The rail ride home was cool enough but the prospect of eating in the heat with a lack of accompaniments was daunting. I needed heft, richness, and it has to be savory. Then it struck me: a trip to old Doc Cheung's rickety, old, mega tea-roasted meat house was in order.

Doc is usually good about filling my needs. Today was no different as he had chicken units slow-sauced with soybean product. The lacquered birds shone from their hooks. "I'll take one," I said. "And make sure you include the head, and hey, you have any of those young chicken units?"

"Just finished steeping a batch; how many you want," he said in a sing-song voice. "Gimme four...," I toned. "Buy five, get one free," he offered. "Done," I said without hesitation. Mrs. Cheung gave a huff as she had already rung up the chicken unit and now she had to add the young'uns to the bill.

Climbing back on the rail, the trip through the sweltering city to face the boiling hot dwelling was uneventful. Cracking open all of the doors and windows helped make the kitchen bunker just a little less than 100 degrees - just enough to break sweat 1.3 second into chopping some hydroponically grown green scallions.

(photo by wm. christman)

"Let's see...," I said to no one in particular. "Noodles, sauce, chicken, tea-eggs, ice water, beer, salad...yep, that should do it."

Three hours later, swimming in a small pool of my own sweat and lying on my side to catch a cool waft from the glowing plasma unit, the dwelling had cooled to a barely tolerable 94 degrees but I was fully sated for the evening.

They said that tomorrow will be the same. I should be fortunate enough to receive another mystery caller with an equally interesting ingredient and start it all over again.