The kid who works down at my local Korean liquor store has become more and more open with me. His family took over the store eight months ago, and they are experiencing severe difficulties. Among other things that they are losing the store for lack of receipts. Apparently no one is buying beer and cigarettes there - besides myself. Some afternoons when I drop in the store he is very despondent. He won't look up at me. He just says that things are going shit.
I found out yesterday his father is sick with Pneumonia. He's been hospitalized for a month. So the kid can't go to school. He has to stay at the store with his mom. And it's pretty obvious she can't watch the store alone. I've hung out and kicked it with him a few times; for twenty or so minutes. Standing out in the parking lot with the dogs. You get a feel for what it's like to run a store on that block. It's pretty random who will walk up on Fountain street, or turn into the parking lot. Fountain is not anybody's local street. It's carrying fast-moving, random L.A. fools. Going from one dicey deed to another.
Yesterday he went out to the family mini-van and got a bracelet he wanted to show me. It was white plastic, three inches wide and it had his photo, his name, and a bar-code on it. It was from the California Youth Authority. He wore it the whole time he was in a maximum security lock-up in Sylmar - for two years. 23 hours a day in lock-down.
He's telling me all this. Waiting for me to ask why; who; where; when. I just held his look and listened. Neither encouraging nor discouraging him from going on.
He was incarcerated at the facility in Sylmar for shooting three guys when he was 15. That's what got him two years in juvi-max. He's dying to tell someone what he did and what happened to him for it.
In my earlier visits to the liquor-mart, he'd shared with me that his ambition was to join the LAPD and become a K-9 handler. I was considering this while he related to me the shooting incident. I didn't have the heart to tell him that he will NEVER work in law enforcement. Not with such a conviction as a triple shooting (three mexicans, all shot in the balls, all survived).
Crazy yes? He recounted to me the whole story about the night that it happened. On the corner of 26th street and Western where his family was living at the time. He says that he had guns pulled on him numerous times in that hood, before he started carrying his friends 38 cal. revolver.

I'm thinking about suggesting that he join the army next year. He could talk to a recruiter about dog-handling, and the military's avenues for that. My point was that he could get a $15,000 sign-up bonus, which would help his folks QUICK. And if he gets sent to the gulf, he'd get danger-pay. Probably send home $4000/month. In peacetime I'm sure the military would never take a guy with that on his youth record. But the military is experiencing extenuating circumstances. And he's brave. He's that guy. He'd always told me how much fire he's got. And there I thought he was only trying to impress me. He says he's not afraid of anybody. Apparently, least of all himself. That's part of his problem. The army could help that. A crime against society, such as he committed, even as a minor, perhaps could only be offset socially by an honorable military service. He may even have a chance to work in law enforcement afterwards, if he can garner a few medals. I think even then it's unlikely. But the private sector has a lot of openings in the for veterans in the security field. He has to turn his life around. I can see that so clearly. The way he is now I feel that there is no place for him in this society.
I don't think he's a psychopath. More of a sociopath. In the story he told me, the guys cornered him and pulled a knife. I believe it. I don't think he's a liar. He doesn't take drugs. He's no "G". Some kind of moral purist? Will not back down. Like a samurai. Very bad tact here in the western world. But certainly appealing to the philosphers. There are many cultures in which it is perfectly okay to shoot someone who corners you in the street at night. Can you imagine Pakistan? Honor still exists and plays out in deadly contests all over the world. And right here in L.A. for some young men. Crazy. Maybe we're all crazy.
He didn't need to shoot anybody. That's what comes to my mind. Of course I wasn't there. I'm not there in his head. I don't live in West Adams. But once he pulled the gun, he probably could have *cooled* the situation just by pulling the hammer back. No, wait a minute... That would heat it up. Pulling back the hammer would cool those guys who had confronted him, but it would heat up the situation. There's a big difference there. A street confrontation is never cool.
But it's doubtful he needed to plug all three of his assailants. A shot fired into the sidewalk would set anybody to scrambling over fences, praying aloud to the very Madre de Dios.
But they'd be back. Guys like that always come back. Otherwise they can't show their faces on the street. They'd come back in a car. With a gun. And they would pop a cap into his Korean ass.

I fear for this kid. And I fear for his family. And I fear for his future adversaries. He's extremely frustrated. And he's so smart. He reads constantly. More than any 17 year old I've ever met. He's learned everything about dogs. Workdogs generally. Protection dogs - specifically. That was his dramatic realization about his life. He told me this. That he discovered what he loved in life, while he was in youth lock-up. He wants to train dogs and become a K-9 handler for the LAPD swat team.
Today I am going to ask him if I may give his mother some flowers from my garden. Honorably of course. I can't have this kid thinking that I'm pimping on his old lady. I empathize most with her. Her husband is very sick. Her son is a convicted violent youth offender. He's unable to attend school because he's stuck in store until midnight every day. And he has to deal with a steady stream of drunks, vatos and assholes. And he's still too hot. It's like the net is closing around them.

Cold here. Cold and damp.
Everything stopped, a week ago. It got really quiet

It's easy to forget that every day is a new day.
Another day. Another chance to make an entrance.

Cold. I don't say that very much. Don't encounter it much. I was trying to explain to someone, the cosmic pivot between what makes things hot or cold. Can everything be reduced to one or the other of the two. Hot. It's how you describe a firearm that has a live round in it. When working with electricity a hot conductor - is just what it sounds like. It's live. Like a body. When I want the plaster I mix to set up faster, I use accelerants. Mix them in. It's called hot mud. Things that are hot are things that are ready to give up their heat. Physics man.

Cold is an altogether different thing. An unconscionable deed. That's cold. A handgun. Is cold. They always are. I once had a Super Black Leatherman. When those multi-tools were first breaking out. No longer just confined to film technicians. I had this bad-ass black one. It came with a black cordura belt pouch. A camera assistant I was working with remarked as soon as I took it out on set. He was a black guy from D.C. Very cool. Damn that's cold, he said admiring the black ninja tool.

Salesmen know hot and cold. They know it real good. Everyone knows it. My hands are cold right now. Sex is hot. Death is cold.

It occurs to me I'd rather have,
Somewhere else to go.
Somewhere sacred and windy,
Sanctified. Not this cafe.

Wanting to be free of my own life,
A freak in that sense.
Crazy eyes. Wild, drug-
crazed.

My life is a prison. My head,
Is four walls of a cell,
And saying so don't make it,
Any other way.

There's a clown in me, that wants
to bring laughter to faces,
and music and trust. Not,
The rifle and its ten cartridges.

What happened today?
It didn't seem so different.
I awoke afraid, clutching,
Sheets to my body for warmth.

And i opened the letter.
The indictment.
The hand grenade, that you,
My enemy sent for my betrayal.

I made eye contact with,
A little black dog.
And I wanted to,
Start a family.

But it was intercepted,
By good people, who take
every damn thing,
To sustain their goodness.

(I wrote this in the winter of 2000. Don't remember anything else)

Rain. So much rain.

It started two days ago and I was not ready for it. I idled away the summer days. I fixed a gutter and tried out some drainage theories here and there. But when the rain came it was in sheets. There was hale too. The walls creaked all during this.
I have to explain. This house for the most part has no foundation. It was not meant to last this long. It was just a stick house on a big lot near the Disney and Max Sennet studios. Back when all the studios were on the east side. It was probably a house for some mechanic or other studio contractor.
Then the 1960s and 1970s happened. The little wooden bungalow got a coat of stucco and heavy steel bars on every window. Hardly a dime was put into the upkeep. Along the way they got the bright idea to back-fill the lot to achieve some level ground. carted in earth mixed with cement and broken pipes. Leveled it to the side of the house. Right up to the gunwales.
And when the rains come the earth gets much heavier. So much so that it has nudged the house a few inches down the hill. I figured it all out while i was jacking it up two years ago.
Rain. Los Angeles is a basin. A hillside's natural state is to be wash. An arroyo. Seco in the summer. Flash flood in the rains.

