1978 9 of 10
DIARY 13581
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 29. Awake at 7:10, which is marvelously luxurious because this would have been 8:10 yesterday, and gather leisurely until 7:35, but Dennis is up then, moving around, and I make the bed and we dress and we're not hungry, so he's downstairs after some questions about the index, and I get to typing diary pages at 8:15, since upstairs is obviously moving around, and say that he'll ring once when he feels like coming up for french toast for brunch, and I keep on typing, finding nothing on Buffalo Clan when I get to that in Amy's reading (see DIARY 13568), call Arnie and say we won't be going to Custom House today but maybe book auction tomorrow, water plants, Dennis buzzes at 11:20, we finish by 11:50 when Allegra calls and says she's going slower, typing reference section, will call me after she finishes the last 10 pages, which could be as many as 750 cards, so I won't be hearing from her soon, then go down with Dennis to try to move bed around, but end up leaving it where it was because it doesn't fit any other way and he WILL get to keep his picture where it is, then up to do the Actualism page for last class, leave word with Andre, finish 14 pages by 1:10 pm! Decide to act on my do-list by writing letters, and pleased to find that I finish letters to Helen (not mentioning homosexuality at ALL), Paul McLean (getting out Clarke books to recommend), Bill (but Arthur Ellenbogen can't find an analysis of millet in his books), and Rita (short and sweet) by 3 pm, leaving only Mom to do, and I watch "The Collection," vaguely gay, and I thought interpretable as being about "collecting" semen by fellatio, with Laurence Olivier, Alan Bates, and a sexy thin Malcolm MacDonald, and then finish the letter to Mom, Amy calls to ask what's up, and I phone Allegra who says the typing took longer than she thought, so I shower, leave about 6, arrange to phone Amy tomorrow, get there at 6:40 and instruct her fairly competent brain until 7:50, watch the film after "Long Search," then subway to Paul's by 8:40 for his housewarming (see DIARY 13582), leaving at 11:50 for a stoned-on-wine walk home through Brooklyn (see DIARY 13584), ate at Athena Restaurant on Henry and Clark, knocked on Dennis's door and he wanted sex and gets into it sitting on my stomach, which almost makes me dizzy with nausea from the wine and just-eating, but he comes and we turn over to sleep about 1:30.
DIARY 13585
MONDAY, OCTOBER 30. I'd fixed his coffeepot last night and was gratified to hear him pouring from it this morning at 8:45 after his shower, and he broils sausage and makes eggs well, and we both leave about 9:20, and I'm upstairs to phone Allegra and answer questions, phone Ute and get Biology data, phone Amy and say I'm giving the day to myself, but by now it's 10:20 and Arnie doesn't have time for the Indian exhibit today, so I leave to get to the basement of the midtown post office at 11 to find that the books that are being auctioned are in HUGE canvas trucks covered by plastic that you peer through and estimate how much OVER the $50 minimum you'd bid for the approximately 1000 pounds of maybe 500 books in each! Subway back down to Rector Street and Morris to bagpipes, new buses, the Indian exhibit at the Custom House (see DIARY 13586), Mayor Koch and the Diamond Jubilee of the subway system, and then back home at 1:45 to phone Amy and say she can come over at 2:30, weigh laundry slightly light, take it out, carrying the 23 JOYI packages that I pay $27.41 to mail, pick up wine and meat and get home at 2:40 to receive Amy at 2:50 and talk with her about the Biology index until about 4, making another sheet of indexing notes (see DIARY 13587), and she leaves and I put on hamburger after I shower and wash my hair, which NEEDS it, Allegra calls with more questions, phone Dennis to say we'll be alone this evening, phone Arthur to cancel his body session tonight because I think Michael's friend is returning the 12 West card, but he phones at 7 to say he'll be phoning again tomorrow night, and I'd misunderstood him. Read mail and work New York Magazine crossword and get out at 7:10 to walk quickly to Paul's to watch "In Search of Oak Island," and they're already down to 230 FEET and have found nothing, a contractor prepared to pay $3 million to find the "treasure pit" contents. Then "Valentino" is a real artificial, campy, unfeeling, ludicrous, unbelievable (though EB doesn't say very much), impossible-to-feel-with colorful film that we chat partway through, me getting agitated by his cats, and I leave at 10:40 and have a slice of pizza at 11:05 at Fascati, getting home prepared to jerk off when Dennis buzzes and comes up to talk about class and plan for tomorrow, and I didn't realize he STILL wanted to see the Indian exhibit, so he returns downstairs because "You DO look tired" and I jerk off to porno in a rather unsatisfying manner (see DIARY 13588) and get to sleep about 12:30 concerned about my COMPLETE lack of lightwork this week!
DIARY 13589
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 31. Wake at 8:10, as usual and lay until 8:45, when I get up and start typing in the diary, and then I phone Allegra and get that straightened out, and then Art calls, and I finish 5 pages by Dennis's arrival to finish HIS index at 10:20, another case of perfect timing to record. I shower and get out about 10:35, getting to Allegra's about 11, and she's typed only 13 lines per page, used two typewriters, has a few typos, more questions, and I'm checking through while it takes her an hour to type a cover page and a bill, figuring for 50 hours work she should get $8/hour or $400, but I tell her I can't guarantee that! Find more errors, she serves me another hot spinach bun her mother made, then two sesame seed rolls with butter and her LUSCIOUS peach-brandy comfiture with raisins and nuts, and I love it, and her mother invites me to dinner some evening next week, and I kept her up working ALL last night and now she's feeding me rolls and tea! Finish just before 2, eager to get out, and BMT to Times Square and subway to 72nd at 2:32 to find that Alice is delayed until 3. Talk with Lea about the Polish pope and a Catholic background that we share, Alice is in about 2:55 and we're across the hall to her faintly smelly room for an active session (see DIARY 13590), and she says I'm RIGHT in what I extrapolate for Actualism! Out about 4:30, and I'd meet Avi on the subway (Andre yesterday, Avi today) and said I'd be over, and get there for more tea, phoning to Robin who's drawn charming cat figures for an upcoming play, talk to Avi about indexing and he's interested in a class, gardeners come and Avi's on the phone so I ask Robin if he's ever done porno, and when everyone leaves Avi reads the first page of U18 aloud, and Robin sketches a rather soft-edged figure that has possibilities, and he says he'll do a series for me. Fab! Leave about 7 after trying to get Dennis at Richard Hilty's and failing, subway home to find him just finishing typing, so he's hungry of course, so I read mail and Mom's Japan and HK report and make meat loaf which we have with wine about 9:30, and then he proofreads and I check his Marriage index and find so MUCH wrong that I become depressed: correcting Allegra all morning and Dennis all evening? Tell him I'm VERY tired, and he goes downstairs, but I'm horny so I jerk off with the great movie photos from Nova that came today, then don't feel sleepy so I page through "Gravitation" until 2:40, dismayed that I couldn't POSSIBLY understand it very quickly, and get instantly asleep when I'm too tired to do ANY thinking at all.
