The Last Day of The Year

H A P P Y
N E W
Y E A R S
E V E

To Everyone.

Good Night 2014

It might snow.

Hot City Diary: Sheriff Letter + 55

It's hot again.

I'm running out of options.

I haven't had anything substantial to eat for a couple days.

I'm fading in between Alaska and the here and now.  Wandering thru the woods.

Far, Far in the woods I hear my name being called.

Somebody who knows me is out there.  Somebody that can save me.  I charge into the woods to find a woman with a baby.  She's calling my name.  She tells me this is my baby.  It's our baby.  There's going to be some great future now.  Then she slaps me hard.

I wake up to find my previous hotel colleague standing there with a baby.

"I'm here to save you."  She says, "Let's get out of here."

I grab her hand and follow her out of the house and into her car and we'll keep driving far, far, far.

The End.

Hot City Diary: Sheriff Letter + 43 Days

It's a new moon, which means no moon, which means the night I've been waiting for.  To steal the dune buggy and make my way out of this desert graveyard for good.

I put a few things in a back pack and grab the gas can full of gas and head up to the empty house.  The night feels good on my face.  This feeling of liberty.  Tonight will last forever in my heart, but this feeling is fleeting now as I think of all I've lost.  Forever lost.

I hop the fence.

 All the gas kindly fills the tank and I push the dune buggy out of the side yard and onto the street.  I push it down a couple of houses and get in, buckle my seat belt and turn it on.

It purrs and I put it into gear and tear off down the street.  Blowing stop signs, my mind and my hair as I light up a cigarette from a pack I've been saving, I think to myself that this is it.  I can leave all these bad experiences behind me.  Divorce.  Hunger.  Madness.  I'm gonna drive all the fucking way to Alaska.

The Dune buggy breaks down at the bottom of the hill.  I don't even get a mile out of it.  I'm sitting on the side of the road; a sitting duck.  I take a long drag on my cigarette and get out.  The cops will for sure stop and question me if they drive by.  Who takes out their dune buggy at 3 am?  I guess I could just ditch it.

Just then a dozen people emerge from under the bridge I've almost made it across.  They laugh and laugh.  I don't know if it's that funny.  I hope it's as funny as they think it is.  They say we can help each other out.  I'm surrounded in flash so I agree to their idea.  The atmosphere starts to buzz as the group pushes the dune buggy under the bridge.  They break it down, taking the seats to somebodies house, the tires become a table for others.  Whatever can't be used is taken out and buried in the wash.

I lie about everything and make all kinds of promises I can't keep and excuse myself after we finish burying the last bit.  Feels like home?  Certainly not, those are little white lies and goals at home.

I try to leave a couple times, but they tail me.

I can't go home right now, so I wander down to Dennys and waste some time with a cup of coffee and the $2 menu.  They're still outside when I come out at 7am.  Great.  I go to the bus stop and get on the next bus and watch them disappear in the distance.  I'll ride this one down to Indio and back and just disappear for half a day.  They certainly won't think I'm coming back any time soon.  So eager to know where I came from and where I'm going.  I sit on the bus and think of where I came from and where I'm going.  Riding this train wreck of a life around the desert isn't easy.

Hot City Diary: Sheriff Letter + 50 Days

I push the window open and make my way inside the house.  Nobody is home.  There's a better way to finding empty houses now and I'm using the internet rental house websites with a stolen phone & stolen energy and can actually see the days it's available to be rented or robbed.  Always rob on non-occupied nights.

The house is nice.  The fridge is stocked.  I gorge myself on the perishables and make my way to the bedrooms and locked doors and kick them open.  Making noise once you're inside is definitely liberating.  Just don't turn on that flash light and shut the fuck up until we're inside.

I've taken a few of the bridge people along tonight on my burglary.  Some new strange bedfellows.  Chance has a nice 2 bedroom pad under the bridge and he helped me dispose of the dune buggy when it broke down on my ride to freedom about a week ago.  Chance appeared out of nowhere, both in my life and that night, and helped me push it under the bridge and then he took it apart and buried the parts in the wash.  He's brought his girlfriend named "Hard Time" with him, tonight.  I owe him a couple of these burglary runs for disposing of the stolen goods.

It's dark out.  Too dark to see.  The moon is a sliver of itself.  It's hot out.  Boy, look where that dune buggy got me.  Lurking around in the dark with bridge people.  I'll have to buy a bus ticket back to the city as soon as I put together $20.  Maybe take the train.  I don't even know where the train station is around here.  This robbing and stealing is getting old, too.  I've gotten good at finding open windows and not leaving a trace, but it just doesn't seem right, anymore.  To make matters worse my new bedfellows are redefining derelict.  Chance shits in the corner.  He wants a painting to put on his bridge wall.  I honestly think it's a good idea.  Certainly brighten up his place.  I plug in my stolen phone.

I've found the jewels and take them without Chance knowing.  He'll probably want a cut.  Then it dawns on me that I've got no way to sell it.  I've come to my senses about pawning the jewelry down the street.  They'll bust me for sure.  I'll just keep it and melt it down and make a gold brick and that should be worth some money on an island in Central America far far away.  I stuff it down my pants.

More sensible is a ticket back to the city and it's certainly worth the investment. An inexpensive ticket back to the city life.  I'll just start over again, back in the city.  I'll get my act back together again in the city.  If I can just get back to the city and not cook for another season, then things will be fine.  I certainly don't want to turn out like my friend Chance.  Living under the bridge is a bad scene. It's a bad coke party that never ends with big fat crybabies and hustling to keep your sad space.

I pull the shades down all over the house and turn on the TV and crack open a bottle of wine.  There's always wine.  You might not find cash, but you can bet on wine.  I find my favorite show of the Alaskan people.  Chance and his girl build a furniture pyramid.  They microwave food and drink wine and sit down in the kitchen to do some hard drugs.  I stick to my wine.

After a while I stuff some dry goods out of the pantry into my backpack, collect my phone, stuff the jewelry further down my pants and jump back out the window.  Chance and his girlfriend are doing disgusting things in the bedroom.  They'll figure out that I've taken off.  Fuck that future me, It's not gonna happen.

Hot City Diary: Sheriff Letter + 25 days

Getting hotter.

For the past two weeks, every morning I've been awoken by workmen banging, cutting and drilling their way through the house.  I stay in my back bedroom until the sun goes down and they pack up for the day.  That was until I destroyed all their work and hid their tools and now they'll wait for me to leave before bothering to clean up the place or fix it.

Nobody comes around anymore, they don't even bother to put up a new "For Sale" sign in the yard.

Things are nice and quiet these days.

I found a dune buggy with the keys in the ignition a few days back.  It just needs some fuel, so I've been scrounging through the couch and the change jars to find some money and I'll fill up the gas can one of these nights.  Take a shopping cart down to the gas station.

I go out at night all the time now.  It's the only time to go out without being spotted and it's easy to get away if someone does.

I've been building up my strength.  I can maybe run for a solid mile now without stopping.  It helps that I ran out of cigarettes a long time ago.

Hot City Diary: Day 320

The pool is cloudy but for the most part clear on the top levels.  It's hot today.

The sun isn't as high on the horizon.  It's not the cooker that it usually is.  I probably have another couple months to find  a way out of here or else I'm a goner.  The sun will turn me into a vegetable if I stay here another season.  I'm just starting to feel some normalcy.   I realize my house is a complete mess and to make matters worse...

There's a knock on the back door.  It's Sandy and she's with some men in suits.  She's here to finalize the divorce and the men are here to make sure there's no funny business.

The dog jumps up and down and is happy to see her.  I'm not so happy.

I sign the papers.

She leaves and takes the dog.

They put up a "For Sale" sign among the cactus in the front yard.  I laugh.  Nobody is going to buy this house.

Hot City Diary: Sheriff Letter + 5 days

The daily mark on the bedroom wall have been washed away by the maids, so I've had to make some new more permanent ones.

I'm not sure how long I've been here now, but it feels like things are heating back up...There's a letter from the sheriff that says I've got 90 days to get out or go to jail.  I'll get out, thank you very much.

I've been surviving on a few more birds and rats and when I ran out of BBs' for the BB gun I broke into some houses and stole some food and took some showers.   It's easy to know which houses are empty and I've been watching several with this binocular periscope that I taped together.

I'm running low on food and I'll probably rob another house tonight.  I've yet to find a car, but as soon as I do, I'm outta here.

Even though I've taken down the sign, the realtors have keys and they walk through the house with prospective buyers.  There's usually a security guard with them that has a stun gun.  Especially after I chased the first couple people out of here.

Stupid stun guns.

I stay in the back bathroom while they are here.

I stay in the back when the maids come to clean, also.

I stayed in the back when the movers came, too, well, after they stunned me and put me in the spare room, hogtied.

Hot City Diary: Day 311

It starts with being uncomfortably warm.

Then it starts getting hotter.

It's hot.  I've got things to do.  I just can't lay around here all day and complain how hot it is.

I get into the pool and float around.  Things are nicer in the pool.  I lay around in the pool all day.  I've got plenty of time for that.  What we don't have plenty of is food.  It looks grim in that department.  We might last another couple days and then the party is over.  We'll have to scavenge in the vacation houses.

Hot City Diary: Day 310

Colorful lights.

Hot City Diary: Day 300

Trapped.

Hot City Diaries: Day 278

We've let a couple other strays off the street in the house.  It's too hot out for them to be wandering the street and it's easy to lure them in with the smell of BBQ coming from the kitchen.