I put on my raingear and went out to survey the house's ability to withstand rain. That's really the measure of a house isn't it? That dryness. O so elusive.
It was bad. Pools of water against the side of the house. Various gutters were rusted and blocked. Cracked and leaking. The roof of this 1000 sq/ft house displaces an amazing amount of water in one of these flash rains. I worked through the rain and most of the afternoon unblocking gutters and trying to divert some of that natural fury.

Later on the sun came out, and while having a smoke I started stacking some rocks and broken pieces of cement tile in the front yard. I don't know why. I squatted down and started stacking upward. Finding the balance. I did several little pagan towers. It's a wonderful thing to do. I began to think about rock-stacking vacations. Go camping in places with a good supply of rocks and build cairns like that.

Rainwater and rocks. I don't know man.

I'm awake kind of early this morning. It's a big day. I'm stepping up from Gaffer to Director of Photograhy for the last two days of this film. My boss had to go away and do a union commercial, and so he is leaving me to complete the photography.

The cool thing is that we are shooting film rather than video or HD. It's 35mm with sprocket holes. So I get to look through a glass eye-piece rather than a grainy little video picture. I realized yesterday when Keith had me operating shots on the Arri BL-IV, that the ground glass viewing system of a film camera is its real advantage over HD video. You see the real thing.

It was ten years ago that I finished school and set out to become a cinematographer. I went to work as an electric to learn the basics of lighting, and then ten years was gone. That's how long it took before I was asked to shoot. Had I known that starting out, I probably would have pursued another career. But no matter. This is where I am. This is all I know how to do.

The first question of the morning will be: WHERE DO YOU WANT THE CAMERA?
Then: WHAT LENS DO YOU WANT UP?

And then get the grips and electrics moving. Come up with an idea for the lighting. Maybe go handheld, or on the dolly.

So I'm awake early. This is kind of important. There are so few shots in this business.

I can't believe I never told the story about going to play paintball in Long Island. For a bachelor party it was. So damn funny. I only knew one or two of the guys. Well maybe more. They were mostly all New York construction guys. They're all Haley's crew. Make their living doing big budget remodels in manhattan. I'd worked on a couple of jobs with some of them. Then there were three quiet guys from San francisco, touring with a band. They were friends of Noah. The guy for whom the bachelor party was being held.
We met up at the rallye point at 9am. A polish diner on Bedford Avenue in Williamsburgh. All the guys turned up in tuxedos. Except me of course. That was the gag for the day. To dress up for a party and then play paintball. It was kind of amazing I'd never played before. I know a lot of guys here in LA who play it. They even own their own guns and pouches. Tactical webbing you could say. I really had no idea what to expect. I was aware of an ongoing question I'd considered. If i would do well at this simulated combat. Or just get rolled. Untested.

A limousine picked us up fore the long drive out to long island. It was. So stupid. A super-stretch Ford excursion. Seating for twenty people. Probably weighed 15,000 lbs. We brought along war movies to play on the limousine's DVD. And we brought beer. Budweiser cans. The floor of the limo was covered with cases. Glug glug glug. Smoking reefer. It was very overcast and sultry. Mid august. The limousine was careening about, getting onto the Long island expressway.

I really notcied that once you're out of NYC, Long island seems extremely conservative. A lot of American flags. We suppprt our troops. That stuff. Little wooden houses. We got hit.

The painball range, if that's what you call it, is run by a burly, mustached Vietnam vet. When you turn into the gravel parking lot, the first sight is a POW/MIA flag. You are not forgotten. It was totally Soldier of Fortune. They issued us paintball guns and Scott moto-cross goggles. the kind with a plastic mouthguard. The kids who worked at the place sized us up. All drunk like that and wearing tuxedos. The site has half a dozen football fiewld-sized combat ranges. each one has partcular battlefield conditions. We decided to start with the WWII scenario. It was littered with upside-down jeeps, and half-tracks. In the middle of the field was a tower. It obviously had an unobstrutced line of fire on the rest of the field. I tried to take everything in. I was kind of serious about the whole thing. I think every man was.
"Test your guns!" the referee yelled out.
We all began to plink away at the side of a decrepit, olive-painted semi-trailer. TACK TACK TACK TACK. The guns went. Wow I thought. they're really accurate.
The driver of the limousine which took us out there and would wait to take us back to the city was a middle-aged Egyptian guy named Ali. We beckoned him to play with us. He refused. Graciously and smiling. Obviously he was a professional. His job was to drive the limo, make money for some other Egyptian guy, and then get the thing back. A bunch of drunks playing simulated combat probably looked like way to get into a lot of shit and screw up his job. I sure know that feeling. But nevertheless we would not leave him alone. He finally capitulated. Graciously, smiling and self-deferential. They gave him a pair of dark blue mechanics coveralls to protect his shirt and tie.
And of course he was totally badass. He was one of the last guys left. He'd been in the army in Egypt. He sought the best cover. And then hunkered down. picking guys off. When the yellow, .51 cal. ball hits you, it breaks and leaves a gooey, water based yellow ink. And then you're out.
My best performance was street fighting. In a little simulated western town, with false building fronts on both sides of a street. I charged. Took ground. Pinned those motheruckers down. Rolled 'em. Like Audie murphy.

There was a woodland battlefield as well. That was fun. We did it twice. Had two battles. It turned out that the team which began with the high ground was pretty much invincible. There were trenches dug which we could hunker down behind. But if you stuck your head above the earthen edge of the ground-cut it gets hit by three paintballs. TACK TACK TACK.

Withering fire.

We were going to finish up the afternoon in the WWI battleground. A labyrinth of 7' deep trenches. Complete with mucky puddles at the bottom. Heavily overcast day. Tired. It was disorienting. I got plugged in the head pretty early on. That time I kept fighting. I cheated.
We were going to turn it in. Hand over the paintball rifles to the quarter-master. We walked past an undeveloped paintball pitch, behind chain link and tennic court netting. Something about the falt, dead grass plaineness caught our attention. We asked what it was for. They said it was to be a destroyed airfield. They were waiting to get the fuselage of a C-47 and a few other aircraft hulks.
At that moment i had a great isspireation. I suggested we do a revolutionary war style-fight. 18th century style. Each team walks up to the other in a line. Each man takes aim. Fire. The other poor chaps do the same. Some fall. We lined up at opposite ends of the field. I began to bawl the orders like a cockney Hussar. The kind of guy with a 2' tall furry hat, chinstrapped and mustached. Stationed in Lahorre for 15 years. Salty.
RI-FLES FORWARD!!!!!!
TAKE AIM!!!!!!
(come on you guys let's look valiant here)
FIRE!!!!!!

Plink plink plink. And some fell. We made a big show of dying valiantly. I fell over like a tree. just let myself crash. I was totally drunk and covered with mud anyways. A crowd gathered to watch us. Lampooning war. They were all super gung-ho paintabllers. They owned their own rifles and extra magazines and air pouches. We all made a big show of dying and drying out on the lonely battlefield. Theatre. Fuckin-A.

