adrienne's Tour Diary

An hour after leaving San Francisco Dan became a member of Costco. The tire installment center gave us a timeframe of FOUR hours before the van's new tires would be ready to roll. We ate some burgers = 30 minutes. We walked the entire nearby strip mall--past Pet Club, Goldilocks Bakery, an optomotrist, dentist, and a nail salon (a pedicure would have been an excellent way to spend our time, but I was the only one who thought so).

We entered Costco around 3 pm and wove through every aisle. I sampled one tiny plastic spoonful of dark chocolate gelato. For five minutes We loitered inside a $1867 plastic fort for children with the same square footage as a San Francisco apartment. 120 minutes later we left with a year's supply of chewing gum, toothpaste, a max pack of granola bars, 9 volt batteries, bottles of wine and port, and 24 bottles of Stella. while we stood in line customers tested out a karaoke microphone, some Costco members more gifted than others.

The new tires = less turbulence, more steering wheel control. We arrived at John's just before midnight and enjoyed Tillamore Dew whiskey with him and Dianna in the cottage, our home in Los Feliz for the night. Laurel called with the address to a nearby party which we walked to via Vons (not Jons), arriving shortly after 1 a.m. It was Charlie's birthday, but we never met Charlie. I was reprimanded for pulling on the ceiling fan controls.

In Sea Level Records I lose the concept of time. I changed in the van and saw Chris G's dad and Gabe parking in the lot. I'd have greeted them but I was, as I mentioned, changing, having come straight from USC to the record store after going with Jamie to take my brother back to the dorms post brunch at Fred 62.

After playing Sea Level we drove up a mountain in Echo Park to Dianna's to drink and dine on her deck with Dave and Michelle, Carrie, Tonah, Dianna and John. John warned that there had never been so many people on the tiny deck. I looked around and planned what I'd do in the event of a deck collapse: jump away from the ceramic potted plants to avoid ceramic shards. The sun went down and all the lights in the valley came on. We heard helicopters.