First, let me preface by saying, I am three sheets to the wind!

The condition my condition is in is this:

FACTOTUM

I went to Vroman’s on Saturday night.

I am a cheap date.

Bukowski’s father (the one that beat the shit out of him) is buried up at Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena.

I am going to spit on his grave.

To heck with his membership to LACMA.

Any Tom, Dick, or Frequent Slapper Fred can get a membership to a stuffy art museum. YAWN!

I know that bringing a book that was written entirely about Linda King to a Linda Lee book soire is completely WRONG.

I AM WRONG.

WRONG!

The podcast from this event is not wrong. It’s right. It’s so right it’s left.

This is Linda Lee Bukowski, a wispy version of Katherine Hepburn.

I’m jealous. She fucked Hank. Oh, shit. My mutherfucking mother reads this blog. Fuck.

This is Mike Malone, stupid. You know! Steve’s brother. Shit. Shit. Shit.

This is my favorite curator of archives in all the world, Sue Hodson.

How many ways can I express how much I love this square cornered librarian archivist mental being?

She said, “mutherfucker.”  She never learned that in Library School.

I wanted to ask her how she came by this particular assignment. Was she lured to the Huntington Library because of her expertise? Or, is she staff and this was something given to her? I think The Huntington must have thought hard and long about Ms. Hodson. She’s not a lightweight. I think Hank would approve, don’t you?

I did NOT photograph S.A. Griffin, as he is a gift from the gods-as you are aware.

I got real drunk on the free wine and tried to kiss everyone there, even poor tired overworked Patrick Brown-who looks like death. I am so SORRY!

Sewing the couch cushion,

MG

PS. I didn’t get a photo of John Dullaghan. I am wrong. WRONG! He’s the best. THE BEST.

Miss Havisham’s Tea Party is accepting your calls for upcoming shows (currently being broadcast here)

Your voice (or whatever) can and will be heard by the seven other Pasadena listeners, six eight if Pip gets the job at Crown City Pawn Shop. Do the math.

(626) 390-0750

Leave a meh.

This is your recording session. Go wild, or be mundane. Why bore the people you are with when you could bore me, MG, Miss Havisham, Mary Kathleen O’Looney, or and Roberta? And, Roberta Norge does not bore easily. At least, not without a Carlton in one hand and a G&T in the other. Huh!

We’ll be listening,

Di,

House of Havisham

How vetty crude. We  shall have to talk to Julia. Tutti frutti as they say en Francee.

Who is she but Pasadena’s little Julie McWilliams. Did she not spend more than forty years waiting for her groom to arrive?

Yes she did.

There’s more to that story.

MissH

I wrote a little script for a podcast. Then, it crashed in the computer netherland. I, became inconsolable.  All of my audio equipment is broken. I am broken. My neighbors are broken. Even you, may be broken.

I’ll have to go to Best Buy with a credit card.

Love. MH

This kind:

Click on I LOVE YOU for the latest.

Tidying up for Miss H,

MG

My sister and I celebrated our mother’s 88th birthday in the park with (gluten free) potato salad on Sunday.

On Monday, I hopped a plane bound for RSW. This time, my bag was easy to pack.

Contents:

2 bathing suits

Sunscreen

Sunglasses

Straw hat

3 cotton dresses

Flip flops

Toothbrush & toothpaste

Lip gloss

If arriving at the LAX Delta Airlines Check-In two hours in advance seems overly cautious, it’s not. Every minute is used up standing in lines.  There are lines to check bags (my companion checked one x $20 charge). Then due to the Northwest Airline/Delta merger, there is a separate line to have the checked bag x-rayed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).

Then, another TSA line where each passenger is given the once over, patted down, squinted at, shoes removed and placed on the conveyor belt. Lip gloss is suspect. My tube of sunscreen too big. Both items were confiscated and thrown into a very large cardboard box overflowing with large tubes of toothpaste, shampoo, hair spray, and expensive jars of night cream. A door to a private office opened and an elderly woman in a wheelchair (buttoning up her blouse) was thanked for her cooperation.

“Have a nice trip!”

After an hour and fifty minutes, my friend and I, Soon2B Sunburn and Chap of Lip, were on on our way.

All for a mere bag of shells,

MG

From the postcard:

July 15, 2009 – Started off in complete chaos; packing and unpacking, doing last minute laundry, a pedicure. Think-talking: Do I bring all white? Why is my bag so heavy? Do I really need my laptop?   Think-doing: Tote bag in hand, carry-on strapped on back, walk to the corner, get the ARTS Bus #40. It comes every half hour.  Give the driver 88 (?) cents. Get off at the Gold Line Station. Buy a one-way ticket for $1.25 at the machine. Get off at Union Station. Walk down the main hall to the Bus Plaza. Buy a ticket for the FlyAway to LAX for $7.00. It comes every half hour, 24/7.