Noticed something new recently. They're reconfiguring all these banks in L.A. Two of the Washington Mutual branches I've visited this week had high-tech new security systems installed. Whereas before you would barge right in and nod to the security guard before getting into the long line: Now you wait in a long line outside, to pass through a smoked glass vestibule with a metal detector in it. Each person in turn at the head of the line waits for a little green light to flash before they can be scanned. Only one person can pass through at a time. I don't know. It gave me pause. I'm a talkative bastard. So I was asking the others in line around me what they thought about it. Didn't get far with those impatient people.
So what's this about? Just a cheaper way to ensure the banks security from stick-up men? Or are they expecting some kind of new threat? I'm always looking for the ways in which the new security order plays out here in the states. I remember that banks in Paris always had heavily armed guards. In Chile they were practically sand-bagged. I wonder if thing are becoming more desperate here.
The other interesting thing I chanced upon was a fleet of stealth locomotives. Well, not exactly. I should begin at the beginning. Myself and a friend were biking yesterday along the LA river around where it goes by Elysian Park. The unofficial bike path we found took us through the greasy-smelling wonder of a Union Pacific locomotive shop. Imagine a field of yellow and grey monster locomotives, rumbling and rolling backwards, or idling with heat shimmers off their steel rooves. Against a background of wilting palm trees. It was cool.
My attention was seized by 12 or 16 newly-painted loc's. Not in the yellow/grey UP livery, but in solid naval grey. They had no markings on the side. There was only a stars and stripes crest on the nose of each one. They looked like (dare I say it) Victory locomotives. I'm no expert on these things, but I recognized that they were older equipment. Probably originating from the early 70s. They were general electrics, but the class with four wheels per bogie. Like I said. I'm no expert in this.
But what could they be for, these strange unmarked engines? I'm thinking maybe for hauling radio-active waste out to the Yucca Mountain dumpsite in Nevada. That's UP territory, so who else is going to get a bid in to haul it? It's not going to be Martinez Trucking out of San Bernardino.
Or it could be that the locomotives have been painted for some up-coming studio mega-production. Perhaps it's a Kevin Costner epic, in which he runs a post-apocalyptic railroad. Bringing a message of hope and renewal along the old iron road. In LA you never know. I really have to get a digital camera.

I got some tickets on KCRW to go see Singin' In The Rain at the egyptian theatre tonight. Debbie Reynolds was to be in attendance, and was engaged to make an appearance and do the Q&A thing. It turned out to be fun. Singin' In The Rain is such a magical film. It gets weird. Beautiful. I think the best number is Gotta Dance! A young hick kid dances right up to broadway, singing to everybody that he's Gotta Dance! And then the hayseed works his way up from the bottom to the bright lights. And he gets himself some fine clothes. But then he meets the dame in green. The gangster's girl he falls for. That whole number in the club. I don't know how recently anyone has seen the picture. The gangster in the club lets him dance with her, but his two goons glare at him all the while. The goons keep tossing quarters into the air, and catching them. They're perfectly synchronized. And the gangster has a huge, comical scar on his cheek. The whole thing is so over the top.
My favorite of all teachers, Marc Gervais always said that MGM was the opulent studio. They had the best costumes and sets. They spent the most on mise en scene. And he would say that Paramount was the epic studio. They went more for the cast of thousands pictures. Gervais really knew about stuff like that.

I need to get out like that more. But it's hard here in LA. Because you have to drive, and I'm just not willing. It's too horrible. The other night I warmed up my old cutlass and drove it over to Hillhurst Street. I came to a stop, blinkered then went to make my turn. Real easy as I always do in the old car. There was a white ford F-150 stopped on the corner to my left. I had the right of way. I proceeded. I'm halfway across the intersection and directly in front of his truck, and he suddenly floors it. With me in front of him. The truck's bumper is at my chin level practically, and his truck jumps off the mark. From a dead stop. His tires screeched and broke loose. And just before destroying me, he slammed the brakes, screeching to a stop one foot short of my door. I had a heart attack.
Then the guy sticks his head out the window, and he's making this horribly scary, leering face. He's like hanging out the window and grinning like a demented logger - whose still got the stitches around his gourd. Sonofabitch. Like I want to go anywhere now.
Sometimes people are just like that in LA. Everyone is doing the wrong thing. That's when it's time. To. Re-valuate. To recess. To relign.

The thing about the cars in LA. It's this. I'm convinced. It harkens back to the days of the Californios. When LA consisted of a few Mexican ranches. On the Mexican haciendas, they would have a inner-courtyard where the horses were stabled. You could ride right into the compound. Very dashing. Very caballero. These guys are lords. Senores guey. There's no question they';re going to have their horses. And they would entertain. People would come for parties that went long into the night. Los Angeles still has this amazing social side to it. Despite the distances of everything, and the pervading sense of alienation. People in LA want to be lords of their little kingdoms. Little suburban kingdoms. I'm one of them. It's a completely different approach to living from New York or San Francisco. They're 19th century cities. More rentals and turnover of populations.

No, this is not going anywhere. I'm just talking. I'm just a guy talking here right?

Here' something interesting. The bible. I try to do this prescribed read-the-bible-in-two-years program as doggedly as I can. But the truth is I miss more often than I get around to it. Two weeks may go by, and then I find the day's date in the two year guide. I open the book and see what I find. Yesterday was cool.

The First Book of Corinthians. Yesterday's reading assignment was chapter XIII. And it just goes to show you that you never know what you'll stumble upon in the bible. This is choice.

Chapter 13

Though I speak with the
tongues of men and of angels,
and have not charity, I am become
as sounding brass, or a tinkling
cymbal.

Great opener. Especially when you're used to more of the old testament. Unintelligible stories and the endless listing of names of men. Beth-al hashan, and ul-tikash, and their sons balderdash-I-one, himme-dezmo, and Choppah-maxwell. Just having read that first passage. the opening paragraph. I knew I was lit up by Corinthians. It goes on.

2 And though I have the gift of
prophecy, and understand all mys-
teries, and all knowledge; and
though I have all faith, so that I
could remove mountains, and have
not charity, I am nothing.

You trying to tell us something here? About charity? It goes on. Emphasizing the point. You're nothing if you haven't charity. Nothing. It speaks across time. Looks you right in the eye. Motherfucker. Several verses down it takes an altogether different direction.

10 But when that which is perfect
is come, then that which is in part
shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as
a child, I understood as a child, I
thought as a child: but when I
became a man, I put away childish
things.

(so that's where that's from! It was neat to find it in the book of Corinthians)

12 For now we see through a glass,
darkly; but then face to face: now I
know in part; but then shall I know
even as also I am known.

For now we see through a glass darkly. Ain't that the fucking truth. I've been trying to read the bible for near two years. I think I finally got it.

This is how it's going to end. it will just be over. Like a death. Nothing spectacular. The summer's end is being heralded by a girl with brown hair who doesn't smile. That's the sign. It's done. What could be clearer? Bodies go on living. Reproducing themselves for the length of their course. But this is over. This is just an idea. A shared kingdom. Created for two. Oh what the fuck. It's the same goddamn road as always. You never go anywhere else. Wipe. Slap. Har. har. Har. It's not a fucking rock and roll song. Just the same miles. I won't bother saying what I think. It's the same thing over and over. There's only two screens. Interlaced. Like fingers. Only not lovers. Something else. I don't know.

It's stupid to think anything would be different. Like a girl would be impressed by a rollercoaster. Little fucking kid. You gotta be tough. You gotta be some fucking dude. Like me cunt. Goodbye august 28. You stupid fucking cunt like-all-the-others.
Hey. Don't take mind to all this. I'm just talking. I haven't hit anyone yet. But you know I could. You better know me. Better than that, maybe you never did. Worse for you. This body is not suited for the present moment.

