Top Sushi Seen Canoodling with Total Dumbass

I just ate Vancouver's best sushi seated next to the world’s worst human.

Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating.  Vancouver has some pretty amazing sushi, and the stuff at Kadoya on Davie is perhaps just among the best.  (I had a California roll, which they obligingly draped with additional avocado for the added fee of $1.75. Sooo worth it. For those of you who want to add ‘California roll’ to a list of PFB-approved cheap choices, allez-y. Kadoya’s wild salmon sashimi is a pillow-y protein party, but pricey; I felt like slumming it today.)

But the man sitting next to me was seriously the worst.


For starters, despite the presence of an artfully-arranged Bento box, the guy persistently gave his mouth the heinous misdirection to talk about himself instead of even once attacking the plump tempura shrimp that could have served so discreetly to quiet him.   As I was sitting down, he congratulated himself for being 34 years old this year, then (as I myself was politely asking a waitress for light Kikkoman) moved into a wordy description of his struggle to select the right Porsche to honor the occasion.  I gather he was choosing between a something-Cayman and a 911, coincidentally the very number I would consider calling for assistance by the end of my maki.   I should mention that his lunch companion was at least ten years older, and, at the very least, didn’t seem to be finding said sports car soliloquy as appetizing as his own chicken teriyaki.  But he still chimed in with a recommendation for some other car, some banana-kiwi-strawberry Aston Jaguar, disons, which chatty-Charlie affirmed with excessive confidence was “a good car”.

If there is one thing that can make my eyes water more than wasabi, it’s the entitled use of understatement.  Clearly any car necessitating multiple fruit adjectives (as interpreted by a female listener quietly enjoying her extra ginger) and possessing a label even resembling ‘Aston’ is more than “a good car”.  I could have splashed my complimentary, slightly nutty-tasting green tea right in his face!

Then, to my gustatory and intellectual horror, this speech-gifted weiner asked his lunch-mate a question more transparent than the oblivious oil that futilely fried his battered Bento bits. 

“Do you like my shoes?”

Gaaaaa!!!  I stabbed a chopstick right into my eye!  Okay, I wished I had. That way I would have rushed to the hospital and narrowly escaped what ensued, which was the offender’s poor, misguided meal-mate barely spitting out the sentence “Where are they fr—“

“SAK’S FIFTH AVENUE!”  the verbose salami jumped in ecstatically.  “Really. It’s a great place to shop.” 

And, you can eat fish raw.  It’s called sashimi.

As full as I was becoming from the party-platters of cutting-edge information from my table-neighbor, I scarfed down pieces #7 and #8 of my generously-stuffed roll (Kadoya’s portions are almost as huge as was my antagonist’s ego).  I tried to focus on swallowing the imitation crabmeat without choking, but the self-obsessed ramblings from nearby pulled my Freudian death-instinct into a perfect negative linear relationship with my diminishing appetite.

 “Now that I’m going to be CEO,”

“Waitress, a glass of water please!”

“I’m desperately trying to avoid moving to Toronto,”

“No green tea ice cream- I’ll just take the cheque!!”

“But, really, can you believe how many people work a REGULAR job?”

As I thrust into my pocket a packaged thank-you mint and spilled an uncounted tip onto the table, his recitation of today’s ego-menu items miraculously came to a close.  Had it all been for my benefit? Or did today's personality-disordered subject just finally want to maow his by-now be-floppen shrimp? Here I will give the credit to Kadoya; even this tamagoyaki-head couldn't resist their Bento forever. 

Readers, I only sat down for lunch today to avoid consuming yet another take-out box, my greatest source of personal anguish these days.  But now I must recommend sitting in for more reasons than just the environmental. For, today, I was rewarded with so much more than fake crab to nourish me!