Cuke-Tinis On Haight Street (7/9/08)

          Martinis are strong - or so it would seem.
     We did the daytime drinking thing (how ghetto, really).  Despite my...reporting from the field, we really don't drink that much.  It's just memorable when we do, somehow.  I really can't - I'm an Addict-in-Waiting, and must behave accordingly.  Most of the time.  PLus, we mostly tend to go cocktailing with Rosy and Zeb (Rosy being Chief's "work wife" who got a new job...God help us all, the home wife in particular.  Zeb is her adorable absolute keeper of a mate.  He's, like, 10 years old compared to the rest of us - a fact we never let him forget.)  They are our Zeitgeist partners (a cool bar, like, under the freeway that has the best Bloodies in town and quirky outdoor quasi-biergarten seating.  Very cool.  Rosy and Zeb can hold their shit - the quintessential bar buds. The Reverend Chief (no shit !) performed their wedding in The Big Easy a coupla years back.)     
     So, we meet upon Haight s Street of a Sattiday afternoon at about 4 (so at least I wasn't suckin''em down at noon)  We stand in the street, Rosy saying "just go to the closest bar !"  And, what ho !  There's the Persian Aub Zam Zam.  Oh, yes indeed - what else but go into the the tiny, dark (but neat as a pin) bar-room in the Haight, one with a history, a vibe, unwritten (and oft-changing) rules and regs.  On a beautiful sunny day.  I have both earth-rocking cramps and a 3 day headache. (Getting worse ?  Get in line, temporal lobe - everything's "worse" at some point, and has been since forever, or at least since 2007-ish.)   
    Miss Rosy asks the babes next to us at the bar what refreshing and fascinating libation they are sipping : yes, it's The Subject Line.  I had a few cucumber martinis, a couple of Bloody Mary's, and , if memory serves, I may also be running for Mayor... 
        Hold that thought, and go back a few years to The Zam Zam in what I consider to be its heyday - like, 25 years ago, even...  I bet it's had a few heydays, actually - remind me to Google it.  It alternately sickens and delights me that things happened that long ago in my life and how cool but then it also means that I am as old as fuck.  Anyhoo, I had a boyfriend that lived on Haight (long story) and he used to drink the famous 70 cent Martinis at The Zam - apparently excellent.  Me, I didn't discover The Martini until my 40's - and that's likely a good thing. 
   So, Bruno, in the day, the seeming owner, operator, the only bartender, even.  He looks kind of like an old Moroccan guy, minus the fez. He is no-fecking- nonsense : a man of few words and equally few facial expressions - the steely gaze and down-turned mouth being constants.  It's all in the eyes with Bruno.  Truly.  
      Many bar guides have referred to Bruno as "a curmudgeon".  They are right. Bruno - the man, the myth, the legend.  And you can better believe that the place looks like it was literally plucked up out of the late 1950's and plopped down.  There could be....Armageddon on Haight Street, but Bruno's area is secured and disturbance-free.  It's like he doesn't take shit from the universe.
      There are unspoken rules that you need to know or else just leave the bar.  Some are iron-clad - others, you learn not to break again, with a virtual slap to your wrist.   Some are more general and, after a while, seem so obvious (i.e. "of course he took the pay phone out in 1968 - duh !") 
       
1) You must sit at the bar.  No exceptions.  To not do so is the hight of rudeness.  No one is allowed at a table.  To not sit at the bar is a personal attack on Bruno, and will not be tolerated.  He will neither acknowledge you nor serve you.
2) There is no pay phone - it was taken out in 1968.  Hasn't had one since.  Do not ask to use it.
3) If you don't order a Martini or equally neat and simple drink (I shudder to think of Bruno's reaction to a cucumber martini..) Bruno may take offense and/or insinuate that you are pretty much a fag. Chief ordered a Black Russian once years ago (or, God forbid, a White Russian - which I'm sure we can all agree that, for some unknowable reason, just seems...faggier, somehow).  Bruno lifted his hooded eyes slowly, and burned a hole right through Chief :  "Don't serve no sissy drinks - never have."  Amen, Bruno - bring me a shot glass and a bottle, bitch ! 
4) Ladies act like ladies.  Go ahead and cuss a little if you must (and I must) - but know your bounds.  The Persian Aub Zam Zam Lounge isn't some cheap beer hall, missy.
5) Be polite, even deferential, while Bruno gets to know you
     Once, I went into the mens' room at The Zam Zam.  I know, right ?  Death wish city.  (Parenthetically, I have been in a number of mens' restrooms in my life and I can't say exactly why.  Maybe the fact that most of them were in bars or nightclubs is a factor.  Or not.)  Anyways, I did this, and was impressed to see ice in the urinal trough...with cherries and limes and stuff.  maybe I'm naive, despite my history with mens' restrooms, but I had never before seen the ice trough display - let alone gussied up with bar garnishes. (It was weird, as it blended the elements of both liquid intake and output.  Like peeing and drinking a beer at the same time.)  And if Bruno had found out, I'd have been banned for life or worse.
    Okay, good times, present day.  The vodka cucumber 'tinis are fabulous : refreshing, beautiful to look at, and who doesn't love a vodka-soaked cucumber slice ? I didn't know I did until just then.  I wanted to put it on my eyes, like a spa treatment.  I might have... I began to wax on about the Cuke-tinis, and about my feeling that they seems to be a rather strong drink.  Zeb, in his infinite wisdom, laughs and says : "Dude, it's a Martini - you can't really dress up straight booze !"  Maybe he's right - maybe that's why, for example, the Cosmopolitans seem to be so fast-acting.  Ah, the demon rum.  White man's fire-water. 
    Either way.  So, most folks are seated at the bar on this particular Saturday - it seats about 12 or 14.  I think.  Bruno must be long gone - he was old 20 years ago.  He'd be, like, 160 or something.  Today, we have a well-groomed ginger : mid-40's, neat beard and 'stache, friendly demeanor, but the perfect bartender in that he is present, ready to be friendly, but terse enough if he knows you just want to drink in peace without any of that coyote ugly shit.  A coupla guys come in and (wait for it) sit at...a table.  As if.   Anyone who's been there more that once knows what'll happen next.    Bruno lives !!  The "table people" left  in a semi-huff, with the bartender shrugging knowingly at their departing backs.  Okay - so the bar is full.  We can all see that. But come up to order, lean for a while, and then gesture your way over to a table.   There's a way to do things in this bar.  Still.
       We had a few pops, and needed to go sop it up with some Escape From New York pizza.  Not a minute too soon - some guy with crazy eyes sat down and started chatting up me and Rosy (like the guy who pissed his pants while talking to me one that time at the Zeitgeist - I am a certified freak magnet.  Always have been.)  He looks crazy or high or both, I'm guessing a stimulant.   He is a poet and a hip-hop artist from Marin County ,  "....but I'm not, like, Marin rich or anything like that - I'm a poet."  Rosy and I look at him and say, in  unison :  "Marin City ?"  He finds a way to bring Rosy's butt up in conversation, orders ice water from the bartender, and we bid him adieu.
     The moral of the story ?  Well, it would seem as if you can make any damned flavor martini you can think of, and Bob's your uncle.  I guess it's basically vodka (no gin here, except in the rare Ramos Fizz of yore) with anything tossed in to soak.  Green olives.  Beets.  Almonds.  Lychee.  Edamame. Cheese.     After one of these "anything martinis",  it's all generally good.  (Remind me to tell you how delicious a...white wine and vodka sangria was, many many years back.  Really - went down like water after the first cup.  What it came up like is another story...)

                Even butter lettuce, I bet.