black Label there, waiting for me. So when I get there, I plant myself onto the bar stool and Nathan fixes me one just the way I like it. First on the rocks. Then with soda. And finally straight up to salute the Hibakusha. The book I’m currently reading is titled The Rule of Four and is the smarty pants version of The Da Vinci Code. While I drink my whiskey under the dim lights, I read my book. In the background, a rainbow of japanese, korean and indian businessman toast to whatever it is that they want in this brief sojourn called life.
To my irritation, a Japanese lady plants herself next to me and smiles her dazzling SGD3000 teeth at me. Immediately the fumes of her expensive perfume permeate the air around me and my whiskey begins to sour in my mouth. Not wanting to be an asshat and give Nathan’s place a bad name, I say hello.
She speaks in halting phrases. First she stumbles and finally at the end, she finds her pace and spits the words out like a piece of gum. Much like a vintage engine warming up in the morning.
“What…are…jooreading” says she.
I show her the cover of the book. Clearly, the charm of the Italian Renaissance is beyond her grasp of the English language. To have to explain to her would be an exercise in sadomasochistic delight. But then I don’t engage in such activities. So I reply, “A book. It’s about a detective and a murderer. Very exciting shite”. And I begin reading to her from the top of page 19
“I didn’t know there was such a thing as a black boy scout,” I tell Charlie once he and I are on our own, heading down campus.
“That’s ok,” he says. “Before I met you, I didn’t know there was such a thing as white pussy”.
The blank expression on her face showed that she clearly didn’t understand a thing I had just said, much less the sexual connotations. After awhile, thinking I was a weirdo, she left me alone and went on her way.
Nathan came over and told me “Dude, you don’t look so good”. And without asking, he ordered me some xiao long pao from the Shanghainese restaurant across the road from his bar. “Eat”, he said. “This is on the house because if you die on me, I’ll have no customers that just come in here for self-reflection”.
Never argue with your bartender. They know what’s good for you. After eating, I finished my whiskey and found that Nathan had already dialed me a cab. On the way home, I looked at the skyline as the cab climbed the upwards slope of the CTE and marveled at the beauty of it.
I regreted being mean to the lady.
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