I'm Special

Yesterday was like a fever dream.  I was in it and maybe somewhere else, too.  Living through the day unconsciously, viewing it from a distance watching myself fumbling and stumbling in some exaggerated, contradictory bliss.  

The End. 

No, kidding.  It was not as weird as Saturday and was surely more fun.  Once again, I got out of the house--and people liked me.  Maybe that's overstating it.  Maybe they only liked my camera.  But one guy shouted out of the crowd, "Nice hair," so there was that.  How many times in your life does that happen?  

O.K.  I get that a lot.  I'm special.  Mom's neighborhood ladies always like my locks. Just the other day, the 91 year old came over and ran her fingers through my hair.  

"You're special, alright.  Short bus."

I know, I know, but you have to let me have this one.  I need it.  I don't have all that you have.  I'm living on borrowed time.  

Sunday.  I took care of my mother's meds and breakfast and sat with her for awhile.  Remember the little Missionary boys I told you about?  They did it.  They got my mother a ride to church.  Only she didn't know it.  She doesn't know how to use her phone and didn't see the text message.  A nice man from the church showed up.  Mom was in her pajamas.  

"Brother [So and So] from the church is here!" she said in a panic going to the wrong door.  She expected me, I guess, to get up and entertain the fellow.  Uh-uh.  I pointed her in the right direction and listened to her walker scoot out of sight.  I stayed where I was.  I could hear them talking.  My mother could neither hear nor think.  She claimed she didn't know it was Sunday.  I could hear the panic in her voice.  As much as she complains about not having anything to do, she doesn't want to do anything.  She's happiest when I am cooking and cleaning and doing chores around the house, picking up and fetching and doing laundry, while she sits in her chair.  The idea of doing a thing is something.  Actually doing it though. . . . 

I've met the man several times.  He is nice.  He came to see my mother in the hospital and at the rehab facility as well as here at her home.  There are a couple women from her church who have done this as well.  He would take her to church next Sunday then, he said, and then he said a prayer, or, as Mormons say, he gave her a "blessing."  

Why didn't I go run interference for my mother you ask?  

Because I do it all the time and I don't think it is helping her.  She needs to try to stay "in the game." She has just given up doing anything on her own.  But yea. . . I feel a bit of guilt.  I don't need you to pile on.  

I sat and talked things over with my mother for awhile before I left to go home.  My house.  Where I once lived.  The day was getting on.  I was going to walk and it was going to be hot.  And it was.  Really hot, and I was sweating through my shirt.  And then, out of nowhere, it began to rain.  I was still a mile from home.  It was ok but for my new Hokas.  They were getting soaked.  

A shower.  It was afternoon.  I could go pick up the 4x5 film I had taken to the lab.  I grabbed the Black Cat Liberator camera, and before I left the house, I took a picture of my palms.  I was determined to use the camera now, so I drove out of my way by a little lake in a neighborhood nearby.  It is a small lake with a brick street running the circle around it, big houses lining the other side.  It is an old sinkhole, really, and the banks are steep.  A fallen oak lay with it's roots exposed.  I grabbed the camera, a film holder, and my phone which doubles as my light meter.  

A car drove too slowly by.  Somebody was checking to see what I was up to.  

Photo of the Day #2!

I was certain to take more photos when I got to the photo lab.  It is another hipster area on the border of Gotham, next to a big milk. . . what?  Production plant?  Bottling plant?  WTF would it be called?  All the area around here used to be pasture for miles and miles.  One of the big cattle families, the Lees, owned it all.  Old T.G. and his wife passed away as people will, and the kids began selling parts and parcels, as kids will.  Houses were built and small shops popped up.  At one time, when the city was still small, the airport was very nearby.  I flew to Ohio with my father out of that airport when I was twelve or thirteen, back in the days when you dressed up to go to the airport.  Now the airport is out of town and the old one is private.  The hipsters have taken over the rundown parts, and so, if you have a big assed camera and are clever, there are photos to be made.  

When I got to the lab, though, I couldn't pull into the small lot behind the building.  A hipster pop-up market was going on and the streets were full of funky kids.  Oh boy, oh boy. . . this could be something.  I was uncertain, though.  I didn't think I had the chops to go into a crowd with a camera anymore.  I've gotten old and feeble living with my mother.  I've lost just about all public confidence.  So, I parked illegally in another lot and left my camera in the car.  

When I walked into the lab, the girl behind the counter smiled and said hello.  She knew who I was.  I think it is the hair.  

"About your film. . . ."

Oh, shit.  

"They developed the black and white o.k. but the color film. . . wasn't color.

"Oh, hell. . . I wasn't sure.  I labelled them with little dots long ago when I loaded the holders, but it was so long ago, I forgot what the dots meant.  It's o.k.  Totally my fault."

"No, no. . . it's o.k.  She only did three of the six, so she will do the rest as black and white.  Let me go back and check to see if they are ready."  

When she came back, another woman was with her.  I was cringing.

"Did she say tell that old fool not to come in here again, that we don't have time for incompetence?"

"No, no. . . ."

I told them about the Liberator camera and they were interested, so I went to the car to get it.  I decided to give them the film I shot on the way to the lab, too.  But the sidewalk was full of kids.  I passed a group taking pictures of each other with their phones.  They looked at me as I walked by. 

"Oh, wow. . . cool camera."

"Thanks."  I hesitated.  I wasn't sure I could do it.  "You want to make some pictures?" I asked pointing to the camera.  

They sure did.  

I took them to the side of the building where there was a mural wall.  After the rain, the air was heavy, and later when I got into my car, it said the temperature on the pavement was 102 degrees.  I was fumbling with the big camera suddenly forgetting everything about how it worked.  

"Hold on. . . uh. . . I have to meter. . . this will take a minute."

The kid against the wall said, "No, it's cool, take your time."

I fumbled with the camera, setting the shutter speed, the aperture, and said, "O.K.  One, two, three."

Oh, shit.  I forgot to take the dark slide out.  

"Wait.  Let's do it again."

One two three. . . nothing.  The camera didn't fire.  The kids were standing, looking at me. Sweat was dripping from my hair now.  My shirt was soaked.  

"Something's wrong," said the master photographer.  I struggled to understand what was going wrong.  "O.K.  Let's see if this works."

Finally.  The mirror plopped and the shutter whizzed.  

"Victory!" I yelled in mock celebration pumping my fist sarcastically in the air.  "Anybody else?"

Uh-uh.  

My head was spinning.  Jesus. . . why was I doing this?  Cursed, surely.  Incompetent, probably.  

When I stepped back into the lab, the cool air gave me a shiver.  The day was blindingly bright, the interior room dim.  I sat my camera on the counter.  The kids ooed and aahed as I showed them how it (didn't) work.  I told them my tale and tried snapping the shutter.  It worked one out of three or four times.  There was something wrong with the cocking mechanism, I discovered.  I fooled with it, and if I pushed it in toward the camera, I could hear a little click.  Then it would work.  

The girls were looking at me now.  

"You want to go outside and make some pictures?"

Oh. . . yes they did.  

We stepped out into the sunlight.  I wasn't thinking straight.  I just wanted the camera to work.  I was having trouble loading the film holder into the back of the camera.  The shutter didn't work.  I fucked around again, and again I was pouring sweat.  I felt queasy.  A couple of tries and the shutter fired.  

"OK," I said.  I took the photo, but when I pulled the film holder out, I grabbed the dark slide and exposed the film to the sunlight.  Really?  Was there any other way for me to fuck up?  But the girls were nice.  The other one stepped up.  To focus the camera, I was using my mother's 3x strength reading glasses.  They worked like a charm, but when I pulled them from my pocket, I broke off one of the arms.  

Sure.  There were many ways to fuck up.  

