"Your dog is fat," she stated. "This means that you are out of shape," she added with a smirk. 
 
I'd heard the witticism previously. 
 
"Good one," I replied. "I've never heard that one before." 
 
She beamed victoriously. 
 
"And I was sorry to hear about the death of your puppy," I continued. "This can't bode well for you can it?" 
 
We both knew that she'd never had a puppy yet she seemed to pick up on my subtle change of subject nonetheless. 

The manner in which I'd written her character had angered her somewhat and I did my best to explain that she needn't be put off. 
 
Firstly, she'd misunderstood her role's motivation. Secondly, she'd been warned sufficiently of just how little respect I pay to the silly lines that separate fact from madness. 
 
I suppose I shall endeavor to write her as more intelligent for the next go-around. Perhaps then we can fight about more pressing matters. 

I saw the guy with the really unfortunate helmet hair today and noticed him noticing the logo on my polo. 
 
I wonder if he's at home now writing about the guy in the really unfortunate polo who always looks him squarely in the hairline.  
 
Perhaps I flatter both of us. 

The bats are out early tonight and are flying closer than I've seen them do. 
 
They're not supposed to be here yet - not before the birds have finished singing for the day. 
 
Curious. 
 
Perhaps they fell behind last night for the storms. 

We went to the Dali exhibit at MOMA the other day. We lingered as we do and took in every second of every film showing on the three screens. The space was organized well and made me think that Dali himself would have shuddered in disapproval. 
 
Then we took in Hell Boy 2 and I found it to be a stunningly beautiful film. 
 
Really. 
 
Curious, that.

She popped in to tell me that they were all running down to the little Cuban place on Lexington for lunch. They would be leaving approximately ten minutes from then. 
 
I reminded her that I wasn't the biggest fan since an unfortunate incident involving goat and Styrofoam. I would need to pass this time. 
 
"Oh, I wasn't inviting you," she explained. "I just thought you might wonder where we'd all made off to." 
 
They are a delightful bunch after all. 
 

I'd always thought that I would appreciate the beauty of a tornado. 
 
And then I saw one in the distance and knew that I had been right. 
 
And then I saw one on top of me and knew that I should never wish such a monstrous tragedy on anyone.

I had a dream that I had died and that I was simply following someone else who looked a lot like me. 
 
When the time comes I hope that I make better decisions. 

Twenty years ago tonight I dined with Suzanne and Bertine at an out-of-the way hotel in Wettelsheim. We shared roasted wild boar's leg - the chef's specialty - and drank wine until none could say how the evening had ended.  
 
I recall the meal fondly as I observe the horribly disfigured ex-convict wrestling my daughter's turkey sandwich-to-be into saucy submission. 
 
The road from Wettelsheim has proven treacherous indeed. 

We'd agreed to let Dominique store the travel crate for her concert harp in our basement. She just didn't have the space for such a clumsy object at her apartment in the city. She would be off to Switzerland soon enough anyway. 
 
One evening Carole was over for drinks and spotted the monstrosity. 
 
Always the curious one, she inquired as to the crate. 
 
"It's a harp case," I explained curtly. 
 
"What's it for?" she wondered aloud. 
 
"Well, Carole," I told her, "when one is in the mood one puts their harp inside." 
 
"And what sort of mood would that be?" she asked. 
 
Such was the sort of question I'd come to expect from Carole and one of the few reasons why she will always remain among the dearest of friends whom I'll likely never see again. 
 
 

"And so the film 'Zombie Strippers' really IS about zombie strippers?" he asked in a matter-of-fact way as if to suggest that I may have had some insight. 
 
"I don't know," I assured him, "but you're no longer allowed to use the word 'film' around me. Do you understand?" 

"One more thing before we go," he added. "If you get cornered by an angry elephant, try to get on a slope and run for your life. Elephants cannot run downhill." 
 
The advice seemed useful although I had to wonder as to the likelihood of needing it. 
 
"So yours is a tried and true technique?" I asked him, somewhat hesitantly. 
 