DIARY 13593
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 1. Wake at 7:10, surprised, and try to do lightwork but doze until 8:10, then decide that I have to do xeroxing BEFORE T&R with Linda at 11, so I interrupt Dennis in the shower to get the (wrong) number for Pam Landau to introduce him and his short index to her at Harper, and then shower myself and get out at 8:40 without breakfast to get to the Flatiron Building via the 23rd St. 7th Avenue station since I FORGOT to turn to the BMT when I left home, but it goes FASTER! Wait for two elevators in the slow-motion lobby, and Barbara's not in yet, so I xerox the index which Allegra didn't have enough paper to copy (and Pam insisted that THEIR indexes are supplied in carbons, too, which is an IMPOSSIBLE pain!), and she's in at 9:20 and we chat about her leaving at the end of the year, and then I go xerox 366 pages, stopping off to take part of it back, and give more pages to Joan Ann and feel GREAT to get it all finished, and then leave at 10:35 and whiz up to Star Center for exactly 11 and my NHS T&R with Linda (see DIARY 13592) which is great except that I forgot my name-book. Out at 12:15, forgetting my gathering sheet on the chair, and down in the warmish day to the subway and home just before 1 to wash my hands and read the mail and then check through TV Guide which I bought, and by 1:20 Pat's not here yet so I start organizing the xeroxed sheets, and Pat doesn't show up! Get lots of it done by 3, and Kathy doesn't show up!! Get all the packages together, stack for Dennis and stack for Meredith the last to do, send an inquiry to Indexstrip for prices, order a film from Nova, send two letters to JOYI people who haven't written back, send U18 to Robin via Avi, talk to John and Susan Lieber about taking indexing course, while Joan Ann and Arthur don't need it, try phoning Cheryl Wexler and will get her new number next Monday, call Dennis and say he should NEVER say "It's ONLY me," and I must be getting through to him, but he gives me permission to be preoccupied at times, and he might have a meeting with someone tonight---and Andrew Pobrielski just calls to say HE'LL be over around 8:30! Out at 5 to mail LAST of current mailings (5 for $6.24, forgetting to get receipt), buy more wine and hamburger, pick up laundry, and back to clean up stuff, typing "What Happened Then" page for JOYI to get it ALL up to date, and get ready for TV watching and meatloaf eating after typing 4 pages by 7:45 pm. "Macbeth" is pretty awful (see DIARY 13595), so I put on films about halfway through and jerk off rather quickly with Bowman, and get back in to watch the end of the film, and get to sleep about midnight, setting alarm to make sure to get up for Susan's tomorrow.
DIARY 13596
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 2. Wake before the alarm at 7:30, form hierarchy while showering and waiting for the hamburger to broil for breakfast, and get out at 9 am to get to Susan's at 9:25 and buzz downstairs to be let in, wait in the hallways for her to enter, grossly scattered, and she lets me in, chats about her lateness and her cats, and she goes a fairly competent session on me (see DIARY 13597). I leave about 11:30, get off at Hoyt, and get the names and addresses of 8-9 used-bookshops from Fulton to Lawrence to Myrtle to Montague for Brenda, in case she calls, check that there's no mail at JOYI, buy wine and groceries and get home at the dot of 1 to find Pat Mandino waiting on my steps: SHE had down TODAY where I had down yesterday! Put groceries away and we have D-cell water and I do a session on her from 2-3 (see DIARY 13598), and Amy had left word that she couldn't be over at 2, so she calls about 4 and schedules to be over 11 am tomorrow, and the calendar just seems to keep filling up! Look at the mail and putter around the house for a bit, maybe washing dishes, and called Dennis this AM to talk about Richard Hilty, and he's only free at 7:30, but then he returns a call to say he's had a cancellation at 6:30, which Pat and I laugh heartily about the perfection of. Get out at 6 and get there just on time, and he accepts me as a student on Wednesdays at 3 for the time being, and I leave DRENCHED in sweat from the first trial session (see DIARY 13599), Dennis still gone at 7 and not showing up until 7:20, when we look through his paper for things to do, walk down to PS 77 for dinner of so-so quiche for me, paté which is more of a terrine for him, passable sparkling wine for $9.50, mishmash of main courses which have too many ingredients with no central theme, both built around chicken, all for $34 which he pays for as part-payment for indexes. Out at 9:40 and walk downtown quickly for 9:55 start of "A Wedding," which is better than I thought it would be: Desi-Muffin marriage bringing gayness, love to Carol Burnett, nude portraits, Nina van Pallandt's drug dependence, Italian brothers reunited after the death of Lillian Gish, lots of sex here and there, Viveca Lindfors going gently daft, and we're out at 12 to walk downtown past porno shops till 12:45 and subway home by 1:30 since we're detoured to Boro Hall, and exhausted to bed right then.
DIARY 13600
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3. Dennis says he'll just go downstairs, and so I get to lay in bed until about 9, doing a bit of lightwork, and Pat Mandino calls and says she loves me, after a lot of building up to it, and is there any chance for her? I don't say no precisely, but when we're through we're talking about how she can get what she wants from Nate. But the call DOES throw me for a GREAT loop (see DIARY 13594). I write part of that page and then just feel like going to BED, but Dennis calls and we chat a bit, and then Amy calls at 11:15 and says she'll be a bit late, so I fix the place up and she comes over at 11:30 and stays until about 2:30, and we've marked about 30 pages of her book between 12 and 1:30, and talked about lots of things, but she seems to have it down pretty well, saying she can borrow a typewriter to get things typed on. The buzzer goes and I pick up the last pages of the Coal index from a bright-eyed delivery man, and call Jim, who says he'll be over at 4 pm to pick it up. I lay around, feeling miserable for myself, not knowing what to do, and he comes over and I go over the fourth sheet of the set and he leaves about 5, and I decide I MUST go out for groceries, so I do that, Dennis phones and I say I guess I just want to be alone, and I do two practice sessions when I think of them, look through the TV listings to see that there's nothing I want to do, then read through lots of Soho, start on a lightwork session that leads me to looking through the IBM benefits again, thinking that at 65, if I'm still around, I could INSIST on a review to see if I can't get the $77/month pension that I might be entitled to, but if I don't there's nothing ENORMOUS lost, since $77 in 2001 might not be worth more than LUNCH! Debate going to bed, watch some more films and come again, then get out the Gravitation book and get absorbed in just turning the pages: it's fascinating! Make popcorn to have something to eat, and eat 2/3 box of Triscuits just because they taste so good, and then scramble up a couple of eggs just before I go to bed about 11:30, feeling disgusted with myself, not knowing WHAT to blame it on, and hoping that I don't feel so discombobulated the next morning!