I put the glasses with one arm on and looked down into the viewfinder.  The fell off.  This was slapstick at its finest.  I bent down, picked them up, and tried again.  

Back inside the lab, I left the film with the two of them to be developed.  

"I gave you a discount," the girl said.  I assumed that was because I was "special."  

When I stepped back outside, I decided to walk around back to the market to see.  A woman was sitting on a low lawn chair eating lunch.  She looked up and said "cool camera."  

"Yea. . . let me take your photo with it."

"O.K."

"This will take a minute."

"Take your time."

She got up to help a customer.  It turned out to be her store.  She was a cool hippie girl and it might turn out to be a good photo, but I don't know.  Somehow I had gone blind.  I had gone stupid.  I wasn't really seeing what she was doing when I looked through the viewfinder.  I was thinking about all the things I needed to do to make the camera work.  The one arm glasses fell off my face.  A girl walking by picked them up and handed them to me.  I didn't want to look foolish anymore.  I just wanted to take the photo.  It worked.  Yay!

But I don't think I set the shutter speed correctly.  

I punched my phone number into the girl's phone so she could let me know where to send the photo.  

I walked around the corner of the building into the parking lot market place.  A guy walked up.  Same thing.  Cool camera.  He wanted to know about it.  He was a photographer, he said.  He used to shoot street with a Pentax 6x7.  I gave him the Liberator and showed him how it worked.  

"Here, let me take a photo of you."

He was working the booth with his wife.  

"She used to be a model," he said.  

"Does she want to make a picture?" I asked him.  

Indeed she did.  

The I surprised him.  I told him to take it. I metered and helped him set the dials.  He framed it up, I pulled the dark slide, and he hit the shutter.  

Nothing.  

I fooled around with the camera for another five minutes, his wife standing, waiting.  Finally, it worked.  

"I hope I didn't move out of focus," he said.  

"O.K.  Let me take one just to be sure."  

"Do you want both of us?"

"Yea, that would be good."

I pulled out my glasses and put them on my face.  They fell to the ground and the other arm came off.  By now, I just expected everything to fail.  I was giving up.  I just had to laugh.  I lay the glasses on top of the viewfinder and did my best. 

Some boys came up to their booth and asked how much for a Guns and Roses t-shirt.  

"Six fifty," said my new friend.  

"Would you be interested in buying one of these," one of the kids said holding out two t-shirts.  My new friend looked at them.  

"How much for this one."

"Eighty," the kid said.  

Wait a minute.  Six fifty wasn't $6.50?  

"I'm going to pass on the $80," my new friend said. 

"That shirt is six hundred and fifty dollars?!?" I exclaimed.  

He nodded.  "Comps online are $800."  

"Holy shit!  Do these tweekers have that kind of money?"

"I don't know.  This is my first market.  I have shirts for sixty, fifty, forty and look at this, a 1980s Adidas shirt in good shape.  Only thirty."

He told me he had a line of Christian t-shirts and he usually worked church things.  What?  Oh, man. . . he'd said earlier we should get together and shoot.  I already had ideas for his wife.  Christians?  

"Is this your whole gig?" I asked.  

"No.  I am a server in a restaurant.  I just do this to pay the rent.  I try to make two thousand a month.  

I've been out of touch for a long time, I guess.  What a world.  

I punched my number into his phone, said I'd be in touch, and took the big assed camera back to the car.  As I put it away, I decided to take all the film I'd just shot back to the lab.  Then I had another idea.  I grabbed my big medium format Fuji GFX with the Leica 135mm lens on it.  I wanted to show my new friend. . . and take a photo of his wife. . . because I wasn't sure that anything I had done all day was going to turn out well.  

And so, the color photo at the top.  

I was slick with sweat when I got back into the car for the last time.  I was weak and worn out.  That camera is heavy and my back was hurting.  My knees.  My hips.  My nerves.  

But I had been in the center of the ring all day.  Nice camera.  Nice hair.  

I decided to stop at the cafe on my way home.  I wondered if my little mimosa friend would be working.  

She was.  We chatted, caught up.  Things were still pretty much the same for both of us.  She was still making jewelry.  I told her about the $650 t-shirt.  She shook her head.  I told her I walked by her shop on the Boulevard and looked in the window one day, but she wasn't there.  

"I'm in the back," she said.  Making jewelry.  "Just come in and ask for me."

"Yea, I thought it would be creepy.  Your boss would be like, who's the creepy old stalker."

"Don't be silly."

We talked about her silversmithing.  And then the price.

"You mean if you made me a bolo tie, it would be three thousand dollars?"

"Sure."  

"I'll have a French soda."

She made it fine. 

I sat down.  I was beat.  There was no way I wanted to go to the grocery store, shop, go back to my mother's and cook and clean.  No sir, no way.  I'd have to think of something.  Soup.  Chicken soup.  I'd drop two eggs in it.  And some bone broth.  Was it really bone broth?  

When I got back to my mother's, I made a Campari and soda and collapsed.  I told her my dinner plans.  She was fine with that.  I pulled out my phone and asked if Kettle and Fire was real bone broth.  

Oh, indeed it is!!!  This is the stuff T left me.  It is one of the few brands you can buy that is actually bone broth.  Look it up.  Use no other.  

The soup was good and healthy and easy.  I think I'll make it ofen.  

So, my friends, there is the tale.  What weekend.  It was almost like having a life.  I will have some 4x5 film to look at this week.  Even if they are shitty, I am going to keep using that big-assed Liberator for awhile.  And if I make any good photos with it, I may have John Minnicks fix whatever is wrong with the cocking mechanism.  

It is Monday the start of the last week of Spring.  Sunday is the solstice.  Summer.  Can you imagine?  It is already a hundred degrees outside.  

Sometimes I listen to new music.  Here's a nice start to this last week of Spring.  

Med Beds, Ivermectin, and The New World Order

Holy Moly--did I have a day!  I want to tell you about it, but there is so much, I don't know if I have the time or energy.  I don't even know where to begin.  

I'll start here--it is a good thing I couldn't figure out how to place an online bet.  Saved myself $100.  I told you the Knicks would win.  Ha!

I guess this will have to be the Reader's Guide version.  Plot summaries and simple thematics.  It would take me days to write it out in detail.  So. . . .

After getting my mother set for the day, I went home, saddled up, and took my long walk down the usual streets and boulevards.  It was hot.  Very, very hot.  My conservative friend calls Al Gore a P.T. Barnum.  I tell him, "Don't worry, it is only inconvenient."  

But we'll get back to that.  

Coming back down the Boulevard, I noticed a new shop went in at the very end of the shopping district.  It replaced a paper shop that had been there virtually forever.  I wish I walked with my phone so I could have taken a memo because my memory is about as long as my. . . whatever. . . but it was something like "On the Boulevard: A Curated Lifestyle."  

A curated lifestyle?  People without a life need a lifestyle?  They need a curator?  

That had me in stitches.  I know exactly the crowd that will be patrons of that place.  Oh. . . don't I, though.  

I give it a year. 

But something was weird yesterday.  There were no crowds.  There were no lines.  There was no Farmer's Market in the West Pasture.  It was kind of spooky.  What was up?

Had I stepped into an episode of "Outer Limits"?

Back home, showered, the morning was moving into afternoon.  Hot as it was, I thought I needed to do something.  I needed to get out and about.  My film was still at the photo lab, so I called to see if it would be ready.  It is in a funky part of town, and I thought if I could pick up the film, I'd do a little camera walk.  So I called.  

Nope.  Not ready.  

What to do?  I decided to go to the little hipster part of town.  Boulevard Records, once on the Boulevard, has been there now for years, and they have a really good selection of books.  I always find something there I want.  

