12th of October, 2003 ANTE·MERIDIEM 03:15

Thu Oct 9 18:51:20 EDT 2003 / Thu Oct 9 15:51:46 PDT 2003

Okay, since the last entry I’ve gone to Seattle, drunk a lot of beer, met a lot of Seattlites, came back to San Francisco, immediately caught a plane to Tampa Bay via Las Vegas—they have slot machines in the departure lounge in that latter, which was a little disorienting—met the impossibly cool Jennifer, drank some more beer, ate some grits (they’re surprisingly boring, for something that always seems to outsiders to have been an eccentric regionalism, it’s decent breakfast food), saw what used to be one of the Ringling Brothers’ mansions, which uses far too much marble for something that has pretty much direct exposure to salt water, walked barefoot in a swamp, used a children’s playground’s swings in the wee small hours of the morning, stuck my hand out a car window and was surprised by the differential in heat and moisture compared to the air-conditioning inside. It’s warm and humid there, as you’d expect, but I was disconcerted by the force of it.

I’m now on my way back to San Francisco, this time going via Phoenix, Arizona. I’ve only slept for a few fitful minutes on planes over the last three days, and I’m afraid I’ve left too much of an unintentionally grumpy impression on Jennifer.

Sat Oct 11 14:30:34 PDT 2003

Hmm, I should have put up the above long ago, but I seem to have found things to do. Anyway. Since then, I got to San Francisco, met Amy and Vernon, walked around a lot, realised I’ve reached my credit card limit, a little unexpectedly (next few months will be lean, but that’s okay, I’ve had fun). Drank some more, slept some more, all good.