When I first started working as a baby accountant back in 1973 my first boss Eddie was an old school Jewish accountant who had two types of accounts: garment center firms and Chinese restaurants. Eddie was the king of Chinese restaurants and he had about twenty five different accounts. Of course in those days they paid $50 dollars a month and it was a big deal when we raised them to $100. When I was still in high school I would come with him in the summer time or on my free time to help do the books. Now we didn’t have no stinkin’ computers, we had pencils and green accounting paper and a giant adding machine which was a huge innovation at the time. He got all these restaurants because when a couple of waiters could save enough to open their own joint they would hire Eddy to do everything. We would get the corporation set up and had a hook with the liquor authority to get them a license in a couple of days and they were off to the rickshaw races. So whenever we came into one of these restaurants they would be all happy because they would want to ask question about how they could set up their own joint. You see in those days all of the immigrants wanted to start businesses and were the hardest working guys in the egg roll business. I am sure it is the same today and I think a lot of the anti immigrant yahoos should meet some of those guys who are more fucking Republican than they could ever be.
Now all of the Chinamen would call Eddie by two names. Kuài jì which means accountant and sounded like Quai-G-See. Or they would call him Mr. Eddie which made me laugh when I told them about Mr. Ed the talking horse. So they started calling him Mr. Eddie Quai-G-See. And of course they called me Mr. Jimmie even though I was just a punk kid. Now I was going there for years since I was about 14 years old and when I graduated college Eddie sold his firm to a couple of guys from the Big Eight Accounting firm who wanted to start their own practice and I came along with the copy machines and the file cabinets. Anyway I was always going to my favorite restaurant on the corner of 46th and Second Avenue. I would take the other guys from the firm to eat there. Sometimes the new guys would go with me as a training episode to learn how to do the books the old school way. We would get there in between lunch and dinner and rush to get all the bank rec’s and write up done before the dinner crowd got in. But the perks we used to have was that we would eat lunch there and occasionally have dinner before we went on a pub crawl up Second Avenue to all the pick up joints like Runyans and Jamisons and Fitzgeralds and what not. Anyway the big perk was that they would never ever charge me for beer. They served my favorite Chinese beer Tsing Tao which is a great Chinese larger that is perfect when you are having a spicy plate of Szechwan dumplings. Man dumplings and Tsing Tao were as good as you get. Of course it also gave me a new nickname, Tsing Tao Mr. Jimmee. When they saw me coming in the door they would start shouting that out and cracking a beer before I even got to sit down. My buddies loved that joint because of course we could drink a lot of beer. But we would also order tons of food because we were all big guys and ate two or three appetizers and two main courses apiece so the owners got their money and the waiters were tipped very well by drunken stuffed fat guys.
So this is a long and rambling story but I do have a point. I had to go see one of my old clients who is about 86 years old now. He used to love to go out for a drink when he would bring his taxes in. When my office was in the city we would hit one of the Irish pubs or this Chinese restaurant which was only two blocks from his house. He is too old to get out now so I had to go to his apartment to pick up the papers. And when I was finished I realized on was on Second Avenue only two blocks away from the restaurant. Now the wife doesn’t like greasy Chinese food because it upsets her and we usually eat Thai food now because it is a lot fresher and they don’t use MSG. But I thought to myself, hmmmmmmm. Maybe I can sneak into the restaurant for a quick plate of dumplings and a few Tsing Tao’s. I mean I haven’t been there in about five years because I never had a reason to be so far over on the East Side. I haven’t been doing their taxes for about fifteen years because we sold all the accounts because they were getting to be more trouble than they were worth money wise and audit wise and stuff. So I had kind of lost contact with them. So why not go in and say hello right? Well I walk the two blocks and mouth is watering and I am ready for the dumplings with the hot sauce and maybe a bowl of hot and sour soup and some egg rolls and Beef with Chinese Vegetables. I get to the store.
It’s a Turkish restaurant now.
That was thirty years no forty years ago man. Things change. The city changes. Things are different now.
Now all of the Chinamen would call Eddie by two names. Kuài jì which means accountant and sounded like Quai-G-See. Or they would call him Mr. Eddie which made me laugh when I told them about Mr. Ed the talking horse. So they started calling him Mr. Eddie Quai-G-See. And of course they called me Mr. Jimmie even though I was just a punk kid. Now I was going there for years since I was about 14 years old and when I graduated college Eddie sold his firm to a couple of guys from the Big Eight Accounting firm who wanted to start their own practice and I came along with the copy machines and the file cabinets. Anyway I was always going to my favorite restaurant on the corner of 46th and Second Avenue. I would take the other guys from the firm to eat there. Sometimes the new guys would go with me as a training episode to learn how to do the books the old school way. We would get there in between lunch and dinner and rush to get all the bank rec’s and write up done before the dinner crowd got in. But the perks we used to have was that we would eat lunch there and occasionally have dinner before we went on a pub crawl up Second Avenue to all the pick up joints like Runyans and Jamisons and Fitzgeralds and what not. Anyway the big perk was that they would never ever charge me for beer. They served my favorite Chinese beer Tsing Tao which is a great Chinese larger that is perfect when you are having a spicy plate of Szechwan dumplings. Man dumplings and Tsing Tao were as good as you get. Of course it also gave me a new nickname, Tsing Tao Mr. Jimmee. When they saw me coming in the door they would start shouting that out and cracking a beer before I even got to sit down. My buddies loved that joint because of course we could drink a lot of beer. But we would also order tons of food because we were all big guys and ate two or three appetizers and two main courses apiece so the owners got their money and the waiters were tipped very well by drunken stuffed fat guys.
So this is a long and rambling story but I do have a point. I had to go see one of my old clients who is about 86 years old now. He used to love to go out for a drink when he would bring his taxes in. When my office was in the city we would hit one of the Irish pubs or this Chinese restaurant which was only two blocks from his house. He is too old to get out now so I had to go to his apartment to pick up the papers. And when I was finished I realized on was on Second Avenue only two blocks away from the restaurant. Now the wife doesn’t like greasy Chinese food because it upsets her and we usually eat Thai food now because it is a lot fresher and they don’t use MSG. But I thought to myself, hmmmmmmm. Maybe I can sneak into the restaurant for a quick plate of dumplings and a few Tsing Tao’s. I mean I haven’t been there in about five years because I never had a reason to be so far over on the East Side. I haven’t been doing their taxes for about fifteen years because we sold all the accounts because they were getting to be more trouble than they were worth money wise and audit wise and stuff. So I had kind of lost contact with them. So why not go in and say hello right? Well I walk the two blocks and mouth is watering and I am ready for the dumplings with the hot sauce and maybe a bowl of hot and sour soup and some egg rolls and Beef with Chinese Vegetables. I get to the store.
It’s a Turkish restaurant now.
That was thirty years no forty years ago man. Things change. The city changes. Things are different now.
So I walked to subway with slumped shoulders. I could still taste those dumplings. That hot and sour soup. And especially the Tsing Tao. When I got back home I went to Nelson’s bodega next door and bought a six-pack of Tsing Tao. We will be getting Thai food tonight and I will raise a glass to all those restaurant guys and most of all to Mr. Eddie Quai-G-See.
The world turns man.