"No-one has ever tested it to my knowledge," he admitted bluntly. "These are things that we tell visitors from the west and would all very much like to see if they work." 
 
I suppose I appreciated his candor. 
 

He said that he was a big fan of my work. 
 
I'd had him pegged as a lying fool long before that moment though. 

I picked up both glasses and studied each carefully - sniffing and swirling the contents in the light of the kitchen window. 
 
Confident that I'd picked well, I took a cautious sip from my candidate and was rewarded by a familiar, if not fundamentally vile flavour. 
 
I saw very little drama in my actions and hold serious doubts as to her claim that my scene had been the single most disgusting display that she'd ever witnessed firsthand. 
 
Methinks she protests too much. 

He ran up to the check-out line with nine pounds of butter and a turnip in his arms. 
 
In what seemed a panic he tossed the items on to the belt and shook his arms as if he were a prize fighter about to face down his opponent at center ring. 
 
"No-one can accuse you of forgetting the butter this time," I said to the twitchy stranger. 
 
He gave me a look to suggest that I'd landed closer to a secret than I knew. 

"Oh my God!" she squealed. "You actually know him?" 
 
"Sure," I replied, somewhat taken aback. "We've been friends for years. We were roommates in fact." 
 
"I don't believe you," she snorted with the kind of dismissal that makes me chuckle normally. 
 
"Well then that's pretty much all that matters isn't it?" I replied. 
 
I recounted the tale to my friend over dinner and he invited me to be famous too. 
 
"You go on ahead," I told him. "I'll hang back and tidy up a bit." 

I heard you whisper my name. 
 
I know you're not really here. 
 
Stop it.

He sauntered past me in the liquor aisle and offered, "Here's the wine, Mommy!" 
 
"We don't need no wine," she belched back. "Wine is for pussies. We drink vodka in our house." 
 
I am shamelessly drawn to the abject and thus shot the young mother my best "do go on..." look. 
 
"And stay over here!" she barked. "You don't know nothing about none of these people." 
 
As she wrestled a bottle of cheap gin from the hands of the five year-old her wad of government food coupons squirted from her pocket and to the floor behind her. 
 
She walked on and left me in a bit of a quandary.

She seemed a little confused and so I offered up some platitude to break the silence. 
 
"What's up?" I asked. I thought it a good start. 
 
"Nothing," she chirped. "Wait, where are we again?" 
 
"We're in Milwaukee," I told her. 
 
"Yeah, so where's Milwaukee," she asked sleepily. 
 
"Milwaukee is in Wisconsin," I replied. "Milwaukee, Wisconsin." 
 
"I know it's in Wisconsin!" she snapped. "I'm not dumb! I meant where is Wisconsin?" 
 
It wasn't a trick and I didn't quite know where to go from there.

We traveled as a group this week and, for the most part, secured accommodations in the same inn. 
 
This was the first of my tactical errors. 
 
On Saturday evening I joined the parents for a sumptuous dinner of "broasted" chicken, tap lager, and fried cheese-like foods at a rustic sports bar north of town and near the proving grounds. 
 
They put us in a back room dominated by flat-panel televisions and sticky walls. On one monitor patrons watched international softball, on another they studied Indy-Car racing, and on the last they gazed at the rare, Saturday evening NASCAR race from either Chicago or Bristol. 
 
"Which driver do you follow?" one of the fathers asked in all sincerity. 
 
"You know," I started, "I feel pretty much the same about all of them. It's hard for me pick any one in particular." 
 
"Yeah," he agreed, "I'm the same way. I just live for the race." 
 
And so we have that in common. 

I wasn't sure as to the protocol. 
 
She'd covered her chest with a sort of inked tequila sunrise - a desert scene looking toward distant mountains with a rainbow, beaming sun and stylized stars high above the ridge and just below the collar bones. 
 
The road off to this tattooed promised land wound its way between massive breasts and originated from a mysterious land somewhere beneath her scandalously plunged neckline. 
 