As I drove by The Cafe Strange, I saw crowds of people milling about the area.  Cars lined the streets.  Oh. . . something must be going on.  I was ready to bust out the Leica and walk among the throng.  But there was nothing in particular happening. I made a pass driving by.  Nope.  I guess the area has just become popular with the strange and the outcast on a Saturday afternoon.  Turning back, I was lucky to find a parking place.  

The record store was packed shoulder to shoulder in the narrow aisles.  It took me a long moment to get through to the back where the books are kept.  Good books.  Exciting things.  I was glad I came.  Getting out of the house can be fun, I thought.  Surprising things happen.  

But the strangeness was about to come.  Earlier, I told you that I had decided to shoot up sixteen sheets of 4x5 film in the Liberator camera, but developing the film is problematic for the top shutter speed is 1/300th of a second.  Not fast.  To make the camera work in varying amounts of daylight, I have to change the iso ratings on the film.  That means many different development times.  BUT. . . there is a solution called stand development.  I won't go into it, but you can develop film of different speeds all together in a single bath.  I needed Rodinal film developer, though, to do that, so. . . when I left the record shop, I headed off to the photo store.  

Of course they didn't have any.  I decided to look around a bit since I was there, but just as I turned a corner, one of the brothers who owns the place saw me.  

"How are you doing?" he asked.  

These guys come from an old Gotham family, moneyed and civic, and the two brothers are on television from time to time showing off their civic work.  Nice guys, but not bohemian hippies, so I have never been able to understand why they have taken to me so.  But they have.  

The brother was seated at a computer and he offered me a chair to sit with him.  He had things to tell me.  And this is where I entered The Twilight Zone.  

"Have you ever heard of the Med Bed?"

And now I must begin to summarize.  Maybe not even that.  Maybe I just give you things to Google.  My God, do you even know how corrupt the government is and how much they keep secret from you?  It is amazing.  One of the technologies that has been around since the '60s is the Med Bed.  You simply lie in it and it "realigns" your genetic material so that it heals.  After that, all your ailments go away.  And Trump is going to make these available soon.  July 4th.  Wait and see.  When JFK was shot, they whisked him away and saved him on the Med Bed.  He is one of the people you always see at the Trump rallies.  His son, too.  He's the guy just behind Trump wearing the fedora.  Elvis, Marilyn. . . all of them.  You know that Kennedy was trying to save Monroe from the mafia, right?  Yup.  Why the camera store owner had only one kidney after donating his other to his wife.  The Med Bed would let him regenerate a new one.  

Look it up!  

I did.  Holy Harry.  

How much money do you have?  What are you worth?  

Wrong.  Have you ever looked at your social security card?  On the back there is a red number.  Do you know what that is?  The U.S. government has been holding money in your account created when you were born.  At my age, I'm worth $100 million dollars.  It's called Redemption.  

You'll have to read it for yourself (link).  

He went on.  Thirteen Original Families still control the World's Economy.  Same ones Christ drove out of the temple.  And they are all pedophiles.  Have you read about all these kids they keep pulling out of the caves?  Look it up.  

The concept of "13 original families" controlling the world order stems from modern esoteric traditions and conspiracy theories—most notably popularized by Fritz Springmeier's book Bloodlines of the Illuminati. These theories suggest a clandestine cabal manipulates global events.These foundational families and lineages typically include:Rothschild: A European banking dynasty that rose to prominence in the 18th century, foundational to international finance.Rockefeller: An American industrial family that built an immense fortune via Standard Oil and expanded into global philanthropy and policy.DuPont: An American business dynasty originally centered on the gunpowder trade, which grew into a massive chemical and corporate empire.Astor: A prominent American and European real estate and business family that built early wealth in the fur trade and New York property.Bundy: A lineage tied to influential American figures in politics and academia.Collins: Associated with historical esoteric and alternative history lore.Freeman: Families often linked to historical publishing and political dynasties.Kennedy: A major American political dynasty.Li: Representing the prominent Asian lineage, often associated with major global enterprise.Onassis: A prominent Greek shipping and business dynasty.Russell: A family with ties to various historical industries and institutions.Van Duyn: A prominent European and American lineage.Merovingian: An ancient Frankish royal dynasty that conspiracy theories often tie to occult or divine bloodlines.

Illuminati--of course!!!

 And finally, Ivermectin.  Big Pharma keeps it a secret, but Ivermectin cures just about everything.  It cures cancer.  Did you know that every animal in a zoo gets it?  Yup.  He checked with Sea World.  Every animal they have.  They get it by the palate.  

"Hey, what time is it?"

"Four-thirty."

"Oh, man. . . I've gotta run and fix my mother's supper."

"O.K.  Look this stuff up.  I'm telling you, July 4th.  Don't say anything about this to my brother.  He thinks its crazy."

It is a good thing I have a sweet, lyrical sense of irony.  It saves me sometimes.  I can joke without insulting people.  All I can tell you is that it is good to get out of the house from time to time.  The world is wild on top and weird underneath.  

Shaken, not stirred, I headed off to my part of town.  I decided to get a pizza for dinner.  I didn't want to cook.  Just a small one this time, though, and I would make a egg drop chicken soup to go with it.  

But when I got to my mother's house, the girls were all there.  They were planning a Tuesday train trip to a town an hour away to have lunch at a cafeteria style restaurant they all know and love.  The lady from across the street approached me as I got out of the car.  

"You need to talk to your mother.  We planned this trip for her, but she doesn't want to go."

No shit.  My mother uses a walker and doesn't go far.  They want her to ride to the train station, ride the train sitting in a hard seat for an hour, Uber to the restaurant, sit and eat for however long, Uber back to the train. . . . 

"Oh, sure," I said.  "I'll talk to her."

Pizza was enough.  Neither of us wanted soup.  A beer and a cocktail and then. . . World Cup Soccer.  I am enjoying it.  Again, not much happens and there are very few commercials.  But today, I saw that the N.Y. Times has been reading the blog again.  There was an article about how the U.S. will take over soccer.  I'm telling you, it will be advertisers who take over.  Once they touch it. . . . 

Today is Trump's birthday.  Ivermectin and Med Beds keep him going.  He is going to do away with the banks.  I forgot to tell you that part.  There is so much gold. . . . 

I can't wait to see the UFC fights.  They will be televised, right?  With a lot of commercials.  

Trump's been right about everything so far, hasn't he?  That is what they say.  

That's the best I can do to summarize a crazy day.  I get to pick up my 4x5 film this afternoon and see "what I got."  Probably nothing.  I don't care.  I will get something some day.  You wait and see.  July 4 is right around the corner.  All will be revealed.  

Holy shit.  Holy shit.  The fellow told me he holds a degree in microbiology.  Unbelievable.  

Anyway. . . I never placed my bet on the Spurs taking the series.  

Oh. . . there is more, but it is bragging.  Did I tell you about all the erotic dreams I have been having?  No?  Good.  That would be gross.  But yesterday I was sent texts from two different women who want to see me.  With pics.  Some days, I just want to die, and others. . . .

Maybe I'll buy those sunglasses anyway.  

And buy a tinfoil hat.  I think they sell them on Amazon.  

Not a Betting Man

Forget about yesterday.  Don't worry about me.  Let's move on.  

It's that time in America when normal people start using the word "nil."  Perhaps they do all the time.  I don't know.  I only watch soccer during the World Cup.  I'm rather like that with all sports now.  Super Bowl, NBA Finals, NCAA Finals, World Series. . . .   But I'll say one thing in favor of soccer, though (and I'm sure American Capitalism will change this)--there aren't many commercials.  I watched the U.S./ Paraguay match last night.  Though the American commentators were irritating, the paucity of commercials was wonderful.  They do now take "water breaks" in the World Cup, though, and you know that was the advertisers' idea.  $$$$-cha-ching.  Wait and see--there will be more to come.  They ain't gonna pay those players salaries simply with profits made from just butts in the seats.  