My dog and two others are living pretty high on the hog.  It's just what I need.  Re-hydrate and build up some more body fat.  I cook whatever I can get my hands on.  I drink a liter of filtered water per hour.  They've got all kinds of frozen meat, and I soon feel like one of those side walk vendors, except my only customers are these mangy dogs and myself.

So we stuff ourselves on the food and they shit all over the back yard and my dog has to make a point and shit in the house, and pee all over the house, and ok, we get it, it's your house.

Later there's a fight and we have to throw out one of the other dogs.  The small little burrito doggie can stay, but Mr. Chompers with the attitude has got to go.  He looks a little bit sad when I scurry him out the front door.  We look outside to see if he's there 10 minutes later and he's gone.  Good 'ol Mr. Chompers.

We all settle down and watch some TV.  I remember that I need to refill my pool and in the middle of a Downton Abbey marathon.  I run the neighbors hose into my yard and turn it on.  The dogs stay put on the mattress kingdom in the living room and I'm back in a flash.

I go take a shower for no reason.

The air conditioner has to be on constantly, but it's a nice 76 inside.  I can finally plot my escape, but the old bourbon that I've found in the bar is making it hard to focus.  I pull a stack of paper out of the computer printer and grab a couple pencils.  It's time to write this plan down.  I'll die if I don't get it together in time and the heat comes back.

Step One:  Find the keys to a car

Step Two:  Get out of here

That's all I really get down before I pass out with the dogs in front of the TV.  I kinda draw a map of the back road out to the mountains and a portrait of the burrito doggie and my dog sitting together.

Hot City Diary: Day 277

It's so nice in here.

Me and my dog have brought the mattress out to the living room so we can watch TV in bed.

I must have taken 5 showers.  I've washed all the gunk out of my eyes and my sight is returning.  My neighbors have the nicest selection of silk robes, so I feel sexy.  The food is phenomenal.  I'm going to have to write my neighbors a thank you note.  Never met them, but I love 'em already.  I wonder if they'll like me?  Probably not after they see what my dog did to the library.  Hmmmm, and the door.  Whatever, it's not like they brought over cookies when I moved in.

So things are great and I've had 3 microwave burritos and so has my dog in our last sitting and now we split a big bowl of bottled water.  Life is easy.

They get all the Alaskan TV shows and we're in heaven.  Simply heaven.

We fall asleep watching the episode where Sue breaks her ankle and tries to make some tea and then realizes she's all fucked up.  We drift off to sleep in the snow fields with her, searching for the magic bushes with the mild pain killer in the bark.

My dog is chasing a moose and then the moose stops and starts chasing my dog.

Sue and I laugh and laugh and laugh.

Hot City Diary: Day 280

I've cut a hole in the fence between the two yards so that it's easier to get back and forth between the houses.  It's hot out and scaling that stupid fence every time I want something to eat or some fresh cool water is too much.

You'll never guess who I found in the house next door.  My dog had gone in thru the doggy door and was eating all kinds food and drinking from the toilets. Between the both of us, we've almost eaten everything, but the rice and pasta will last us a couple more weeks.

I've managed to somehow get it together.  Although if my neighbors came home right now, they would totally disagree with me.  There's fresh water and a climate that I can control, although I've had to hang a blanket over the glass door that I broke, or else all the cool air just goes outside.  The neighbors house doesn't smell funny or have mold growing on the walls.

I've been watching TV again.

One day around 3 in the afternoon, while I'm watching re-runs of my favorite Alaskan TV show, the neighbors come home.

I see a car pull up into the driveway.

"Oh Shit!"

I grab my glass of water and the sarong I've found in the closet and run for it.  The piece of fence is easy to put back into place and it almost looks like it was never cut in the first place.

I run into my house and hunker down in one of the back bedrooms but I can still hear the screams and the police sirens.  I wait a day and then go outside to find my hole in the fence seems to have gone unnoticed and they've had the glass door repaired.

It wasn't much use anymore anyways.  It did have ice and ice cold water.  I will miss that.

I wonder if the neighbors on the other side of my house are home?  After a quick scouting mission, I find that they are not home but they own some pretty big dogs and seem to make it their full time residence.

I'll have to go out in the early evening and scope out some of the houses.  That should be the first step in my budding burglary career.  What the hell is going on around here?  What's next?  Maybe I'll find a gun and start robbing people.  I need a car.  Maybe I'll find a gun and car jack somebody and get the hell out of here.

That sounds like a plan.

Hot City Diary: Day 275

Too weak.  I'm blind in my left eye and things aren't looking good for the other.  I've long since abandoned the sofa fort and left it to the hordes of fire ants and their dirt empire.  I will now make my stand under the patio table.  It's teak, and so it feels like a ship. 

Discarded wings and husks of beetles are all that's left.  Things may sound bleak but I keep seeing something at the bottom of the pool but it's yet to bite that hook that I've left dangling for it.  I'm sure I'll pull up something soon.

I'm not sure if I ate my dog or if she ran away, but she's been gone for quite some time now.  Certainly I would have some of her bones laying around if I ate her and there are none.  Maybe she went for help.

I killed the champion of the lizards two days ago and I'll kill more if they come back.  Vanquished from my back yard.  I figured out that the fire pit was their beacon and now that it's destroyed, they can't receive anymore signals from the mother ship.  I'm sure they'll send down a scout, but I'm not afraid of them anymore....

Time seems to have taken on a new meaning.  It's probably that I'm just crazy and time is different for crazy people.  It's not linear.  It jumps all over the place.  

There are sounds at night, but I ignore them and the images in my head never materialize.  The day comes and it's blistering, again.  Temps in the 100s and the inflatables have melted a little bit on the tops.  I don't dare step into the sunlight; or maybe I should.  Step into the light.  That's the last thing to do or not to do, step into the light, or remain in the shadows.  I don't want to step into the light.  I'm not ready to step into the light.  I'm not ready for the last thing to do or not to do.

I've got to get out of here.

The first clear thought in a long time.  I've got to get out of here.

I get up from under the table and need to take some time to stand up.  I haven't stood up in a really long time.  Head feels light.  I sturdy myself against my trusty ship and look with my one good eye over at the neighbors fence.  I can climb over that.  There are some Eucalyptus bushes on the other side and they don't make a good cushion but I fall into them anyways and they kinda break my fall.  

I'm in the neighbors back yard.  I look around and see no one.  It's all gravel with some iron statues set out.  An iron coyote glares at me.  I ignore it's stare and make my way to the back door, and look/fall into it.  I bounce off the window and the sound reverberates around me.  I pull on the door and it's locked.  My knock turns into a rapid banging and then tappers off into a tippity tip tap.  Nobody is home.  Or at least they are waiting for the police to arrive to come out and see what I want.

I lay under the patio on a lounger for a long enough period of time that I realize the police aren't coming.  There must be no one home.  If I can get inside and get some food and some water, then things are gonna be okay.  Then I can plot the next steps to get out of here.  Maybe I'll even use their air conditioning.

I wait until it's dark and grab that damn coyote.  I wait until the low rider with some boom tubes and a tricked out muffler comes down the street and that's when I throw the coyote through the back door.

BOOM.  BOOM BOOM.  BOOM.  CRASH.  BOOM. BOOM BOOM. BOOM.

Hot City Diary: Day 250

The cold air at night is relieving some pressure.  Allows me to think clearly.

The doves don't come around anymore.  I killed about 12 of them last week.  The rats aren't as smart.  I catch about 2 of those a day.

For snacks I've been living on the flowers and bugs for quite some time now.  There is still water coming from the pipe but who knows for how long.  I have stored quite a bit in some large jugs.

I'll be okay.

I can't write much, the lizards know when I send out these transmissions.

I'm safer outside in the sofa fort.

Hot City Diary: Day 240

Dead flies mixed in with all the lint and dog hair line the walls.  The dog food is gone.

It's still too hot but it was actually cold last night.  It might have been 79.  The headaches aren't happening as much but I'm seriously fried.  I'll need some time in the snow for a couple years, after this.  There are short stints where things make sense and those are the times I'll try to get out of here.

I have made a nice little camp outside where it is much cooler.  It's made out of the living room and dining room furniture.  Most of the stuff my wife bought.  There is a fire pit to boil water and grasshoppers and rats and whatever else wanders into my backyard. I found my BB gun and I can shoot birds out of the trees and off the wires.  There are more than enough doves to keep me going for a while.

Hot City Diaries: Day 113 Day of The Dead

Luisa is dead.  He was 35.  He had a heart attack.  He said he was feeling ill so he went home and we all laughed and laughed and said he's not sick, he's going to mucho mucho fiesta tonight.

Then he died 2 hours later at his home.

Somebody leave a comment

Is this blog still being hit up for nudie pix or is anyone following Hot City Diaries, because it really hasn't caught on with more than 25 people. Which I'm stoked on! So, I'd like to hear from you.


I'm gonna go and then come back and I want a comment.

Hot City Diary: Day 61

Rikki is the new night security guard and I'm the new night auditor.  It seems as if we are going to get along swimmingly.  We're both brand spanking new. He smiles. I like Rikki, he's built like a running back but must be pushing mid 50s.  He likes to talk about how stupid people are and how his Mama raised him right.

    He comes in after helping a couple find their sunglasses on their head.  He talks about Virginia in the 1970s and how it was a time of excitement.  His Mama was quick with the switch and would sit him down and explain how if it didn't make sense, then there was no sense in doing it.  She wants Rikki to be sensible.

