What could be more splendid and true on a warm summer day like this than a lemonade stand by the side of the road? A card table, a red checkered tablecloth, Igloo cooler, plastic cups, and a good firm voice to carry your pitch.

But this kid, manning his stand along an interminable redwood fence in full morning sun, needed some priestly advice from his Dad. There are better ways to earn the money for a skateboard, Son. Go mow some lawns. Because no matter how nice it is out in the sun and sea breeze, how bittersweet the lemonade, how bright and bold your twelve-year-old voice, it’s not a one man job.

You need a brother, a sister, a couple of friends, with you when selling lemonade. The hours are long in solitude, and all that clear and chirping, pure untangled sunlight starts to ache.

I could have stopped and bought a cup, but I was on a mission. Still waters run deep; at 32mph, pity flows shallow, drains away. Besides, if he keeps this up, he’ll be a writer someday.

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Here’s something to think about. Are the Beetles the most truly innovative musicians of their time? (Along with the Grateful Dead of course.) If you heard Hard Days Night on the radio, is there any risk you might not recognize it? No. It’s completely unique. I’ve never been a great fan of the Beetles, in terms of wanting to own and listen to their music. But it’s just a matter of taste. I sure do admire their innovaction and talent.

Check out the great gag on All That Arises .

I paid $2.30 per gallon for the cheapest gas today, near Santa Barbara, CA. The bastards are trying to squeeze a last few arterial spurts of blood out of us before the end of tourist season. I can’t seem to locate my copy of Dante, but I seem to remember a couple of lines about

a twisted ring of blueblack

by lakes of gasoline

— Level eight, the Malebolge; the fraudulent, malicious, panderers, grafters.

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Here’s the result of tonight’s short writing practice.

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The milkman wakes up sad every morning, too early. He used to be glad to be up before dawn, before the dogs awake and start barking. Even the gulls and doves are still asleep. He was glad to set milk on the doorsteps of families, so that children had breakfast and went off to school. So that fathers had shredded wheat unsweetened, carefully avoiding their fresh-knotted neckties, went off to their offices, with their business sections, briefcases, bumbershoots. What a fun word.

But lately, he wakes up sad. He dreamed once and saw what the children really need, and knew in that moment that his dream was true. So he steps from the bathroom, having washed his hairy chicken bony arms and legs, and brushed his pearly canines and acrylic crowns, puts on his white uniform in the blue-gray room, where the bed still groans for him come back, give up, sleep in. He knots his black rayon tie in the whispering darkness, four in hand, lets the tip fall against the buckle of his belt, and thinks about what families really need.

The ocean. Not all of it, just the serrated, sloshing frothy edge, just at that point where the last briny sheet slows in foam and indecision on the sand, thinks better of itself, and turns away. Put down your pasteurized vitamin D 2% and toast, he thinks, and meet the universe just there. Everything behind you dries like a leaf and falls away. But there, down, down past the kelp and the wharf light’s reach, down there is the fresh, refrigerated mind.

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Just for fun, I did a little Natalie Goldberg writing practice tonight – writing for 10 minutes, starting with “I remember…” – and coughed up the following in 10 minutes flat:

I remember when I was trying to learn to ride a bike. I had a green bike, lime green. It had fat tires. One speed, no hand brakes. I got on it at the top of the drive way. My Mom was out front, standing and talking to a neighbor lady. I got on the bike, meaning to go down the driveway and turn at the mailbox and go down the sidewalk. The bike started down, it wasn’t steep but my brain froze. I forgot how to steer or brake. I just hung on and my Mom was standing talking to the neighbor. I rode past them and sort of screamed and went like a rodeo bull rider straight into that mailbox. I don’t think I got hurt, or damaged the mailbox, and that bike was built like a tank. A little first aid from Mom and I was back out there, seeking gravity’s insidious kiss.