"Why Bob. . . there's gold in them hills!"

I don't like to bet, really, but I might put money on the Spurs winning the next three games of the NBA finals.  I can see it happening.  I don't expect it, but I can see it.  I need to check the Vegas odds on this.  What would a $100 bet make me?  

I've only bet on sporting events twice in my life, both times on horses.  Well, a horse once, and a jockey the other.  I won $3.10 at the Hialeah Race Track long ago, and I lost $20 on a redheaded female jockey running in the Kentucky Derby.  

Observation: why does everyone on American television sound like they are talking to children?  Hyperventilated sing-song voices, pop-eyes. . . where did this come from?  

Except for Kaitlin Collins, Wolf Blitzer, and, well. . . many at CNN.  But not that nit Erin Burnett.  

Now "peace" in the Middle East may be at hand.  Really?  Has there ever been peace in the Middle East?  But if a deal is reached between Iran and Trump, I wonder what we will have "won"?  

We showed them, though, didn't we.  I still say Trump will be the first to use a "desperation nuke."

Other than all the things I delete from the blog, that is, in popular parlance, "all I got."  That and a painful right index fingernail that keeps hanging on.  Back in January, I believe, I reported closing my finger in the door.  It hit right on the nail bed.  Now, the new fingernail has grown beneath the old, dead one, but the old fingernail is hanging on at one tiny spot so that if I catch it on anything, I am brought to my knees.  I keep a bandaid on it to prevent this.  But yea, it took six months for the new nail to grown in.  

Just so you know.  

"What are you going to do this weekend?" people ask me.  Ha!  

"The same thing I do every day," I reply.  

"Oh. . . yea."

But I will take a long walk today coming back by way of the Boulevard to see the weekend crowds lining the street and the Western Pasture where the Farmer's Market takes place.  The breakfast restaurants will have long lines and people will be eating at sidewalk tables in that European style.  Teenage girls will line the block around the Brandy Melville store, and I might pop into the bookstore for a look . 

Tell me I don't know how to live.  

I'm still tempted to drive back out to the mall and buy those expensive but really cool round Ray-Ban sunglasses.  Here's my thinking.  If I place that bet on the Spurs before game 5 and I hit it, I can definitively afford the glasses.  Game 5 is in San Antonio, and I'd give the Spurs an 80% chance of winning at home.  Then it is back to New York for game 6.  At that point, I'd give the Spurs a 50/50 chance of winning.  If they could steal that game, the series goes back to San Antonio for game 7, and I'd say their chances of winning at home are better than 50/50.  

But don't listen to me.  I've never been lucky with money or love.  Well, that's not exactly true.  I've been very lucky in love, just not sustaining it beyond my stamped on expiration date.  But they have all been spectacular.  My luck lay in two areas--not getting fired from the factory and keeping my nose relatively clean.  

But WTF--I think I'll place that bet.  

Nothing to Express

Just deleted the post.  My problems are my problems and you can't help, so there is no use in the telling.  Maybe it was good for me to write it out, though.  But I am not feeling well and it is time to take my mother to her doctor's appointment, to the drugstore, and to the bank.  No time for revision or reinvention, so. . . I'll leave it like this for now.  

Yea. 

Goooaaallll!!!

Of course I didn't watch the Knicks last night.  I watched about two minutes and when the referee called the second foul on the Knicks's center, Karl Anthony Townes, which was obviously a foul on Wentanaby , I switched it off.  Unable to find anything else to watch, I left the television to my mother and went to bed.  It was nine p.m.  

It was probably a good decision in many ways.  I needed the sleep.  I didn't get up this morning until six.  Then I went to the highlights of last night's game on YouTube.  Holy shit!  I missed it!  What a spectacle.  

Obviously Trump was not there.  He was off designing $12,000 coins to commemorate his UFC birthday, and coincidentally, maybe. . . 250 years of the democracy he has undermined.  

Today kicks off the World Cup.  The game will start at 3 pm my local time.  Maybe I'll go to a pub somewhere and take a peak.  I mean. . . three o'clock.  

I was in a small town in Peru when Germany played the final game against Argentina in Mexico City in 1986.  We sat in a garden restaurant with a few other people and the restaurant staff watching the game on a 12" black and white t.v.  Argentina won 3-2 and the place went crazy.  

I was in Manhattan when the U.S. soccer team made the quarter finals in 2002.  I was staying at the Pod Hotel on East 39th St. and had just gotten up and hit the street.  It was early.  As I walked by a pub, a crowd was rowdy and cheering.  I decided to go in and have breakfast.  Men in suits were going to be late and drunk for work, it seemed, for everyone was drinking beer.  I ate breakfast and watched until halftime.  

I was headed downtown to the Leica Gallery.  When I got off the subway, I could hear people cheering.  As I stepped into the building where the Leica Gallery was housed, the security guard was sitting at his desk with a small t.v.  

"What just happened?" I asked.  

"The U.S. just scored a goal."

I went up and perused the photos in the gallery.  As I left the building, it was unusually quiet. . . and then, it seemed, the entire island erupted.  I could hear cheers coming from near and far echoing through the canyon-like street.  Covered in goose bumps, I just stood still and listened to one of the most spectacular things I have ever heard in this life.

I can imagine the same sound was heard all over New York last night.  

In 2006, I was on a short vacation trip to Charleston with my girlfriend.  I fell in love with South Carolina then.  We had rented a car and decided to get out of town for a day.  We toured an old plantation then went to the beach.  It was mid-afternoon when we decided to stop in a outdoor beach bar and get a drink.  It was July, and the weather was gorgeous.  The place was packed.  The World Cup Final between France and Italy had just begun.  We stayed and drank and watched the entire thing.  It was tied 1-1 at the end of regulation.  Italy won dramatically in the shootout.  It was a spectacular game and a capstone to the weekend.

I have become something of a World Cup Finals fan, though I never watch soccer otherwise.  I guess I'm like a lot of other Americans.  I'll probably watch today's game for fun.  I could use a little.  

So. . . I think I mentioned this already, but. . . I'm not feeling so great.  Yesterday, I decided that maybe a little retail therapy would pick me up.  I decided to drive back to the mall and buy those round Ray-Ban sunglasses.  Oh, sure, I don't need them and will probably lose them in a week, but I felt the need for something.  Then it started to rain, so I stayed inside.  I was home and at my computer.  I started looking through old photo files.  I started in 2016.  What I discovered was that I haven't looked good for a long time.  I was fat even then.  As I went through the photos, I found that Ili wasn't as pretty as I thought she was, either.  We were both fat.  Puffy, really.  And yet, at different times, we each looked good.  There were photos of her that made my heart melt.  There were photos of me that made me happy.  Sometimes neither of us was as puffy as at others.  

I worked my way forward as the rain continued.  After she left, I swear I looked better.  Then worse.  Then better.  

I came across my vacation photos from the end of September through early October, 2018.  Ili and I had broken up.  Then the night before I left, she mysteriously showed up at my house while I was packing.  Why?  I needed to get some dinner and asked her if she wanted to come.  We climbed onto the Vespa and drove to the good bbq place where we used to go.  Takeout.  I could feel her emotions as she held onto my waist, her head resting sometimes against my back.  That was the last time we ever rode the Vespa.  After dinner, I told her, "Why don't you come with me.  I have already booked the rooms and the car.  All you have to do is buy a ticket." 

I looked it up.  A round trip ticket for tomorrow's flight to LA was cheaper than the one I had booked.  Same flight.

