Jan 28 Tues
I didn't have to stay at any meetings after school today. I talked to a woman at Tech Ed. We set up some training classes for February 28 and March 1. I'll have to type up a flyer and sign-up sheet. I should do some push-ups. I feel extra conscious of the flab on my torso. I think I can pinpoint the location of yesterday's pizza and alfredo sauce. I was thinking of going to the Underground Tea Room on La Brea, but it seems too risky now. You might get murdered out in this town. I'll drink some water when I'm done. The Counting Crows are on the radio. Jeopardy will be on in forty minutes. I played a little basketball today; do I have to tread still. What shall be the sentence that goes next in Jim? How about "Let's go to the ATM."? What if it's in a Seven Eleven? It could be hours before they get with the girls. Jim doesn't steal anything. There were no LA Times at my little liquor store this morning. The place seemed to be sweating on the inside. Seven Elevens are sometimes very surreal places, the paranoid buzz in them...What else? My hands shake like a Richter scale needle, my pen does. I aye yai yie yoi yoy. I had a corndog and salad and diced peaches and corn for lunch. I sat with Rachel and then Elvia came and sat down. George still won't come into the class. He goes with Mrs. Spalla every day. Now Mick is singing "Wild Horses". What else? God I've still got to get to the bottom of the next page. I'll be happy to do some reading next. Pam gave us white chocolate molded like big aspirin at the end of the last Instructional Team meeting. Maybe I'll dip mine in peanut butter and skip the treadmill. What else? This emptiness is dreadful. This is killing me. I'll just right bla bla bla to the bottom of this page so I can just release myself from this Hellish chore. The beginning turns out to be the middle sometimes. bla bla bla bla. Something will come to me. The kitchen light is on again; no one is in there, though. Sting sings about a teacher tempted by a student. Compares him to Humbert Humbert. There's a thing here on mutual funds that Getoff left. AAUgh! KSCA is having a going away party at the Troubador on Wednesday. The washer and dryer are doing their things there in the kitchen alongside the fridge. I need to use up my film. I should have sat at the window. I need to shill from time to time. You see the planes coming instead of the birds from the east, one after the other.

Ho-Hum

Monday Jan 27
"The Joy Luck Club" is on TV. We had a couple of useless meetings after school today that have me way behind schedule. I ate my leftover pizza and fettucine when I got home at quarter to six. I breezed through the newspaper. Gave up on the crossword after about thirty seconds. Now I'm trying to do this and watch the movie at the same time. Justine called. She's working at Commonwealth Elementary. Julia called. She likes "Miracle Mile." I should call her back tomorrow. Kathleen, too. Getoff called. He wants to start some kind of timeshare on the driveway. I think the idea is asinine. What else? It did not rain today. I played up a good sweat in a basketball game with the boys today. It was Carlos, Francisco, and I against about ten other boys. Time ran out with the game tied twenty to twenty. I put "Dragon's Lair" in the computer. I just finished the second of two Bud Lites I asked the pizza guy to bring with my pizza yesterday. I have a little, little piece of bud. At this point, I'll save it for tomorrow. I photographed hollow, hand-painted Chinese eggs for Craig today. I stayed home and watched the Super Bowl by myself. Shirelle went to where she could drink and smoke out. I wouldn't have kicked shit to Desmond Howard. Too bad Parcells is such a fat-head. What the fuck else? Those meetings ruined me today. Tomorrow I'll come right home. What about the rest of those photos? We have to do the CARE test. I've got to go to the post office after I find Jancy's pictures. Is that asshole downstairs playing that music? Oksana Baiul in court! I didn't get to call National Health Insurance today about my annuity contract. There won't be much time to read tonight. What the fuck else? Fifteen minutes after this. I won't get to tread tonight. I still have to call the Mac people and Tech Ed and fix Rachel's computer. If this movie wasn't on, I would go write at the kitchen table about the night out the window. Fuck fuck. Maybe if I check my e-mail, if I can get on, I'll have enough to write about to finish this page. Thing's on the phone with his girlfriend. Blah blah blah. Fuck ack ick argh. I have to copy that article and get it back to Eddie. Piss. Thank God the fucking jungle drum beat downstairs has finally fucking stopped.