RELAXED CONCENTRATION

Second show today. Matinee. Matinees are hard. This was print number 2/5. Perhaps better forgotten. We were the first show of the day. "Door in five minutes." The stage-manager said. Suddenly it's time to go. I have three wardrobe changes, in a tiny dark hallway behind the curtain. In that moment it seems hard to connect the piles of wrinkled clothes, stuffed in a plastic bag of course, to the entity of the performance which we create. Sanctity.
My first scene on stage is purely corporeal. Doc. I attack another character. Kick him and beat him senseless. Stuff him into a wheelchair. Dress him like a rabbi. I exit.
I return. Hot. The monlogues. About 15 minutes of work. I engage the audience. I make eye-contact with everyone in the house. One by one. And then off I go, shadow-boxing, stream of consciousness. My strongest identification with this character I play, is the bad lieutenant. Flow. Adversarial. As they are. The audience is inherently adversarial. They're watching for you to fuck it up. They look for the seams. Sons of bitches.
Tonight I blanked. The text was gone. The past second dissapeared without a trace. So much for mind. Don't trust it. I just stood there breathing. How long? Me and the house. Do they know. Just hanging out. I saw a sudden flutter of movement in the booth behind the seats. Line please. I'd fallen down in a puddle of watter five minutes before. How bad is this.

"There were little tags on everything, naming the world." I said finally. I'd found a trace. Oo. How many lines of the monologue had I flubbed. About ten, single-spaced. Maybe Eight. Keep going. Definite loss of glow.

I'd went further out on the limb. I did not know the text well enough to flow so that way. Which was great. I remember how I felt. Hot. I'd gotten the room tuned into me. My entrance was abrupt and shocking. But they'd come around. We were complicit. They relaxed. What I was doing. There's no place like being on stage. Pushes the envelope.

Tonight we had our last rehearsal of Shivah/Proper. Until saturday at 10:30pm each of the four of us can do our own thing. What a process this has been. What a. Nothing could have prepared me to act. Shivah may as well have been the first play I ever undertook. What I do seems to be going over with the company. They tell me good things. There's no explaining this.
I will do speed-throughs tomorrow. When I have abslolutely no desire to work, which is most of the time, then I can do speed throughs. I just do the monologues over and over as fast as I can. So many words. There was no direction really. The words found their meanings in our bodies. Eventually you can learn any script. I know now what it means to act.
I found a way to weep. I just did it. I imitated myself weeping. Weeping the way I don't even let myself weep. It was weird at first. Now it's as natural as sweating.

Now we're all weeping. One by one the other monologues are reaking into weeping. Tonight Alexis (woman On cross) began to weep when she finished off her husband Prayer. What a weird fucking play man.

I keep listening to MURDER FOR THE MONEY by morphine. They were so good.

New York is so good. It's its own fucking thing. Today I walked down Broaodway in SoHo to look for a pair of adidas *mali* indoor soccer shoes. SoHo is a horrible mega galleria super-imposed on 20 city blocks. Every storefront is a clothing boutique now. And people are mean. They are not nice. I can't believe it but I knew SoHo in another time, when it was on the brink of this transition. The lower eat side is pretty much the same. Fuckunting nitwits. Native people selling crafts. Gaaa.
I was thinking about L.A. all day. i =found myself talking to y dog. Aloud. Good typing. I'm glad I don't live here. But i'd be lying if I said i hadn't thought about moving back to NYC.
It's Murder. For The Money. I wish i had more to say. I feel funny but have no thing which strikes me as being worth talking about.

HOW DO YOU MAKE YOURSELF WEEP?

In this dream last night I was in montreal, driving in a little red mustang convertible. I was very pleased to have the car, but also afraid of it bringing trouble to me. I was with some old friend and we were trying to get across town when we were stopped by a line of riot police. I stopped the car and tried to signal to the cops that we just wanted to get through and park. Finally I gave up and backed the car away from them. I just then saw people fighting and rioting on the other side of the police line. It was very violent and I was suddenly disturbed by it. We got to an alley and I parked the mustang in it. I still felt insecure about the car, especially after the trouble I'd seen. The alley in which I parked was full of other old mustangs. we went upstairs to this old friend's apartment, and I watched the riot going on down the street from a window. It was extremely violent. There were guys in the street with huge knives, killing one another. I saw guys get stabbed and I was very disturbed by it. I tried to get my friend's attention to look out the window but he could not get there to see it. It was Daniel Diaz. We left after a little while to Janie's on Ste. Famille.
At one point I was riding my Superhawk down St. Urbain Street, and I popped a wheelie. A bunch of people cheered.

THE BEST THING I EVER DID WAS ALSO THE WORST. At least as far as motorcycles are concerned. And it happened last night. Well, it happened this morning to be totally factual about things. This morning meaning when I woke up. But that was actually yesterday. These sorts of things never seemed so complex when I was a kid.

OLD FRIENDS. They are coming up out of everywhere. Last night I found myself with some lighting technician buddies from new york. They're guys I'd known when I was starting out in grip/electric. Their names: Phil Ya Up and Robby Drubbin. They're crazy fucking dudes. New York and Los Angeles motion picture technicians are so hardcore. We met up at a restaurant on Sullivan street in the village: I had not seen Rob since - well I'd say - 1999. When Phil mentioned he was coming I got real excited. I don't know why. I guess I was just in a good mood. It was a beautiful warm summer night, and we were six people around the big outdoor sidewalk table of a Brazilian restaurant. I had worked that day on the set of a very kind but tiny independent film. We went thirteen hours.

WHEN ROB PULLED UP AT THE RESTAURANT HE WAS RIDING A HARLEY. It was really loud. The sound was amplified even more, bouncing off the tight little Greenwich Village street. It was one of those bikes everybody wants to see banned. I didn't get a good look at it, on account of his parking it behind a big roll-off type dumpster. Rob had always been into choppers. He was the first guy I knew who got into that. Craze. I hired him once as the key grip on an indie feature that shot out in New Jersey. The production payed very low rates, but they still managed to be sticklers about all kinds of shit. By that I mean protocol stuff. Everyone acted very big budget. On the first day of the job, Robby Rob as he was known, rode out to location, a high school in New Jersey, on some beat gone English chopper. The machine, an early 70s Triumph, had leather fringes hanging from the barends, but seriously worn and greasy. It was black, and smelled strongly of gas. Some of us were walking through the school parking lot to get to set, and we see Rob's bike, and we're suddenly breaking up laughing. He had parked the greasy chopper in the high school principal's very well posted, reserved parking spot. "What a biker Rob is." The girl I was with said, shaking her head in amazement.


WE WERE YELLING AND MAKING A RACKET AS IT GOT LATER. A couple of the people I 'd worked with had to leave, on account of their early call the next day. but Phil and Rob wanted to go to Doc Holiday's on Ave. A. I was looking at a day off, so I elected to hang with my old friends. They both seemed to have aged so cool in the five years I'd been away. Hanging out and making it memorable seemed like the thing to do.

I HAD ALWAYS HAD A PREJUDICE AGAINST DOC HOLIDAYS. Just like I did about everything else when I lived in the village. It seemed to have this air of phony redneck appropriationism. I regarded it as I would Coyoye Ugly, which now has a franchise in Vegas at the New York New York hotel casino. But Doc Holidays was where those dudes thought we should go. When we got there Phil right away ordered each of us a huge glass of Jack Daniels and a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon. It was going to be one of those nights.

WE GOT WASTED. WE LISTENED TO ROY ORBISON. I WON SOME MONEY AT POOL. We talked about all kinds of shit. We kept going out onto Ave. A to smoke cigarettes, and then back in to drink more Pabst Blue Ribbon. Phil was walking around singing along to Crazy by Patsy Cline. It was beautiful. He was beautiful. His voice was high and cracking like a 90 year old lady. I mean it was funny in the deep clownness of it. But it was his eyes and gaze that made it stirring. He really looked like he was going to cry. He didn't mind how bad his voice sounded at all. He just gave it up. His eyes looked so hurt. He would walk by and gaze, puppy-like at the two of us, standing there transfixed. After a couple of verses the two of us were laughing - even with the involuntary gesture of a hand to cover my mirth. As you do. Phil went on, in his high creaky voice, shrugging his shoulders with heartbroken resignation. Worrry! Why do i let myself, worry?

