It’s lunchtime and I’m starving.
Across the street from the office is a row of food carts. I’m thinking Tom Yum soup from the good Thai cart but I’m really hungry and I know it won’t last into the afternoon so I go to the Los Locos Burritos cart because they have really good chicken soft tacos. I can get three and a soda for the same price as their 2 taco combo and avoid the rice and beans I won’t eat anyway.
It’s a little after noon and the side walk is crowded with hungry people. The popular carts have lines bisecting the sidewalk the undecided bob and weave through and the committed huddle in little groups by the curb, waiting for their chicken tika and naan, philly cheese steak (damned good, a guilty pleasure), or burritos, maybe a salad or soup. The Thai cart is near the end of the row on the right and the Mexican place I decide to go to is the second from the left.
As I walk out the building courtyard into the early Spring sunlight, I hear some off key singing. I jaywalk across the street toward the the crazy little donkeys and realize the weatherman is a lying shit for forecasting 60 degrees and sunny. It’s sunny but no way is it 60, not with that wind blowing through the artificial canyon walls. The dude producing all the noise is a scruffy black guy with a guitar. His anemic attempts at the blues stabs the air around him, but I’m too hungry to care that much as a I order my food.
It takes a few minutes for my food to come up. I’m suffering in silence with the rest of the multitude at this guy’s voice and cursing the weatherman under my breath. Sixty degrees, my ass. From the left, a mother slowly pushes her stroller through the crowd. The business end of the leash tied to the stroller trails a long-haired dachshund who does not look happy at all the tall people with big feet crowding around. The poor thing walks a drunken line as it tries to keep its distance from, well, everything.
As the stroller passes the guy croaking out something resembling a tune, he leans down toward the dog. The dog looks up and gives him one good bark, right in the guy’s face, before trotting away.
I smile and think, “Well done, sir canine. Well done.”