INTERESTING FACT:
This entry’s image is the reverse of the image from my 4/25 entry.
Dear diary,
I like lazy ideas that are a waste of time. That might sound like a joke but I’m serious. Too much of the world is go-go-go. Too much of the world is tremendous! and mission accomplished! — I just want a vacation. And I want it to be a purposely low-aim vacation because then it doesn’t matter when it fails.
Some people take vacations and say “Our family shall now enjoy the perfect outing.” Then they spend the next several days whipping each other into shape. A map is drawn up of all the places that they must sightsee, and they follow a rigidly timed itinerary: they stop to tag landmarks, leave immediately after taking one photo, and they race thru museums. — The result is that the mom hates the dad; the dad hates the mom; the kids hate each other as well as their parents, and the parents hate the kids right back. Once the vacation is over & everyone returns to work or school, they’re actually relieved to have escaped the wrath of “enjoyment”.
So I guess I must admit that, in a way, the traditional family vacation is genius. It’s a great idea, if you want to learn to embrace your quotidian life. But I myself start out each morning in a romantic mood, which means that I yearn to be anyplace other than HERE. So, no matter where I go, I feel dissatisfied — even acutely agitated. Remember that passage in Paradise Lost where Satan sez
Which way I fly is Hell; my self am Hell;
And in the lowest deep a lower deep
Still threat’ning to devour me opens wide,
To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heav’n.
Well, everywhere that I go becomes not exactly Hell but just really annoying. So let me imagine a bad vacation that I could sorta half-tolerate:
Let’s follow the cliché — that way it’ll be easier to jot. And whatever I get wrong about this stuff (which I of course know nothing about) will provide the stiltedness that’ll give this entry its character.
1
So I start out in a lawn chair, on a tropical beach. I’m wearing a boxy shirt with a printed pattern that people from the contiguous U.S. label “Hawaiian”. But I wanna stress that I’m not in Hawaii. Not that there’s anything wrong with vacationing in Hawaii — that is a cliché — but I’d rather keep my imagined sanctum’s locale indeterminate; this way, it can, at once, share traits with a place like Hawaii, while possessing traits that a place like Hawaii lacks, such as the world’s largest pinball arcade. (Does Hawaii possess the world’s largest pinball arcade, by the way? I really should research these assertions before stuffing them in the Fact Bin.)
I spend all morning watching the Rainbow Lorikeets, which are a type of exotic bird. The day is sunny, and there are just enough clouds in the sky to make it picturesque. In my right hand I’m holding a cocktail glass, which I touch to my lips from time to time, but it’s almost certain that I’m only doing this action for show: I’m not truly sipping any liquid — this pisses off my audience, and that makes me feel smug.
Next I watch the Golden Pheasants, which do their show directly after the Lorikeets. These new birds flutter and prance all around, on & about the spindly leafless tree near the lifeguard chair at my left. The tailor’s dummy occupying the chair is draped in a red one-piece bathing suit.
Then the Rainbow Lorikeets come back, and they start to talon each other. (I’ve always wanted to use the word “talon” as a verb, so this makes me grin.)
And now the Queztal birds swoop down gracefully, directly in front of me, to search for buried treasure in the sand near my crossed legs. And the Hoopoes join them.
Finally the Bali Bird of Paradise appears: it is standing on a plank that is being lowered ceremoniously from above. The ropes of the plank have been spray-painted gold. — I salute the bird; then I pantomime sipping my beverage. Salsa music is playing softly in the background.
Now, for an encore, from both stage left and stage right march out troops of Atlantic Puffins, and they go to battle with the Lear’s Macaw, which just emerged from the plastic pail that is on its side in the sand. And the Lear’s Macaw wins. The beach is strewn with the corpses of Puffins.
2
Goddamn, that was a really good morning. I carefully place my drink down on the arm of my lawn chair, and turn and walk towards my hotel room. When I’m two steps away, the drink slips and tumbles earthward, but the Bali Bird of Paradise speeds forth and talons up the glass in midair. (She takes my drink back to her nest. There is still a dash of liquor left in the bottom, tho most of its contents got dumped out during the fall — so the crabs that live beneath the surface get to consume what spilled.)
I enter the hotel where I am staying. I had intended to take the elevator to my room; but, when I glance over my shoulder, I notice that my favorite philosopher is sitting alone in the dining area; so I head over to greet him.