ROB HAD GOTTEN A HUGE TATTOO ON HIS SHOULDER OF THE WORLD TRADE CENTER TOWERS. He'd been on the set lighting crew that cabled and rigged ground zero for light, on the night of the disater. He was a genny operator. He didn't give a shit about film, or lighting. He just liked motors. I was outside having a smoke and I suddenly took a mind to go check out Rob's Harley. He'd only had it on the road for a year. But he'd spent three years building it. It was a 1979 sportser. 100cu/in., aircooled *iron head* V-twin. It was a rightside chain drive. I love Harley's with chain drive. I suddenly found myself completely grooving on the chopper. It was an epiphany. The engine was so large it was out of proportion to the stripped down bike's frame and tank. It didn't have extended forks, but the front end triple clamp was high like a bull's shoulder, as is characteristic of Harley's from the late 70s. Probably to accomodate the huge motor and crankcase. And that engine was clean, from having the oil painstakingly wiped off with a rag every day. The whole bike was polished with its own motor oil.

ROB GOT IT INTO HIS HEAD TO GO FOR A MOTORCYCLE RIDE. He was offering to let me ride his other chopper. A 1959 BSA 650. It was 3:30am. I immeadiately objected. I did love the idea, but I was wasted. Phil also spoke up against it, in his New Zealand accent. He thought it was a really bad idea. He kept saying that we should all just go get some coke. I suggested we walk over to Rob's place on 11th and Avenue B. , just so i could see the old BSA. Phil was getting all bent out of shape as he fell in behind us on tenth street. "You guys are gonna go for a fucking ride aren't you?" he kept asking, exasperatedly. "Let's just go get some coke man!" It was a perfectly calm warm night. There was not a soul on the street/ Even the parked cars were in REM.

THE BIKES WERE CHAINED TOGETHER ON 11TH STREET. He kept them under covers. We right away set to work starting the BSA. It was a kickstart, and the thing had such compression i could stand on the foldout kick lever with both feet and not be able to turn the engine at all. We took turns in threes for twenty minutes, and I bruised the inisde of my calf from hitting the foot peg several times. I was only wearing a pair of bright orange Dickeys shorts and a wife-beater under shirt. It was the same clothes I was wearing when i left the house for work, 18 hours before. My socks, my Doc Marten rangers, everything was plastered to my skin from the gritty heat.

ROB WAS STANDING SLIGHTLY BEHIND THE MOTORCYCLE, KICKING THE LEVER AND SHOUTING "INFERNAL MACHINE!" And suddenly it caught. It was caught and it roared. I mean- what a loud bike! It didn't have any muffler, instead the exhaust out the heads was sawed off with a grinder just under the right foot peg. Rob produced a helmet from the camper shell of his 73 ranchero parked across the street. He handed it to me, sitting there on the strange beast. "Now you're legal." he said. And he climbed onto the harley and fired it up. What a goddamn racket we were causing.

THE HELMET WAS A JOKE. It was one of those little, black wehrmacht style biker lids, but resembling in workmanship the plastic batting helmets they give out at baseball games. it had a teeny little nylon chin strap which was so loose I could fit a fist into the slack under my chin. It was not adjustable. Rob leaned over and hollered into my ear, over the roaring motorcycles, asking if I could figure out the gearshifting on the BSA. It had a right-side toe lever, with a 1-up/3-down arrangement. I had heard that English bikes were different from the Japanese ones I've owned. I realized, suddenly quite awestruck, that something remarkable was occurring. It was a bloody fucking marvelous thing. I lifted the lever up, heard it KNOCK into 1st gear; released the clutch and we were on the road. We both smiled broadly and I whoopped, inaudibly on account of the cacophonous motorcycles.

THERE WAS NOT A SINGLE CAR ON THE STREETS OF ALPHABET CITY. We had it absolutely to ourselves. We turned right so we were heading south on avenue B, and by some fluke we pulled up right behind a cop that had just left a space. We were stuck behind a cop on our choppers, while the city that never sleeps slept. But Rob had other things in mind. He headed straight for the F.D.R. We got on the highway and opened the bikes up all the way. The F.D.R. was so dead empty. I'd never witnessed such a sight in New York. Rob took off like mad on the Harley. He was doing at least 100mph. In a moment he was almost out of sight. I gave chase, working the gears of the BSA. It was crazy. The bike is a hard-tail. No suspension but the heavy steel frame. It also had no turn signals, gauges or mirrors. So cool. We roared down the FDR, under the WillyB and then the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges. We overtook one car that seemed to pull over to get out of our way. Or maybe just to check out the bikes. They were really loud on such a still morning.

WE GOT OFF AT THE SOUTH STREET SEAPORT. It stank of fish. Everywhere smelled of the east river in all its pungent majesty. I didn't mind at all. My helmet of course had blown off and was dangling behind me from the chin strap. my eyes were tearing from not having goggles. Rob said that I really needed to open the bike up on the way back to the village. He suggested that I lead that time and give it everything it had. I didn't quite do that, but I got it going 80. It was the most wobbly motorcycle anyone ever built. It sounded like a firework plant conflagration, explosions bouncing off the building and bridges along the river.

AT THE CORNER OF AVE. D AND HOUSTON STREET THE BSA DIED. We were right outside the east river housing projects. We couldn't get it going again. We stayed there for an hour. Rob tried to clean the points with the striking surface of a paper match book, while I held a little keychain flashlight for his observation. He got pissed off. He would get up and walk around, going through his head the possibilities as to what may have happened. He said it all aloud. It was 5:30am.

"THE BIKE WASN'T HAPPY YOU RODE IT" HE SAID FINALLY. And he shook his head. It was conclusive. We still had a mile and a half to get back to Rob's place on 11th/B. He suggested towing me on the BSA with his Harley. I was immeadiately game. We tried it first with me sitting on the BSA, holding the harley's rear-fender. It seemed impossible. The Harley was pulling me just fine, but the BSA stayed where it was. What finally worked was me grabbbing his belt, and leaning the bike away from his at a steep angle, my feet out wide like outriggers. It actually worked. I won't say we were the first guys to ever tow one motorcycle with another, but it's not something people do very often. It seemed to go with the whole night. It was so warm and humid. We passed a cop car heading up Ave B. I could not believe they let us get away with that tow rig.

:BLUE MOON//YOU SAW ME STANDING ALONE//WITHOUT A DREAM IN MY HEART//WITHOUT A LOVE OF MY OWN:

That's not true. I never did that. Something very white just came into my head, that's all.