DIARY 13601
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 4. Wake about 9:15, amazed that I'd slept almost 10 hours, so FATIGUE must have been part of what happen edyesterday, or COULD it have been a reaction to the surgery on Tuesday? Had clipped grass from the pots Thursday morning, before watering the rest, but the pots were still in the sink, so I don't feel like making breakfast. Get back into the Gravitation book until Susan calls at 11, asking to come over to study, and I say I MUST have breakfast, shower, and wash my socks (which I STILL didn't do, so do it NOW!), then phone Dennis, find he hasn't eaten yet, go down, Peggy calls JUST as I knock on door, so I find PERFECT time to SHOWER, and use his nice lemon shampoo, and we chat and he makes great omelets for breakfast and I'm upstairs at 12:15 to finish dressing and get stuff together for the class and get out at 12:30 and get to center just at 1:05 with Donna Lee, and the class goes pretty much as before (see DIARY 13602). Out about 4:30 with Arthur to walk up to 79th and 81st, then get off hot bus at Lexington and walk to his place, waiting while he gets laundry, and in at 5 to compare notes and find he DOES owe me two after this, so I start on him at 5:30, going VERY hard (see DIARY 13603), and he's up at 6:40 and I take off to get home at 7:40 to watch last part of "Unknown War" until 8, put on roast beef, phone Dennis to come up at 10:30, and Bruce comes in at 8:30 while I'm hoping to watch some of "Necromancy," but will have to do it later with a querulous Pamela Tiffen, and Bruce and I chat about his activations and I get on the table for HIM to do (see DIARY 13604), and he falls asleep so I wake HIM at 10:10, put on artichokes and frozen corn, and Dennis comes up at 10:35, I chase Bruce out, we have overdone beef, good corn, applesauce, good-enough artichokes in butter, and then he has MORE beef and muffins since he didn't have lunch, only a slice of pizza, and we go into the bedroom at 11:45 and he doesn't smoke and we get into cock and he listens to science-fiction music and Inna-Gadda-Davida and Mahavishnu on records and asks for vibrator and comes with vibrations REALLY setting him up, and we fall asleep about 1 am, having made LOTS of noise, setting alarm for 9:30, in case we don't wake up in time.
DIARY 13607
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 5. Wake about 9 and lie quietly, comfortably, and Dennis is up about 9:15 and we lie nearby, quietly nuzzling, until the alarm rings at 9:30, and before that I'd asked him about his fantasy for the day, and he said he wasn't hungry, wanted to get the call from his folks, do things around the apartment, and then go out and do laundry and study French. So we got up and he left and I'd mentioned a set of dreams about roller coasters and Romans (see DIARY 13605) which he enjoyed, and then sat around dazedly wondering what IS going on (see DIARY 13606), and then thought I'd finish paging for the first time through Gravitation and read a couple more pages and mark a couple of things and decide I have to read it THIS way always: thumbing through to see what MORE might be worthwhile reading, marking it off according to when I read it. That feels good, but the other stuff still piles up, but I'd done singing posture-exercises for 5 minutes around 10 and noon, which made me feel virtuous and SORE, finished with Gravitation about noon, then got to the diary typing, taking time off to wash socks and dishes and fix up the apartment, resisting the impulse just to READ or watch TV and just let the day PASS, since I had WORK to do. Did a fairly productive lightwork session between 1:40 and 2:40, puttered around while listening to music on records, went through yesterday's mail, and finally finished typing 13 pages to keep up to date by 6:55, having caught up with YESTERDAY'S singing practice at 3 and 6 pm, now I have to start on TODAY sometime! Watch a fairly boring "Long Search" about Catholicism and the Little Brothers of Christ and a housewife in Leeds and the American head Dominican and the head of Montserrat from 7-8, then watch "The Time Machine" with a fairly cute John Beck but AMATEURISH acting on a Classics Illustrated nebbishy program with effective Morlock glowing eyes from 8-10, sorting through my drawer and setting up a writing file during the last part of it, and cooking dinner of roast beef and sweet corn and applesauce and wine for Dennis at 10, when we watch "Fawlty Towers" with the critic, "Monty Python" I'd seen before, but still funny and Dennis laughed with pleasure a number of times, and "We Interrupt This Week" until 11:30, and then into bed after washing teeth, both feeling tired enough to just snoozle for awhile and then fall asleep about 12.
DIARY 13609
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6. Wake at alarm and can't get interested in lightwork, and Dennis gets out of bed at 8 and I broil bacon and fry eggs and he eats here and then goes downstairs to make lunch for work at 9 am. I put more things into the writing file, getting the DO list down to its lowest, 7; write a note to Effie, practice singing stances at 10, 12, 3, and 6, send for my UNICEF Xmas cards, phone Susan to find she's busy firing someone and hasn't found my book order, so I search back, straightening up my check stubs and cancelled checks in the meantime, and find the two missing books and phone them in to her, saying I'll be in for lunch late next week; find that Cheryl hasn't phoned her new number in yet, Dennis's not willing to phone Effie about Stonehenge for Thanksgiving, so later I phone Don and he says he's like to have it HERE, but he'll think about it for the 17th; Pat says I can leave here at 4, then calls to say she has an interview at "Windows on the World" and she'll call back sometime; Arnie calls, we chat, and he says he'll be over about 12:30, which he is, after I talk with Rolf about his advances and problems with indexing, and he's enjoying it, suggesting that we can rent the apartment below HIM for maybe $100 for an office! Arnie arrives with 3-D tic-tac-toe, which is fun, we look at stuff, then leave at 2 to find Uncle Chu's closed so we're to Hunan Heights for a good lunch for $6 with a GRAND 25% tip until 3, to his place to see his videorecorder and get LOTS of fruit, then back here at 3:30 to watch a rather amusing "MASH" about a homosexual who doesn't get discharged because of an awful pesky Dr. Burns, then stay turned for a cute soldier on "Match Game," another Goodson-Todman winner until 4:30, then back to things to do, typing up proofreading marks for another page (see DIARY 13610, since I forgot to make a copy of it now), type a letter to Mrs. Johnson again about Ms. Watson, type a J/O group formation letter to be sent (see DIARY 13608), and then this page by 8:20, going GREAT! The only thing left is the JOYI transmission to Meredith, and I quickly type up four pages of explanation (see DIARY 13611-13614) and a cover letter (see DIARY 13615) by 10:30, write out a few more checks, get everything away, and had done lightwork (see DIARY 13616) from 8:20-9:00 and CAUGHT UP on singing at 11 pm, and begin to despair of Dennis's arrival by 11:25, when I mark 16 pages of the "Antiviral Agents" index until 11:50, then eat dinner until 12:45, when I mark 17-76 through 1:30 and get into bed at 1:35 feeling that I've done a LOT today.