   There's a call about a fight over the radio.

    He moves off like a well oiled tank.  The fight is between the people running Karaoke and a patron.  He comes back in a few minutes and doesn't mention what happened in the lounge.

   He wants to talk about him and his buddies in a bar in Virginia and how he knew everyone and sometimes some out of towner would pick a fight with his friends and he would go sort it out.  He get's the fists to come down and get's everyone talking and figures out the fight was over a girl and then the girl wasn't even the girl he thought she was, and he went over to the girl and got her involved and after he straightened out the entire situation he told him to take off or he would get the bouncers, who were his friends, to throw him out.  And the guy left.

He will tell this story every night from now on.  He also likes to roll his eyes when he talks about something he considers ridiculous.  He's constantly rolling his eyes.

Another call comes in and he's off again.  Tank tracks moving with precision and force.  He must be about 5 feet tall and 300 lbs.

Go Rikki Go.

Hot City Diary: Day 67

Peeling myself off the couch.  It's hot and the pool of sweat that I'm laying in also works as an adhesive with the faux leather couch.

I get up only to get light headed and sit right back down.

It's too hot to do anything.  Gahhhhhhhhhhhh.

I just lay back down and listen to the sound of the fans and television and start to doze off.

I'm in a hunting lodge in Alaska.  There's all kinds of people milling about and I introduce myself to some and pour drinks for others and sit down and talk with some more until we all decide to go outside.

Somebody opens the lodges front doors and a wicked wind  blows some snow inside and blows out some lanterns.  I grab a hold of my gun and make my way out into the cold great wide open.  Nobody follows me.  It's just me and my dog and once I'm outside they close the door.  I'm sure they'll let me back in if I knock, it's my dream, but I decide to wander around outside.

Soon I'm surrounded by a million trees.  Covered in snow.  My dog and I walk around them and over fallen trees and into the woods.  Our feet stomping thru the snowpacks and my dog chases a bunny rabbit and now we are running thru the woods and kicking through the snow and find ourselves in a big open field.

It must be a lake during the hotter months, but now it's frozen solid.  I dig through the snow and find the top layer of ice and clean the snow away so I can see the surface.  I'm looking at something in the ice.  It's a scene that's playing out on a television.  I try to look closer.  It's people walking around in a snowy wonderland on a television.

That's when I wake up on the couch with my favorite television show on.   I try to get up off the couch but I'm too weak.  I just lay there and come in and out of these dreams and watch TV.

Hot City Diary: Day 77

Michelle skips to the front desk and tells me she hates her husband and wants to get a room.  She's re-doing her home in the area, and she's got a lot of money; so she says, and she just can't stand her husband tonight so she needs to get away.  Of course this all comes out in a drunken slur and I realize she is really drunk after she gallops like a pony out of the lobby once I tell her the price of the room.

She comes back about ten minutes later with a Mai Tai and puts her purse on the counter and tells me to find whatever  I need to charge her for the room.

She stands there and tells me how adorable I am and grabs for my face.  At first I avoid her grabbing for me but soon I stop dodging her advances so I can concentrate on her reservation and find myself getting a face massage.  Fantastic.

The bartender comes in and tells me she never paid for the Mai Tai and she hands him a ring.  He smiles and walks off.

After a few minutes of listening to Michelle whisper and slur a conversation she's been having for quite some time with herself, I'm ready to swipe her credit card and issue her keys but I find her credit card went bad in 2012.  When I tell her this she picks up her Mai Tai and runs off out the front door, leaving her purse and some other patrons wondering whats with the drunk housewife?

I continue my paperwork and put her purse aside and she comes back in ten minutes with another purse and tells me she can't find anything.  She dumps most of the contents on the counter and reminds me that she owns the hotel.

I find an American Express amid the receipts and power bar wrappers.  There's also a lot of makeup.

I run the card and it works and she finds a twenty dollar bill and gives it to me, and grabs the keys and a map and winks and gallops back out the door.

I continue my paperwork and in no more than thirty seconds I'm assaulted by some passive aggressive drunk that wants to talk about his great uncles hat he is wearing and then scream about the bad service in the restaurant, all the while standing too close.  I call security and they stand between us and tell him to go away.  He doesn't go away initially.  He wants to know why he has to go away and we tell him that the bar is closed and he has to go to his room or go home.  He doesn't have any shoes on and we find out he's just some guy that lives next door.  Whether it's the meth camp or the new condos is anyone's guess.  Finally he goes away after asking "Why?" at least 50 times.

Then Michelle comes back and tells me she can't find her room.  Security walks her over there.

I continue my paperwork.

The bar starts to close and one of the last songs is A$AP Rocky with Fuckin' Problems, it's just the hook, over and over, and it seems like that's the theme tonight.  Fuckin' Problems.

I continue my paperwork.

The phone rings and a guest tells me that some woman is in her room and she is telling everyone to get out because the hotel belongs to her and every room belongs to her, no matter what.  You try paying insurance on this bitch for one month, see you do that, she says loud enough so that I can hear her over the phone.  I ask if it's a tall blonde, and the guest tells me that her name is Michelle.  I send security over to take Michelle back to her room.

The passive aggressive drunk comes back and says he's sorry and wants to shake hands.  When I refuse to shake hands he get's upset again and starts yelling and wants my managers business cards.  I give it to him and call security back to kick him out again and he wants to shake the security guards hand now.  He finally leaves after he realizes no one will shake hands.  He screams "Sorry!" in a horribly mean voice and leaves.

I continue my paperwork and the sun slowly illuminates the valley outside my glass box.

Hot City Diary: Day 43

The dog doesn't like the heat.  It's makes us all lazy and slow.

Gosh.

I need something to drink.  I lick my lips and wander into the kitchen along the large tiles that line the house.  The tile is cool on my feet but the heat seeps into the house through the poorly installed french doors.  They have all kinds of leaks.  Hot air pushing in from all around on my cold little bubble lined with tile.  The air conditioning tries to keep up, but the house is slightly uncomfortable at a balmy 80.

I wander outside and it's over 100.

When did this happen?  It's never been this hot this early in the year, and then I realize that I've moved out to the desert in Riverside.

That's nonstop sunshine with no traffic and beautiful mountain views wherever you look.

Hot City Diary: Day 44

The local Buddhist group is over tonight.

They are chanting up a storm.

The house is radiating heat from the hot day.

The Buddhist are radiating energy.

Things are getting above 100 degrees and the sun is quietly toying with us.

Hot City Diary: Day 100

It's steamy tonight.

It starts off simple enough with us both racing into the back office to get some keys.  At the lockbox it seems as if I've pinned her against the wall.  She starts kissing my neck and I tear off  her blouse and her tits fall out.  They're cupped in a lacy bra and now she's grabbing at my pants and soon she's undone my belt and pulled my pants and underwear to my ankles.  It's too late now, my cock is in her mouth and she's not stopping.  I close the door.

It's 1:45 am and the guest that wanted to see if we had tshirts in a small has now wandered off.

I stop her from stroking and sucking and turn her around and put her on the managers desk.  Her pants are at her ankles and she rubs at her pussy furiously.  She looks back over her shoulder at me and begs for me to hurry up.

"Just a little bit and then we can finish later," She says.

So we ride it out on the desk for about a minute, her squeeling like a little piggy and me grunting like a piggy.  We're a couple of pigs fucking on the managers desk in the back office.  Then the maids open the a door and close it fast.  Shit.  We pull our pants on and hunt down the maid that saw it before he can gossip.  Luis who prefers Luisa is the one and we quickly corner him and convince him that he can never mention what he saw.

We tuck our clothes away and put things back into place and continue to work.

Hot City Diary: Day 80

Kyle, the engineer, is no where to be found.

The weekend just ended so it's time to relax.  He must be sleeping in his quarters, or in some hot babes room.

Whatever.

We've got bigger problems on our hands.  It's 1am, Somebody has broken into a guest hotel room and stolen thousands worth of computers and phones and cash and all that.  I'm hoping it's just a transient and I didn't accidentally hand out a key to a master thief.   It could have been my counterpart, or maybe the assailant found the door open?!?  We phone the police and wait 3 hours for them to show up.

In the meantime, there are a couple stupid people crank calling me from a car parked outside in the parking lot.  They're watching me in my glass showcase.  They make me go search for a red purse in the photo booth and then maybe on the couch and then I catch on and tell them to shut up and hang up.  They call back and laugh and laugh and mention how they love my Cardigan.  I don't think it's funny.  They call back a couple more times and then lose interest.  I get back to my paperwork.

Security wanders the property.

Housekeeping wants to know if the aliens will be coming again tonight.  I tell them they're already here and their eyes light up.

Hot City Diary: Day 79

The youngsters are getting heated and nobody has anymore patience.

There is a complaint that the picture booth is broken.  I hear an earful of nonsense from some twentysomethings and then the flashes from the booth light up the lobby.

"Oh look, it works now."  I say

They shuffle off.  I walk outside with Sammy the restaurant manager.

There's a glow in the mountains.  It's a reddish glow.  Looks like it could be a fire but we can't see any smoke, so maybe it's not a fire.  It's also 1am and it's so dark up there on the mountain that we probably wouldn't be able to see any smoke anyways.

Stupid smoke.

Some of the housekeepers come and join us and wonder what the strange red glow is just over the ridge of the Palm Springs Mountain Range.  We all come to the conclusion it's aliens.

