Miss Jo's San Francisco

MISS JO’S OLDEST NIECE, A LAW SCHOOL STUDENT IN MADISON, WISC., WAS BORN 23 YEARS ago today, which is cause for a lot of nostalgia here in San Francisco, where her aunt would like to share a story about the birthday girl, Ella Numera Una.

It all went down during one of Ella’s trips to Fog City and speaks to her leadership qualities, as well as finesse at ditching a dinner party of 50 strangers as salads are being served.

Of all places, Miss Jo and Ella, then 19, found themselves at a late 19th-century mansion in SF’s tony Pacific Heights, attending a catered party for a company that had just moved to the City and about which Miss Jo was writing a story.

The evening began with high expectations. Aunt and niece had never hung out before as co-adults at a festive non-family event.  They sipped champagne, noshed on elegantly prepared organic nibbles and listened to a jazz combo. It was a travel tale for Ella to take back to her university as a freshman. Miss Jo also scored a couple anecdotes for her article.

Clueless the night’s novelty was wearing thin, Miss Jo and Ella decided to stay for dinner and were ushered into a smallish dining room where they grabbed two seats at a table near the back. Taking the party gifts off their place settings, the duo began admiring their swag bag contents of cool t-shirts and perfume.

They also looked around and noticed the party had changed. The hip cocktail crowd had moved on, leaving an employee dinner party about to start, complete with snore-inducing job performance awards and grip-and-grin photos with corporate brass and the Mayor’s office!

“What should we do ?” Miss Jo consulted.

“Pizza Orgasmica,” Ella said, taking charge.

The SF pizzeria on Clement Street in the Richmond and its Kama Sutra pie— spinach, mushroom, hearts of Palm and garlic— beckoned, but they had to act quickly before everyone sat down.

“Should we take the goody bags?” Miss Jo asked, worried how it might look dashing before dining, swinging their small shopping bags of freebies while squeezing past the narrow dining room doorway now jammed with people.

“We can put the stuff in our purses,” said Ella, who always has great ideas.

“That means we’ve got to take the empty bags too,” Miss Jo added, now committed to the conspiracy and anxious to leave no evidence.

All packed and heading for the door, Ella spotted a short cut through the butler’s pantry where they shimmied past waiters picking up trays of food.

They scrambled out the door into the foggy San Francisco evening, as the Muni #1  bus pulled up @ Sacramento and Fillmore to take them to their pizza dinner.