10:07 PM Saturday 7-17-99
I'm at home.  "The Big Sleep" is on cable.  We went to the Marina today for brunch with mom and sister Mardi.  I read the paper while my mom talked politics, and Shirelle talked wedding, and Mardi showed off her cleavage.  My mom listens to too much talk radio.  After brunch, we went up to Melrose.  Mardi was shopping for clothes to be Barbie at her God-daughter's birthday party.  I got a shirt with dice and martinis on it.  When we came home, I fell asleep on the couch for a couple hours.  When I woke up, I spent some time switching channels around.  I've got ashes in my lungs.  I've got acid and gas in my guts.  We've got a game tomorrow morning.  What else?  [pencil sketch of noir detective and femme fatale]  Looks like I won't be working on Jim again today.  Just like Bogart and Bacall.  It's sweaty tonight.  "Why don't you go to the police?  I just killed your best boy."     "Where to, Mister?"     "Follow that gray sedan.  It's a tail job."   "I'm your girl."  What book should I read next?  Do you get the feeling Humphrey Marlowe usually had pretty bad breath?  I ate a couple leftover slices of pizza.  I should go to sleep.  I have to close the front door.  "The Big Sleep" is over.  Now they're showing "Marlowe" (1969) with James Garner, screenplay by Stirling Silliphant, directed by Paul Bogart.  I tried to sketch Bogart as Marlowe, but it came out looking like my dad.~~~  They~~ wer~~e both~~~LA~~detectives.~~~The mail dropped in like a pistol shot off the waxed wood floor.  A black dude walked down the street, a dusty wind with a jet roar at his back

or in his wake.

7-15-99 F 1:20 PM
I'm at Dublin's.  The bartender loaned me this pen.  Odd that there weren't any in my backpack.  I went golfing at Hanson Dam with Kayo yesterday.  He came and picked me up.  We stopped at his pad and he gave me a fat sack of shrooms.  Then he had a pot pickup, and we drove up to the course.  We played with a good Christian named Daryl.  I ate a cap and half a stem.  I was doing well enough, except for holes fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen when my muscles and nervous system had a fungus.  It was great weather.  I dropped to a knee and thanked God for the luxury of such a day.  We stopped in the clubhouse, but there was serious bitch in there wouldn't let us bring out beers in. We hould have shined her on, but we said, "Fuck it," and left.  By the time we got to my place, I had to hop right on my bike and pedal to work.  It was a long night.  When I got home again, Shirelle drew a bath for me, and I read the paper in the tub while she scrubbed me all over, paying special loving attention to my weenie.  She ordered a pizza.  I had a couple slices and some hot wings.  I watched the news and went to sleep.  Shit!  I just remembered I've got to get to LACAS to sign some paperwork so I get paid.  Fuck.  I did a third-person page.  Jim drunk on the beach.  I finished To Have and Have Not.  All the characters were selfish and immoral.  Ernie seems to blame the depression.  It was all very Hobbesian.  I rode my bike up here.  I randomly rode past Laurel Elementary and saw Carlos and Amy and Agatha and Elmer and Ralph and Sonia.  I've read the paper.  I guess I'll have a bite to eat next.  I wonder if Tim and/or Carlos will show.  I rented the Hitchcock flick "Shadow of a Doubt."  Guess I'll eat, shoot a little pool, and bail.