Consigned to Hell

Sunday Jan 26
Ugh. Dread. I slept on the couch last night. Shirelle is a stupid fucking drunk. I'm so sick of her. We drove up to El Coyote in the rain. Her windshield wipers don't work, and she had drunk a bottle of wine and was stoned on marijuana, and I put my fool ass in the car with her. She straddled the lanes down Beverly. She drank several scratch margaritas at dinner and smoked more pot out in front of the restaurant, under the dripping awning where two sheepdogs sat uncomplaining. She had told me she would pay for me when I had told her I couldn't afford to go, but I ended up paying sixteen dollars which was more that what I had consumed. There were two Russians in our party who had left the Soviet Union in 1979. Demona did a little song and soft shoe under her umbrella while everyone waited for their cars. It was cute. Then retard and I walked to her car. A parking ticket lay drenched under the inoperable windshield wipers. Guess who ultimately will pay for that? We drove to Demona's. Shirelle drank some more. Nothing was going on there. Julie and Debbie plaued Acey Duecey backgammon. Dave and Ben decided to go back to Ben's apartment on Cloverdale to play "Madden", the latest NFL video game. Everyone decided to go there. I didn't care where we went so long as I didn't have to ride in a car driven by Shirelle.
Debbie and Ben have a cat. I stayed by the window and it's rainwashed air. Shirelle drank beer and smoked pot. Debbie put on ABBA. The girls played UNO, except Shirelle and Demona, who were too drunk. The guys played video games. I had been consigned to hell. I knew what was going to happen. I didn't have to get in the car. It's my own fault. The Russian girl, Margarita, looked how I felt. These are not adults, her face said. These are not intelligent people.
I read a little Lamott when I got home. It was after one AM. Shirelle got on the phone and loudly chewed down a corndog with mustard and ketchup, cradling the phone between her ear and shoulder, lying in bed next to me. That was when I went out to the couch. Shirelle kept saying last night that she would have Thing take her back to get her car in the morning, as if my perturbation stemmed merely from the possiblity that I might have to do it.
She says she wants to go wherever I go to watch the Super Bowl. I'd just as soon not go, then. I heard her walk down the steps to walk the mile or so to get her car. I went into the bedroom and read a chapter of the Second Book of Samuel. When she got back, I walked down to Ralph's and got a newspaper.

What the Rain on the Window is Like

Sat Jan 25

Ok ok ok. What's there to say? It's still morning. There's not much to report. Shirelle drove us in the silver '66 Mustang to the Bob's Big Boy restaurant at Highland and Wilshire. I got a paper and ordered the breakfast bar. Shirelle is not feeling well because she is menstruating. I ate three plates of eggs, waffles potatoes, French toast, biscuits and gravy, sausage, and bacon. I drank coffee and water. It's another gray, wet day.   Hardly seems like So Cal. I didn't get too far on the crossword today. Yesterday's included a star symbol several times in its solutions. It's the first time I've ever seen anything other than letters of the alphabet. "Startled" was the symbol of a star and "-led" for example. The Rangers and Penguins are playing hockey on Fox TV. I filled a beer mug with Gossamer chardonnay.
I wanted to walk to I&E Liquor on La Brea and San Vicente to buy a bottle and research for Jim a little, but when I announced my intention, Shirelle informed me that there was already a bottle in the fridge. The raindrops look like sperm cells wiggling down the windows. Shirelle jerked off my hard-on this morning. I listened to the 1812 orchestra in bed with the lights off last night. I ate an apple for dinner last night. I took out the trash this morning. Shirelle wants to go up to El Coyote tonight to meet some friends. Mariachi is expecting us for the Super Bowl tomorrow. I have a bowl packed on the pipe here. Shall I smoke it now? I'll do my fifteen minutes next and then read for a while, then smoke and play guitar and give Jim a few more sentences. I lost another chess game to the computer last night. When I first got this thing over a year ago, it played audio CDs, but now when I put them in, it says they need to be initialized, which it says will erase all the info on the disk. No comprendo. No cuido, tampoco. Looks like I'm blowing off the auto sale and the retirement luncheon for Sylvia. Getoff just called me to come down to the studio. He and Jason are engineering the latest effort of the Stone Roses. Aug. What else? The rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain. Here it just gums up the freeways. The rain in LA falls mainly on the freeway. Shaboom shaboom. Nothing nothin nuthin Two more lines. I can only fluff it. The GIP's downstairs at Carlin's.