The night goes by smoothly, until the drunk Englishmen arrive at 5am and want hookers.

I tell them that there's nothing worth getting in Palm Springs right now.  Craigslist is a disaster waiting to happen.  The girls in the meth hotels in the north part of town are great if you want the gift that keeps on giving; give your girlfriend herpes when you get home.

I call them a taxi and tell them to work it out with the driver.  Maybe the Casinos will still have some girls that are up and ready to go.

They light up when they hear about the casinos.  It's party time.  They want to know where the ATM is and how long until the taxi shows up.  They want to know if they can go back to the room and do some more drugs before going out.  The taxi shows up during the conversation and ends things right there.  They do a little fist bump whisper shout thing and head out to the taxi and jump in.

I continue my paperwork.

Hot City Diary: Day 112

It's only in the mid 90's this evening.  I stay inside the lobby.

The bar closes at 1 am and there is a loud Tranny in the lobby.  She is drunk and wants to try on T-shirts and wants to know if the cigarettes in my pocket is a bad tit job or if they're cigarettes.  He wants to know if I want to drive his car.  Roxy is big trouble.

The bartender comes out and smacks Roxys' ass and gives her a kiss on the cheek.  

"See you next week sweetie!"  The bartender says.

Roxy almost spills her drink.

She's drunk and mumbling under his breath.  Then her eyes light up when she sees me bring out the tshirts and she mumbles some more and picks them up and throws them back onto the counter and takes a drink of his Pina Colada.  She's got all this expensive jewelry on.  It must be fake.  Who wears diamonds that big?  Her leather body suit with matching jacket looks expensive.   He takes a drink of her pina colada out of the straw.  Her botoxed lips suck at it.  She makes everything overtly sexual.  

Roxy has finally had enough of it, she wants to go home.

"Call me a taxi."

One Taxi arrives and stops the cab far short of Roxy and get's out and walks up to her and tells her he will not give her a ride.  He complains that Roxy has a history of throwing up in the cabs and refuses service.  He does the polite thing and calls another taxi company that doesn't know Roxy. 

I wait for the other cab and give the driver a plastic bag and wish him good luck.  He looks confused and I pat him on the back and tell him to keep it within reach in case she gets sick.  He laughs.  I laugh.  Roxy slams the door.

I walk back into the lobby and the bartender is dancing around and telling me how Roxy is crazy rich and she burns through employees at a crazy rate.  

"Didn't you hear her ask you to be her driver?  She wasn't kidding.  That bitch tipped me $200 for each pina colada, and she had THREE!"  The bartender runs off screaming.

Wow. 

Hot City Diaries: Day 225

The ghost in the bottom of the pool is not making me feel very good about things.  I have to stay in the shallow end or else I might fall prey to him/her.  It all happened the other day.  I fell asleep on the mattress in the pergola last night with the dog and after we woke and ate most of the watermelon and then took the rest for a swim.

The light is flickering in the shallow end.  The floaties are casting mean stares across the water.  Swoony the swan has only one wing now.  She's just a fun reminder of the crazy Italian film producers that came to stay at the house.  But not tonight, she tries to smother me as I come up for air.  I have to really push up to break the surface and throw her off me.  The turtle and orca aren't any help.  Then it was either the ghost or me cramping up from eating half a watermelon and plus more while in the water.  The hulk of it sits there on the side of the pool.  The dog licks it and takes a few bites and wags her tail.  It was probably just the watermelon, but who really knows what lives at the bottom of the pool.

It's hot outside.

The spirit seems to move the floaties about the pool.  No real direction or pattern.  Nothing really aggressive and things seem to be copacetic.  It's a scary good time at the pool.

Hot City Diary: Day 230

It's getting close to Halloween.  I can see the leaves changing colors, or maybe it's just that they've been burnt by the sun.

I feel burnt by the sun.

I find myself sitting for days in the living room watch the mold grow.  No real food besides the dog food is left.

Hot City Diary: More Dope

The Restaurant manager walks into the lobby and places three baggies on the front desk.  They sit on top of all my paperwork.

There's about an eighth of mushrooms in one bag.  An eight ball (which is just stupid drug talk for an eighth) of white stuff.  It could be heroin or cocaine.  Nobody knows and Sammy and I aren't just going to try it.  Kyle walks in.  He tests a bit.  It's cocaine.  Really, really good cocaine.  The third bag is full of dirt, Two wristbands, a hotel business card and a sandal strap.

I laugh.

The restaurant manager is on his way home and off to a vacation in Miami when he stops by the front desk.

"I don't want to deal with this."  Sammy says

"You should take some with you to Miami."  Kyle trys to put the cocaine in Sammys' bag and we all laugh and laugh and laugh.

A guest walks into the lobby and while everyone freezes, I nonchalantly throw some paperwork over the drugs and Sammy puts the cocaine in his bag.  He asks about food and I tell him the only thing open is Taco Heaven and Double Burger, but nobody delivers after midnight in Palm Springs.  Maybe 1 am on Weekends.  We all look at our respective watches, phones, whatever, it's 2 am.  He reaches for his car keys and falls to the ground.  We help him up and call him a cab and push him inside and tell the driver to drive him thru the Double Burger drive thru and then bring him back.  He mentions to Sammy a few times that he could use a pick-me-up while waiting.  Sammy apologizes for the coffee machine being put away.

Once the guest is gone Sammy takes the cocaine out of his bag and puts it back on the desk.

Kyle wants just a couple caps of the mushrooms and Sammy laughs and says it's all too late, because it's all on camera and security better just log it and destroy it.  Sorry Kyle.  Sammy has me radio security and our new gung-ho recruit takes it all away to the security office to log and destroy, or does he?  Kyle doesn't think he's going to do it, and follows close there after.

I get back to my paperwork.

Hot City Diary: Day of the Rig

The late shift.  It's one of the slower days so as soon as the person I relieve takes off, I walk over to the engineer shed to say hello to Kyle and make some coffee.  Engineers now have Folgers on repeat in the engineer office.  I make some coffee with Kyle.  I've got to stay awake and I'm not going to use the stuff that the new security guard is using.  I haven't used that stuff since the 90s.  The engineering shed buzzes and hums with electrical equipment.  There are a couple different rooms, all kinds of strange and funny looking tools and graffiti from what looks like every engineer that ever worked here.

The shed is uncomfortably hot.

It's still hot as all fuck outside.  How can it be 100 at midnight?

I make my coffee and thank Kyle and head back to the front desk.  I pass the pool.  People are swimming and dying on the pool deck.  The chicks like to wear wife beaters with no bras.  It's driving the young men wild.  They horseplay in the jacuzzi and it spills over into the pool.

This week we have a group of designers staying at the hotel.  They happen to be all women.  They're a group of successful, stylish, good looking chicks with money.  They're as gentle as a pack of Koalas.  You can see they have the claws, but they don't use em.  They wander the lobby and hotel bar and make polite conversation.  I start my paperwork and take a sip of my coffee.

The security guard tears through the front office.  He's mumbling a mile a minute and says "HELLO." somewhere in the middle, and stops right in front of me and then starts talking about what a nice piece of knotted wood we have at the front desk.  He wonders what kind of wood it is.  So do I.  He then asks for a vacant room list, so I print one out and hand it to him and he studies it closely, turning it over in his sweaty hands and grimacing about the amount of work, then heads off to make sure the vacant rooms are vacant.  It's something we do every night to make sure the vagrants aren't sneaking into the rooms or the patios.

Kyle comes into the front desk to hang out.

Before the new security guard get's outside the lobby, he get's a phone call.  I'm busy shuffling through the paperwork and talking with the hotel restaurant servers about their shift, but when everything calms down and the lobby is empty with just me and Kyle in it, He asks me if I heard the telephone call the security guard just got.

He swears it was his dealer.  He was saying things like: "Yea, where you at?  I could meet you over there on my bike later.  Yea!  Do you have enough?  No, I can't right now, I'm at work." and things like that.  Kyle explains that we get a lot of bad elements through security.  Most of them have criminal backgrounds.  Then he throws a bunch of  packaged needles on the front desk.  He found them out front of the South building.  They could be for someone with diabetes or they could be rigs for our security guard.  He says the desert is a haven for meth users.  It's even worse up in Joshua Tree.  It's so bad there is an emergency phone number given to residents to call regarding meth activity.  He asks where the security guard lives and I tell him White Water.  Kyle nods his head.  It's a huge meth neighborhood.

What can you do?  People need to fill their time up with something.

Wow.  Only serious users shoot that shit.  I thought that maybe he was just a weekend warrior with a little bump to help him through the night.

Nothing works like coffee.

Kyle and I agree that he'll fuck it up all on his own, no reason to report it.  No reason for me to report this, yet.  Maybe I should report it.

He's running through the lobby at one point.  Then comes back inside and tells me he's tired.  His cheekbones are starting to become more pronounced.  He's sweating.  He asks for my full name.

He leaves.

Then comes back full of energy.  He's got to pull the bikes up and for the next hour I see him ripping around the property delivering the bikes to the hotel guest bike rack.  We stash them at night so no one steals them.

My relief comes in on time and I take off.

Hot City Diary: Day 133

The papers arrive in the mail today.  Apparently the state of California wants couples to wait 6 months to finalize any divorce proceedings.  So we will wait 6 months and when she see's that my girlfriend is 7 months pregnant, then Shelly is never going to talk to me again.

