Chee Chee Club in Downtown San Diego 8am

April 4, 2002

I have to transfer buses downtown and cross Broadway at 9th Avenue to catch my connecting bus on my way home from work. The stop is directly in front of the "World Famous Chee Chee Club". That is the full name, but the pink neon sign out front just says Chee Chee. It sounds like an oriental meditative exercise, but it isn’t. It is really something less spiritual but equally soothing. It is a seedy after-hours bar in downtown San Diego. A bar that closes only briefly in the early morning, and is back in business at 6 a.m. One can find a Pabst, a transvestite, some crank, or a crack rock inside the Chee Chee, any time of day. It is 7:15 a.m. on a sunny Sunday morning.

So, here I come jaywalking across the street, trying not to look very stupid in the big puffy pirate shirt and baby-shit-brown polyester slacks that make up my front desk uniform. I am failing. Since I am a heavy smoker and drinker (and famous glutton), and because there is another bus coming, I am fairly out of breath as I approach the curb in front of the Chee Chee. I am panting and twisting around, fumbling with my back-pack for my cigarettes when this very drunk 300 lb Polynesian woman looks up at me from the bench and says,

"Hey Baaaaaaaaaby!"
I figure I know her from somewhere. Maybe she's a drag queen friend of a former roommate. Maybe we went to High School together. Maybe she's there everyday and I've never noticed her. Since the 929 is bearing down on me pretty quickly, I reply (in a significantly less enthusiastic tone),
"Hey Baby."

I make it across Broadway in time to avoid the Airport Shuttle. Miss Thing then proceeds to ask me for a cigarette, which I still can't find because they are being crushed under this fabulous book I’m reading called The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley-Robinson. I rescue the damned things and am opening them up when she asks,

"Can I come home with you?"

I hand her one of my last three cigarettes (even though she has a lit one hanging out of the corner of her mouth) and say,

"Well, I'm on my way to work."

She puts my cigarette behind her ear and replies,

"Oh."
Of course, during this entire exchange I am looking frantically for my bus. It does not appear around the corner, despite several quickly improvised prayers...

o’ holy mother of commuters, pray for us now and at the hour of our transfer...

"It's a shame you have to go to work," she slurs around her cigarette, "cause I'd sure like to lick your balls." Even she doesn't sound convinced. The best reply I can muster is,

"I don't think my boyfriend would like that."

She is not impressed. Without a moment's pause, she fires back,

"I don't care what your boyfriend likes, I just want to lick 'em."

Since my Mama brought me up right, I utter what I can only hope is the most polite response.

"Well...thank you."

"No problem."

She offers me a beautiful, sunny smile, and my bus pulls up. I get on the #7 as she is rummaging in the mass of hair behind her left ear, looking for the smoke I'd given her. By the time I find an empty seat and the bus begins to pull away from the curb, she has it lit.

The next time you're in San Diego, we are going to the Chee Chee!