10 Beautiful things I saw last week

10 Beautiful things I saw last week.

1. The shimmering multi-hued green of southern Michigan's fields and forests.
2. My 92 year-old grandmother's smile when we saw each other for the first time in two years.
3. The three does and four fawns gathered around the salt lick at dusk in my parent's back yard.



4. My great-nephew Alexzander: chubby, smiling, blonde and blue-eyed.
5. The bluebells and tiger lilies scattered like pebbles along the side of the back roads of Jackson County.
6. The stabs of lightning flashing from a thunderstorm 200 miles to the south while flying west on a moonlit night above the clouds.
7. Jama Rizzi.
8. The last fireflies of the season performing their ghost dance in the Michigan night.
9. The twin Latina actress/models jogging together down Runyon Canyon, their skin glistening in the late afternoon sunlight.
10. Ryan Taylor-Smith in facepaint with a sockpuppet.

The Circus is in Town!

Hooray for Hollywood!
That screwy ballyhooey Hollywood
Where any office boy or young mechanic can be a panic
With just a good looking pan
And any barmaid can be a star maid
If she dances with or without a fan

So the song goes... And after 10 years living in the HollyHood, I've come to accept it as true. It is truly the screwy ballyhooey Hollywood. When people ask me how a man who grew up in a town of 800 people (and twice as many livestock) can stand to live in the middle of Los Angeles, the answer that comes to mind is pretty simple. The Circus is always in town.



Sure, the air is foul and traffic is fouler. Yes, the Plastic People rule the world here, and the velvet rope is in effect everywhere you go. Yet, yet, yet - I'm never, ever bored. Every single day there is something interesting going on. Every band in the world tours through L.A. Every movie plays here. All the traveling art exhibits make a stop here. Every type of food known to man is served here. If I feel like Ethiopian tonight, there's five restaurants within 2 miles I could visit. Same for Peruvian, or Hungarian, or Laotian. Want to frolic in nature? The Mountains are that way, the Ocean is that way, the Desert up there. All close at hand. Seriously, did you know that Los Angeles County is roughly the size of Delaware, and that 1/3 of it is state and national parks?

But above it all, the thing that keeps me here continually fascinated is the circus. The kaleidoscope of crazies that wander the landscape in an effort to provide me free entertainment. Last night I was on Hollywood Boulevard a few minutes after midnight. Over the course of 10 minutes I saw a man dressed as Jesus (I don't think he was the Real Christ, he seemed a bit white for that), two lovely women who took a moment to seriously consider a man's offer of $50 to "smell both your drawers", three cop cars and five cops joining forces to bust two teenage jaywalkers, and the various club kids, homeless and vampires who haunt the streets of Hollywood after dark. All in all, unparalleled entertainment value for a slow Wednesday in May....

Peace,

Patrick

This is NOT a Test.

...although it probably should be. This is NOT the revolution. Yet. This IS a place for me to post the random craziness that wanders through my life from time to time. Come along, won't you..?

If you want to know the derivation of the title "First Firefly", it comes from an 18th century Japanese poet, Issa. One of my cherished childhood memories is soft summer evenings when scores of fireflies would glisten across the backyard of my family home. There are no fireflies (or lightning bugs or Pyractomena angulata if you're a science snob) in Los Angeles, which is a definite drawback to the city of angels...

Patrick

The first firefly,
But he got away and I-
Air in my fingers...