DIARY 13617
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 7. Wake at 9:10 with a sore neck (and had wakened at 6:20 with a VERY sore neck from singing-posture and urinated and took two aspirin) and get up to stand for 6 minutes, then sit from 9:20-10:15 and do a lightwork session that leaves problems (see DIARY 13616), then put on hamburger and phone Dennis and have breakfast of meat and grape juice and a tangelo, an apple, and banana, reading "Fresh Foods" and Ernie calls about 11 and we chat about upcoming plans, and Cheryl's company seems to be out for election day, Terry gives me to Berta and Virginia for the Mood-Altering Drug index question from Rolf, and I feel accomplishmentful by typing 2 pages by 11:50 am. Get to marking pages 77-102 of the "Antiviral" index from 12-12:30, typing 241 cards from 12:30-1:05, marking 103-208 from 1:05-2:15, and then I figure I just HAVE to get out to vote, so regret that the banks are closed on Election Day, figure I'll mail the Meredith package even if the PO's closed, and get out to a tiny line to vote for Carey, find there are no Tuesday Times left either (the second day of publication after the 88-day strike), find the clerks ARE there at the PO and mail the Meredith package for about $1.25, find nothing in the JOYI box, and buy some groceries. Put things away and maybe talk with Dennis on the phone to find that he didn't know we'd set up Monday nights as eating late there, and then I type 216 cards from 4-4:30, mark 209-303 from 4:30-5:55, interrupted by 5 minutes on the phone with Rolf with indexing details, then wash my hair and shower and shave and dress until 6:30 for Allegra's, at which time I type the 210 cards from the third section from 6:30-7:05, and get out figuring to find liquor stores closed, but they're open, so buy a bottle of Cassis and get there at 7:55 to be greeted by a sleepy-eyed Stephanie, a plump smiling Stefan, and a busy Mrs. Levey. They have no white wine so Stefan is about to go downstairs shopping when Andre arrives, saying I look "smashing" and then saying "When are you going to throw away that awful pullover?" for the red one that I'd worn when we went to the Caribbean, and I merely say "I guess I always wear it with you." Champagne in kir is tasty, but there's not much of it, Mrs. Levy's cheese pastries served with hard-boiled egg-halves is fabulous, there's red wine that Andre helped select, talk about numerous things, tasty chicken with dill, salad with more of the same, and a lovely LOAF of crème caramel which is fabulous. Then some Mandarine as we sit chatting in the living room until 11, TV saying that Carey has probably won again, and Stephanie cries to greet our exit at 11:10, and I get to the front door just as Dennis goes for his mail, so we're down to his place to cuddle till 1.
DIARY 13618
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 8. Wake at 7:15 and cuddle and he's up to shower and get me out of bed at 8:45 with oatmeal and raisins and nuts for breakfast, which is perfect since I'm still full from last night's dinner at Allegra's. Upstairs to read mail I didn't have time to read yesterday and pick up some packages with indexes today, phoning people all morning until it's time to shower again and leave for Dorothy's at 11:45, not even time to type up the diary page for the day. She says she's overloaded and I suggest I do HER, and she says OK, so I do (see DIARY 13619), and we "determine" that her 6 pm appointment will cancel, but it doesn't. I leave at 2:45 and get down fast to Richard's for my lesson at 3, and it goes fairly well and very Zen-y (see DIARY 13620) until 3:40, because the following girl is late, and I pay him the $15 check and phone Dorothy to find no cancellation yet, then find there's a public library on Amsterdam and 82nd, so I'm in to check the card catalog to find they have no books that I want (except the Dinesen "Carnival" that's not on the shelf), don't have Scientific Americans before 1971 (and my reading started August, 1964, just AFTER the February, 1964 article that I wanted to check after reading "Tao of Physics"), so I settle in to read Monday's and Tuesday's and Wednesday's Times, with only 10 pages on Monday as an after-strike summary, 2 pages of obituaries, and then I'm hungry so I leave at 5 to wander uptown and find the Atlantide Cuban Restaurant, where I have good-tasting pork chops in yellow grease on rice and GREAT black beans all for $3, phoning Dorothy at 6 to find she's not there, so I go back to the library, and it's really getting cold out, and we have our meeting on the moving forward and backward in time that SO activated me that I didn't do ANY sessions in the following week at ALL, but it was rather interesting in itself (see DIARY 13621), and we're out at 10:30 and I get to Dennis's at 11:10 to try his TV for Ingrid Bergman on Cavett, but there's no picture and only faulty sound, so we shut it off and he keeps working at his cream of cabbage soup with oysters, and it's not bad at all, though 12 oysters for 8 servings isn't that many, but they're good. He smokes and gets into his cock and comes very nicely, but I'm too tired and have had too much wine to want to respond right then, so we're to sleep about 1:30, having eaten after 12:15!
DIARY 13622
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 9. Same pattern this morning as Dennis heats more of the cabbage-oyster soup, and toasts some of his new bread that we'd had part of last night, and I leave about 9:10 to get upstairs to shower before Susan arrives, but she's not here on time either, getting in at 10, and I'd taken the time to look through a New York Magazine to find that "Grease" is on for the last day today at St. Marks, call for the schedule, and then Susan arrives with a HUGE bag of fruit and we go through grapes while she talks and then she gets onto the table about 10:45 (see DIARY 13623), to get off about 11:45, at which time Dorothy calls and says she's been DEVASTATED by the Subtle Warrior energy, so she'd not gone to work and would like a body session from ME if I could do it, so I told her to come at 2, knowing that would give me enough time to get to the movies before dinner tonight! Amy arrives about 12 and Susan finally leaves about 12:20, late for work, and then Amy goes over her markings for a number of chapters and she seems to be doing well enough with a few corrections and modifications and clues about the ways of marking. This takes until about 2:20, which is only fair since she wanted at least two hours and Susan made her late, and then she leaves and I chat with Dorothy for a bit before SHE gets on the table (see DIARY 13624) and gets off about 4, at which time I send her off fairly quickly at 4:20 and I hop onto the subway without withdrawing the money that I even need for DINNER tonight, splurging on a 60 package of Milk Duds to eat voraciously during the last half of "American Hot Wax" in which "they" ruin Alan Freed without a WORD of explanation about who's DOING it, and then a pretty awful "Grease" in which the sexy second-lead guy is by far the best, Olivia Newton-John so insipid in the first that she's not believable as the sexpot in the last, and Stockard Channing is FUNNY but just not BELIEVABLE as the bombshell. Out at 8:40, dashing to the subway, cursing the system for locking the 40th Street exit so I have to walk to 42nd to walk to 38th, 6 blocks instead of 2, and get to Guido's, the Supreme Macaroni Company at 9:10, to find that Bob arrives at 9:20, so I'm not last, but the food is mediocre, my manicotti all cheese and little sauce, Dennis's veal pretty good, Art's eggplant best, and with two bottles of wine we're cheery enough, then home to find we're both tired so I get to my place and fall into bed about 11:45, setting alarm for 7:30 to ready for painter at 9.
