3-18-01 Su 10:25 AM

I’m sitting at the kitchen table. I’m still not feeling well. Yesterday was St. Pat’s. I poured some Bushmills in my coffee yesterday morning. I drank it and did it again. Then I poured some in my orange juice. I call that a sunburn. I had about three of those. Rochelle’s mom came, and I made one for her. About ten, Rochelle and I walked up to Wilshire to wait for the bus. A cab came before the bus, though, so we hailed the cab. We stopped at the Gaylord and met Thing and his date, Kewena. We all had a shot of Jim Beam and walked to the subway. We went to the Pantry, and I had steak and eggs and French toast. Then, we walked to the Staples Center. I got a Bailey’s and coffee and a Hennessey’s and a Lite beer. We had a smoke on the patio before puck drop. The King seemed lifeless, like they still weren’t awake for the early start, especially old man Robitaille, but Potvin stopped every shot San Jose slapped at him. The arenas was rocking. Tied zero-zero, the game went to OT. Selanne made his Shark debut. “Hit ‘im in the stitches,” I yelled. “The knee! The knee!” A row of people in Shark jerseys expressed their disapproval. “That’s not cool, man!”

“What would anyone from San Jose know about ‘cool!’ I fired back. I grinned at them.

Forty seconds into OT, Smolinski got one past the Sharks standout rookies netminder, Evgeni Nabakov, and everyone went nuts. The Kings pulled to within two points of Phoenix, who play tomorrow. If they win that game, they’ll be tied for the last playoff spot.

After the game, we walked up Flower past Seventh to the Irish pub, Casey’s. But in a perfect example of what’s wrong with downtown LA, it was closed. An Irish pub in the center of a major American city, closed on St. Patrick’s Day. Where else in the English-speaking world? So we walked back to the Milner Hotel on Figueroa to try the Backdoor Pub, but it was closed, too. Weekend, ghost town downtown LA. So, we took the subway to the Biltmore, and the bar there was open. We drank and shot pool and watched UCLA and USC advance to the Sweet Sixteen round of the NCAA basketball tournament. After a couple of beers, we walked to Pershing Square and took the subway to Wilshire/Vermont. We said good-by to Thing and Kawena, took a bus back to Hudson, and walked home.