Nothing Here

Fri. Jan. 24
I wrote Chronos a good e-mail about how it went at court last night. I'll have to see if I can retrieve it and save it so I won't have to write it again. The craziest part was the judge dismissing what I was guilty of and charging me for what I was innocent of. Doh! I've ended another sentence in a preposition. Anyway, he assured me it was for the best. And in a system where the opposite of the truth rules, I agreed.
The Frugal Gourmet has been busted for sexually assaulting teenage boys, says the Cable News Network on the TV behind me. Shirelle and Christina and Getoff are going up to Cafe Largo to see Ilyeni sing. We got fruit salad and bread sticks and chicken parmesan with rice and carrots and spinach, and carrot cake for dessert at the luncheon today. Earlier I had a danish and half a nut muffin to tie me over til lunch. I drank coffee and water and iced tea. The speaker reduced us to thirty-foot tubes with stuff going in and out. I'll definitely be treading mill tonight. Thirteen minutes to Jeopardy. I'm ready. I'll copy down the contestant phone number tonight. I just lit the cigarette I rolled with Geoff's tobacco in his and Carlin's kitchen last night. I sent that little story to Linda. I'm ruining my lungs. Hope I make it to retirement. I'm calling my sister. I'm leaving a message. I told her her message sounded like a call girl. Then I said, just kidding. I'm going to brush my teeth when I'm done with this. I've got to put some more sentences on Jim. I wonder why there's no publication of extension fiction at UCLA. Someone will have to do something about that...I feel a bit fritzed out. The Lamott book is doing me some good, though. I typed about the comet dream. I don't want to go out tonight. What else! I tuned my guitar. It needs new strings. I'll play for a while tonight. I'm going to do some wall push-offs tonight. I made an appointment with the DMV for Feb. 3rd at 3:30. I transferred $1200 to my checking account. I like my credit union. Tomorrow: Will I go to the private auto sale with 7% APR? Sylvia's retirement luncheon? Put in my thermostat? Write all day? Until then...

Another Day in Paradise

Jan. 23 Thurs.
Heavenly shades of night are falling; It's twilight time out the full-length windows from the fourth floor of the Van Nuys courthouse. A cloud bank has parked itself against the San Fernandos and is hovering over the twinkling valley. I got here an hour early with a hankering for some Mexican food. Wonder of wonders! There is a Mexican restaurant right across the steet from the courthouse. It was the first thing about today that did not suck. Then miracle of miracles! I found a parking place! And with enough time still on the meter to get me through to the end of the hours of operation for that meter! I strode with purposeful hope to the restaurant. A sign on the door said:

CLOSED

Hours 8AM-6PM M-F

It was 4:45 PM Thursday, but the doors were locked. I looked through the window and pointed at my watch to the girl inside and held up six fingers and shrugged and lifted my eyebrows. She turned her palms shoulder level to the ceiling. Then some little punk came out with a mop and waved me off. I walked up to the Subway sandwich shop and ordered a six-inch pizza sub and an iced tea for $3.77. I ate and did the crossword puzzle and felt pretty forlorn, wondering how long this court fuckover would take. I wrote a letter to the judge requesting remuneration for the time, energy and money spent correcting the court's error. I hope he doesn't slap any cuffs on me. I look out over the plaza below and fantasize about pulling up a truck full of explosives, or maybe do an airstrike in a small plane, ditch it over the ocean, and have co-conspirators waiting in a small boat bound for Mexico. A car just drove up over the curb and around the concrete pillars designed to keep cars out, right into the plaza. I'm waiting. It hasn't exploded. I'll keep waiting. My mucous has turned yellow. I forgot to take my vitamin this morning. We were on rainy day schedule all day again. The courts and the state and federal offices are surrounded by porn stores and head shops. I hope the lawyers here catch my cold. I have a workshop in Long Beach tomorrow on chemical disorders in the brain. In the morning, if I get up early enough, and there are no clouds, there will be a comet out the kitchen window.