DIARY 13625
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10. I wake about 7, before the alarm goes, and move things out of the bedroom quickly, piling things up on the bed, so that it's clear by 9 am. He doesn't arrive until 9:20, starting about 9:30, and he says he'll do the bedroom and then the living room and probably the hallway today, and the rest tomorrow. I'm climbing on and off chairs moving the books from the bookcase onto the cushionless sofas in the middle of the living room. Ask him from time to time about how much room he needs, and the extent of his moving is to move the tape-bookcase around the door into the living room so that there's more room for the record case and the chair and the curio cabinet all in the middle of the room, since he's using a long paintbrush roller on a pole to get the ceiling. Move all the plants into the body room, which makes it look like quite a jungle, and I'd taken down the body table which becomes a temporary desk with all the stuff from my desk AND the telephone on it, and as I sit in the afternoon making a number of telephone calls to people, it looks rather nice: sunlight streaming in through the jungle before the french doors, furniture and more greenery tucked around the cocktail table behind me, small wooden desk seeming quaint and elegant after my expansive Formica one, an intimate feeling contrasted against the stark furniture-covered whiteness of the living room as he paints on, having finished with the bedroom about 11:45 and finishes with the living room about 4, having done the hall between times and taken numbers of spots of paint off the carpet with benzene. Dennis calls from downstairs to say he's sick and hasn't gone to work, so he won't be going to Margaret's party, so after I go out to deposit money in the bank and withdraw cash, much needed (Dennis accepted Guido's last night as part of his meal plan for me), and find 4 letters in the JOYI box, and return with pork chops, he says he'll take them and make dinner, so I'm putting the bedroom back to rights and getting started on the living room in order, then go down to his place at 10 for burnt-but-marinated chops in mustard with a tasty millet soup, then we get into cock and I think we both come before getting into bed about 11:30 for a record-early bedtime, and I have him set the alarm at 7 so I can get up, though I keep telling myself I should get up there sooner to fix up the apartment for painting completion tomorrow.
DIARY 13626
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 11. I wake and it seems bright outside, but I check my watch and it's only 3:10. Ridiculous! Then look at watch after a doze and it's 3:50, then 3:55, so I'm not even sleeping, so I slip out of bed, put off the alarm, and get upstairs to continue playing tapes quietly (went through most of the Beatles yesterday until the set had to be covered as he painted the living room) as I put things in the living room back in order enough to start receiving items from the body room, but then it's 7:30 and he's said he was coming at 8, so I clear out the bathroom completely just as he arrives at 7:55 and he says I'll have to get to the kitchen soon, since he needs to use the same paint on both, so I get to the kitchen quickly, opening the dumbwaiter door and having him do the inside after I pry off all the junk that was there and cleaned off the dust of decades from the inside, and I'm just finishing up in there when he enters to start there! Then into the bodywork room and start moving books off the bookcases onto the cushionless sofas and cocktail table and body table, but at 11:15 it's clear that I won't be able to finish in time, so I phone Dennis, who's still in bed, and he comes up about 11:30 and helps me move books and furniture until 12:20, when the painter, who'd gone out to lunch at 11:40, returned to finish the living room and I decided that all I could do was wash my hands and face and dress and take off for class, which I got to at 1:05, not the last one there, and it was a typical class (see DIARY 13627) that lasted until 4:30, but Arthur and Bruce had scheduled a body session together, so all I could do was go home. Had phoned Dennis at 2 to find he was OK and had no plans for dinner, and then when I got home at 5:10 I rapped on his door and he had no meat, so I took down the pork chops, and maybe THIS was the night we had the burnt ones, which means I don't remember what he served last night, and he made a fabulous cranberry-granola dessert that he made whipped cream topping for, and that was about 10 pm after I went upstairs and tried to handle some of the stuff, concentrating mainly on washing the windows since I had all the plants out of them, then took to painting, going on until dark, continuing playing tapes all night, leaving windows ajar to get rid of the smell, and then he smoked and we got into jerking off and he got out cockrings and we both came with great sprays of come and wiped off and fell into his warm bed, having phoned everyone to come tomorrow for indexing.
DIARY 13628
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 12. We wake about 9 and play again, both coming again, and about 9:45 I go upstairs (he has to go out for cough syrup, so he'll get the Times that I couldn't get when I went out about 10:10 last night before going to his place because it hadn't come out yet), and move some things back before taking butter and bacon and orange juice down to him for breakfast, and just as I leave he calls to say Avi and Robin are early, so I'm there at 12 and Dennis goes into a number with bacon and apple-cheddar cheese-omelet that takes him until 12:40 to prepare, after warming rolls and then the pecan ring, and I go upstairs for Advocates for ads to price porno like Robin's drawn, tell John not to come down until 1:20, and phone Rolf the same, and relieved that Susan doesn't insist on coming over at 5:30-8:30 for the same talk, because I'd mentioned that to her before and then FORGOT about it! Also during the week I'd tried many times to contact Cheryl Wexler, and finally Dennis got her home number from Dana and I called her Saturday to find she wasn't interested now, having gotten a new job at AT&T that she likes better, so now she'll call ME if she wants to index. Robin and I discuss possibilities (see DIARY 13629) and then Rolf comes in at 1:30 and stares blankly at porno and then John enters at 1:40 and we get started, going through write-up while Rolf takes notes on my "rules" and then he asks ME to come up with a list of rules to compare with his, so mine may be duplicated or improved on. Avi and Robin leave about 3:30, Rolf stays until about 4:30, and then I sit down and read the Times complete except for the TV section and puzzles, taking the Times out to the garbage when I leave at 7 to watch "Zen" on "The Long Search," which seems very CLEAR to me now (see DIARY 13630), and then Dennis says he'll make the pork chops again and I work around moving things back, scrubbing floors (did the hallway Friday night, thinking it was finished with, but it had to be RE-done tonight, since it was STILL a mess, and it seems the work will NEVER end), though I'm getting lots of new ideas about how to place things in the apartment (see DIARY 13631). Then down, he gets a call from a J/O friend, I look at New Yorker (this is tomorrow), we drink lots, then both are very tired so we just go to bed fairly early, looking forward to working tomorrow: he at Tree, I with my endless apartment fixing.