It's humid.  Around 96 degrees.  It certainly doesn't feel like the furnace is turned on high today.  I think I've just been sitting here too long; BECAUSE 96 IS HOT!  But it doesn't feel like it.  The humidity makes everything sticky.

Damn.

Hot City Diary: Day 140

It's triple 1's today.  It's triple crazy.  Who can live in 111 degree heat?

I've been taking the car out to pick up groceries and such in the evening when it cools down and to run some errands but the other day when I went out to get groceries I found myself blacked out in the desert off of Dinah Shore Drive last night and when I start the car again it was a real chore to get it back on the road and back home.  The car engine knocks and rattles when I drive over 50 mph, now.

I don't need any car Trouble.

I take it into a car repair shop today with some good reviews and they make it worse.  The engine mounts have become loose and are hitting the engine.  The mechanics say there is nothing they can do.  They actually say it in a really menacing way and there are three of them and it's weird so I just leave.

Dang it.

I barely make it home.  The car rattles like I'm being shot at.  It does better at high speeds but maybe that's just wishful thinking.  I keep it slow most of the way home with people running this way and that when I stop at the intersections.  It rattles off like an AK-47 and people duck and sprint when I make a right hand turn.   I keep the windows rolled down and wave people past as I try to stay in the golf cart lane.  The sun cooks me and my wounded car as we limp back to the house in the cove.  The neighbors come outside to see what's happening when I pull into the driveway.

They snicker and congregate in the middle of the street and I apologize and hastily make my retreat back into the walled compound and across the blistering cement front patio and into the house.

The door is open.  The dog is laying in front of some fans on the cool tile floor.

I join her and lay down in defeat.

No more wheels.

Hot City Diaries: Day 123

It's another Scorcher.

Losing my mind.

Up in here.  Up in here.

Music does help, though.  So I have the computer streaming all day.  I can switch over to the mobile when the black outs hit.  Gotta stay in the shadows.  Stay cool.  Stay hydrated.  Wait out this heat like a lizard under the rocks.

The lizards are all over the back yard.

Not as dangerous as their intelligent counterparts up there on Io.  The ones in my back yard are missing a couple hundred million years of evolution.  By the time they evolve to something formidable, the sun will have enveloped the planet.  Those fucking lizards better get it together.  Suddenly a large shadow passes by the window.  I sit up from the couch where I've been kinda napping/sweating. What was that?  The dog is barking like crazy.  There is a loud smash in the back yard and I'm up with my crocs on and running around the house to see what it is.

I run inside my gated side yard.  It's blistering hot out.  Then the door closes behind me.  I turn to see a lizard tail pushing it closed.  She's standing in the shadows.  She tells me that there is a plan for us.  She doesn't want to be dangerous and we can all live in harmony she tells me.  If I can just get the dog to play along.  Don't be a fool like the people up in Joshua Tree.

An intelligent life form from Io has come to visit.

She crashed her Ionian ship down the street and needs some water and chlorine and acid to get the ship going again.  It's kind of like a tourist bus.  She brings wealthy Ionians to Earth and shows them the sites.  They were on their way to Tijuana when the ship crashed in the hills behind Cat City.  Needless to say, everyone is pissed.  She needs to get the stuff and kinda get going.  They're behind schedule and all that.

She mentions that the pool waters' PH balance is all off.  Too much alkaline, but it will have to do.

I tell her to take as much water as she needs.  She says she's gonna need some muriatic acid.  I ask her how much she needs.  She says all of it.  I fetch it from the garage and when I come back the pool is empty.  All 18,000 gallons.  She's holding it in a small bag.  It's easy to move around when you shrink the molecules, she tells me.

Whatever.  I tell her it's gonna cost her something.  She fiddles with her ear and hands me an earring and tells me to wear it if I ever want to talk to her.

That'll work.  I ask if I can see the craft and she tells me that the Ionian tourists might like a close up chat with an inhabitant, which usually doesn't happen until the tour hit's Phoenix, but sure why not.  She does remind me that they are in a hurry, though.

She reduces the size of the chlorine and acid and strides out the back gate and I struggle to keep up with her.  I don't have time to close the gate, so the dog runs out and follows us as well.

"You go back home!"  I yell at my dog, but she doesn't listen.

We all run/jog down the wash to the ship.  The Ionian tour bus leader tells me we only have a moment and brings me onto this silver cigar looking ship.  It shines in the sun.  She parades me up and down an aisle and all the lizard people gasp and gawk and talk amongst themselves.  I get to wander the aisle for a minute.  They sit in fancy seats and drink fancy drinks and slap their legs in disbelief.  I do a little tap dance routine and they love it.  Then the tour bus leader shoo's me off.  It's time to go, they are running late.

I thank the Ionian for her time and then she makes sure I'm outside and seals the door and it just lifts off.  Very quietly.  Very slowly.  Like somebody turned off gravity, but only for the ship.  It floats up past my head and then after getting 30 feet up, it zooms out of the picture.

I wander back to my barking dog and we head back to the house.  I'll have to refill the pool.

Spanish Sex Bomb

Buenos Dias Palmas de Mallorca

Hot City Diary: Day 86

Kyle is the night engineer.  He's dating the chick that hires all the shows at the hotel.  She use to run Beauty Bar, LA.  She books the DJs', he sets up the mixer and breaks down the speakers.  It's an awesome combo.  So, Kyle is usually here until the wee hours and tonight he's talking about all the weird stuff that he thinks is going on.

He lives in Joshua Tree so for the most part, it's right on track.

There are six different types of aliens.  The one's we're most likely to see are the Tall Whites and I could actually get killed for telling you this.  I hope you appreciate it.  Anyhow, the tall whites like to do fun things like hang out and drink and go to Las Vegas and gamble and things like this.  They kinda look like albinos and you've probably danced with one at a Hollywood night club.

They live underground in these giant cities that the government has built.

There are over 500 underground cities in the United States, one of the largest is just outside of 29 Palms and the Marine Base over there confirms it.  They're obviously guarding something.

One of the entrances is off the Malibu coast.  If you ask anyone that's lived in Malibu for a very long time, they will say that they have seen ships go in and out of the water.  One thing they've forgotten to factor is the amount of drug use in Malibu and out of control partying.  I'm sure people have seen all sorts of things in Malibu.  Whatever.  I start to grow skeptical after the Malibu stuff, but I roll with it.

Maybe we are alone in this Universe, I joke with Kyle.  There might not be other intelligent life in the Universe.  Maybe no-one made it past the nuclear phase of their development?  A theory is that as civilizations grow over the years and they enter into new forms of living, Hunter & Gatherers to Stone Age to Bronze age to Iron Age to Industrial Age to Nuclear Age that nobody really get's out of the nuclear age.  Civilizations always end up bombing the fuck out of each other and ruining the planets or moons they live on.  So far, Earth has dodged the 1960s, but what is gonna happen when everyone has nuclear bombs?  Somebody is gonna use one.  That's the scary theory.  Let's hope it doesn't happen.  We've kept this civilization thing going 8K years this time around, let's hope we can graduate from the nuclear phase with no issues.  Kyle dismisses it with the amount of stars, one has to have intelligent life.  I kinda agree with him.

I ask Kyle why don't the Aliens intervene, and he says they are, JFK was an Alien.  He was the last good alien.  Now only the really bad ones intervene and it's ruining everything.  If I ever see a 3 eyed man, I should kill him, he tells me.

Okay.  I promise to kill all the three eyed men that I encounter.

Then Kyle shows me some You-tube videos.  Lot's of talk.  Somebodies kid was killed for knowing too much about the cities, but this one guy Charles Hall has a day pass.  He can talk about all kinds of stuff, but nothing happens to him.  Kyle explains this as some people are so highly regarded by the aliens, there is a list, a very short list, and Charles Hall is on it.  He can do whatever he wants and nobody can kill him.  No red list, blue list, CIA stuff for him.  He get's the day pass, everyday.

Then he tells me there's no way to measure time.  I ask him about the speed of light and he says it isn't a constant.  I tell him the universe is 4 billion years old and he laughs and says we can't even be sure what's in our solar system.  There could be another couple earths on parallel tracks in bubble universes that have bizarre different outcomes.  He tells me about how maybe the Universe is just a big animal, looking for another universe to fuck to have a universe baby.

I have to check someone in.

Kyle lingers and looks up more videos as he waits to indoctrinate me more.

I check Ms. Fancybottom in and head outside for a cigarette.  Kyle borrows a smoke from me and tells me that the majority of the Aliens are only using the Earth for a way point on their travels thru space.  The Earth is a roadside diner for aliens.

The lizards are the worst.  IF I ever see a Lizard man or woman or child, I should kill it.  Then go on the run because Cheney is the chief Lizard and he hunts down all lizard killers personally.  He shoots you in the face and eats your heart.

"So, good luck with the info, It's 2:30am I've got to leave." Kyle says.

"Thanks Kyle, I'll remember to kill 3 eyed  people and lizard people and stay off the red list."  I say

Kyle get's in his subcompact and drives the 45 minutes back up to Joshua Tree.  It's probably more like an hour because he lives off Old Woman Springs Road.

I wave and then get to the paperwork.

Play

buttonbass.com

Hot City Diary: Day 154

Hotness.

Madness.

I'm the dragonfly.

I'm the palm tree.  I stand so tall and straight.  My skin can handle this sunlight all day long.

