Friday Night Hights #1

Hit play, go on I’m listening while I type

I had some of this Tropicanna Cherry, earlier; last night too. Probably the most purple flower I’ve ever ground, easy, its just pure deep purple. Med/High, chilled, thinking vibe, mellow. The taste though, its so cherry its almost sickly. Very burnt dark cherry taste and such a tobacco taste, its like cigarette tobacco. Like licking a tab. I mean its nice but just very strong. With a hint of medicine.

I have to drive to Malaysia tomorrow, Farmer said its seven hours but he had a girl with him and they stopped for lunch and stuff. Plus his truck is a lump of heavy iron bumpers/fenders and huge sump guard with MT tyres, I’ll be 5 hours. Apparently a mototaxi across the border and circle back and a 30 day tourist visa is mine. We;ll see, I’m taking a grab bag with me in case they say no and make me jump through some other hoop, the only way to do it is get back to the UK or HK, UK is easier as can do in 2 days not a month. Anyway & Co can’t come with me as her passport as expired.

First one here they only give you 5 years, a very low percentage of the population have a passport. So that 5 years went quick, HK is the only other country she’s ever been to. So anyway, sure it will be fine, not crossed a border on land in a while. When we first met I’d go to this bar me and @the-real-nick-hardy used to call ‘Food” Apart from Pringles and some nuts they sold no food, you could order from restaurants nearby, but only if the wife hadn’t fallen out with the owner of that establishment.

And she fell out with everyone, all the time. One guy, a guy I knew from HK, ordered his food from the place opposite on the beautifully named “Soi Spiderman” The lady walked across the street with it and there was some screaming match, plate got dropped and he had to go across the street and eat it, once it had been remade. Food Bar lady wouldn’t let him back in after either 😂 She wasn’t as bad as the dog though, “Money” that thing was feral. Tried to bite everything, and yet looked so sweet, like a baby version of the Dulux dog. Angry fucker.

Anyway I used to play pool in the late afternoons/early evening with Kon the husband. Golden Hour for the light, I could have been at the beach 500m away watching the sunset, but nah, playing pool in this small crappy bar, open air sorta, but listening to this playlist every time I needed to focus, to really focus on playing pool, it had to be this playlist. For a while it annoyed him but then he started using it back to me, he knew it so well he could focus better as well. But those games, then and to this day we’re so evenly matched.

We still use the same two cheapass cues, he’s bought new ones for the customers, nice looking ones, and they’ve expanded, have way more space and 4 more tables, but last month I was up there, waiting for & Co to sell some weed I think, so we play. Same table, same cues, best of three we said, just a quick best of 3. We finished at 3-3 after just over an hour, neither of missed much at all. Nor had either of us had noticed & Co come back. Though she’s a witch and pretty sure can apparate as and where she pleases. We’ve never been more than 2-3 matches apart since we started. (That would count as a match)

So why is it called Food by Real Nick? There used to be a group of HK guys I knew there that would also come out here regularly, some of them before me. I hopped here more at the start, the moved here properly (Thanks Covid!) though two of them now live here mostly full time. Anyway on one of these big meet ups, there were Whatsapp groups and fights between best mates back home, over where to go for lunch or a fistfight over a hooker I saw once, HK people… <sigh> but I was playing this one guy who we’ll call “Slinger”, like a 5 Day Pool Competition, best of 5 every day for 5 days, we called it the Pool Ashes, like the cricket one which was on at the time I think.

It was pretty boring, mismatched, I was winning easily every day, and he was complaining lots every day. Him and some the other guys start their usual whatever, complaining about the world is easy when you earn $200k plus and pay 12% tax, Anyway the brains trust decided it wanted to get high and has no idea where they might purchase any. This is like 6 years back, way before legalisation.

Why don’t you ask here?

Nick Hardy

Predictably a load of jeers and all that kinda stuff. I should describe the decor of Food it was not much bigger than the single pool table in the middle, it was “Premier League Rasta” Half was TVs and English Football posters and scarves and the other was pictures of Bob Marley and Jamaican flags and all that kind of stuff. All mashed together across all 4 walls and the ceiling. So I felt it possible they may sell a bit of weed, or know someone that did. They ‘pooh poohed’ me. Whatever. I look for Kon and he was behind the counter, which had a shelf in front of it for privacy. I walked round and lo! He had a fucking half kilo block of Thai press he was busy cutting up. Turns out he was like a distributor or something, he certainly wasn’t moving it out the door of that place, 20 customers was a good day. Anyway he was a little flustered but just said ‘shush’ I asked if I could buy a joint rolled, he said sure 5 minutes and I went back to playing pool.

5 minutes he brings me a perfectly rolled joint in a clean ashtray and I place on the table the others are sitting at. “What’s that then?”

You said you wanted a joint. There’s a joint, your break, by the way.

Nick Hardy

Yeah we’re not friends anymore. My unusual luck just pisses him off. Anyway, a couple of months later, Real Nick visited. He had nicknames for all the bars, that will forever be ‘Food’ for the rather utilitarian reason that they put weed on the bill as “Food” ‘The Bar” he called “Wallet” Someone nicked my wallet off the table we were at. I was surrounded by Thai friends, $500 in it and all my cards, I went nuts, people were checking the CCTV, people were threatening each other. I was furious. Yeah, when I’m furious, 😅

Is this your wallet? Some how I’ve found it in my pocket?

The Real Nick Hardy

Food had been taken,

I met & Co the next night in that bar though, that was something.

Nick