DIARY 13632
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13. I'm awake and go upstairs to start working immediately, and move the stuff back around in the body room so that I can be set up for Pat's visit at 5:30. Dust individual books for the nonfiction section, getting that together, and vacuum and move the bookcases back into their original positions, and then had dusted all the floors before scrubbing them for one last time, and figured I had to clear off the bed for me, which I did, and washed curtains and hang them out, and it seemed endless working, not stopping a bit until 5 when I decided I HAD to wash for Pat, so I showered and she came in at 5:35, just when I was hoping she'd cancel, and suggested that I not put the big bookcase back into the body room, which started lots of thoughts after being painted (see DIARY 13631). Then I got onto the table and she did a great session on me (see DIARY 13633) until about 7:30, when I had an apple, my first meal of the day, when she had to leave, and then I got a call from Dennis who said he hadn't gone to his class tonight because he hadn't felt that good (OH, the FIRST thing I did this morning, from 7:30-9:30, was work on the crossword puzzles from the paper, doing the double crostic fairly easily considering I'd been away from it for so long!), and he said he had pork chops still, so I suggested he cook them and he said OK, so I took down wine because I knew he was pretty much out of it, and went down at 8:45 because we were both hungry. He got a call from a friend, Bob, who wanted to jerk off with him, so he told him to call back at 9:30, and I sat and looked through New Yorker while Dennis whispered "Tell me about it," and "That's a beautiful cock," and "Just jerk if off baby" without even getting excited about it. I'd brought down grass for him, too, and he smoked a bit, but then he said he was very tired so I came upstairs rather relieved, because I'd gotten the film from Nova in the mail and wanted to watch it. Well, it wasn't any good because the guy never got hard, though he's rather attractive, and they didn't include the adapter reel either. But I jerked off anyway, just to come, and by that time it was 11:30 and I watched Dick Cavett talking to a very intelligent-sounding Alan Pakula before watching Neil Simon's "The Good Doctor" from Chekhov plays, with a bearded Richard Chamberlain, a wide-eyed Marcia Mason, a good Lee Grant as "The Defenseless Woman," funny Bob Dishy giving "The Sneeze," Mason being taken by Grant in "The Governess," a marvelous remote-control "Seduction" where Mason kisses the candle and blows the husband's lips, Chamberlain letting "The Drowned Man" drown, and Mason winning in "The Audition." That's till 1:50 and I go right to bed, having eaten peanut butter for my third meal of the day.
DIARY 13634
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 14. Woke to shut off the alarm about 8:45 and showered so that I could get the phone call from Susan at 9:30 saying she'd be here quickly and tell her that she should NOT bring in any more fruit. Put some things in order and she's in at 9:50 to share a pear and an apple and a tangerine with me, clearing up lots of stuff, while we chat at the table, and then she astounds me by asking if I'd rather have an oil and vibrator, which is exactly what I'd like, and she talks about how she gave notice at work when she wasn't willing to produce an interested attitude about her work of selling real estate, had to phone someone about an apartment that had already been rented, and then I got onto the table under the covers for a good session (see DIARY 13635). She wasn't finished until 12, so all I had a chance to do was put on hamburger for lunch after she left about 12:30, go down for the mail, and read New York and eat before I had to leave at 1:45 for my surgery with Alice, forgetting my sheet in the bargain, and then she's a little late. Into her room for a data-filled blood surgery (see DIARY 13636) and out at 4:20 to wander the darkening Central Park trying to absorb everything and get things cleared out for the Pelvic Unloading that she said I could do if I wanted at 6, after Lea had called on Monday, after talking to Bruce told me I should check, to say that the policy was that I shouldn't do two such things in one day. (It certainly does make a lot of Actualism sheets to TYPE!) Sit on an island and watch lights going on and off in Century, Majestic, San Remo, and Beresford (and can see the towers of the El Dorado), the last in the line, then walk along the 72nd crosstown to chat with Ken Miller, who's going to Dakar over Thanksgiving, and then have the men's pelvic from 6-8 (see DIARY 13637), hurrying home to watch the majority of Tim Curry and "Ice Dancing" on Skyline from 8:35-9, then heating chicken to eat during the "man-made famine" film of Bengal "Distant Thunder" with Satyajit Ray, who had to sit through the INCREDIBLY inept Kevin Thomas, an inarticulate film critic afterward, and then with popcorn sit and watch Emlyn Williams on Dick Cavett until 11:30, then jerk off to porno and drop off to sleep about 12:10, feeling quite tired, and maybe I'm coming down with something like a cold.
DIARY 13638
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 15. Woke at 8:30 to the phone ringing with Bruce, who'd stayed home from work feeling ill, and we talked until 10, making both of us feel better hearing that the other was in a total state of denial and figured that Actualism didn't work at all. I told him about Alice's rambles in the Blood surgery, felt good that she said I could make my own decision, and agreed that things were probably happening that we didn't know anything about. He talked a lot about the woman in California that everyone thinks he should marry, and I thought "Actualism likes teachers in pairs." Then out of bed and make hamburger for breakfast, and yesterday before Alice's session I'd met Dorothy who reminded me we had an appointment for 1, which I'd forgotten, which she said was good for me, and she said she'd be at my place at 12 unless she called. So I put a few things away and hung curtains and washed the bedspread and ate and didn't again have time to do much of anything before she showed up at 12:30 and she stared at my piles of books and we decided the bookcases would be OK in the living room and finally she got onto the table incredibly late at 2:25. I still didn't know how to treat her with the NHS (see DIARY 13639) and when she got off at 3:30 she said she had to be somewhere at 4:30 but was hungry, so we went to the Promenade where she had an ENORMOUS chicken stew that was ready made and we ate salads and I have sweetbreads which were partly tasty and partly uncleaned, but interesting for $4.75 in a coffee shop, back about 5 to bring in the bedspread and shower and get onto the subway again at 5:30 to get to Dorothy's so she could do ME from 6:15-7:35 (see DIARY 13640), having lots of tea with honey because my nose is running and my throat is sore, and I'd phoned Richard Hilty at 10:30 (who said a 3-hour cancellation was fine, which was GREAT since I hadn't practiced at ALL this week, and he told of virus that's going around felling people for 6-7 weeks which Ampicillin cures in no time, putting the idea in my head that I should take antibiotics for my cold) to cancel, and we taxi down to center because I don't feel like walking, and the "long" reunion in consciousness starts at 8:10 (see DIARY 13641) and ends at 10:45, with breaks during which I pass out copies of directions to my place for next week, Lea is coming, so is Barbara, and I whiz for subway, just making it, home at 11:45 to make some eggs for dinner, taking three tablespoons of apple cider vinegar with one of honey and it still tastes awful, on Alice's advice for alkalinity, and the heat's off so I put on the electric blanket and put the phone near the bed and hope my cold just goes away and get to bed about 12:30 making a list of people I should phone and check with.