As she worked to cut my hair her large chest jiggled and bounced happily. I couldn't help but find her choice of artwork oddly appropriate at that moment.  
 
The mountains and the sun flowed and flickered with every clip and the lost highway glimmered like a lake that I'll never reach. 
 
"I like your tattoo," I told her. "I hope it's okay to notice it." 
 
"Kind of hard to miss ain't it?" she replied. 
 
I took her words as tacit approval.

I probably should have noticed sooner that she was hanging on my every word. 
 
I still find it off-putting when people pay attention to what I have to say. 
 
I wish I could just tell them that I'm making it up as I move along. Just as they are. 
 
I need to be more careful. 
 
There are those who think that I know things. 
 
I don't.

I was surprised by how easily I fit in. 
 
I simply took my can of beer and exited the air-conditioned sky box to take a seat in one of the eight chairs overlooking the people who'd paid to watch the game by choice. 
 
From there I gazed vacantly across the grass allowing my eyes to dart and shift in reaction to various noises and sudden movements. 
 
I did this for three hours and then I came home. 
 
"So this is what it's like to be a baseball fan," I said to the hostess on my way out. 
 
"No," she muttered as I passed. "Not really."

She explained the menu to me and I told her that I'd never seen the Cobb handled that way. 
 
Yeah, it sounded dirty then too. 
 
I asked her if she was sure that they were even open. 
 
She replied that she was indeed not a figment of my imagination. 
 
I wondered aloud if I might pay an additional fee to make that the case.

He asked me about my line of business. 
 
"What line of business you in brother?" he probed. 
 
I went with the most obvious and current truth. 
 
"Publishing," I replied, "or, rather, media and content delivery." 
 
"What the Hell does that mean?" he asked, visibly agitated. 
 
"Less and less these days," I responded. 
 
"Look," he pressed. "If you don't want to talk then just say you don't want to talk, alright?" 
 
"Okay," I agreed. "I don't want to talk. Not to you anyway." 
 
And for some reason this worked today. 
 
Tomorrow I may just open with that.

The Answer: Seven 
 
The Question: How many times can I start to sing Elton John's "Island Girl" before my daughter punches me in the back of the head? 
 
I am now nostalgic. It seems only yesterday that fisticuffs would have ensued after only four such musical tributes on my part. 
 
Either she has grown weary or my talent has evolved. 

We'd lunched with a pair of lovely young lesbians in the East Village where we'd discussed - more enthusiastically than my nature would normally allow - the art of Koons and the current exhibit in the rooftop garden at the Met. 
 
And so we would wake the girls today and enjoy an afternoon in the company of the playful pieces overlooking Central Park while sipping a smoothie or a bubbly San Pellegrino. 
 
And then we would scurry through the museum for an hour looking for emergency feminine hygiene products. 
 
These are moments that every teenage girl dreams of sharing with her father. 

She is a lovely young Indian woman with curiously blond dreadlocks. 
 
There's always a logical explanation so why pick this to hold against her? 
 
"Look at this," she said as she held out what appeared to be a pack of gum or weathered playing cards. "Stare at this long enough and you'll see things that aren't real - all around you." 
 
"Things that aren't real?" I asked, seeking clarification as I am wont to do. "Or things that don't occur naturally?" 
 
It turns out that I have a bad energy and that few good things will ever happen my way. 
 
And so I have that going for me now.

I helped a particularly large family of particularly young girls over the concrete barricade after the fireworks last night. 
 
As I bent to lower myself down, a man kicked my hand out from under me which caused me fall to the northbound lane of the FDR - landing on my finger and snapping it like a twig. 
 
"That's what you get for helping people," a woman said as she stepped over me. 
 
I wonder if the city brings out the best in the worst people or the worst in the best. 
 
It matters little to my broken finger. 
 
Huddled masses indeed.

We bought fairies in the Village today. We'll probably go back tomorrow to design our own bar soaps. 
 
Because we can't buy fairies in or around our parts. Probably can't bake soap either. 
 
I will admit that I'm taking all of this on faith.