She hemmed and hawed and I said, "Look, I need to go to bed.  It is an early flight.  If you want to come, I'll see you at the gate.  But you have to go now.  I need to sleep."

She didn't come, but I thought the whole episode strange.  

I flew to L.A. the next day and picked up my car and drove straight out to Palm Springs.  I stayed in the coolest little historically niche hotel you can imagine.  After a few days, I drove back to Venice and stayed for about a week.  I was taking photos and sending them back to Ili each day.  

The last picture from that trip was from a surf spot in Malibu, the sky and water supernaturally clear.  

Then the next photo.  October 7.  I have tubes going into my chest, my body black with bruises and bloody from I don't know what.  There are tubes in my nose and bandages on my torso.  Seven broken ribs, a collapsed lung, a broken clavicle and several broken places on my scapula.  My A.C. joint was torn apart.  My hip was black and there were deep gashes in my left foot.  My eyes were closed.  

Ili took those pictures.  She stayed with me every night but one in the hospital for over two weeks.  I remember little of it.  But there are pictures I took of her with my phone.  She brought up a speaker and we played slow jazz.  She brought crystals and put them around the room.  Along with the morphine that I got on demand, it kept me calm.  

The next photo is Halloween.  I sat out and passed candy to the kids with my mother.  Then Christmas.  I was not supposed to be released to go back to work for months.  I was in such bad shape they hadn't even begun physical therapy with me yet.  But I got up and walked, first up and down the driveway, then to the end of the street, then around the block, then twice.  It was very, very hard.  I still had a PICC line running from a vein in my arm to my heart.  I had to have strong antibiotics shot into it three times a day.  A nurse came to see me at my mother's home in the afternoon, first every day, then every other.  

I began walking three miles at a time but I had a hard time breathing.  They had cut me open and plated two of my seven broken limbs.  My chance of living, they said, were much worse than my chances of dying.  

But in early December, I returned to work.  The crew at the factory had showered me with thousands of dollars worth of food and gifts.  They were teary-eyed when I made my first meeting.  

When the team of doctors were at my door talking, they thought I was out, I heard them say they didn't know if I'd make it.  

"I don't know," one of them said.  "He's pretty tough.  He gets up several times a day and walks around the corridors."

Yes, I thought, I'm tough.  

Ili and I began to travel.  There were photos from Mexico, Carmel, Detroit, Miami, Paris.  I often didn't look so good.  

I retired, Ili left, Covid came, and the photos change.  I walked with a camera every day documenting the abandoned world.  Lots of people-less pictures.  And selfies.  My hair was blonde now, and longer.  Sometimes I looked better, sometimes not.  There were photos of my meals, my drinks, flowers, the cats.  I had made them all look so good.  

I looked through eight years of photos.  There were photos of my mother in the hospital.  Lots of them.  Two broken shoulders.  A head injury.  A broken wrist.  Lots of falls.  There was no use in looking at the last two years of photos.  They are shit.  

Then I looked at the photo the fellow took of me with the camera the other day.  Of course I'm fat.  I was fat ten years ago.  But I had a girlfriend.  Now I am just fat.  

And ten years older.  Without a life.  I look worn.  Of course I look worn.  

I don't think the sunglasses will help.  I'm glad it rained.  

So today, I think I'll watch some soccer in a bar with strangers.  That sort of sounds appealing.  They say France and Argentina are the favorites to go to the finals.  It's O.K. with me.  

"Goooooaaaaalllllllll!" 

I loved that guy.  

The Poor Get Poorer

Fifteen years ago, the world’s billionaires collectively had $4.5 trillion.  By 2024, their wealth had more than tripled to $14.2 trillion.  Now, their combined wealth totals $20.1 trillion — an amount that is equivalent to nearly a fifth of the entire world’s total yearly output.

The top 1 percent of Americans own half of all stock.

The rise of billionaires is accelerating at the same time that workers are getting a smaller share of the wealth that national economies are creating.

People complain, even "the little people," but they still dump their money into watching sports played by wealthy young men and women.  Oh, they may not be able to afford going to the stadium, but they buy all the merch and hype that keeps the corporate sports machine going.  How do you think Dana White made all that money?  It wasn't from butts in the seats.  It was everything surrounding it.  "People" are still addled--excuse me, awed--by pop stars.  We are being entertained to death.  

Whatever.  Etc. 

Trump, it seems, can only stay awake when he's talking.  He doesn't like it when other's talk, especially women.  He says they are hysterical.  Watch the "Meet the Press" interview if you want to see hysteria.  I know you already have.  Just sayin'.  

I just remembered something I meant to tell you.  

"I think I have evolved a tender, lyrical form of irony."

Somehow, though, today I think I have been unable to perform the theory.  

I shouldn't be writing.  I don't have anything to say.  I'll stop for now.  

I don't even have a song. 

X allows users over the age of 18 to view and post pornographic content that includes any body part and intercourse; Instagram prohibits the display of genitalia and visible erections.

Instagram permits men to be shirtless and show their nipples; women are not allowed to show theirs, unless they are breastfeeding or displaying their breasts in a “protest” context. But what constitutes a protest leaves room for interpretation. Instagram also has a long history of complaints by users who have had breastfeeding posts taken down.

Exposing an anus is supposed to prompt deletion. “Close-ups of visible buttocks” are also prohibited, though their definition of “close-up” is vague.

“We’re so sorry, but the prompt may violate our guardrails around nudity, sexuality, or erotic content. If you think we got it wrong, please retry or edit your prompt.”

Mentally Ill

I TOLD YOU that Trump would jinx the Knicks.  And he WAS loudly booed by the fans both inside the arena and at the watch parties around the city.  He needs to stick to MMA shit with knuckleheads and Dana White who has ridden their backs to fabulous wealth.  Those boys love 'em some cowboys and Trump.  I like cowboys, too.  We need cowboys of all kinds.  What we don't need is Trump. 

But trying to come up with a good dem alternative has become a party game.  We all know Harris will drown the party if she is nominated.  I've never heard anyone say, "Yes, Harris is the one for me."  But that is where the game begins.  Who?  People are digging deep into their political knowledge now to come up with someone.  

"Who?"

"That guy from Ohio."

We're fucked.  

But what do I know (other than about the jinx)?  I stayed up and watched the game until the end even though I said I would not, then I didn't sleep for darn all night long and I feel like I've caught something this morning.  I won't stay up to watch another game.  I'll watch the highlights in the morning.  

I think I'm coming to a realization that you all have probably come to already.  I think I might have a mental illness.  Bipolar?  Schizophrenia?  Only recently, though.  In the last few months.  It is scaring me a bit.  More than a bit, really.  I am in a life situation with only one out.  It keeps me from sleeping now. 

That and the pain in my right knee.  And apnea.  And sometimes the pain in my hip or in my back.  

I tried to make some Black Cat Liberator pictures yesterday, but not very hard.  I made a mistake and thought my house cleaners were coming, but they come on Tuesday, not Monday, and I had been waiting until mid-afternoon.  When I realized my mistake, it came like a blow.  My mind is slipping.  This is not like me.  

By the time I realized, though, the afternoon was passing and the sun was hot, and rather than lugging around that monstrous camera, I went to get a French soda instead.  Around three, I headed off to the photo lab to drop off the film I had already shot.  I needed to take one more picture, though, before I took the film holders in, so I took the camera out in the parking lot behind the lab and made a picture of the T.G. Lee Dairy building across the street.  As I was preparing the camera, a tattooed man came walking across the parking lot.  

"Whoa!"