DIARY 13643
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 16. Wake at 7 feeling just AWFUL, painful cough, lots of sneezing and dripping nose, so I decide "what the hell," and take one capsule of old Tetracycline with water. Then wake at 8:30 and feel good enough to get up, so I put on long johns since we're without heat, long socks and slipper socks, undershirt and pullover and sweater, and decide I have to get down to the catching up with the diary. So I start by completing DIARY 13617 for Tuesday, 9 days ago, and type and type, stopping about 11:30 to put on hamburger and chocolate chip cookies, finishing with both about 12:30, and back to typing, phoning Arthur at work to find he's home and sick and would have wanted to cancel our 5:30 appointment anyways, getting a call from IBM at 10:30 saying the salesman is sick and he'll cancel our appointment and will call back to make a new one; get a call from Audrey Hanneman with a new index of Vector Analysis; leave word with Don to phone me because I'm sick, phone Dennis at work and find he's not feeling that good and won't go to Stonehenge without me; have on my list to call Jim Connolly and he calls me and says we have to meet at 12:30 tomorrow; I phone HIP and talk to seven people before scheduling a visit with Dr. Alter at 2:20 tomorrow; toward the end of the day telephone Pope and talk with him about 45 minutes, catching up with his depression and chart work; phone Jack Seelye and Lloyd Moore and have a mind-boggling conversation for about an hour (see DIARY 13642), and keep on typing back pages before going out at 2:10-2:50 to pick up two more letters from JOYI, lots and lots of mail, lots of vitamins and Glycothymoline by the pint for $2.19, and lots of meat, but can't get in touch with Dennis to invite him to dinner tonight; type a page on painting (see DIARY 13631) at which point I decide to MOVE the phone connection, what could be simpler? Find that my do list is now down to an impossibly-small 5, essentially out of existence, don't do a THING with the apartment all day, and find that it's now 10:20 and I've taken the WHOLE DAY to type 26 pages, 12 of them on Actualism! Eat lots of chocolate chip cookies, which destroy my appetite, and so I put on the T-bone steak about 11:45 and finish at 12:15, which means that I have to stay up another hour, so I read lots of stuff from Graduate Review and fall exhausted into bed about 1:30, hoping to have no trouble falling asleep with squishy lungs, and don't.
DIARY 13645
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 17. Wake about 8:15, lay around until 8:30, then get out of bed and look at all the STUFF I have to do, then decide to start the day off the right way with hamburger, then start vacuuming again to get the junk off the floor, decide to pile the bookcases on top of each other on the windowless side of the room, put the plants back so that I can water and fertilize all of them---oh, had drawn about six sketches for Robin this morning, too, getting up so horny that I jerked off, and then remembered the dream about temperature-feeling that I had (see DIARY 13644)---and I'm spitting a lot of mucus into the glass and taking Glycothymoline. Jim Connolly rings exactly at 12:30, as he said he would, and he comes in for a couple hours of talking and corrections (see DIARY 13646), and then I leave at 2:10 to get to the HIP office to the third floor to be told Dr. Alter's on the fourth floor, and wait until about 2:50 for my 2:20 appointment, and he says I have an upper respiratory infection, 99.6 fever, says tetracycline isn't the drug of choice, and writes me out a prescription for 20 erythromycin for $4.20, which I fill, then buy chicken and more hamburger since he said to stay in for the weekend, and then back at 3:30 to unload groceries and Jim rings just then and stays until 5:10 going through the Coal index, insisting that he can finish the whole thing by Tuesday afternoon. I hope so! Look through the mail and eat more chocolate chip cookies after offering him some, and then decide I've GOT to put up the bookcase, so I put it up and move the white cabinets into their place and start lugging things around, making my cough worse, and I stop at 8 to watch a rather silly "Star Wars Special" with a tiny bit of Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher, and a lot of Art Carney, Beatrice Arthur as a waitress in the nightclub, Diahann Carroll as a fantasy, and Jefferson Starship as a TV show, with a cartoon, C-3PO and R2-D2 a tiny bit. Turn it off at 9:30 to watch "Return Engagement" with a plump Elizabeth Taylor and VERY square-chested Joseph Bottoms who photographs SO much better (in the blurred film) than she does (in the focused film). Then put on the radio and listen to music as I move books and move books, getting through the end of the fiction (ate steak at 11:30, so I had to stay up to digest) by 1:40, and fall into bed exhausted, taking two pillows to plump up my head and not being able to fall asleep right away because of the coughing and lung congestion. WORK antibiotics!
