scrambled

this is the first morning of a nine-week north american tour. the first of 67 mornings. the first of 67 breakfasts! and i'm going to write about all of them!

25 degrees, hollywood, los angeles
april 9th 2013

i woke up with a start at 7am, orientated--remarkably orientated. it wasn't strange that there was another bed, unoccupied to my right, nor that all the lights were on. the wind was still whistling... through... something, but what? and so what.

i'm thinking: layers of crunch: lemon curd, greek yoghurt, any berries. damn, i'm thinking of tina's.fantasies abate, and i'm downstairs, wandering around. i like this place because it doesn't provide the usual canteen buffet-style community-vibe "let's-have-a- goddam-conversation-about-it" breakfast. i have to walk all the way next door to a diner, sit down by myself, and look at a menu: a simple, peaceful, devastatingly lonely transaction that suits this capitalist child. there's men at the bar, hunched backs, a bored waitress smeared in lipstick, and me.

"hihowarrrreyou" she drawls, eyes akimbo. i don't care how i am, but that doesn't seem appropriate, and the one thing i've learnt in the US is that questions are only social graces.

tepid coffee. i'd go so far as to say lukewarm. the saving grace of american "drip" coffee is that it is weak enough to have no real effect, taste or energy-wise. it's harmless, like weak lager. the danger is you hit it with a dependency weened from euro-espresso, and three or four are needed to get that hit, and your gut is left reeling. needless to say i just can't resist. two cups down and i'm warming to it, just as it is cooling to me. the second cup is chilled; the third downright cold.

finally my eyes have opened, and a tiger wood press conference appears in focus to my left eye, a wild fishing documentary to my right. third eye zoning out on some kind of inane americana indie music on the stereo. 

i order "scramble #3": queso fresco (possible name for my future good-time wedding-party jam band), scallions (wyld scallions?), avocado, some kind of salsa... mezzo secco jack, whatever the hell that is. perhaps this was a mistake from the off. i like scrambled eggs, but i'm not sure anything else deserves the indignity. what exactly is a scramble? not quite a blend; not a mash so much as a mush; certainly not a measured mix. i'd venture to say it's just a mess.

scrambled egg works because there are just two parts to be messed: the yellow, and the white. you start adding to that and you're not much more than a four year old in the kitchen with a big ol' wooden spoon.