Muleboy kept the water a flowin’ while we tried to wait patiently for our food. He didn’t seem to mind the name either which was pretty damn big of him considering he was just a friend doing a favor for the owner (Paul). Paul warned us that service for 30 or more people could be sloow.

Squid Vicious is the real Vietnamese food expert here so heads up: “really truly authentic Vietnamese with a Cholon flavor [not colon, FOOL--”Cholon” happens to be Sai Gon’s Chinatown], and Paul's dad can definitely cook up a storm. Cam On, Ong! “ (?) Hmm, well...we’re ALL pedants here I guess. That name-tag thingy won’t come off of the top of Juan’s head and he didn’t use any sticky stuff either! Amazing! Meanwhile, there was a big verbal altercation (fight) between Buc y Bono and Elton Kriste. Elton was one of the first to order and the last to get served. SO Elton gets really hungry, right? And cranky too. Then Buc Y Bono starts to tease him about how to eat the food, white boy. Then Elton says “I’m Spanish alright, NOT Vietnamese!” He gets all worked up and red in the face and starts pointing at Buc Y and Buc Y doesn’t stop and it gets worse and worse; and before you know it they’re talkin’ about takin’ it outside and Elton says he doesn’t need any weapons cause he’s got his kiCK (and we know he does!). Of course afterwards they make it up and love comes back to town.

Noodlicious, Phobulous! says Bazmataz.

Bright lights. Bright lights and Brights and for all we’ve said in the past about how much we hate them, this time it reallY worked! Maybe it was how they complimented the pistachio green walls or maybe it was the fact that the room was small too, which saved us from floating away somehow and made us feel like we were in mom’s kitchen so who cares what we look like, right? Robot thinks it was the loudest we’ve ever been--good thing they shut down the restaurant for us: “It really put the din in Silverlake Dinner Club”. Yuki says it was so loud she had to go outside a couple of times for an ear break. Robot Moose also appreciated the quickness with which the vegetable spring rolls were produced to quell the ravenous crowd during what was oBviously going to be an extended dining experience. Many of us were on the verge of rage and starvation (see Elton’s experience above, he wasn’t the only one) and those rolls settled us all safely down. Miaou. MeeOw.

Kari Kaos was confusing the waiters out of their mINDS! She wanted the shrimp and vegetable and pork eggroll without the pork but with the vegetable and also with the shrimp. Confused, the waiter stopped taking her order, but then came back later with a vegi spring roll. She then became very happy and complimented their intuitive service. .

Anthony Ausgang says the meat was bad and faTTy. He ordered the H16 with beef and the tofu skin shrimp. All of it was delicious except for that dang beef! Well Anthony dahling, that's whut you get for eating moomoo.

Meit/huus says the eggrolls weren’t traditionally done and the portions were too small. Hardly any meat with his dish. Tasty and inexpensive, but for another buck more they could have “beefed” it up a little. Haha, get it? Yukistar says Meit/Huus’ dish was good, it was a kind of fried spring roll with pork. It looks like “ahhh...someones fried thumb”. She ordered H4S which was skin bean curd wrapped around shrimp. Pork vermicelli: Squid Vicious said it was the best thing. Yuki says the best thing was the Nuoc Mam: chili fish sauce that you put all over everything. She even pretended to put some on Elton’s dish during the fight (oops! Watch out Yukistar!).

B12 and B16 had very fresh vegetables, good tofu, sugarcane wrapped in shrimp paste--very succulent. John says the meat was jerky with a strange spicy taste but he enjoyed it quite a bit. CTHULHU kept raving about his pho and pouring on the cilantro, saying you can never have enough cilantro. We agreed that you can never have enough cilantro. You can also never have enough mint or garlic either. Brain Ambrosia. Wrong Dimension Boy loved his B19 Bun vegetarian something or other with vermicelli noodles and the spring rolls too.

Liz just had probably the best spring rolls she’s ever had, and she’s had a lot of spring rolls baby, baby rolls into spring. The beer was tasty but we bought it elsewhere (we saved our receipt!). She ate a few bean sprouts (you get a plate of these and mint leaves to put in your pho/soup). As usual, our lovely Liz ate a miniamount.

Buc y Bono took off on his motorcycle with Yukistar on the back and ChrisLove (me) sang Born to be Wild while he did a few bikey, guy-type tricks in the parking lot. He didn’t come to the after-party cause he was really tired (especially after that emotionally draining fight! You know, you think that stuff doesn’t affect you, but if you’re in tune with the universal vibe you realize just how draining all those negative emotions can be. That’s why WE here at SDC always try to have a smile on our faces even if were fucking miserable). But Yuki made it (she wouldn’t dare miss out on Meit/Huus’ extra spectacular cookies!) Of course poor Buc Y worried that Elton would think he didn’t come to the after-party because of blah blah blah. See how messy these goddamn fights can be? Thank God they nipped that one in the bud! Pheeew!

It’s a trend! Now Prickle is wearing a nameless name tag on his head too! What the fuck? What does it mean? “Well it had to be seen” says Prickle grandly whilst sporting a phat shiny purple shirt. Prickle had the P16 pho. It was quite delicious though apparently skimpy on the fish (this seems to be a problem with them). Prickle was quite amazed to discover that Jane and Amy’s brother was one of the kids on “Trout Mask Replica” (A Captain Beefheart Album). It wuz the track called Hairpie which was recorded live at a house and the kids wandered in on the recording session. KEeeewl, fAmUs people now.

Trixie reminds us of how we had to write our order numbers on napkins so that muleboy would have a clue as to where to land the food whilst Paul shouted out the number of each dish as it slid out from the slot at the kitchen door--pushed, no doubt, by the unseen but multi-talented papA. Everyone kept saying Bingo. It got old after a while. Trixie broke down the system by putting the wrong number on her napkin and getting John’s B19 instead of HER B18. Oops, sorry for the confusion folks. Luckily she got the right dish ‘cause she just LUUved her Pho OK B18...just enough vermicelli, chicken, and fresh veggies w/ mint leaves in a bowl to satisfy a light appetite at the right price. She’ll definitely be back. Mr. Name and others used their name tag to pin their numbered napkin to themselves, and ChrisLove placed her numbered napkin around her drink with the help of condensation! Very efficient...watch and learn folks. Speaking of which, that coconut drink was not so very good, which surprised her since she’s never met a coconut she didn’t like?

Oh well, time to go pin her name tag to her head! Signing off from Lucky Quadrant 13...May the Force be with Youze.

(CL)

Words that rhyme with shabu shabu:

Song by Shamu the shmoo & the new zoo review entitled nanu-nanu: Mr. Magoo says screw Captain Kangaroo and the Royal Crown Review--I’m down with DJ LuLu but what’s gnu witchu? Well I went down a river in a beaver canoe, with Kaja Goo Goo, and we saw lulu the zulu fly thru the crew and take a doo doo on Nancy Drew, who committed a taboo by flirting with an emu in Peru. Whoo hoo! aahhchoo! (chorus) Boo Boo, poopity poo poo poo poo.