Dinner and a Show

There is a Vietnamese restaurant in San Francisco called Tu Lan. It's on 6th street, near Market, NOT a nice neighborhood. But it was right on my way home from Moscone Center, where I am involved in the lead up to a keynote address I'm working on for an Intel executive, and I didn't want to have to cook when I got home, since I still have work to do. And there was a parking place right across the street.

As I walked in, I wondered if I should buy a paper to occupy myself while I waited for my food. I needn't have worried - the entertainment I sought was right in front of me. Sitting at the counter, I had full view of the two main cooks working at the stove. They maintained an amazing pace (Tu Lan does a big takeout business), working smoothly together, grabbing ingredients, using their tongs as pretty much the only utensil. The stove spewed flame, customers came and went (including a man whose shaved head was tattooed all over with a spiderweb pattern, even around his eyes, and a homeless man who came in and sold some batteries to the restaurant's proprietor), and dishes kept being plated.
I wasn't bored for a second.