OaktownBear said:
You can always tell who the drinkers are by who puts Kips on any list. Some of the most dreadful food I've ever had. Kips entire reason for existence was cheap beer, nonexistent carding policy, next to the dorms.
I must be older than you, because those dorms next to Kips had not been built yet when I was a freshman living at Putnam Hall east a couple of blocks on Channing Way in 1959, the first year that dorm opened. And in those days, Kip's made a pretty decent burger. As soon as Si's opened, we trucked on over there, because their burger was even better, and it stayed that way for years. LaVals was mostly for pizza, and for beer and fights between Joe Kapp and the football players vs the South Americans (mostly from Peru) who played in the band at LaVal's on the weekends. I avoided the fights at all costs, because Joe Kapp was my idol, and and the Peruvians were all my friends, because I worked with some of them hashing for meals at Bayview Terrace, a girl's boarding house up on Warring.
As to burgers, there was no better burger than the "Liz Burger", where Elizabeth, the cook at Bayview Terrace used to turn them out, 40 at a time for the girls and a few for the hashers. She used some great spices and cheese and made them in the oven. One day, one of the Liz burgers fell on the floor. Charlie the other hasher, a Yaqui Indian, swooped it up off the floor, and slapped it on a plate, and headed for the dining room, saying "This one is for Miss Peck", who was the girls' very strict and mean old housemother.
Elizabeth was 4'-10" tall, 175 lb, and had more down home sayings than I can remember, like "Baby, you been wrong for so long, but you're so right tonight", or "The bigger it is, the littler it is". Ponder that one. Effie the Weather Bird used to work there as the housekeeper. Down in the ghetto (now called the hood, I guess) Effie got that name because she always knew what the weather would be like that day. When I came to work at 6:45 AM, Effie was already there, and I'd ask her what the weather would be, and it would always turn out that way. 100%.
Elizabeth invited me over to watch the Giants play the Dodgers on TV, and all these folks from the neighborhood would drop in, half of them Giants fans, and half of them Dodgers fans. One man came up to me and said, "You see them Dodgers, like Tommy Davis, and Willie Davis? Well, I'm Wesley Davis. They my cousins." And everyone laughed and called him a fool.
I used to take Elizabeth to Giants-Dodgers games, and she would get all dressed up in a suit and high heels and a big bonnet, and we'd sit in the bleachers with all the same people and more, while they made lots of bets. "Willie McCovey, that fool gone strike out." No sir. i got ten dollars says he won't" Strike one. Strike two. Then McCovey hits a dribbler back to the pitcher. The first guy says, "He struck out." The second one says, "No he didn't." The first one says, "That was worse than a strikeout." And no money ever changed hands.
Not only was my thread off-topic, but now I'm off-thread. I apologize.
