One thing I definitely won’t miss about San Francisco will be the stupid-ass hippie granola factor. Case in point: two of my neighbors were sitting out on the sidewalk playing a long, repetitive bongo drum duet for about a half hour late this afternoon. It was the same eight beats over and over again — enough to drive any sane person crazy — and I could hear it all the way in the back of the flat even with the windows closed. It was loud…
Finally, I couldn’t stand it anymore, so I went downstairs to see how long they were planning to continue. I asked the thirtysomething guy and his twentysomething female companion if they’d be playing much longer.
“Oh, probably not.”
“Good, because I can’t hear myself think anywhere in my apartment.”
They promptly and without incident stopped their little performance and went inside. It wasn’t like they were being defensive or confrontational or anything. In fact, they almost seemed hurt that someone didn’t appreciate their musical “gift” to the neighborhood. What really bugged me was that stupid fucking deadhead kind of obliviousness, as if they couldn’t wrap their brains around the fact that not everyone on the block really wanted to listen to an hour’s worth of the same drum loop over and over again all night long. It just hadn’t even occurred to them, apparently…
I guess they just assumed that everyone else within range was as stoned and stupid as they were…