Someone turns on the oven and we start to bake in the house around 6 am.  The coils are heating; they just look like cement.  The street out front is sucking in the heat and can exceed 150 degrees at some points.  Too hot, hot, hot.  There is cement all around the house. around the pool.  It's everywhere.

The pool water sits in a cement basin and it cooks. The water has been over 100 degrees for several days now.

I can't reach the sink so I crawl out front to the hose and cut it off the at the spout and turn it on.  It's hot and only get's lukewarm after a while, but I don't care.  I lay under the spout and wash myself with the water until I have a sane thought.

I'm not a palm tree.

I'm not the dragonfly.

I'm some idiot stuck in the desert without air conditioning.  I should go hang out in one of those senior cool down centers.  They keep the air at 72 degrees.  All day.  All night.  I might go if I could find the car keys.  Stupid car keys.  Maybe I'd keep on driving and make my way up to Big Bear or maybe keep on driving up to Alaska.  Go stay in that camp in Kavik with Sue and the Foxes.  A lot of maybes.

Dear Writing

I hate you.

Hot City Diary: Day 76

I'm talking to a co-worker about how the Mrs. got up and went back to Italy because it was just too hot, and how I've turned off my air conditioner for an experiment to see what happens when you try to live out here without A/C.  First she tells me that I'm crazy, then she tells me of someplace that's close and a nice way to beat the heat.  There are tall and wide mountains nearby.  She tells me that she's been and it's a dreamy delight up there in the mountains.  All kinds of trees, cool breezes and fresh air and it smells like heaven.  I don't believe her.  How can that be?  We're stuck here in the middle of the desert and she nay nays me and and says "It's true!"  It's only a 2 hour car trip BUT if you know the secret way via the back of the mountain then it's just 45 minutes.  You turn up Old Woman Springs Road which is located off 29 Palms Highway right over there in Joshua Tree by the SaveMart.  Big Bear and Lake Arrowhead are both accessible which are both fun mountain villages.  Big Bear is larger with a larger lake and more populist.  Arrowhead is elitist and has a small man made lake.  There are a lot of Jesus freaks up there on the mountain, though, in both towns.

    A secret road that leads you to a nice cool place.  My co-worker laughs and laughs and can't believe that I've never been there.  It has a glorious lake and a fun little downtown where you can walk around.

   I close my eyes and try to imagine a different place.  Someplace other than this god damn desert.  Someplace where it doesn't sting when you go outside into the  sun.  Someplace where the plants and trees aren't wilting.

   She prints me out a map and put's some skull and crossbones in a corner and a compass in another.  It's my secret map to the mountains.  If for some reason, I need it.

I think I need it.

Hot City Diary: Day 1 Million

How long have I been laying here? 

Sweating.

Going in and out of consciousness.

It seems like forever.

The Wall

We've hit it.

Hot City Diary: Day 75

Karaoke night at the hotel bar.  All the usual suspects are here.

That's when Diamond comes in.  She's dressed to kill and showing off her body tattoo.  She's here to see her friend the lesbian bartender.  She's lesbian, too.  The security guards go bananas all night.

Hot City Diaries: Day 97

The official word in the pass-down is that a non guest was bleeding on property and appeared to be on drugs.  Police and an Ambulance were called and non guest left without incident.

But the heart of the matter was that Micah had been robbing houses in the trailer park behind the supermarket down the street and the owner came home early and surprised him and he ran out and climbed a barbed wire fence to get away.

His hands are bleeding badly.  He can't get them to stop.  They've been wrapped up in his shirt, but now that's a bloody mess and his hands still continue to bleed.

It happened a couple hours before I got there but the hotel was still abuzz with the news when I arrive at 11pm.  My new trainee arrives in work clothes that look painted on.  A wink and a smile and then she slips into the back office.  One of the day employees' pulls me aside and says that Micah has come in earlier when things were rather busy and nobody was paying him much attention.  He's bleeding all over the floor at that point and a couple guests notice and tell her.  She radio's housekeeping and calls the cops.

Micah wanders over to the pool to see what's happening, since things are too busy at the desk.  He's going to ask people at the pool if they've got any meth.  Looks like as good as place as any to make a score.  He's pressing his hands into his stomach and losing consciousness with all the blood.  He can't open the gate so he wanders back to the front desk and this time he looks white and the employee tells me she gave him some water, which his bloody glass lay in the trash can, and then he walked outside where the medics and the police meet him and treat him like a bio-hazard.

Michael the meth magician aka Micah is going to be alright.  Hopefully he'll get sober in the hospital and stay sober for a while.

hot city diary: day 122

I'm out in the woods with Alaska Sam and it's unseasonably hot.

My dog is floating next to me in her ski outfit.  I must be dreaming.

There's a rustling in the bushes and then a bear comes out of nowhere.  Tree branch smashing and kicking up undergrowth, this bear is mad.

My dog and Alaskan Sam disappear and it's just me and Grizzly.

I wake up to me sitting up in my bed punching the headboard,  I've busted a knuckle and it's terribly painful.

I crawl into the kitchen and take some aspirin and stick my fist into the ice chest.  Ouch.  I'm a bandaged mess.  The ice is the only thing making it better.  Stop the swelling.  If only I could stop the swelling in my head.  I stick my head in the cooler and things are better, for now

hot city diary: day 19

Floating.

Diving.

Moving effortlessly in the water.

Hot City Diaries: Day 14

The main drag is full of trucks.  All kinds of action is going on at the town store across the street.  A steady flow of patrons going in and out, getting in and out of their trucks.  Whole families stored up in the trucks, some of the trucks will just pull up the sidewalk and let out a little one to go pick up some goodies.

It's not that hot over here.

We make our way into Carlee's to get some grub.  It's a fun divey restaurant with a bar that wraps around the entire inside.  It's cheerful and friendly and the waitress apologizes for forgetting to bring extra plates and then runs off again.  She's great.  It's nice and cool inside and the ol' folks from around town are mingling and doing their thing and somebody thinks I'm the double for a friend that lives in Vermont.  I ask how my doppelganger is doing and she gives me a quick breakdown where he's had problems with his relationship but things are great now that he has a job and can pay alimony.

I agree to take a picture so she can send to Bob (Robert, if you don't now me) Something.

The band starts to sing.

"Baby, I'll never forget our time in Borrego,
Where did it go?

Baby, You want to run away to Borrego,
What do I know?

Babe, Why can't we be together in Borrego,
Where do I go?

Baby, Let's sail away to Borrego,
Come on, let's go."

It's nice music.  The food comes and it's a huge portion and the drinks are gigantic.  We share.  It's Borrego.

Hot City Diary: Day 13

"Let's Go, Go, Go to Borrego!" is the chant we cant stop yelling on the way to Borrego.

Hot City Diary: Day 12

My pool is unreal.  It's deep enough to put in a diving board, but if you launch off it too hard to the left then you might land in the jacuzzi, so maybe the diving board is a bad idea.

What a beautiful day.

The sun is out.  Clear blue skies from here to eternity.  The mountains rise up all around the house and the small local community that's tucked away up near the base in a cove.  Each house has a front yard that is a work of art with water friendly plants and rocks and stuff.  Palm trees lick the sky.

My beautiful Italian wife is being funny on the large inflatable swan that she bought.  Shelly laughs and almost falls off her perch on the swan.  She wants her magazines and a beer.

The dog is running and playing in the grass.

I walk out front to get the mail and the neighborhood is sweet.  I meet some of my neighbors and they tell me they paid too much for their house and ask me to put the TV, that Dan left, back in the sideyard.  I apologize for leaving it out on the curb since I moved in.

"I thought the city was coming for it." I say

"Look, we might not be upper cove, but we certainly aren't lower cove, so if you could just keep it upper cove-ish, that'll be great." He says.

"Sure thing."  I say.

Hot City Diary: Day 121

We're on the back of a dragon fly.  There are millions of tiny molecules heating up and floating off into the atmosphere.  It's happening on a large liquid plane out in the backyard.  Our dragon fly skirts the surface, making a figure eight over it; flying back and forth, back and forth.  Sometimes, he'll dip down and bounce off the water, then it's off into the bougainvillea.  As the days heat comes (today it will be 108) it happens at an even faster rate.  These tiny molecules are the water evaporating off the surface and the dragon fly is bathing himself in evaporation.

So common to experience rain, but no one gets to evaporate.

I've busted my pinky and torn up my big toe.  Blood all over the place.  There's a knot on the back of my head the size of a softball.  What the fuck happened?  I try to stand up and realize that it's going to be better down here on the floor.  I'm on all fours.  Head spinning.  There's music still playing down the hallway.

I crawl forward and make my way into the living room.  It's black outside.  A hot breeze blows through the house.  I grab a towel that's hanging on the oven door.  It's dirty.  Everythings dirty.  Good god.  I need to spray down the entire inside of this house.  Something else to put on the list.

I figure things will be better in the pool, so I crawl, limp, hop and fall into the blue, er light green.

It's perfect in here.  I can float.

The towel is now soaking wet, so I throw it out into the moonlight to dry.  As dry as it is out here, the towel will probably dry out in the moonlight.  I float around in the pool.  The shallow end is a mess of grass and algae and all kinds of bugs working it out in there.