I knew he was admiring the camera.  I said hello, focussed, pulled the dark slide, and hit the shutter button.  Then I let him see the camera.  As most people are, especially photographers, he was fascinated.  We talked for awhile, and I told him about Minnicks, the madman who made the camera.  He put the camera on top of his car and took some phone snaps, then when he handed the camera back to me, he asked if I would mind if he took a picture of me holding it.  What could I say?  I gave him my phone number so he could send the photo to me.  

I put the camera up and went inside with the film, six color and two black and white 4x5 sheets of what might be mystery film.  A woman at the counter before me had a big bag of 35mm film rolls.  She was explaining that the film was twenty years old.  Her mother had cancer and spent the last three months of her life driving around the country taking photographs.  The film hadn't been developed.  

"Is it still any good?"

The counter boy hemmed and hawed and said there may not be anything on the rolls.  It would cost her $580 to have all the film processed.  The woman said she would start with three rolls.  

"I hope those turn out," I said.  "They will be spectacular, I'm sure."

"Was your mother a photographer?" asked the counter man.  

"My father was a cinematographer," she said.  

I wanted to ask her if I could see the results, but I didn't.  What I did suggest, though, was that she might want to try developing some of the black and white rolls, too, as they had a better chance of turning out.  

"Our black and white is down right now," said the counter man.  I guess that is why he took the color rolls first.  

He gave me a form to fill out for my film, and when he rang it up, I owed $68.  That was over $8/sheet.  I usually process my own, but I'm trying to get through all the mystery film first.  After this, though, yea. . . I'll be processing the film on my own.  

If I keep the camera.  As curious as people are about it, it is hard to use and heavy and the chances of making a good picture can be really slim.  And yet. . . when you do. . . . 

Back in the car, I decided to look at the photo the fellow had taken of me.  I think that is when the mental illness really kicked in.  Is that what I look like to other people?  Holy shit.  Holy shit.  I wanted to cry. 

"Help!  Fire!  Help!!!!"

It is everything I have feared.  I don't really look all that bad, but I don't look like I think I do, either.  The photo sent me into a downward spiral.  

My mountain buddy had called earlier while I thought I was waiting for the maids.  

"Do you think I'm a good father?" he half-joked.  He ran through some scenarios concerning one of his sons.  Maybe I would handle things differently, but I don't have to.  He asked how I was doing.  I went through my list of woes.  His mother is the same age as mine and is having a parallel experience right now.  But he is 3,000 miles away, and he has two brothers and a sister to help his father who is 95 and still taking care of his wife.  My buddy has his own family as do his siblings, so there is much shared responsibility.  And. . .  there is beaucoup money.  More than they need.  There is no way I can convey what I am going through alone.  Nobody gets it.  They can't.  You don't know what if feels like to drown until you are drowning.  Nor would you want to.  You just know the word and that it is bad and that you don't want to do it.  

I'm drowning. 

Yes. . . I think I have become mentally ill.  There is no good future in my sight.  There is only one exit.  

Still, if I don't look a the photos people take of me, I can almost pretend.  And if I think of photo projects, I can still pretend, too.  I want to make this swimming pool series.  The one at the top is just an iPhone snap I made at a wedding.  

I don't know why, really, but a swimming pool represents something to me, part aspirational, The American Dream.  This abandoned pool says something, too.  

I doubt that I will ever seriously pursue it, though, or anything else.  When I lie down at night, it all begins running through my head.  

I went through some of my photos in a file the other day.  I have some good ones.  Are they?  They seem really good.  Don't they?  Then I see other images, the famous ones, and I think, "Fool."  

Maybe I've had a mental illness longer than I've known.  

But seriously--this album cover photo sucks.  It is horrible.  Hokey.  It doesn't pay tribute to the music.  I swear I could have made something so much better.  I do know that.  

But you may find the music a bit hokey, too.  I am ever and always a fool for a samba.  It reminds me of swimming pools.  

Mormons, Trump, and the Broken Vertical Blind

I have new photos, but when I look at them, I just want to throw them in the trash; however, I may have new photos soon.  Maybe.  I broke out the big Black Cat super camera yesterday and made a few pictures.  Nothing of any note.  I just want to find out if I am ever going to use it or if I should sell it.  I have gotten better at the technical part, I think, but the thing is big, awkward, and heavy.  The middle of my back got worn out using it yesterday in very little time.  But I am determined to make sixteen photos with it before I decide.  My main problem right now is not really knowing what film is in the film holders.  They are labelled with colored stick on dots, but I am no longer sure what those dots mean.  I am guessing.  Once I shoot through all the mystery film, I will reload them all with the same film so that there is no mistake.  Then begins the sixteen photo project.  Last night, lying in bed, I convinced myself I would use it to make stranger portraits.  I would pretend to be deaf and dumb and hand people cards saying "May I Take Your Picture" on one side and "I Will Give You A Dollar" on the other.  No shit--it seemed like a capital idea at the time.  I would just grin with the big-assed camera on my shoulder and a dollar bill in my hand.  It seemed a sure bet.  

But I was probably drunk.  I had made spaghetti and asparagus for dinner and had been drinking red red wine and was on my first scotch while cleaning up the kitchen when the doorbell rang.  I was at the kitchen window and could see it was Mormon Missionaries.  Surely you know what that is.  You've seen them riding bicycles wearing white shirts and ties.  Yes, those are the ones.  My mother is a Mormon.  

"Mom," I said, "some missionary boys are here.  Entertain them in the living room while I clean up." 

She had the look of a cornered rat.  She wants me to sit with her whenever people come over, but I wasn't in any mood to do that.  I had just broken a vertical blind slat that my mother asked me to try to fix because it was not lining up properly. They never do, and she has had the neighborhood men come in to try to fix them when I am not here so that I am silently shamed. I HATE vertical blinds and my mother's imperious ways and was too forceful when I turned it and it snapped.  Now I was pissed off at my life and at the world.  I went to answer the door.  

"Hello, boys. . . come in.  My mother will be right with you."

I went back to the kitchen as my mother hobbled by.  As I washed the dishes, I could hear them talking to her and then repeating what they had just said, and then asking if she heard what they said.  I let this go on for five minutes until I heard them say something about leaving, so I walked into the room.  

"It's nice of you to stop by and see my mother for a couple minutes," I said leaving out the shitty part about how it must make them feel good and righteous.  "My mother has been giving her ten percent tithing to the church her whole life.  She is a Christian and a True Believer," I said knowing that some do not believe the Mormons to be Christians which came as a shock to my mother, "and anytime the church wants to build another annex or a new building, they come and put the touch on my mother.  Now she could use some help.  She would like to go to church on Sundays, and it seems to me that maybe someone could take her and bring her home, and maybe there are activities she could join in during the week."

The boys were now wearing perma-grins and pop-eyes.  

"What do you think?"

"Yes, uh. . . I think we can arrange for a ride to church.  I don't really know what activities they have. . . . "

"That's great.  I appreciate you guys and love you," I said.  "Her friends from the church are all very sweet and she appreciates them."

They said they would come back on Friday to see my mother.  

"Is six o'clock good?"

"Fuck no, man, that's Happy Hour.  We'll be balls deep in the liquor bottle by then!"

Of course that isn't quite what I said.  I told them that was dinner hour and that my mother didn't stay up much later, the second part being a big fat lie, and that mid-afternoon would be perfect.  And so, they said, that is when they would come.  I gave them more gratitude and love and saw them to the door.  

When they were gone, I looked at my mother.  She looked like she had just walked through a hurricane.  

"How was that?  Was that O.K.?"

"Yes."

"I didn't come on too strong?"

"No.  You know how to do things I don't."

"O.K. then.  You'll be going to church from now on.  Good news."

I don't know if that is really what she hoped for, but I am weary of her complaints.  My life is shit, what little I have, and my last years will be spent caring for my mother, cooking, cleaning, driving her to her many appointments, taking her to banks and insurance companies, etc., and still feeling guilty when she complains about the misery of her life.  And then I will die and she will have to find another caretaker.  

