Monday June 16 2014

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Waking up at 1:58 p.m. Mm. Way too late for my tastes.


Bran Flakes and Berry Cobbler Granola with Almond Milk.


Errands.


Vacuuming downstairs and upstairs.


Scrambled Eggs. Everything Bagel with Vegan Cream Cheese. Honey Green Tea.


Practicing a little bit at the storage unit.


Banana.


Street basketball with Anthony and Riggs. We pick up a lone baller on the court for a couple of 2-on-2 games.


Back at the house people are gathering for the movie. We're showing an Italian film called The Great Beauty (2013), a rather visual and artful piece about an aging writer searching for great beauty. Ana and I share a Cheese Pizza from Chicho's and a small bowl of Arugula.

...

Someone makes a joke at Kevin. "I'm infended," Kevin says without thinking.

"Infended? You mean offended?" somebody asks.

Kevin: "Offended. You guys knew what I meant."

Me: "It's not about what you mean. It's about what you say!"

Kevin's comeback: "Put it in your blog, Robert!"

...

Jessica announces after Kevin whistles at the boobies on the screen, "That's all you care about, Kevin. Playing the violin and women."

Kevin just smiles haughtily and says, "That's right."


"The most important thing I discovered a few days after turning 65 is that I can't waste any more time doing things I don't want to do."

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"This is how it always ends. With death. But first there was life, hidden beneath the blah, blah, blah... It's all settled beneath the chitter chatter and the noise, silence and sentiment, emotion and fear. The haggard, inconstant flashes of beauty. And then the wretched squalor and miserable humanity. All buried under the cover of the embarrassment of being in the world, blah, blah, blah... Beyond there is what lies beyond. And I don't deal with what lies beyond. Therefore... let this novel begin. After all... it's just a trick. Yes, it's just a trick."


Upstairs, Ana and I lounge on the bed and talk. She looks up at a picture I have on the wall of a castle and asks what castle it is. This sparks up a history lesson on the Neuschwanstein castle and Ludwig II (The Swan King). I pull out a few books from the shelf and we skim through pictures and letters written back and forth between Wagner and Ludwig.


Sleep around 3:30 a.m.


[i] The Great Beauty.

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