“How are you, sir?”
“Bryan! What brings you here?”
“I rarely ever leave.”
“Have a seat! I’m glad to see you! Have you eaten?” he sez.
“I drank my breakfast on the beach already, this morning; thanks,” I answer, while patting his hand. “How about yourself? Can I buy you a home-cooked meal? I know that you philosophers are often in penury, because the pursuit of wisdom is a fool’s errand—only crime pays—therefore you all tend to die of malnutrition, despite sadly being just within reach of the finest cuisine, because you guys tend to haunt these high-end restaurants in hope that some snazzy billionaire philanthropist like myself will come along and coddle you, out of pity for the world that could have been. So what do you say — eat or starve? What’s wrong, cat got your tongue?”
“I guess I could go for some eggs,” says the philosopher meekly.
“Eggs!—coming right up!” I reach into my pocket and place a silver call bell on the table before us and ding it repeatedly, until a handmaid appears.
The handmaid bows.
“Juliette, I want you to dash as fast as you can to my room and make this gentleman something for breakfast. Two eggs, overeasy. Also a large plate of sausages. And bring me another martini — I lost the other one in the sand (one of the vultures tried to attack me). Actually, make that four plates of sausages. And please work fast: this man is liable to flatline — he’s over eighty years of age, and he hasn’t eaten since the last Great Depression. Do you understand the urgency of this situation? Don’t spend a lot of time lollygagging — don’t think that you can spare a half hour to call your boyfriend on the telephone before preparing the meal. Don’t open the main door of my suite and immediately recline on the couch, stretch your legs in the air, and giggle at all the sweet nothings that your boyfriend keeps blabbing into the receiver, while your toes of your bare feet caress the spiraling cord of the landline. In fact, if it helps you to labor more efficiently, just think of ME as your new lover. Pretend that I won your heart away from that old lover: you decided to kick that mutt to the curb. I’m your boyfriend now: I’m the amorous one, darkly handsome: I’m the only man who makes you laugh. Got it? For, if not, then what do I pay you for? — Do you understand these instructions?”
“Oui, Monsieur.”
“Good. Now curtsy, frown, and skedaddle.”
The maid shuffles away.
“Sorry about that,” I say to my philosopher friend. “These young handmaids are always dazzled by my charm — once they engage me in parley, they simply can’t stop jabbering. But I hope we didn’t take too long — I hope you’re not feeling like you’re on the verge of fainting from starvation…”
“No, no, thank you again: I’ll be fine. I’ve been munching on these pretzels,” explains the philosopher, “that the hotel offers as a complimentary appetizer: there’s a small dish of them on every table (I’ve cleaned out all the ones on the north side of this room, so far); so I was quite contented while you two were enjoying your little tête-à-tête. It was amusing to observe you, in fact — it was like watching a movie. And you two have really good chemistry together. I think she loves you.”
“Really? True love? How can you tell?”
“It’s the way that she gazed at you when you said ‘I’m your boyfriend now.’ It was like she was hypnotized; and there appeared a twinkle in her eye.”
“Ah!” I say, “I assumed that was only a teardrop.”
“No, tears mean that someone is terrified,” says the philosopher. “Here, look closely: this is a teardrop—” & then he shifts his body so that his face comes very near to mine. He stares directly at me for some moments, in total silence, with a blank expression. I begin to feel awkward. Then, suddenly, a pair of shiny wet tears well up in his eyelids. At last, he blinks, & the tears streak down his visage and land upon the tabletop.
Now the maid returns with a tower of plates capt with warming lids, stacked one upon another, atop her head. She sidekicks open a tray table, hefts the plate-tower onto it deftly; then grabs a kerchief from her apron pocket, wipes off the philosopher’s side of the table, and places the top plate tenderly before him. The remaining plates she slams down in one grand stack in front of me.
“Merci, Juliette,” I say. “You made really great time. Would you care to join us? Do you like pork sausage?”
“Monsieur, the hotel had no sausage, so I had to substitute.”
“But why not just run to the closest slaughterhouse and shoplift a wagonload? It’s unconscionable to neglect restocking essentials.”
“Because, Monsieur, all the slaughterhouses are bolt-locked shut for Mother’s Day, and I’ve been told that there’s a tragic situation, which can happen only once in the lifetime of any universe: You see, apparently a strange disease has killed off all the swine.”