I float to the bluer end and it's not as blue as it use to be.  It certainly isn't as blue as when I first bought it.  The haze in the bottom of the pool is getting thicker.  I'm sure I'll have to empty the thing at the end of Summer.  Emptying the pool at the end of summer.  The pool will be empty by the end of summer.  What was once full of water, the most precious of precious.  We will kill the lawn, but the pool must always live.
But not this year.  Not for me.  The pool and the lawn must die, but not now.  Not yet.

The pool is perfect.  I hang on to the orca floatie for dear life.  I shouldn't be floating in the deep end.  The water is around 89.  it's perfect in here.  I just need something to eat and some filtered water.

The music plays from the broken out windows.  Oh that must have happened last night also.  What is happening to me when I fall into these heat black outs?  I need to make sure the gas is turned off.  What else did I do?  I swim to the steps and get out and hobble around the house and yes the gas is turned off.  Whew.

I lay down on the outdoor lounger and fall asleep in the warm midnight air.

Hot City Diary: Ode to iced water

Hello ice water, how I love you so.
in a mug or in a glass
sweeter than the sweetest ass
First we filter the water thru charcoal and then poor it in 8 ounce servings.

And by we I mean me.
maybe the dog.

The water that's been sitting out on the counter all day sparkles in the pitcher.
The ice crackles when we drop them in.

Hot City Diaries: Day 95

I'm so tired of the heat.  106 today.

The cool air at work helps.  It actually makes me want to fall asleep.  I can't sleep at home with it being so hot and filthy and it's just so nice and cool and clean here.  The maids flutter around and clean it even more.  Somebody is in the lobby with a brush most of the night.  Unfortunately when they go to clean other parts of the hotel that's when it get's weird.

I'm dozing off on the couch in the lobby, at least if the phone rings or somebody walks in, I'll wake up.  Not like falling asleep in the back office or in one of the linen closets or even better, one of the rooms; anyways it's NOT like that and I doze off for 20 minutes and wake up to Michael sitting on the couch next to me.

He must of been run out of his meth camp or the cops raided it.

His Six and a half foot frame is stretched across the couch at the furthest point from me.

Well, he's laying down with his jacket over him and he's taken off his shoes and there is a horrible stench in the room.  Horrible.  He's not sleeping either.  He's in this weird state of consciousness.  Mumbling about handling it and magic.  He can't put a sentence together without some other part of him ripping him apart and he starts talking about something completely different.  He moves his jacket over his head and then sits up with it draping over his face.  He's so dirty.

He's suppose to be the son of a famous politician.  They've tried to help him but he needs to hit rock bottom before anyone can do anything.

I remember this and try to get him into a conversation about his Mother or Father but we easily get sidetracked about how he can make shit work by magic.  He snaps his fingers and claps his hands and wants me to look at him when he's talking.  I remember they say he carries a knife.  Security says that, they've got the whole file on him.  I really need to find out who the Mother and Father are.

That's when I give him a cigarette and tell him it's been cool but people will be coming soon and he has to leave, then I sneak into the back to radio security and ask him where's he's been for the past hour? or more?

Turns out he's the new guy that just got back from Iraq and he's deaf.  He's legally deaf in his left side because of a rocket launcher mishap.  He's also the guard that, on his day off, comes running over to the front desk and can't get any of the clerks attention because they were slammed and he yells, "There's a dead body out back, somebody call 911!"  Some guests were a little put off, even though it turns out the body was gone 2 minutes later when they all went out to look.  Yea, the new guy, he says he lives at the motel down the street.  Sounds like a fun guy.  Fly by the seat of your pants living in a motel, do what I want and half deaf war hero.  I like him already.  Sure, he's stoned all the time to get over the bad shit he did over there and it's A-fucking OK with me.  Send these people out to war and they get to smoke as much pot as they want when they get home.  He's friendlier and has a great big smile and even though the jokes are way to complicated, he's funny.

 Michael stops opening the door and talking thru it and then letting it shut and then opening it again just a little bit mumbling something and grinding his teeth letting it shut and then opening it again to clap his hands and snap. and Michael, who I accidentally call Jacob and  he corrects me with Michael.  So that's when our security guard shows up after unlocking the pools with the chains and locks in hand at 5:30am and does it for effect; and that's when we ask him to leave. We ask him to leave nicely.  He doesn't want to leave until we give him cigarettes.  We give him some cigarettes.  Security also reminds me not to look him in the eye.  He finds that intimidating and starts to get all hyped up.  I think about our magic time together and realize he was just having a freak out.  Snapping and clapping, what a freak show, whatever, I don't look him in the eye anymore and soon he puts on his shoes and stands out side and asks for another cigarette and a lighter and then lights his cigarette and throws the lighter back at us and leaves.  All the while flailing about and riding a certain intense high.

We open all the doors and turn the fan on high and have the housekeepers fabreeze the shit out of the place.  I sneeze.  We laugh, and Security makes his way on his rounds.

Hot City Diary: Day 94

Burning, burning, hot, hot, hot!  Yikes this car is hot.  It's gotta be 200 degrees Fahrenheit in here, not to mention the rest of me is being quickly cooked.  What can I do?  I roll down the windows and catch a hot breeze and go.  It's more training at the night shift and things are going great.  The car slowly cools off and by the time I pull into the dirt lot in Palm Springs, it has cooled off a little more.

It's the weekend and the bachelorette train just keeps on coming.  They got all kinds of ideas of what they're going to do.  The Sequin Crew tore thru the place like a tornado.  The bride calmly walks in last with all the adornments, the sash, a veil, and some kind of nice white dress, not her wedding dress but something expensive.  The sash reads Bride to Be.  Some of the girls have gone inside the bar and others goof off waiting for their pictures from the photo booth and the bride mingles.

Then comes another crew.  This time not as obvious as having matching outfits or theme party, but they're all very nice and one of the girls is wearing a sash.  They walk past the desk and see the photo booth and freak out and take some pictures and then disappear into the bar.

Somebody wants pillows.

Somebody is streaking the compound.  Probably room 4K.

Somebody wants somebody else to shut up.

Somebody needs some antacid.

The party goes into the early morning hours.  People complain that there is no parking.  We tell them how sorry we are and not to be upset, they can park in the 10 minute parking overnight.  Soon it's all full.  The whole compound.  There's an estimated 272 guests in house.

It's 3:43 a.m. Some guys hop the fence to the pool and get busted and want to know if they have to climb back out or if security will open the fence.  Security makes them climb back over.

Soon it's 5 a.m. and the reports are finished and the desk is clean and we refresh the water and wait for our relief to come in.

Hot City Diary: Day 160

It's getting worse in the back yard.  The pool is looking like a pond.  Grass has grown into it at one end and the algae has bloomed and so there are all kinds of things happening in the shallow end.  The bottom of the pool has a ghostly fog on it.  I can swim around in the deep end and the water is still fairly decent.

I can't have people over.

There's been so many hot days that now when one of them is around 100 it's not that big of a deal.  In fact you tell family that calls that it's nice out today.  It's only 99 or 100 degrees.  It's crazy talk.

The pool waterfall continues to flow, but I can't get enough chemicals in the water to change the mix.  I'm fucked.  The pool is a world of it's own now.  I will put a pound of chlorine in the pool today, but it won't change anything.  I'll also have to put in a gallon of acid and wait a couple hours in the bathtub until the pool is usable again.  More like 4 hours.

Even the cactus are melting.  They turn brown at the bottom first and then the arms start to fail.  Maybe you'll get lucky and you'll get the white puss and then they die.  They become shells and the sun further tears them apart and the shattered honeycombed insides are left to further bake in the sun and fail under the weight of the rest.  This is the worst heatwave combined with a drought that this area has seen in my lifetime.  We need more rain in California.

Hot Sex Diary: Day 93

The girls promised it wasn't about sex, they wanted just to have a drink and give me a shot up in their room.  They worked in the hospitality industry and so do I.

How could anything go wrong.

Well, they start undressing as soon as we get in the room.  Bra's and panties and booze.  Trouble.

Hot Totty Diary: Day Unknown

Gurgle.

Hot City Diary: Day 87

Big Weekend Night.  The feeling is in the air.  Come out dancing begs the music on your radio.  Most of the desert makes it way to the clubs and nightlife.  Palm Springs is the spot on the weekend.  Our hotel is one of the stops on the Weekend party train.  Vacationeers from O.C., L.A., S.D. mingle with the locals.  It's also in the secret book for bachelorette parties.  We are over run with women preparing to tie the knot on the weekends.  Whatever.  There are not enough straight men to fulfill the quota.

Some fun rave group is playing the hotel this weekend.  They've got a good groove going.  The dance floor is jumping.  Never seen the place this packed.  The music has never been louder.  It was close when the DJ was screaming that he was from Brazil.  They like it loud in Brazil.  Several people have clamored onto the bar and continue to dance.  Rave is back.  Rave is happening in the desert tonight, but last call is 2 am and there is no after hours, so it's not a real rave, is it?  Whatever, ravers have children in high school now and have to grade homework, so give them a break.  Or don't.  They are having a great time right now.

Some super big DJ that I remember from Monster Mash at Hollywood Park back in 94,  I was 8 when I started raving.  A halloween party at the horse race park was AWESOME.  Whatever.  Raving is stupid now.  I don't know what's cool, but it can't be raving nothing stays cool for 20 years.  Anyhow, this super big DJ is staying at the hotel.  Just on a nice little retreat.  He's not here on business.  Pure pleasure.  Pleasure out in the palm groves.  But he's gonna need some sleep.  Damn it!

