While driving around various neighborhoods in search of lunch today, I noticed an interesting trend. It seems that culinary terms change in accordance with their status. The most noticeable change is that as menu prices rise into the territories where "meal combos" are suddenly known as "prixe fixe," solid matter that you ingest by way of your mouth abruptly ceases to be known as food.

Suddenly, instead of merely "eating food," you are now "experiencing cuisine." Also in that price range, there seem to be an awful lot of "cafes" that completely fail to serve coffee, and "bistros" that serve egg rolls in place of French rolls.

After thinking on this for a while, it seems like it's a progressive exoticism of food. The farther up the price scale you go, these days people seem to demand more of their food, in regards to experiencing another culture. Whether this culture differential is ethnic or societal in nature seems fairly immaterial, but at least in San Diego, it seems like ethnicities are linked to class levels in certain ways.

At the top of the heap, these days, are fusion restaurants. It seems it really doesn't matter what you fuse together. If you're mixing some kind of cuisine with another, that bumps your menu prices up by at least 15-20%. The most popular thing to fuse other kinds of food to seems to be Japanese. I suppose you can pretty much stick anything into a sushi mold and call it fusion. Hot dogs and seaweed? $30 a roll. Boo ya, I'm a genius.

Right after the fusion joints, are the restaurants that serve ethnic foods that come from farther afield than usual, often tending to Asian flavors. Thai and Japanese seem to be the big flavors of the day, while Chinese appears to have fallen out of favor in a big way.

Given that eye (or tongue) for exoticism that seems to heavily influence an eatery's value, I have to wonder if Thai or Japanese people have similar ongoing trends.

I know restaurants that we view here as junk food -- McDonald's, KFC, and the like -- have tried to portray themselves as gourmet restaurants in Japan.

I wonder if there are TGI Friday's (tried to figure out how to pluralize that, gave up in disgust) in Japan that serve Dom Perignon, and if you order a steak, your jalapeno poppers have to be ordered separately at $8 each.

Or maybe Taco Bell has cloth napkins, a waiter who brings you your nachos on a covered silver platter, and a 64-ounce Diet Coke quietly beading with condensation alongside your Chateau Lafite Rothschild.

Mmmm.

To my bewilderment, I have abruptly found myself to be at that age where it is fun to meet new people and discuss vaguely business-related topics while drinking tea and coffee.

In one of those coincidences that test my commitment to the staunch belief that I am entirely luckless, I ran into an ex-potential roommate. The first words we exchanged involved me pulling a face and saying,

"Do I know you? You look really familiar."

Which, I said afterwards, made me feel like some sleazy dude pitching a pickup line. I should have worn a leisure suit and a chest wig.

At any rate, I suppose my mug is just ugly enough to be vaguely memorable, since she kind of recognized me too. We mulled it over for a while until the realization dawned that we'd nearly ended up living together.

A Twilight Zone moment if there ever was one.

I'd like to take a moment to note that, although I can instantly name some obscure character actor under twenty-five layers of makeup, it takes me five minutes of intense concentration to recognize someone with whom I nearly shared a bathroom.

Truly, my mind is hopelessly broken.

So I ended up spending about two hours in the company of my new friend, along with a fairly sizable gathering of loosely affiliated people who all happened to be working in industries very similar to my own. Coincidentally, they were all very friendly, eager to trade advice and connections, and fun to be around.

See what I mean about that luck thing?

Funnily enough, until this point in my life, an evening entirely devoid of (in reverse chronological order) scotch on the rocks, Jaegermeister, Long Island iced teas, Quake, foosball, Doom, Transformers, G.I. Joe, M.A.S.K., Fraggle Rock, Speed Racer, or a shiny object would have held few attractions for me.

I suppose we must all grow up eventually.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go get hammered on single malt and watch Cartoon Network.