“Dead swine in the slaughterhouses!? But why should that deprive us of our sausage linx? Isn’t that the whole point: to kill the beast and eat its flesh!? So where in heck ARE the dead bodies of these diseased swine — they didn’t just incinerate them, did they? If so, they should reverse course: grind them up instead, add some filling if necessary, and stuff them into casings.” I shout. “I myself will gladly eat them, if no one else wants them.”
“Monsieur,” explains Juliette, “I was able to contact by telephone the representative of this island’s largest slaughterhouse (the fellow happens to be my ex-boyfriend); and I spoke to him for a good thirty minutes while reclining on the couch, prior to preparing the meal: He tells me that, after witnessing this illness outperform them at their own expertise, all the butchers in town felt so resentful that they decided to abandon their profession and instead to become interns at a lab that studies infectious diseases — now their hope is that, by working together with the other members of the scientific community, they will discover some concoction of deadly perfumes that can be spritzed upon whatever germ or bacteria is to blame for this theft of their prior career: and, for this reason, they have secured every last porcine carcass in the morgue’s enormous freezer. (All the human corpses that were sleeping there till now have been safely transferred to a mass grave out back.) The slain swine have thus been set aside to be studied by the eye of empiricism, so that the mystery of their death can be deciphered: they are not for individual resale.”
Hearing this, I wrinkle my brow. “Darn,” I say. “Well, then what did you choose to use as a substitute for the four large plates of sausage that I ordered?”
The maid smiles and announces with poise: “I made french bread instead.” She then lifts the cover off the topmost plate of the tower, and, sure enough, a number of loaves are neatly displayed.
My eyes widen: “Oh, I love bread! This is much better than sausage!”
“May I take a seat beside you here & join in your partaking of this feast?” sez Juliette. “I brought two sharp knives for us to rip with.”
She holds up two sharp knives. I take one in my hand.
“Yes, thank you. Please, sit down,” and I point the tip of my knife at the booth.
So the maid plants herself opposite the philosopher, with her hip touching mine, and we tear into our bread with the extremely sharp knives, all the while moaning with delight: “Mmm, this tastes wonderful!” Meanwhile my friend the philosopher uses his fork to push the eggs around his plate.
3
So now in the next part of my vacation day with Juliette and the philosopher, we all sneak out of the diner thru the back doors of the kitchen.
“Hop on this dune buggy and I’ll drive you two to the beach,” I say to my companions.
So they accompany me to the world’s largest pinball arcade (for I inform them that we MUST make a pit stop); then we speed over the sand until we arrive at the place where I was lounging earlier this morn: There are now three lawn chairs positioned facing the sea.
“Oh, shoot!” I say; “I left my martinis back in the eatery!”
“No, Monsieur,” sez Juliette. “I never served them to you at all — for I mistakenly left them in your apartment. I remember this distinctly now, because, back when I was preparing the meal for our luncheon, I tried to place the martini glasses on the plates that were stacked atop my head; however, when I did, I was unable to stand straight up without the rims of the drinks scraping against the ceiling — if I had carried them that way, I would’ve needed to keep crouching severely, or walk on my knees the whole way down the fifteen flights of stairs, in order to avoid splintering the glasses into a billion shards — so I decided to leave the drinks on the counter in the main room of your suite. My plan was to return & fetch them after delivering the rest of the breakfast; but then I got distracted when you accepted my request to join your celebration, and I plum forgot the beverages. Shall I sprint back and get them?”
“No, don’t bother,” I say; “they’re gone by now, anyway. Some birds have surely taloned them up and brought them back to their nesting-ground for safekeeping. We’ll never see those martinis again. I’ll just order more from room service.”
Thus I unclip my phone from my belt and dial nine-one-one.
“Hello?” sez the voice on the other side of the line.
“Hi, Bryan Ray here, a guest of the Happy Isles Hotel.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m the bigshot from Suite 9000.”
“Oh, OK.”
“Well, I was hoping that I could get some room service out here. We’re at the beach; it’s a lovely day — not too many clouds...”
“Sir, I’m sorry to break this news to you, but ‘room service’ only services rooms. You say you’re out at the beach? Then you should call beach service.”
“Alright, what’s that number?”
“There is no number. Such a thing does not exist.”
“You’re kidding,” I say. “Seriously, you’re pulling my leg, right? I don’t care what I have to do, we just need some martinis out here, pronto. The day is fading. Night is approaching. And all I’ve eaten today is french bread.”
