Finish your coke...

 Finish your coke...



     I am from a family of eavesdroppers and this dates back to my Mom who would repeat what the clueless dopes at the next table said when we went out for dinner. It was a little treat to drive over to Long Beach blvd. for the old-fashioned Cantonese Chinese dinner at Hao's that gave her a break from cooking and pleased we spoiled kids who learned to love Egg Fu Yung, almond chicken, fried rice and dry noodles for an appetizer at a great spot in Belmont Shore. You had to stand in line for that place but Hao's was an easy walk-in. The acoustics were ideal for listening in also. We sat in a booth next to a threesome of an old depression generation couple with a neighbor. It was obvious the old man had no interest in this exotic fare and looked miserable, slumped on his side of the table. Mom was berating Pop for being a culinary stick-in-the-mud telling her lady-friend "All Paw wants to eat is ham n' beans, just ham n' beans." The sentence stuck and we used to repeat it around the Creason house to get a laugh out of Mom. Unlike Paw, BC was not afraid of trying new stuff and would darn near eat anything set in front of him from beef heart to abalone. This tale takes its turn in the grand old Azalea city where I was ensconced during the late 70's while I searched for what Greg once called "the easy way." There was a fun tradition that bachelors Billy and I would go out to eat at places we had read about or just wanted to try on Sunday evenings. Our funds were limited to say the least. Most of our dining destinations were great and cheap. The best was the Guadalajara Inn serving a dish called carne adobada that was beauitiful on the plate and the palate. Simple touches sometimes make the meal and their pickled carrots to awaken the tast buds were terrific. We also visited Inge's in Bellflower that defied restaurant pricing by serving a wunderbar German feast for $2.99 that included Knackwurst, Schnitzel or Saurebrauten, dark bread, kraut, potato salad and a salad. You were greeted at the door by the lovely German War bride Inge in a cocktail gown and there was a horseshoe bar  filled with old-time ruddy-faced white-guy boozers. So, as young men with light wallets we always tried to behave properly and not interfere with other diners, even if they were blue-collar yahoos with no social skills. The pickins were decidedly slim in the southeast but we stretched the culinary boundaries to far off Bellflower or even exotic Long Beach where full scale Greek feasts awaited. So this story does take place in a Straw Hat Pizza restaurant on Tweedy boulevard where the men of our softball teams would gather and slurp a few beers. The place was only a temporary stopover while Danny Salissii got the godfather of all Gate Pizza pie shops Florie's back in business after some misunderstandings with the SGPD. We were young sophisticates by Gate standards who thought we knew most of what needed to be known and there was an example of a poor woman trying to fill her kids bellies with whatever fast food they would eat. In this case she was riding herd over a couple of raggedly looking kids at a greasy looking table where pies had been gobbled. Now the Mother gave her last bit of direction and wisdom to her little girl with "finish your coke or you can't have any dessert!" In our sweaty softball togs we mused on the statement and realized there was little hope for the youth of  America. 




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