Anyway.  Uber DJ keeps calling down to complain that the guests next door are using drugs and it's 4am he can't sleep.  I send Security over again.  Security tells them to shut up, and then Super DJ calls back to say it's not so much the talking but the door slamming is the main thing ruining any chance of sleep.  Security heads back over and it's funny enough, but it's the rave group DJs that are causing all the problems.  If they knew that they were keeping Mega DJ awake, Well, I don't know, would they play his records and make fun or would they show ultimate respect and go to bed?

Who knows?  Security doesn't want to get thrown under the bus so he doesn't mention it.  Don't blame him.  Hotel guests are always throwing us under the bus.  We have meetings down there sometimes.  So many of us.  It's better just to be vague.

What else happened?  Somebody lost their phone and lost their shit.  A big cry baby with no phone.  Total bummer.  We found somebody else's phone and returned it, she was ecstatic.  Found out there were 8 people staying in one room and being all ratchet.  Some people were sleeping outside on the patios'.  It's a good time.  Housekeeping refused to bring them any more pillows.  We got show mein from the kitchen and a cupcake and cookie later my colleague and I stormed thru the paper work.

Oh yea, and Super DJ had 2 pages of requests.  We filled it!

It's around 4:30 when the noise finally stops and then it starts to rain.  It rains for 15 minutes and then stops.  Nothing huge, but nice enough to water the cactus back at home.

The security guard comes around the front desk more with my curvy 19 year old colleague telling us stories of breaking up with her girlfriend.  He never stops by this much.  He try's to have an excuse for each time he comes in.  This time it's to report that he's hungry and going to get a bite to eat.  Good.

The sun starts to peak thru the clouds around 6 am and things are great.  I leave early once we've finished all the paperwork.  I throw security a bone and tell him keep an eye on our young helpless employee and he jumps on the game.  He agrees with me.

Pulling my car out of the dirt lot in the back, I roll down the windows and smell the wet landscape.  This is so rare.  Rain.  My car drives thru the puddles and rain soaked streets.  The cool morning air drying my freshly washed vehicle.  It hasn't been this clean in months.  Gotta love a free car wash. The early morning drivers are driving extra slow this morning, which is fine.  I turn up the radio and slow down.  I stick my head out the window and feel the wind blowing around my face.  Blowing my hair.

Hot City Diary: Day 143

Finally some relief.

A large Typhoon formed off of Mexicos' Pacific coast yesterday and Typhoon Sam ripped up Baja California but failed to make it to the states.  Some of the after effects are hitting the Coachella valley today.  Leftover clouds and the moisture they bring.

It's going to be around 95 today.  It's 95 at 8 am.  Not for a high or a low but a constant 95 degrees for 24 hours.  The temperature will not change for the entire day.  The locals love the cool temps but the vacationeers want high temps and passing out in the jacuzzi with a bloody mary.

The wood in every single fence at the house is splintering.  It's all been sitting in the sun for what could be 10 years.  Some of it could be older.  I replaced some beams holding up the back patio because they were bending.  Thank goodness the house is covered in whatever the fuck that is, fake adobe.  It may heat up and the paint may peel after a few years, but the wood in the house is good, well at least it's not dry and splintering, it could be full of termites, but that's something else entirely.

The drought is getting worst.  The water ban is in full effect. You cannot water lawns anymore.  Pretty easy patrol really.  If the anyone has green grass in a week, then they get a ticket.

Where is all this water coming from?  I always imagined that I've filled my pool with snow pack water from the tops of the mountains that surround the valley.  Now they say it's coming from aquifers and the Colorado river.

 Bruna is running around the back yard high on cockroach traps, again.  She runs over and takes a big drink of water.  Then she runs over to the edge of the pool to look in it and then comes running inside.  We wonder when the water ban will hit the swimming pool.

I lean back in my lounger in the living room and take a sip of water.  It's not that hot today.  The house is not really that hot either.  There is a light wind blowing thru the house.The mold is still there, but just barely as a washed out spot.  They look like clouds. There are some clouds.  If you look out over the front patio then you'll see all kinds of clouds peppered in the distance stretching north towards Desert Hot Springs.  Things are different for a change.  The humidity is a little bit too much and it makes you think a bit too much about the mold on the wall and in the cabinetry.

Water is very precious out here in the desert.

Water.

The newspapers talk about the reservoirs half empty.

The TV shows talk about the drought with shiny pictures of half empty Lake Mead and graphs and heat maps.

It's all very convincing.

It's going to be hot later.

Hot City Diary: Day 92

Sticky is a big fat liar.  She's not going anywhere.  She loves it down here in the sun.  It really helps her breathing problems.  The evening staff saw her wandering around property and bumming cigarettes off of patrons.  She's laying low now that she knows I'm on shift.  That tricky Sticky.

It's midnight and it's 100 degrees.

I wander into the street and take a picture with my phone, then scamper back into the air conditioned office to make sure that my body is cooled into the 80s for the majority of the 24 hours in a day.  Must be more than half.  If you're above 90 degrees for more than half, then you'll go mad.  If it's 100+ then it only takes hours.  36 hours of 100+ heat will do it.  It will cook you.

Hot City Diary: Day of the Radio

It's the only thing that still works.  The 1985 radio is playing a tape right now.  One of my mixed tapes.


We're shut down in the desert.  The satellite dish melted or maybe not the dish but something important cooked and the TV is busted now.  I do still have all my Cosmos saved and Alaskan TV shows.  It's fucking THURSDAY!  I'm gonna get stoned and lose myself in Alaska.  Those guys and gals are super independent and great hunters.  I remind myself to go hunt down at Trader Joes later today.  I need to buy some food.


It's blistering out.  Horribly hot.  The kinda heat that  make's water taste like your Mom's cookies.  Water tastes soooooooo good on a hot day like today.  Throw some ice in that glass and POW!  Better than any cocktail.

One of the managers was saying the other day that there is a heat advisory in full effect for the next two months and that we need to drink water.

Water.

It's the only way to survive out here.  Hydration.  H2O.  Hydrogen and Oxygen.  Can't we double or triple up the hydrogen to my oxygen.  How about H6O.  How about that.  That's the only way to survive in the desert.

Suddenly the backyard patio comes apart into atoms, and dances a little to the radio and then put's itself back together again.  I can't be outside anymore.   I'll just have to smoke in the house from now on.  I've been in the sun too long and I'm starting to see things.  The world couldn't have possibly come apart into atoms and then danced and then rearranged themselves.  Next the dog might come apart, and we don't want that.


Stay hydrated is the only rule.  None of the other rules matter because you'll go mad.

The tape stops playing, it's melting a little and i rush to take it out of the tape deck.  I stick the radio in the cooler and let it sit for a while to cool down. Losing the radio would be another lost tie with the outside world.  My smart phone and tablet burnt out.  Internet is spotty at best.

I take the radio out of the cooler and tune the AM channels to see if I kind find anybody.   I find two channels.  The first channel is a woman who is looking for her cat.  She is also sending out good vibrations and has water for anyone that needs it.  She's located on Paradise Way.  The big house with the walls made of solar something.  The second channel is a man who needs help, he needs some water.  The woman on the first channel talks about him a bit, about how he doesn't know we're listening so he doesn't give us his address.  It's a tragedy playing out on the radio.  Then I realize that I don't have any stations on the AM dial.   I roll up and down the dial and nobody.  My Cat woman is gone and the dying man is gone, too.  I must have either lost them or who knows If I was listening to anything but the thoughts in my own head.  Am I going crazy? I should go get a drink of water.

I flip the radio to FM and tune in KMET.  Rock-n-Roll starts to play.

Hot City Diary: Day 142

I'm standing in the shallow end of the pool with my sombrero on and I'm trying to stay cool.  It's only 107 today and that's good stuff for July.  Usually it's up in the One Teens.  The pool water in the shallow end is about 94 degrees.  It's hot.  I swim into the deep end, where I soon find myself treading water.  It's not that difficult.  I keep my head above water and navigate the hoses from the BarracudaV2400 and the pool animals.  It's a tad windy, which makes it a little more bearable, but not really.  I realize my joint is out and paddle to the love seat by the jacuzzi waterfall and light it again.  I few moments go by and I realize I've lit my sombrero on fire and it's going like dry brush.  Holy shit.  I duck underwater but the chinstrap puts me in a choke hold and I end up dragging the hat down to the bottom of the pool with me.

It's nice down here at the bottom.  I hold my breath and now that I'm just floating there, the sombrero floats there, too just a few inches from the top of my head..  A quarter of its burnt.  I turn it so it faces the back and then come up for air.  The hat is soaked, so I lay it out on the cement to dry and it starts to do so immediately.

Such a good hat, it had come from Mexico in the 90's and had so many adventures.  There was even some kind of secret compartment in the hat, that was so secret that I forgot where it is.

The dog has been eating cockroach traps and getting high on the poison.  She's freaking out right now and running around what's left of the grass.  She get's so high she'll jump in the pool sometimes.  This time she just runs back into the house and slides along the tile floor.

I grab a beer from the cooler and make my way back out to the pool.  I grab the hat which is dry already and put the burnt part toward the back and walk into the pool.  It's nice.  It sparkles.  Instantly it cools the body down.  The head should be submerged as much as possible to keep the brain cool.  It's hard to keep it underwater, but I'll try to take a swim around the deep end every ten minutes, just to keep it cool.  I'll leave the hat floating at the surface and then try to come back up into it.  Keeping my sunglasses on.  It's quite a feat.