October 25, 2003 – We just got the EVACUATION ORDERS. Some people are not going. They say they don’t like being ordered by anyone, especially “sum g’ment agenceeeee.”  I don’t think we are really in danger but I’m packing Cap and me in the car anyway. We’ll have to go down the backside of the mountain. The neighbor said that Chuck Henry’s satellite truck burned up on Highway 18 and no one can get around it. What a traffic jam. Where are we going to sleep tonight?

August 31, 2009 – There’s fire in the hills. FUEGO! My ears and eyes shut when I hear about evacuation orders. A wildfire had changed my life in 2003. My house went up in flames. Proof of my love in exploded pine sap.  Proof of existence. Everything I ever did, wrote, held in my treasure chest of lux or oddity. What did I pack that day?

A forty pound bag of dog food,

a box of photos,

tax, insurance, and birth files,

two large dog dishes,

pink pajamas,

a dog bed,

a dog leash,

dog vaccination records.

I packed these things because I am an idiot.

Did I pack the 200 year old antique lamp that I’ve had for 20 years? Did I pack the circa 1929 heavy metal fan that was  stealthily scavenged from the set of an Oldsmobile commercial? Did I pack the globe stand that belonged to Einstein and was a Christmas gift from his grandson? Did I pack the two gigantic hard drives into the lonely empty half of the back seat?

November 7, 2003 - There’s nothing here but the chimney and the foundation. A great swath of melted glass arches over the north end of the retaining wall like  a stack of clear blue plastic raincoats, as hard as coke bottles. My father’s keys were found on the cement, hot to the touch. Smoke is billowing out from a hole in the ground where tree roots smolder.

August 31, 2009 – I don’t want to feel anymore. I do not want to read anymore. I want to do. Do and do nothing but be grateful to pack for my silly little trips. A few things for a few nights.

Beside a cozy couple of bags, a kiss is placed on  the well worn wooden floor of  an ancient little Prairie-Victorian in the old Quaker neighborhood of Pasadena. Promise me you’ll be standing here when I get back. Love.

Wondering whatever happened to that dog,

MG

Please come to Boston

She said…

Only if you take me to the MFA. It’s hosting the Greene & Greene exhibition that I missed when it was here.

He said…

Another museum? No, no, no. Let’s go to Harvard Square and have bad Indian food. There’s a dive bar in Cambridge called “Bukowski’s.”

Bad Indian food!?! Dive bar? You can get that in Pasadena adjayce.

Pasadena adjacent!?! Go to Glendale if you want bad Indian food.

Glendale!?! What about Pasadena?

And we’re off!

Dive bar in Cambridge? Ahem.. Boston adjacent?

Maybe.

The rules are simple. If you can tell me where I took this photo you will win a fabulous prize.

Example:

???

And the answer is:

House of Mitch is a dive bar in Gloucester, Mass. You won’t find it listed in any of the tour books but it’s a stand out. I’ve been traveling coast to coast this summer and having the time of my life. I don’t know how I got so lucky all of a sudden, maybe the i ching and tarot cards are flipping me into a force field of positive energy. The House of Mitch is a place to sit and talk to completely blotto local fisherman, and assorted sunburned barflies. Pure heaven. Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah haaaaaaaaaaah haaaaaaaaaaaa

More about my travels back east later…

TO WIN THIS THING:

You can win this fabulous Pasadena tee shirt, possibly two dirty martinis, and a couple of tea sandwiches if you can answer the following question:

Photo (w/permission) by Petrea Burchard, Pasadena Daily Photo

Name where this photo was taken? (below)

Hint: It is an easy five minute trolley ride to Harvey Milk’s old camera store.

Come on. What city?

Your answer here: ______________________________

Leave it in comments or email to: thaddius.d.patrizzi at gmail.com

GRAZZI!

ref: music link on this page performed by Pancho the parrot (with unknown corny accompaniment)

Go here.

No.

Go there.

Go anywhere.

Sourdough bread from Boudin’s in San Francisco is great but a loaf of La Brea Bakery -Los Angeles baked in the ovens of Chapel Hill, North Carolina is even better. It’s the humidity!

I have not yet unpacked myself from the gypsy caravan of my completely impulsive spur of the moment vacation. I have been EVERYWHERE! We need a dinner party to spew the filthy details. Stay close.

Dianne “fish monger” (or hater?) Patrizzi