I watched a great baseball game tonight. I totally get baseball - again. I mean the last time I cared about baseball, such as developing a relationship with the players and the TEAMS, was when i was twelve years old. The Boston Red Sox are such an interesting team. I have a lot of friends from Connecticut, new Jersey and that part of the country, and they're all huge redsox fans. Today, watching Boston defeat the new york Yankees 9-6, I grasped why so many love this team and so emotionally.
I had never seen Fenway prk from the air. I was spookily amazed to observe that the field is not the usual diamond, but is instead shaped like a kidney. You wonder by what strange fluke that happened. The red Sox have so much damn character.
And isn't it great that they play at Fenway Park. Their old clubhouse. It's so Boston. The Boston RedSox are not going to have a home ballpark called pizzahut.redsox.com/stadium. It's Fenway Park. And damn well it should be. I think these corporations should be ashamed, but i guess it's really the team owners. It's the whole chingasa it is. How about a corporate culture which makes a stand, and doesn't try to overwhelm and eradicate the small things which give our cities some depth? How about allowing some mysticism, besides the hypnosis of brand loyalty? Yeah that's going to happen.
But then, those redsox. Senator John Kerry was sitting next to the Boston dug-out, in what i imagine would be the most coveted seats in the ballpark. He was with John Glenn, and the crowd loved it. I loved it. Millar jacked a homerun with the bases empty in the bottom of the sixth. On his way back to the dugout he high-fived Kerry. I mean kerry is Boston. Talk about a son of that state. He threw out the opening game ball; a flacid lob I have to say. It landed on the plate itself, ane of the announcers good-naturedly called: "Breaking ball."
Volkofsky noted amusingly that the Red Sox are a hair band. It's true that a lot of them have funky hair. I barely know anything about team line-ups, but Boston has all the guys I've heard of. I guess I know the names of few yankees players too.
But I know that Boston has, or recently had Tim Wakefield, a knuckleballer. He has the slowest pitch in the big leagues. His knuckleball averages between 41 and 61 mph, and the catchers can't even catch them. They're junk wobbling through the air. This is at a point in the game when buffed up jocks with flame throwers are throwing fastballs at 104. Wakefield plays a really old school game, in which owners have little confidence. And of course he plays for Boston. The teams are run like McDonalds. At least a very high paying McDonalds.
Ken Burns was being interviewd on NPR theother day, and he was waxing poetic about baseball. He made such great points about the mysticism of the game, at least what baseball's diehard fans will always try to convince you is the game's mysticism. Burns pointed out that baseball the only sport in which it is the Man who scores the point. In all other sports it's the ball, the puck, the stone which has to cross, or be placed or slamdunked in order to gain points. And in baseball it's the runner, and he does it by getting home.

NOTE TO TO SELF - NEVER EAT POT COOKIE AGAIN AS LONG AS YOU LIVE! DO YOU COPY?
Wow. Boy was this last week ever weird. It seemed to pass by like something that fell off the roof. I had to go back to LA last friday for a job with Keith that we'd planned weeks ago. I'd booked my return friday afternoon, thinking that i'd have the evening to relax and I could show up for keith's show refreshed and prepared. But it didn't fucking happen that way. I couldn't get anyone to pick me up at the airport in long beach, so i got in one of those vans headed up to LA.
The problem was the dude didn't inform us that his first stop was in pasadena, and so we ended up stuck in afternoon rush hour traffic for two hours. A guy riding behind me started laying into the driver, and i just wanted to shrink, or dissolve or something. he was absolutely right that the driver should not have racked us in a van to pasadena, when we were all going to LA. But who wants to hear someone berated like that? Fucking sucked. I saw my refreshing little evening dissolve before my eyes.

But that's not the weird part. No. No, that was monday. The weird part happened on monday when I ate a pot cookie a friend passed me. NOTE TO TO SELF - NEVER EAT POT COOKIE AGAIN AS LONG AS YOU LIVE! DO YOU COPY?

My idea had been to catch a light buzz and then just tend to chores around the house. There were plenty to do what with my imminent departure for new york. And all of them were sufficiently brainless that the cannabis would just glide me through all mellow and ras. The problem was that the buzz i caught was not light. I was fucking wasted - and delusional. My heart beat at some anaerobic level for about 10 hours. I was unable to catch my breath. i went into the kitchen and ran straight into my housemate. She seemed startled. She could look right through me.
"Dude, I ate a pot cookie and I am really fucked up.' I said.
"Oh wow, really?" She asked with what seemed like a complete absence of concern. She made a THITCH sound with her tongue against the back of her teeth.
"Well I hope you come down soon." She singsonged, as one reads the last line of a bedtime story to a sleeping infant
"Yeah yeah - me too." I said, smiling weakly as I backed away from her towards my room. I closed the door and exhaled fully. Must not leave room again, I thought to myself.

I sat down at my desk and stared at the elder tree in the backyard. I tried to think of happy reassuring things and I concentrated on Volkofsky's play. The play is the greatest thing in the world. In my world. Yeah that's right, the world. The play is my beautiful world. My magic box.

The breath suddenly tightened in my lungs when I grasped the essence of DOC, the demented character I'm to play. I had an innocent little fairy of an epiphany turn into a horrendous, howling demon. I gasped in fear and regret for having accepted the part. I couldn't believe that I had agreed to do it; If the devil handed me a signed original contract for my soul, i could not have had greater regret or terror: For having left my happy little pink house in california to be subject to the indignities of that part.

Volkofsky is trying to destroy me. Oh my God. How could I not have seen it? just the concept of Doc, his ugliness and sadism, channeled through me... A dark cold thought came over me: It's a Jewsih sacrifice ritual. And I'm the guy who's gonna get it.
This part - this Doc is a human meat grinder. I do a three page monologue not only wearing red boxing gloves, high heels and a glass of water strapped to my head - I actually have no pants on. My cock, my balls and my ass are literally hanging out! They may as well be hanging out on the corner, smoking cigarettes and whistling at girls. Volkofsky is going to utterly destroy me! Of course! It's a Jewsih sacrifice ritual. He needed a gentile to destroy, and I was the perfect mark. Oh god help me! I said aloud.

My eyes were as big as faberge eggs - falling out of their sockets - dangling from intercom wires like an improvised explosive art device. Terrifying and fucked up.

I lurched across the room and fell down on my bed. Breathing erratically and trying to get a hold of myself I stared up at the acoustic cottage cheese ceiling, and in the faint outlines of the boards beneath it, I saw a great white cross - glowing before me.

"Holy fuck-ing shit" I whispered: over and over. "Holy fuck-ing shit"

Hours later, after a three hour nap and still stoned out of my mind I went over to Trader Joes on the bicycle. There was no way I was driving a car in that state. I was terribly thirsty, and stood in the line with four bottles of Orangina. Everyone seemed perfectly aware that I was sub-human waste, but I managed to get through the check-out line. As I was walking out the store, the phone rang in my pocket

caller ID:

VOLKOFSKY

He must know that I'm onto him.
I let the call go to voicemail. I seriously thought about going to see a priest. I thought about calling my dad. I finally fell asleep in the hammock in the backyard.
The next day, still bleary as hell, I went online and booked a ticket back to new york. I called Volkofsky to tell him that I would make it for the saturday rehearsal.
"Good." He said. "I was wondering for awhile yesterday if you wouldn't back out."
"Nah, I wouldn't do that." I answered. "I did actually freak out for awhile yesterday, but I feel okay now."
"What were you freaking out about?" He asked.
"Ahhh, I'll uh - I'll tell you about it another time." I finally said.

You know. The thing is, he is going to destroy me, or at least part of me. But I'm kind of into it. And anyway he did the part last year, and he seems like a better man for it.

I just noticed that i'm coming up on the 100th blog marker. That's unbelievable to me. It seems like only yesterday I was *trying it on*; looking for a voice. i wondered what kinds of thoughts and ideas would lend themselves to the format. And now - oh how we've grown! Ha ha ha. But these are my favorite writing pieces I've ever done.
I'm not certain of this, but i believe that it's the uncertainty of readership which creates the blog's wonderful tension. I write from a place of not knowing whom, if anyone will actualy read it. I know that some people read my blog regularly, such as my mother - but I'm never sure of anyone else.
The blog then is addressed: To whom it may concern. This is my message in a bottle. Volkofsky described my writing as a plea to be understood. And though I shuddered from embarrassment at the time he said those words, I've come to see that he's 100% right. If anyone cares to hear me, then I shall keep talking.

i made the decision to spend the summer in new york. I know the impact of this decision will be felt long and profound for the duration of my existence, and so i'm not even really considering it. That would just freak me out too much. We have begun rehearsals of Shivah Proper. I have not undertaken a theatre project nor so much as held a script in my hand since 1998, when i was doing THE ALL GIRLIE LIVE CLOWN REVUE. It was during our final week of rehearsals that i was mugged and beat up on the Williamburgh bridge, and my clown I put away after that. My next live appearance was a Muay Thai match on my 30th birthday, in which I hit one of my friends so hard in the face that his mother climbed into the ring and screamed at me that I was a bad man and I must leave her son Hanson alone. This poor woman was so angry that she was shaking.