I remember doing the same thing on Craig G’s dirt bike, when I was about 17. We were out in the thunderdome area on the east end of town. There was a race track out there back in the 20s or 30s, but it’s just rutted dirt trails, scrubby bushes and lizards now. I used to part out with my girlfriend Carol, probably about a year after I crashed Craig’s bike. It was nice of him to let me ride it. Actually, I didn’t want to. I’ve always known I have no balance, need four wheels under me. But my brother was off on his yellow and black Yamaha, and Craig wanted me to try his out and he showed me the controls. I rode it around for a while, through the scrub bushes and fennel, wild mustard, the ocean close by. Got confused at a turn, went the wrong way and the old brain froze up on me again. Went right down in a ditch. Hated to see Craig come walking along the trail, to drag his bike out of there. Sometimes the ground is very hard.

What’s going on in Texas is every bit as dire a travesty as the grotesque circus of politics in California. Here’s a letter, written from exile in NM, by Texas State Senator Rodney Ellis.

I’m kinda tired. I turned off the computer at midnight last night, and settled down in front of the bedroom TV for some X Files. I decided to stay up for a while because my dog was restless, wanting attention. Turns out she had a tummy ache.

I turned out the light at 2:00 (it was a double episode) but the doggie was still restless.

Wait a minute. Does anyone out there want to read about how my dog got diarrhea in the middle of the night, and I wound up getting sleep between 8am and noon? I don’t think so. Why would anyone want to read about that? Crazy @&($%^# writer.

How about this: “Nowhere can a man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul.” — Marcus Aurelius.

Well, that’s very idealistic, Marc, you old goombah. But it presupposes that one’s soul is in a certain requisite state of repair, that it’s been swept and dusted; a little Windex for circumspection and mildew killer in those pesky damp spots.

My own soul seems more like a leaky, creaky tree house than a chapel lately. The feng shui is all fenged up; my chi has been having too much cheese. Way down in my soul, someone is just beginning a short, unpromising career on the accordion. All of which reminds me of this poem by Frank Logan, which includes the following lines:

I have a friend named Frank–

the only one who ever dares to call

and ask me, “How’s your soul?”

I hadn’t thought about it for a while,

and was ashamed to say I didn’t know.

I have no priest for now.

Who will forgive me then. Will you?

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I wonder what it is that makes spammers like this so hard to catch. Is there any doubt that if I tried to pull something that stupid, I’d be in jail by sundown? Nope.

Almost as incredible as their scaly slipperiness is the fact that there are still folks out there falling for such lousy bait. Can anyone explain why there are morons in Nigeria or wherever, trying to get people to help them launder money for a huge handling fee? Is that really still believable to anyone with sufficient mental alacrity to turn on a computer? I guess so.

Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see what Citibank’s stock does tomorrow. The bobbleheads behind “consumer sentiment” will probably cut it down a notch. Just for the halibut.

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Another Darwin award narrowly averted:

Gun in Oven Shoots Woman

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Well, I found out what that software is, that kept trying to down itself to my computer. A porno site – some sort of auto-dialer. It kept popping up, closing my windows, trying to start a download. I kept clicking no and cancel, and finally I accidentally clicked Yes. A thumbnail dirty picture appeared on my desktop, and the thing started hitting my modem, like an alien creature trying to slither into some guy’s spleen.

That’s what these pornographers are – they’re parasites. No better than the fleas that try to get on our dogs. We have flea control products to kill those bloodsuckers, and we need something just as prefunctory for the pornographers.

Trace ’em, find ’em, shoot ’em in the head. We’ll all be happier when they’re dead. Just a modest proposal for their summary disposal.

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Well, I finally got through to blog-city.com. They have a notice posted, saying the were hit by denial of service attacks overnight. I guess it’s still going on. Anybody who does stuff like that — to anybody, for any reason — is scum.

My laptop is doing something stupid. Since this problem with blog-city last night, sometimes when I try to navigate to a site, it starts downloading something with German dialog boxes. I’ve deleted the cookies, flushed the cache. It’s running Norton antivirus and corporate edition Windows NT Pro. Supposed to be very stealthy. I’m running a full NAV scan, but suggestions would be appreciated.

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I don’t wish to make light of the trials faced by people back east. I know that a lot of people went through a very difficult time. And they showed the world — again — that the citizens of American cities are strong and good. And look, there’s another silver lining:

The Iraqis are getting a real kick out of it. Apparently, they think it’s a hoot. And they have some warm weather tips to pass along. It’s a good thing: America is about more than just a good asskicking. All the worlds a stage!

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