2008-07-15 - 9:57 p.m.

Summertime in Baltimore. Sticky where my arms meet up with my sides, neighbors taking their dogs out for late-evening walks. Drinking some Carlsbergs and watching the All-Star Game, living-room window open, lights out, ceiling fan going and softly clicking like a metronome, keeping some kind of secret time. So far it's one-nothing Nationals--my side--and the managers are deep into substitution mode. The wheels keep turning.

Been making good progress on the book. Met with Boarman on Sunday--it was our second weekly meeting--and he likes what he's seen so far. He's working on a political thriller-type novel and I like seeing how his plot unfolds. I've been showing him chapters. He'll see my third chapter next time. The first one was an overview of the eighties through my eyes, with a focus on the wanting of toys and personas and goods. The second was a brief family history that ends with my birth. The third is, I think, a pre-K thing, featuring a Radio Flyer and my first friend who wasn't a brother. I actually still see that first friend from time to time. He moved to Baltimore, too, and works in the movie industry. He worked on The Wire and also on stuff they filmed here: Ladder 49 and also a Nicole Kidman movie that hasn't come out yet. I like having deadlines again. It forces the hand and probably I need that more than I'd like to admit.

Flying out to Seattle in two weeks, for a wedding. Looking forward to gaining some memories of that town, the public library, all the crags of water, the recent history. I like small adventures.

I like, too, the sounds of the city, any city, really. The sirens, sure, but also the trash trucks and the occasional helicopter, the static of the rabbit-eared television reception, the stuff that wends its way through bookcases and bowls of dog food and stacks of bills to get here, right where I've somehow found myself.

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