Today I began the work of learning the text of the play. I sat in a coffee shop most of the morning, putting off the the inevitable first breaking of ground that would eventually be a vast underground chasm of words. That's what learning a script bears the greatest resemblance to (yeah i know, thats a preposition: i don't give a shit - it's my blog). The first sentence begins:

No one lives. Forever. Anyway.

Pacing around Kirsten's apartment, I engraved the words into my quick access storage-brain. And that was the the spade's first cut through the grass and clay. As I move along further down the first monologue I reach the point that I can recall the entire first five lines. I find that I've dug a tunnel: I begin to add shoring in the areas that are weak. I go back and work over and over on the more complicated word groupings. It's like I'm adding a fourbyfour here and there (don't want a catastrophic cave-in). Some dust and plant roots fall from the earthen ceiling onto my head, but it seems to hold.

I'm asking myself: How do I make it shine? This role has only ever been performed by Volkofsky himself. The very words he wrote are now coming from my mouth. It's as if we are melding into one being. I have to give myself over to his direction entirely. I've never tested a friendship so.

The last few days Volkofsky and I have gone to play baseball at a riverside park in astoria. We take turns pitching to one another, each of us trying to outjunk the other with interpretations of victorian era pitches. We attempt knuckle balls and exaggerated sidearm breaking balls. Some Dominican kids came along yesterday and challenged us to a game of three on three. That's a concept that doesn't really work, unless you love to run. I had rollerskated to the park and so I had no shoes to wear. Each time the biggest of the kids nailed a pitch into the deep outfield, with a resounding KLINK from the aluminum bat, I tore off through the field after it, all the while trying to watch out for broken glass. Those kids thought i was some kind of wild old dude.

Lately i've thought the same thing myself.

The last flashes of my time in Mexico are only glowing now. I've received a few e-mails from friends there, all promising to come up to California, or else insisting that I return to the D.F. It's almost as if I wasn't ever there. I feel the weight of emotion on my chest. The loss of so much new love and life. I had to remember why I went there in the first place: It was a job. And now the job consists of unpacking our freight on monday, and getting my check from keith and moving on with my life.

That's the only view that's consistent with my survival.

The last time I saw Tulo was at Papagoyo Tabares in the center of Acapulco. Him and some of the other guys dragged me back to the famous stripclub for one last insanity, even though I protested that I was sick and feverish (which I was) there in the hotel parking lot, and that I hadn't had any sleep in 32 hours, and that I had a plane to catch at 5am. No matter, they said. Better I should have some tequila to attack the fever, and stay awake with friends at tabares.

Tabares was on. just a few nights before some of the other Americans had gone there on my reccomendation, but they complained that the girls were ugly and it took them forever to get their clothes off. Of course these guys had also gone with wives and girlfriends, and so they did not end up with their booth full of chicas, grabbing at their pricks and selling them sex and an end to all pain. Well of course they didn't like it! they were in a little bubble.

That night was my thrid trip to Tabares. I had literally become a regular. Tulo had also become a regular, and the to of us sat drinking beer talking about the Scorpions. Tulo's wallet had been stolen in tabares a week before, and one of the company grips - Noe - had been mugged at gunpoint on his way home, but no matter; we were right at home there. I loved all the girls. I told them they were angels. They understood my emotion. On the set us dirty bastards in lighting and grip don't get any attention from women in the comapany. For one thing we're too busy working, and then those chicks are alays occupied with the male talent - los putillos - whose hair they're brushing and clothes they're arranging.

Everyone in the company knew we hung out in tabares. Hell we left every dime we made there. If you stay in tabares late enough the fun show begins. Clowns and dwarves rollerblade around the place, and all the girls are carried out and deployed to dance on the tables in matching red sequin dresses. Some guys in the bar are dragged up on stage to receive their *privados* in front of the whole place, and they end up ith their clothes off, on stage, getting their dicks sucked to raucous aplause and approval from the bar's patrons.

And then the music changes. Metallica or whatever strip club standard is discarded, and there beginds the peeling violin of a drunken mariachi or ranchero. And then you're really in Mexico - timeless Mexico. I stumble seeing double to the bathroom, and not one table fails to salute this staggering gavacho with a tipped bottle of beer or a lecherous wink.

The last time I saw Tulo he was in the private dancing booth. i had looked all over tabares for him, because I had to leave to catch my flight. He was sprawled out on the rounded booth, and a girlwas lying naked atop him, perpendicluar to his body.

"Puta madre guey! Testoy buscando por todos lados!"
"Ya que onda guey?!" he yells back over the roar of the maricahi.

Me voy ahorrita. We kissed. i kissed him over and over, and then I kissed his putilla and thanked her for loving him. I reminded him to create the image of the *Virgen de Tabares* and i would have it tattooed on my chest, and then I left for the USA.

Oye que desmadre es esta programa..!

Mexico. I don't know how much more I can take. I had always heard that this land was more akin to a civilization than a mere country. Now I have this place running through me like a dialysis. I wish I had written more but i was too busy working and trying to finish the damn show honorably. From the first day we loaded in our trucks to the hero villa in Las Brisas we were massacred by inexperienced people above us. We survived on beer and late nights. the entire city hits it so hard.

I would have blogged more but i had no e-mail *contacto*. I'm living in Spanish, learning the nom enclature of set lighting. My vocabultry of Spanish slang has exploded. Of all the lighting terms I picked up here in Acapulco my favorite is the expression for gripping down a light source so that it has some shadows. the Mexicans call that *punishing* the light.

"hay que castigar mas a este 6K PAR.

I still love Mexico but I'm not sure how much more I can take. Everyone is exhausted of living in a hotel. I for one want nothing more than to take my espresso at my kitchen table, with the birds singing and the day's LA Times. I'm unable to socilaize anymore... But in Mexico there is no isolation. It's great for me. I can already hear the melancholy echo of all these wonderful voices from where I live. This job has been an outright sprint, and my head will still be in motion for longtime after.

Salud

Damn my email's been corrupted by the neon sleaze of pop-up ads. Like a vine these things grew into my mail and browser so that I have full page smut with no functioning close buttons. It juts goes to show you that things break down. The weeds start creeping. I get this abnormally high sprint bill which has a surprising new added service.

PCS Vision premium Pack $15.95/month

I called right away. That made me mad as hell. They make so much money off me it's not funny. They make it off all the hardcharging disorganized people who don't have time to read their bills. Leave it to Sprint to go and invent some service that has nothing to do with phonecalls. The Sprint operator informed me that I got that service automatically when I bought my new phone.
"But I never asked for this." I said. "What does it even do?"

"You did agree to it sir, when you signed up or the rebate on your newest phone." She said. "It's for downloading games and screensavers - worldwide webbing etc."
She sounded confident that she had me. 'The rebate you got - remember?' Her voice seemed to tease. I had taken the money she gently reminded me.

"I never got the rebate on this damn phone." I said to her. "I paid full price."

"I don't understand." The operator's voice on the other end of the line

"I paid something like $230 for this phone, and I never got the application in or the rebate."
She was silent on the other end. Is she calling or her manager?
"I just blew it off - do you understand? I never signed up or this PCS Gold vision pack."