I think it was snapping off the vertical blind that did it.  This morning I looked it up, though, and found I can either buy another one for $45 or I can order a repair kit on Amazon for a few bucks.  That is a bit of a relief.  

But I still hate the fuckers.  

All the sports world is abuzz about the N.Y. Knicks, up two games to none over the San Antonio Spurs.  Swept them two games on their own home court.  Now tonight the series heads to New York, and fans are rooting for a four game sweep and a championship.  But Donald Trump is going to tonight's game sitting nearly courtside, and he will be a curse.  He is definitely going to jinx the Knicks, and it would be a miracle if they could overcome that.  The crowd will be booing Trump, I think, though it may be made up of rich republicans as tickets are going for tens of thousands of dollars.  

Still, I believe in the jinx.  Trump gold is all gilt.  He can turn anything precious into shit.  

I don't think I'll watch.  

Well. . . you know the drill.  My mother is up and sitting at the kitchen table waiting for me to make some breakfast.  I think I'll put on some music this morning and try to pretend I'm going to do something fun.  Here's one that reminds me of The Beach Boys.  21st Century Beach Boys.  Hell, that would be a good band.  

Half Gone

Again, my photo from the "A Few Days One Summer" series colorized with an overlay.  I think it's Groovy and gets us away from the controversies of the past couple days, though I must say, it is something that the Freud painting drew no ire but the A.I. image did.  Selavy.  

I read an article about people who spontaneously produce alcohol in the gut and become drunk.  It is called ABS syndrome (link).  It seems almost a superpower.  It made me think of the condition where people just suddenly burst into flames, spontaneous human combustion.  I was dismayed to find that there is no science behind that idea, that it is pseudoscience.  There is, however, the Wick Effect where people's body fat melts and they will burn like a candle for hours.  

I would like for RFK jr. to weigh in on this.  I'm sure he has some ideas.  

I've been dreaming crazy shit the past few nights.  A girl I know has been in a few.  They seem too real, and when I wake up, I am dazed and confused.  These dreams haunt my waking hours.  

I've lost track of time.  I can't believe we are more than halfway through this year.  I have done nothing but prepare meals and medications and cleaned up after.  The year is just disappearing like sand through a giant sieve.  

"What day is it?"

"I'm not sure."

"Look on your phone."

"It's Sunday."

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know.  Maybe we should have mimosas."

"Let me look. . . yea. . . we have everything."

"So what do you want to do?"

"Who are you talking to?"

"You, I guess.  It's your story.  You're writing it."

"I guess we can have mimosas, then.  I can't think of anything else."

"O.K.  Let's have mimosas."

Do Not Enter

Well, I got my ears boxed by the Blog Gods again yesterday within minutes of posting.  If you couldn't see the post, it doesn't matter.  Actually, it might be a good thing.  I don't think I'm fit company for polite society anymore.  But here's what confuses me about getting spanked yesterday.  I can post a nude painting by Lucien Freud without any trouble at all.  

I think.  We'll see.  But this image is posted online everywhere.  It is published in magazines and newspapers.  O.K.  It is, I guess, not considered. . . I am not sure. . . real?  But when I post an A.I. produced image, how is it different?  It isn't "real" either.  I don't get what moral grounds are being followed there.  

I hope this doesn't offend anyone.  I was going to reverse yesterday's 1950s ethos (that ran all the way through The Craig Ferguson Show) by turning things around, or maybe please Progressives and make the image with two women, but I figure why push my luck?  

The "right" has always favored censorship.  Now that the "left" does, too, we are a better country.  People should not be allowed to offend anyone.  

I have thought about moving the whole blog to Substack.  They censor nothing there.  It is still a kind of "Wild West" situation.  I'm pretty sure, however, that sooner or later, that will change.  It will probably be due to economics.  

The 1960s was a goofy, failed attempt at "Peace, Love, and Understanding."  It was hijacked by capitalists and drug dealers.  Pretty much the same thing.  

I didn't feel like cooking yesterday, and I had a bright idea.  I'd go to the good Mexican place and get takeout, and while I was waiting, I'd have a spicy, skinny margarita.  I used to go there a lot when I wasn't living with my mother and the bartenders knew my friends and I.  T is a talker.  I'm the quiet one.  I haven't been to the place for maybe five or six months.  The last time I was there was an early dinner with T.  There was a new barmaid, pretty, from Brazil.  Another bartender, a tatted up Brazilian boy T dubbed "Cannello" was also there.  T chatted them up as he always does.  I just kept looking at the barmaid.  She had bright eyes and most spectacular cheekbones.  So I told her.  

When I walked in at 4:30, being Friday, the bar was already filling up.  There are two bars that face one another, one inside the restaurant and one outside.  When I sat down, Cannello was there.  

"What can I get you, my friend?"

"My friend," is what the boys say.  The girls always call you "Mi amore."  

I ordered and looked around.  Two women were sitting at the outside bar.  They looked expensive, and not in a hooker way.  But who knows anymore?  They were a mixed couple, one white and one black.  The white woman was wearing expensive sunglasses, but I could see she was staring at me.  She looked familiar.  She was a true beauty, exquisite hair and nails and the smoothest most lovely skin you might imagine.  I, on the other hand, looked like me, and I was getting a little uncomfortable.  

Just then, though, the barmaid came from the other end of the bar where she was making service drinks.  

"Hello!" she beamed.  It was the Brazilian with the great cheekbones.  I was feeling very unattractive that day, and so my response wasn't really what it should have been.  But she stayed and talked a bit.  She remembered everything about our conversation five or six months ago.  I was stunned.  I stumbled through it all and motioned to my cheeks.  She smiled.

"I have put on some weight, I think.  They do not show so much."

"Yes, that was the first things I noticed.  I said, my god, she has put on so much weight."

She laughed and went back to the other end of the bar.  

The woman outside was still keeping me in her line of vision.  And then it clicked.  I think she was a girl I had taught in a film class oh-so long ago.  Was it?  I did the math in my head.  It was not long after I got divorced, after Sky left town, but before the gig at Country Club College?  Man, my timelines were getting skewed.  I couldn't remember, but if this was the same person, that was twenty years ago.  I don't think this woman was nearing forty.  No, not a chance.  So. . . what?  

Maybe I was wrong.  Maybe she was a hooker.  There are plenty in this town.  A plethora you might say.  

I was glad when the food came and I could bolt.  I'm not used to being in public now.  Pinhead Quasimodo just wants to hide in the belfry.  

I tell too much, but I have kept back a lot of "unsavory" details here.  The girl from long ago had asked me for a favor I had not been willing to grant.  She did not take it so very well.  

Maybe that is why I had the dream I had last night that has unnerved me this morning.  But, as I say, I tell too much sometimes, or show too much, or lie too much, or tell too many truths.  

I should stick to simply opining.  People are used to that.  It is what has replaced the news.  

O.K.  We'll see what the Blogger Gods have to say about this one.  One day they may just pull the plug and I'll have no way to tell you where I have gone.  I should be careful.  As Homer Simpson told Bart, "Don't say anything unless you're certain everyone agrees."

"Now Who in the World Would Want a Picture Like That?"

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All Right, Then. . . .

Both my mother and I have those split sinks, the ones with the divider.  I hate the things.  Funny, though--I bought mine when I remodeled the kitchen when we bought the house.  Mine is an enamelled cast iron sink weighing several tons.  My mother's was here when she bought the house, a light metal thing.  Neither side in either of our sinks is large enough to wash large pots or baking pans.  It was only this morning that I realized why they even make the double-basin sink.  It comes from the Ozzie and Harriet days when people washed dishes on one side and rinsed them on the other.  Duh.  

