When you don't drive and you work a 9 to 5, your days start pretty fucking early. And 9 times out of 10, breakfast is not an option. Sure you'll make time to pour and guzzle a cup of coffee, but scramble some eggs and fry up some bacon? No sir!It's too early for all that domesticity.
Now sometimes you make it til the lunch break. Or you tell yourself that 3-5 cups of the office coffee before lunch does a full meal make. But sometimes you just can't help it. You check the watch, look both ways for the bus, and if there is time to kill you hit up the liquor store, duck into a Starbuck's, or if you were like me, every so often, you'd give into the little Spanish lady with the shopping cart, Gatorade pitcher with the matching cooler, and a pouch full of cash around her waist.
You know who I'm talking about. Look out your window on your commute to work and your bound to see her, on any corner, Los Angeles, doling out delicious tamales, and this popular goulash looking drink that seems to be all the rage with my fellow morning transit riders. (and some commuters who pull out of traffic to get their fix.)
[SIDENOTE: I ain't been bold enough to buy a cup yet. Though not knowing what said drink is is starting to bug the shit out of me. So much so that I am this close to tapping one of the vendors or fans of the drink and asking what the hell it is exactly. Not in those exact words or tone of course.]
At the Pico/Rimpau bus station, where many a bus rider must go to connect to the Santa Monica Blue Bus, these matronly like vendors were always out, every morning, in full force. Literally four or five steps away from each other, selling tamales, that aforementioned drink, homemade jewelry, baby booties, etc. She who set up shop near the bus I needed to ride was quite popular, and damn it if those chicken tamales she was peddling didn't smell good each and everyday.
And one day I couldn't take it. The one cup of coffee I had while getting dressed and reading horoscopes and the like was not gonna cut it. I gave in. Asked for the price [only 1 dollar!], and bought two of what tasted like Mexican heaven at 7:45 in the morning. From that day forward, if I was hungry and needed a quick fix before work, I would check my watch, look both ways for a bus, and if all systems were a go, two of my dollars and mangled Spanglish she would get.
Skip to the end. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. A lot less traffic for many people, excluding me, had the day off. And apparently so did all the matronly street vendors. But it's cool I thought, smart move. Holiday. No revenue. Why not take a day off?
But a day stretched into a week.
And a week stretched into a month.
And still no sight of them, including she with the tamales I began to love so much, who found my mangled Spanish charming. The first thing I thought was [and still think], well, I guess MTA officials said something and had the police politely ask them to cease and desist.
Wait.
Nah.
That's crazy talk!
Or maybe not?...
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