How do these corporations function? Their M.O. seems to be to introduce a charge - weasle it in, and then cash in on the aggregate of disorganized people like myself who let it go by - just for being too busy to read the itemized section of the bill. The few customers who bother to go through the phone labyritnth in order to get it refunded - like I just did - will only get a credit back in a month. Sprint is able to generate a shitload of cash like that. I wonder what they call that practice, in their little dens.

What do they call it in those big companies when they lower the blade and take a thicker cut? I'm sure that there's a word for this.

I've been out skating at night. I went last night and another night about a week ago. Before I settled on my present skate spot I spent a long time looking for a place suitable for my particular brand of *shredding*. It had to be sufficiently close to the house that I didn't need to drive there, but it also had to be private enough that i could work out without feeling self-conscious.

The biggest condition of all for a skating area is that no one gives a shit that i'm there. If they're going to call the cops then it's not a good spot. I would walk all around the neigbhorhood with baby, trying to find a place that would make me feel comfortable to strap on my wheels. I finally settled on the Discount Tire Center on Hyperion Blvd where I can go to blow off steam and work on in-line tricks.

Quitting smoking is what set this off. I've simply got too much energy. So I skate.

I'm working on jumping. That's the basis of all in-line skating tricks. You have to be able to jump - and land - on-wheels. It's sketchy because I'm top-heavy like only a human can be. I get tired too. Skating is hard work. It's hard on the lega.

But the best thing of all is the time spent outside on the streets of LA. Skating in the city is very showy at any time. At night, hauling ass down city sidewalks all dressed in black, with a dog running behind is downright edgy. The city appears different when one relatres to it in such a way. Last night me and the dog were over on Sunset boulevard and we had the sidewalk to ourselves. I could skate backwatds down hills with baby galloping along behind me. There are little concrete ramps and culverts to jump and grind off. No one bothers us.

Last night I couldn't concentrate too well. I was busy thinking about the job I'm starting in Mexico. There's is so much at stake here for me. Each day as I talk to friends who have no work, I realize I was damn lucky to get this gig in Acapulco, keying a network show. My stock is shooting way up from this - after 10 months of having nothing. I've been doing AFI films just to keep my skills up, and now I'm making $2000/week cash, living in a *****hotel on the beach, overlooking Acapulco bay.

There is so much that could go wrong. I've been up nights reading books on stage rigging and large scale electrical rigs for television. I know this shit but i feel like I've kind of gotten out of it. Two very important friends in this business plugged me for this job. I have to rock them down there, and there will be many more high paying TV shows.

I've got this idea to recreate my oldsmobile as an Italian rallye vehicle. It all started with yellow striped tires. A sporty old American car pretty much has to have a white wall. That's what everyone says. But then I thought to myself, what's the matter with a yellow band on the tire wall, to offset the racey green paint job.

No one does that. It's awesome. My buddy Mike Gonzalez out in College Point, texas drives a black '66 Ford Galaxy. The thing's a John Birch mobile, except that Mike had the tires installed with the markings on the inside, so that all you see is no-name tirewall. That's very cop; I like it. A nice small subtle touch.

Janie says the Cutlass's green paint is a stock ferrari color. *Medio-verde* she says, echoing the bodyshop guys who did the paint job 15 years ago. But who's ever seen green ferrari? I asked an italian guy about it and he said there was never a green ferrari, anymore than there was ever a green Ducati. Italian cars and bikes are red, black, yellow or silver.

IL CUTLASS DI CORSA - EN MEDIO VERDE - i'm seeing my Cutty, the all-american grocery-getter with yellow striped racing tires, and a set of foglights racked on the two intakes of the grill. That would give the Cutlass six eyes total - that's enough to see everything - and look like a mean motherfucker at the same time. The fibnal touch would be a European licence plate - one of the square ones with two rows of letters. No one does that. It's fucking badass.

I worked the whole damn weekend in my garage (the hacienda) trying to get some of my stuff in there organized. jesus how boring can a weekend be? My little 22 year old roomate went galivanting around the town with her friends. Would I switch with her - and feel fabulous? Talking, hanging out, going to bars and clubs? Hell no, of course I wouldn't. It's fucking boring and there's nothing out on those streets.

But working at cleaning up the garage all weekend..?

This terrible bombing in Spain has really held my attention for days. i keep going back to the news, looking for signs of where the story is leading. I find all of this unsettling - yet fascinating. The most recent item was that the Spanish had tossed their government and elected a socialist one in its place - who then promised to extract all the Spanish forces from iraq by June.
Well, the people have spoken, and they want no part of the American/British war in the middle east. Nevertheless I find it surprising that this one attack managed to back them off so much. It's like walking up to someone and slapping them across the face... And they say: "whoah, okay man whatever."

I got to thinking that the real distinction between people's views on the iraq war comes down to whether one hopes that the thing works out. You can NOT support the war, but also hope and pray that it succeeds in its stated objectives. I guess that's the closest thing to a postion that I have.

So I learned I’m still stuck in my own head. I’ve always been stuck in my own head, except for a few hours of escape I achieved via sex or hallucinogens.
The pilot house of this vehicle, if you could call me that, is my upper palate. You can sit right on down there
In the captain’s chair, and take me for a spin. Look through my eyes – they’re a split windshield.
My septum is the dash board. It has leopard skin on it. Feel free to put your feet up. You can take me off road if you want.

When I was about ten years old I spent a lot of time alone, walking and hiking on my own adventures. I can often remember this feeling of a benevolent stranger sitting behind the windshield of my eyes, maneuvering the vessel.
He was a little man about 1” tall. He had the physical attitude of a super-keen 1950s gas station attendant.

I was always fascinated by mechanized creatures such as the Imperial walkers from Empire Strikes Back. Walkers were these big slow-moving metallic beasts of four legs, with long-barreled laser cannon on the sides of their head. Their drivers and gunners were inperial soldiers who sat behind armor plating in the walker’s head as it swung from side to side blowing the shit out of everything. I thought those things were bitchin’. I liked them so much I was probably a little self-conscious to even discuss it. That is how powerful I felt about manned animal-like machines.
How weird is that? It makes me think there’s something more to it than simple little boy truck fascination. There’s something funny and a little strange I recall from that age between nine and 12. Not to suggest that any age is more normal than another - but i seem to remember something unique about 10 years of age. It could be something to do with the development of consciousness. Maybe not the setting up of it, but the curing – where things really get hard, like Portland cement.

But what is it about trhe idea of sitting behind the controls of another creature that seems so far away from the adult thoughts people take on.It seems like a vestige of early consciousness from the hidden archives of inheirited memory. WhateverI gotta go to bed.
goodnight imperial walkers
Don't jump up and sleep on the couch

MONTREAL EXPOS TO MOVE TO MONTERREY, MEX

That's what I'm hearing in these parts. Sunday afternoon I was bored as usual and so I walked next door to mooch some barbequed meat from my neighbor Manuel. There were a few geezers over there, drinking beer in manuel's backyard. These guys are serious norteno cowboys. They're all related - suegros and cunados. They hail from Jalisco. They're pretty good neigbours i have to say.
Anyway they were talking about baseball and got to saying that the agreement was all but made which would see the Montreal expos ball club, players, real estate, Dominican farm teams - relocated to Monterrey, Mexico. Now that's a hell of a thing. With a mexican ball club the majors would really become a North American league. It's only a matter of time before there's a Dominican club, because that's where all the players seem to come from. Baseball could make a HUGE comeback, if there were japanese and Korean, Mexcan and Cuban teams in the world series.

And I predict that montreal will regret losing the Expos. The hapless ball club for Montreal will be like the old car they finally have towed off the property - which turns out to be worth $50,000. Relocating the expos will give them IMMEADIATE street cred. 80 million mexicans, not to mention Central America, will fall in behind the Los Expocisiones.

The Expos will be down and brown.