Action!

Remington and I had a rousing time at Tony's birthday party. Even if Tony wasn't there. We kept phoning him after every round, telling him it was his birthday, and that he should come out. He didn't sound very happy, and declined our invitation. I'm just glad it wasn't mine. Birthdays are contemplative days that can have disastrous consequences. Which is exactly why I spent the afternoon making Tony a CD of 13 reflective, and quite possibly melancholic songs. Hopefully he can listen to it when he is in his roadster, staring at the horizon ahead of him with his crisp white shirt flapping in the breeze.

Cody phoned me from the other home town with some weird news. A friend of ours had been found floating face down in a hotel swimming pool in Spain. There were people after him, I guess they found him finally. It reminded me of Sunset Boulevard. How it opens with William Holden face down in a backyard lap pool. It all sounds so exotic, much more enticing than being stabbed in some dirty hotel bar over an unsettled debt. Okay, that sounds pretty good too.

I woke up in a haze about 730 in the morning. There was a woman sleeping beside me. It was Ananta. I hadn't seen her since february. She invited me out for a drink the night before, which turned into 2 movies and 2.5 bottles of wine. She awoke to me jumping up and down on the bed to Ace Freehly's, Rip It Out. I took pictures of her in my bed with her black and pink panties on. I stared at the little beads of water on her delicate shoulder in the shower. I crossed the street with my arms flailing in the rain, while raving about the power of colonial architecture. But then she let me know, over coffee, that her cancer may be out of remission, that she was scheduled for tests that afternoon, and that she would be moving away shortly. I walked home alone, and crossed an intersection where they were filming a movie. It was cloudy and grey, but the lead woman was dressed as if it was a hot summer night. She stood there smoking, staring off into the distance while the crew fiddled with the bright lights.

Frannie called from Toronto, where she had been to visit her brother. She was at the airport waiting for a flight to Montreal. I thought of the last time I had seen her, when she came to watch me sing in a seedy end of town. She was wearing the loveliest Betsey Johnson dress, and while I waited with her for a cab to take us to a party, a guy pushing a shopping cart told me that I was one lucky dude. I think he was right.

John Cusack is dating Remington's boss. Apparently she is bringing him to see our band play at a small club next month. He is making her a mixed cd, just like in High Fidelity. He really does that, makes his love interests mixed cd's. And while Remington and I tipped our glasses, and giggled at the way life imitates art. We celebrated a birthday, even though the guest of honor wasn't there.