“Get a room: then I can help you. Until then, you’re on your own,” the voice sez & hangs up.
I turn to my comrades. “Alright,” I announce. “Here’s the deal. We’ve encountered a snag: It turns out that this stupid place won’t serve us alcohol unless we build our own hotel room, here on the beach. But I think we’re in luck; cuz I recall reading somewhere that all you need to make glass is melted sand. Now, look around us: There’s practically nothing but sand, as far as the eye can see. That’s becuz it’s a beach. So all we need now is to find a way to melt it.”
“I have a hair curler that I left on high, back in your suite,” sez Juliette. “Do you think that would work?”
“Hmm,” I say, with a puzzled look; then I turn to my friend the philosopher: “What do you think?”
“A glass house? Do I understand you right?” asks the philosopher. “You’re looking to live inside a glass house?”
“Well, first we need to build it,” I answer, “before we can live there.”
“OK, let’s reason this out,” sez the philosopher: “An iron for curling hair can get extremely hot, especially when left on high for a while… and, in order to melt something, you sure do need a LOT of heat.”
“That’s true,” sez Juliette.
“Well I don’t wanna make any propositions that might soon be proven wrong, but, I must admit, your plan will work,” murmurs the philosopher while looking down at his shoes.
“Yes-s-s-s!” I pump my fist in the air. Then I shout to Juliette:
“Juliette, sprint back to the room & fetch your hair curler! Go-go-go! Faster, faster!!”
In about forty minutes, Juliette returns, swinging the item by its cord. Her hair looks fantastic.
So we make the requisite number of clear glass panels, and then we carefully reposition our lawn chairs inside the living room, so that they are facing the large front window. I plug in the landline and lift the receiver:
“I’m getting a dial tone!”
“Hello,” booms a voice from the telephone’s speaker: “nine-one-one emergency; how can I help you?”
“Whoa!” I say, “I didn’t even dial a number yet!”
“Everything’s touch-free & powered by mind nowadays, on account of the pig-flu,” booms the voice. “How can I help you?”
“Can I order room service now? Cuz we built ourselves a room. It’s totally see-thru, but it has four walls, plus a roof and a floor.”
“Yes, we deliver to any geolocation nowadays. Not many people have shelter, after the crash. What would you like?”
“I’ll take six martinis. That’s two for each of us (I have a couple guests at present — I’m sorta running a mini hotel-within-a-hotel, if you know what I mean…”
“Alright, six martinis coming right up.”
“Wait,” I shout, “I didn’t tell you our room number…”
“We already know everything we need to know. It’s all in your file. Everything comes up automatically on the Caller I.D. screen, when you choose to make contact.”
“And what if I would have refrained from making contact?” I ask.
“It’s still there, to be honest,” the voice booms.
“Well I appreciate your candor,” I say. “Now, how long should we expect the delivery of this order to take?”
“You should be seeing a sky-drone come hovering overhead, right about... NOW!!!” booms the voice.
I look up. Sure enough, there’s a “Santa Falcon” dropping six brimful martinis down our chimney.
So, with my palm covering the telephone’s mouthpiece to mute it, I shout to Juliette:
“Catch the drinks before they spill!”
4
The rest of the evening is spent inside our glass room, reclining in our lawn chairs & watching the ocean. We have an excellent view of the Exxon Valdez.
5
On the morrow, we admire some art at the drive-thru museum.
6
We spend Tuesday watching the conflagration consume the nation’s capital. We order cheesy fries from a street vendor.
7
Wednesday is spent sleeping off the cheesy fries.
8
For “Throwback Thursday” we photograph ourselves next to the year 1985, straddling a statue of the President. We post these pictures on the social network, & some of our friends claim to like them.
9
Friday is spent agonizing over the fact that our vacation cannot last forever. We stay in our room (the one back in the penthouse suite, not our makeshift glassy hut) and watch cable TV shows all day and partway into the evening. We hit the hay about three hours after midnight. We get very little sleep.
0
Global warming reaches its full bloom on Saturday, in tandem with the onset of nuclear winter. So, altogether, it’s a wash. Humankind finally expires, and other creatures take our place. Tho we ultimately found this region uninhabitable, these beings who succeed us seem to enjoy Earth just as it is. Boy are they in for a rude awakening when the planet keeps changing, cuz eventually it’ll start to displease even them.
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