"O.K. boys, why don't you help your mother out and wash the dishes tonight."

"O.K., dad."

"David and Ricky are really good kids, aren't they Ozzie."

"You bet they are."

Sometimes I hand wash dishes here, but just like everything else I do, it is half-assed.  They are never as clean as when they go into the dishwasher.  Sometimes afterwards I'll find something stuck to a knife I just washed.  And did you know that a dishwasher uses less water than hand washing?  It is true.  Use the Google.  

I wish I'd have bought the old farm kitchen sink instead, but changing mine would be hard and expensive.  My mother's on the other hand. . . . 

Sometimes I think I'm smart, then I find out otherwise.  

I said goodbye to T yesterday.  As things go, closing on his house took longer than expected, so mid-afternoon, I figured I wouldn't hear from him about getting together.  I was sitting in the cafe sipping on my lavender French soda--I couldn't believe it, but the counter woman working that day was not the one who made the last one for me, but she knew how to make them.  When I asked her if she did, she looked at me like I was a fool and said, "Of course."  Lavender was an alright choice, too.  I will take a tour of all the flavors eventually just to see.  I thought about buying the fixings and making them at home, but I decided against it.  I'd make too many and burn out on them.  No, it is better to go to the cafe to get myself a treat.  

I was just writing all of that in my journal when my phone rang.  It was T.  2:30 p.m.  

"What's up?"

"I'm at that Cafe Strange sucking down a French soda."

"I'm on my way to pick up my checks."

"Why didn't you just have the deposit them in your account?"

"I've had them split the money up into four checks that are going different places, into different LLC accounts.  Are we still going to get something to eat?"

"Man, I thought we were going to get together early."

"Yea, I got caught up.  I got a room at the Hyatt.  I have to hook the trailer up and take it over there, shower. . . I can be ready by six."

I hesitated.  "That's too late for me.  I've got to . . . "

"I know.  Don't worry, it's O.K."

"You'll have to call Black Sheep."

"Yea, he's been blowing up my phone all day."

"I'll call you later on," I said.  

I felt relieved in some ways.  A long farewell dinner. . . . 

After the cafe, I went back to my house to pick up my things--remember, I live out of a travel bag--and head to the grocers.  I was making pho and I would have to boil the drumsticks for awhile.  Then I remembered that T and his wife had given me an InstaPot that I had taken to my mother's.  Oh, yea.  I'd pressure cook them.  Perfect.  

It was four when I left my house.  I was just turning by Country Club College when the phone rang.  It was T.  He thought he might need help putting the trailer on the bumper hitch now that it was full.  I made the detour to his house to help.  

But when I got there, he had a jack under the trailer tongue and was preparing to hoist it.  

"Country boy shit," he grinned.  He backed his $100,000 pick up truck that "can pull down a house," got out and jacked the trailer tongue up just high enough to drop onto the ball hitch.  I didn't have to do anything.

Except say goodbye.  

"Ain't your house anymore," I said.  

"Nope." 

"You have to feel some relief that all this is over with."

He nodded.

"Alright.  I got to run."

"Yea.  I'll be back at the end of July."

We shook hands. 

"I'll call you later after dinner, amigo."

We left it like that, like we would parting after a night out, talk to you later, etc.  But driving away, I knew I was down yet another friend.  I've run out of people to call when I need something.  Physical or mental.  I could feel the void.  

At the grocers, I got the things I needed.  Chicken legs, garlic, ginger, cilantro, basil, scallions, jalapenos, avocado, bean sprouts, mushrooms, hoisin sauce, and. . . shit, piss, fuck. . . they had duck sauce and oyster sauce but no fish sauce.  Whatever.  I've never used it in pho before but read it was highly recommended.  Well, not tonight.  

A bottle of Vouvray.  

When I got back to my mother's, I had to get started right away.  I chopped garlic and ginger to saute.  I had the burner on to heat the pan before I put in the olive oil as I've read I should do.  As I cut the ginger, I smelled something odd.  I turned to the stove and saw that I had turned on the wrong burner, the one that I had laid the top of the Instapot on.  The plastic was burning.  HOLY SHIT!  I picked it up and saw the melted plastic.  Had I ruined it?  Would it still work?  This was me all over.  A brand new, never used Instapot and I fucked it up.  I let the plastic cool, then I put the lid on the pot.  It went on.  The damage was only cosmetic.  

Phew! as they used to say in the days of double-basin sinks.  

I sauteed the ginger and garlic, and. . . shit, piss, wtf?  I'd forgotten to buy chicken stock.  I ran to the pantry to see if there was any in the house.  Oh, yea. . . there were several boxes of organic stock that T had given me when he was cleaning out the kitchen.  Real stock, not the Swanson shit that is fake.  Nope . Good old T.  The pho was on him tonight.  

Stock and wine, salt and pepper, chicken legs, red pepper, the sauteed things and the sliced scallions.  I set it for half an hour.  Poured a glass of wine and went to sit with my mother to tell her about my day, to hear about hers. 

"You're going to miss your friend, aren't you." 

"Yup." 

Now when I needed something, I was on my own.  Me and mom.  

I went back inside to check on things.  I cut the avocado, opened the bag of bean sprouts, tore the cilantro and basil leaves, chopped the green parts of the scallions.  I took the chicken from the pot and put in the mushrooms.  When the drumsticks had cooled enough, I pulled off the meat and chopped it into small pieces and put it back into the pot.  I boiled the noodles.  

"Hey. . . dinner's ready."

I'm getting better at making pho all the time.  This was the best I'd made yet.  

"You're a good cook," my mother offered.  

"Sometimes." 

I was that night.  

After dinner, my mother said she needed something from the pharmacy.  Benadryl.  My mother takes more drugs than anybody I've ever known.  She gets 40 mg of oxy a day and still takes over the counter pain pills and things to make her sleep.  I think it is clear that drugs will not kill you.  I've always been afraid of them, but I'm beginning to believe that I have been wrong.  

It was eight o'clock and beautiful out.  I am nearly never out of the house at eight o'clock anymore, and it felt good.  I felt like running, just revving the engine and never looking back.  I remembered for a minute what living felt like again.  

"Run, baby. . . just run."

There are still a thousand places I want to go.  I don't let myself think about it much, but the desire now was like a flood.  Rather, I parked the car and walked across the lot in the golden light.  I got the benadryl.  Then I stepped next door and got a bottle of scotch.  

After a little t.v., both my mother and I were ready for an early bedtime.  

I didn't call T.  

I slept and had glorious dreams.  There were women.  There was travel. I took fantastic pictures.  The last image I had as I woke late after nine and a half hours was of a woman in that basic carnival mask and a white dress on her hands and knees atop a washer and dryer, a man's torso in the foreground, back to camera, looking at her.  A brightly lighted scene.  Probably using well placed strobe flashes.  

I opened my eyes.  Yes! Why have I yet to make that photo?  

And that was the start to my day.  I'll fix no breakfast this morning.  In a little while, I will take my mother to a distant bank to renew some CDs.  Then we will go to TooJays, a deli restaurant, for lunch, and I will get what I always get there (Rain Man), a pastrami/corned beef sandwich with coleslaw.  

A big outing.  

OK, kids, that's the report.  I've yet to hear back from the Leiter Foundation.  If I don't hear something this week, I will write to them again, tell them that I am going to publish the article one way or another and that their silence on the matter will become a centerpiece of the story.  

No I won't.  I'll just beg.  

I wish there were still big clubs that had stages and big bands like they did in the "Thin Man" movies.  I'd love to go sit at a table and order drinks.  I'd go every night. 

It doesn't matter, though.  I couldn't go anyway.