7-14-99 W 1:16 PM
I'm at the beer bar in the middle of Farmer's Market.  I read the paper. I'm on my second beer. I was talking with a very old guy who looks like he belongs in a Sergio Leone western.  Another guy was talking about Into Thin Air, so we talked Everest some.  The bar was grilling me about my tattoo and about doing the crossword puzzle.  Crosswords led to Everest which led to "Jeopardy!," so we talked about that for a while.  Sergio Leone has a cancerous-sounding cough.  I haven't eaten today.  I smoked, and now I feel dizzy and weak.  This dull pencil robs my writing muscles of strength.  An old guy asking about my tattoo says he loves cartoons.  "Yeah," I said, "when I was a kid I used to lie in bed and pray that I'd have cartoon dreams instead of nightmares."  The bar murmurs this over.  I guess because I'm the new guy, I'm the source of some interest.  "After a while, though, I started to dream about naked ladies."  This turn away from nightmares restores the bar's good nature.       I need a massage.  What shall I eat?  I guess after this I ought to pedal back home and work up a page for Jim.  MOCA is going to be at night school tonight.  I want to golf tomorrow.  I talked to my grandparents this morning.  They know I'm going to the Bahamas with a Shirelle.  I said "we," and they said, "Who's 'we?'"  I said, "A girl," and Gramps said, "No shit," and I said, "Shirelle."   They seemed to suggest that I'd have more fun if I went with another guy.  Gramma suggested I'd meet more girls, which translated to me as my own gramma saying I'd have a better time trying to fuck strangers.      There was a wee weed in me smoke.      What else?     The American League beat the National League last night at Fenway in the seventieth Major League All-Star Game.  Pedro Martinez struck out the first four batters he faced and won the game's MVP award.

2:01 PM Tu 7-13-99
I'm in Cheetah's topless bar on Hollywood near Vermont.  I've been riding around the new subway line, exploring.  I just finished reading the paper.  I must seem like a freak reading a newspaper in a titty bar.  I kept getting flashed by a red light.  "...shuffling down the street, people think I'm crazy...What's the matter with you boy?"  Girl writhes in her bathing suit, mirrors and flashing lights all around.  Should I play some pool?  I'm down to my last six bucks.  I think I spy an ATM.  Uh oh.  I have to go to work tonight.  I had a little trouble navigating the multi-leveled underground labyrinth and rode the wrong train the wrong way a couple times.  There's a big-screen TV in here in case you need a break from looking at wiggling asses.  I don't know how I'll look reading Ernie in here.  I just rolled a smoke.  I didn't have a light.  The barmaid said they were out of matches, but she dug a lighter out of her purse.  It had little colored lights running through it, too.  She sparked it for me, and I puffed.  Kinda sexy.  I feel a bit shaky today.  What else?  I typed fifteen.  Ate a couple English muffins for breakfast.  My beer's gone.  My mouth's still dry.  Had a bong hit before I left.  I wonder if that contributed to my underground confusion.  Georgita.  [pencil drawing of Wild Spirit liquor label]  What next?  Pool table?  . ?  My smoke went out.  A fellow at the bar has a T-shirt that reads, Life's too short not to be Irish.  Beers are four bucks.  I've got to leave by 3:30.  I have an hour. 

7-12-99 1:28 PM M
I"m at El Coyote.  I ate a fat-ass combo, tamale and taco with rice and beans and cheese and sour cream and extra tortillas.  I've had three screwdrivers, and now I've got a bloody Mary and cup of coffee in front of me.  A loud-mouthed Brit has been roaring about American politics for so long, I want to punch him in the mouth whether I agree with him or not.       Flashes of white cracked the sky over the San Gabriels yesterday attesting to the heat storm in the mountains north of our baseball game.      I rode my bike here. I typed fifteen minutes this morning. A girl on a cell phone says, "Honey" and "Darling" constantly.  She opened her conversations with, "I'm calling you from El Coyote even though I always swore to myself I'd never talk on a cell phone at a restaurant."  Yeah, right.      I rented "Sex, Lies, and Videotape."  I guess when I'm done with this, I'll ride over to Farmer's Market and read some Ernest before I head home.  Then I'll do my third-person page.  Then maybe I'll watch that movie.  Then work on Jim.  Then go to work.  Then what?  It's about a hundred degrees outside today and humidity say at sixty percent.  What else?  Bob and Mike started talking about baseball brawls.  Whatever.  What else?  Jose came by to look at the bare wires coming through the dry cypress tree, said he'd send someone out Wednesday to figure out what to do about it.  Mac called.  Said he won some money in Vegas and was sending me a money order for the hundred bucks he owes me.  What else?  Has Aaron locked his keys in the car?  Is the battery dead?  Both?  What kind a friction will there be between Jeffrey and Jim?