So, the saga mentioned in a previous post is pretty much over. A side benefit is, of course, that I now have no qualms about publicly discussing it. Essentially, my ex-roommates cheated me out of a month's rent. The money doesn't really bother me that much -- in truth, while the amount was substantial, I was more or less prepared to pay that much. Details: I made the mistake, as you might recall, of moving into a new apartment with two complete strangers, with the intention that if one of us had to leave, the flexibility afforded by such an arrangement would be much greater with regard to modifying the lease. So we all agreed that if one of us had to leave, then the only responsibility of the person departing would be to find someone to replace them on the lease (legally, with the consent and authorization of the leasing office and the other two residents). Done. Hands were shaken, a lease was signed. All was well, save for the occasional generous dusting of female pubic hair clippings I would have to clean off of my toilet, and the time I had to plunge that selfsame toilet free of more feces than I thought a girl was capable of producing. Obviously, I was mistaken. These were women. Or at least, some kind of hybrid over which taxonomists would undoubtedly lose sleep. And they complained about my leaving the occasional dish to soak overnight. Anyhow. Fast forward seven months into a 9-month lease. I find a new job, and I have to leave. I let them know, and start drafting a roommate ad to go up on Craigslist. Next morning, a note, to the effect of "I'm not comfortable with a new person moving in, and I'm also a deceptive, petulant child" is left for me. It goes on to say that I will need to pay out the rest of the lease in full, and that she enjoys the delusion that she is a clever monkey. I like to read between the lines. I reply, saying "Um, no." So I gather the other two for a meeting, and we talk it out. I tell them that I will pay one remaining month of rent, if they agree to pay the last month. They agree. I ask again, to confirm: They agree. One more time, to be absolutely sure: They agree. Hands are shaken, a deal is struck. I retire for the night, comforted by the warming presence of the spirits of compromise and human decency. Perhaps you would like to take a moment to venture a guess as to what happened next. I'll give you a few lines to contemplate. Okay, then: Next morning, a note: "I still don't feel comfortable. Also I don't have enough money, even though I am working, pay for a personalized diet and weight-loss plan, have just replaced half of my wardrobe, and have enough money to buy a refrigerator for my boyfriend. You have to pay all of the lease. In addition, I would like to take this opportunity to make it publicly known that I consider infanticide with accompanying cannibalism a pleasant way to spend a Sunday afternoon." You might well imagine the scope of my disappointment. I am, as you might imagine, staunchly anti-baby eating. That, and the other thing. What was it... oh right, the horrible, horrible lies. After another e-mail exchange, I am frustrated beyond belief. It takes my good friend frylok to talk me down. It's not often that I get really mad. I often rant and rave for fun and to vent, probably more than is strictly necessary, but I almost never get truly upset. When it comes to overt betrayals like this, it's hard to stay calm. So, I wrote a rebuttal. I present a "director's cut" version here, courtesy of my id: "Dearest Dirty Lying Skeezy Munghole, Okay. I'll pay the leasing office, since I tend to keep my promises. And then I'm going to sue. Care to rethink? Let me know. Otherwise, see you in court." I knew from the get-go that it was a weak case. Even considering small claims court is informal, I had no hard, written evidence. It boiled down to, in legal terms, a "bitchfest," where essentially people disagree, and neither side has any evidence. As the person filing the complaint, this made my case weaker than G.W. Bush's gamma wave. Their case was further strengthened in that it was unhindered by such considerations as might be mandated by using "facts" and "the truth." Like I said, though, I wasn't really interested in the money. My goal was to force those two -- mostly Ms. Munghole, the other one is basically just weak-willed and spineless -- to consider the ramifications of their dishonesty. In that, I suppose I was successful. Unfortunately, they strike me as the type that tend not to learn the lessons that life so generously provides. Were they otherwise, I imagine they would have learned, on their parents' knees (or over them), to cherish and protect the value of their word. I suppose you could say that I pursued my claim out of spite. I couldn't in all truthfulness say you were wrong. But I'll be damned if I didn't have fun doing it. They both hate me, an unsurprising state of affairs of which, given the context, I am rather proud. While I bear them no specific ill will, I hope at least that the experience and hassle of all this will make them rub their three collective neurons together for a little longer, the next time they want to swindle someone. As it is, I still have yet to hear the judge's decision -- could be a week or two before I get it in the mail -- but I am not expecting a decision in my favour. Even considering the laughable that there is, Skeezy McStinkhole has assured me that she will not be paying me any money. I would, in that case, take an indecent and possibly damning amount of pleasure in putting a lien on her possessions, garnishing her wages, or having a big barfy face sticker placed on her credit report. That last one probably isn't possible, but by god, it should be.