San Diego - October 2002

October 15 - On a friend's advice, I drove out to Ocean Beach to check out Hodad's (5010 Newport Ave. 619-224-4623). The initial plan was to pick up a burger and a movie before returning home. It was about 8:40 PM when I called over and told them I wanted to make an order for pick-up.

"Sure," he said. "But we're going to close at 9:00, so get here before then."

I promptly hopped in my car and jetted out to Ocean Beach. I arrived at Hodad's at around 8:50 PM. "Got an order for Jiyan," I asked at the front counter where a guy with long hair and tattoos was standing.
"Yeah, sure do," he said as he handed me a greasy brown bag.

I paid the man and started to head out, before thinking to myself, "Jiyan, this hamburger is going to be soggy by the time you get home." Looking around and seeing quite a few patrons still seated in the restaurant, I decided to sit down and eat there.

The burger was nothing special. It was somewhere between Carl Jr.'s $6.00 burger and a Hamburger Mary's burger. The bread was already soggy by the time I started eating, and had the same texture as mucus. After eating the burger and working on the fries, I headed to the back, where I asked a bald-headed guy with tattoos for a cup of water.

He got me a cup of water before saying, "Not to be a d@#k or anything, but when you say you want an order for pick-up, that means for God damn pick-up!"

I stared at him flabbergasted for a few moments before responding, "Well, what about all the other people in here? If you looked like you were closing, I wouldn't have eaten my burger here."

"Yeah, well we close at 9:00," he said. "That means you can't stay here after 9:00."

"You should have said something from the beginning," I responded as I took my water and headed back to my table.

So bottom line on Hodad's: average burger, awful service. If you want a burger, go to Hamburger Mary's. If you don't want to go to Hamburger Mary's, save yourself some time and some money and go to In-N-Out Burger.

October 12 - I had a pretty twisted dream last night in which I was part of a coalition of superheroes, and I got to be Superman. We were running away from our enemies and somehow arrived on a balcony. The leader of the group, a Charles Xavier-esque type, began to get worried because there was nowhere else to run. The drop from the balcony to the swamp that lay beneath was a good 70 or 80 feet.
"Well, guess this is the end of the line," he said.

I leaned over and said, "Well, I don't normally like to tell people this, but I can fly. It's not that I'm trying to lie to anyone, it's just that if I let too many people know, they will start asking me for favors all the time."

He seemed pleasantly surprised by this and I spent the next ten or so minutes, flying all the other superheroes onto what appeared to be a small gazebo floating in the water. Some of the superheroes, like He-Man for instance, were complaining that the gazebo was too small for all of them.

Ultimately, I got all of them to safety, or so I thought as I abruptly recalled that I would need an electric plug to start the floating gazebo, so that it would motor us to safety. Unfortunately, we didn't have a plug and of course it was me who had to fly far away to find it (not my idea of fun).

Flying back by myself, I felt an absolute thrill at the feel of the breezed running through my hair, and at the picturesque beauty of the swamp. It was late afternoon and the sun was beginning to set, causing a crimson haze to fall over the scenery.

I returned to the gazebo to find everyone missing. Plugging the gazebo in, I realized that it was not long enough to begin with, as the gazebo could only travel about twenty feet before it extended the plug's capabilities.

Last night, James, Karl and I went back to our "old faithful": Bar Dynamite, where I was pleasantly surprised to find that it wasn't packed, as one would normally expect on a Friday night.

We danced with some cute girls for a while, had some drinks, and I met a Belgium guy named "Jill," who was celebrating his 25th birthday. I started introducing him to random girls, and there was even one girl's name that was "Jill," so I said, "Jill, this is Jill. It is his 25th birthday."
We finished off the night by going into the taco shop next door and afterwards, headed home.