DIARY 13648
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 18. Wake about 8:10 to bed noises from above, and decide to get up and keep looking at the mess in the living room, then figure I just had to pile ALL the books into place, no matter what, so I kept piling and piling and piling, putting up book ends when I could find them, trying to muscle the phonograph records out of the way, moving the TV set against the window, where, it occurs to me too late, it'll be too bright to watch during the daytime, and start vacuuming and pushing things around and pile up all the "decorating" stuff on my dresser and get EVERYTHING off the bodywork table and vacuum everything again, getting it all done by 11:40, but by then there's only time to cook hamburger, coughing terribly and raspy, and eat that before leaving at 12:20, getting a last-minute call from Robin Mazey, and then subway on a JAMMED local to 72nd and the class is a torture after 3 pm because she won't leave us have a break and I'm coughing more and more. She says I CAN get bodywork just forming hierarchy and using enlightened awareness and the flow of love and gratitude, and she's assuming I'm overloaded. Out about 4:15 and subway home on a JAMMED car with LOTS of great-looking people, except for a prissy-mouthed Peter Ream who doesn't look at me, and get in to clear the paint off the dimmer, put the vacuum cleaner away, move the last things around, wash dishes at last, and phone Robin to find he wants to charge $25 for each sketch and then I can do what I want with it, giving suggestions, too. Then sit down about 6:20 to start typing, and Dennis calls (after I've scoured the sink for the final time) to invite me to dinner at 10, so I type these 5 pages by 7, ready for TV watching! Watch a gun-shattering "Unknown War" from 7-8, typing DIARY 13647 during the intermissions, then watch the less-sexy Adam of Michael Parks on "The Bible" through to the flood until 9, when I turn to Zulu Zion, African Heaven-on-earth with a black prophet-figure for leadership who died in the 1930s, and then take medicine and buy the Times and get down to Dennis's for African Breeda with Kool (cabbage) with meat and potatoes and chilies, tasty, and he doesn't like Almaden but has me listen to an Atilla Zoller record until 12, when we sympathize with each other's colds (and I'd helped him shade his cylindrical lamp, and upstairs to watch "Hustling," which brings back thoughts of disgust for people in general (see DIARY 13649) and I get into bed at 1:50, not coughing quite as much.
DIARY 13650
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 19. Wake at 7:40, feeling pretty good, jerk off, so out of bed at 8:10 and take an Erythromycin, mark pages 305-400 from 8:15-9:35 on the Antiviral agent (HA!) index, then stop to cook breakfast and wash out the batik hanging that needs it so badly, reading in the fresh food book, and then getting a call from Don about cough medicine, dinner Thanksgiving at 2, and I type 2 by 11 am! Type 182 cards from 11-11:30, start marking 401-501 until 12, when I find that the Nova "Whisper from Space" I'd seen before, and finish marking at 12:55. Type 227 cards, much better, from 12:55-1:35, then talk to Jim for about 15 minutes, and he's not doing well, having just started. Mark 502-604 in part from 2-3, then watch "A Month in the Country" on TV, somewhat better, except that Wayne Sleep, who was so much BETTER than anyone, was replaced, and it seems they sparked up the rest of the production. Not bad, but boring in parts. Then put on the hamburger and Woolite the batik and hang it out, and just about then the sun comes out. Lunch and back to finish marking those pages from 4:35-4:45, then type 174 from 4:45-5:15 and mark 605-703 from 5:15-6:45, typing a gratifying 275 from THAT section until 7:30. Then talk to Dennis and put on dinner for this evening with Cornish hen here, and start sorting and editing from 8:15-9:15, basting with a brew of honey, orange juice, lemon juice, celery salt, and brandy, putting in the last of the onions, and he's up at 9:30 and has kir to crown the "artificially-aging chemical" whose taste he doesn't like in Almaden wine, and he gobbles down the hen with disgusting personal habits, animalistic and greasy, and the peas and carrots are overdone. Finished at 10:05 and he decides to go downstairs to work there (I'd gone down at 7:30 to look at his straw flooring, not bad, nice in wheat and cherry-red patterned squares) and I watch Fawlty Towers until 10:30, Monty Python, a NEW one, until 11, then sort from 11:05-11:35 through the C's, then flip back and forth watching "Watermelon Man," where Geoffrey Cambridge made an unconvincing white, and Estelle Parsons was a ditsy wife, and "Starship Invasions" until 2 am, making popcorn right at the end and thinking of all the things I have to do, DESPITE the fact that things seem to be moving "naturally" (see DIARY 13651). Bed at 2, feeling not so cough-choked as before, hoping it's getting over. Jim called at 1 to say they were through the second 110 pages with 250 or so cards, and he'll work till dawn.
DIARY 13652
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 20. Wake at 7, amazed to be up so early, and then go back to sleep to get up at 9, which is 7 hours and more like it. Do dozens of little jobs around the house, amazed that such things can take such time (see DIARY 13651) and also sorted through the JOYI people to get files up to date and make a list of what pages have to be xeroxed, hopefully doing some of them tomorrow when I take in the Raven index, and then make a list of the groceries I need based on Dennis's recipe for chicken Mexico, skillet style. Fix up the apartment of any little glitch that I come across, kill a few roaches, who don't seem to be flocking to the Roach Motels probably because there are enough goodies otherwise around them, and welcome Jim at 12:10, and he starts tearing the cards apart and I'm finished with 2 pages at 12:25. Get him to start alphabetizing, giving him my index cards which I didn't think of asking him to buy, and I get to my editing from 12:35-4:35, taking about an hour off to talk with him, tell him how to edit the cards when he seems to be alphabetizing without editing, trying to bolster his faith in himself, but he's so TIRED from not having slept last night it's hard to get him GOING. Then he calls his family and finds out some dreadful news, has to smoke his cigarettes out in the hallway, and Amy comes over at 4:35 and just seems to be much more TOGETHER than he does, but then she's spent more time in USEFUL parts of investigating indexing: marking, typing cards, than he has. He leaves about 5:05 to something, saying he'll call me before 9:30 tomorrow, and Amy and I check her cards and marking and the glossary and it looks good, but Uta's on vacation this week. She leaves just at 6 and Pat had called to say she'd be here at 6, and comes in at 6:05 and we CHAT and have D-cell and tea after SHE doesn't want me to work on HER without an energy, and she doesn't want to do a session on ME so that I owe her two. She'd called a cab to be here at 7:30 and at 7:55 she leaves, and the guy never DID buzz. I'd been tempted to watch "Bartered Bride" at 8, then find to my relief that it's on TOMORROW. Back to editing from 8-9:35, then get HUNGRY and make hamburger special with curry, eat until 11 reading New York, then decide to get to bed at 11:10 since I'm tired, too, worried about party Wednesday and all the STUFF that has to be gathered for it, gotten John's punch-set this evening when Amy got the salad bowl before she left, but then I think of movies and watch 2 (Angelo and Tommy) before coming rather copiously and getting to sleep almost coughless at 12:10, needing TIME.
DIARY 13653
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 21. Wake at 7, lay until 7:10, then decide to get out of bed and wash dishes, all John's cups and punch bowl, plastic cups for non-punchers, and my dishes, finishing about 8. Then get stuff together to take to Raven for xeroxing, make more lists of things to buy for party, and type this page by 8:35, wondering how far along Jim will be when he calls before 9:30. Work on editing the index from 8:35-8:55, then figure I just have to take a shower for Susan, so I do that and just as I'm getting out at 9:30 she calls sounding AWFUL and says she's too sick to come over, so I don't get a body session before the party at all. Jim's in just about then and he helps me take off the padding from the table so that I can start it as a table for his use for indexing, and after telling him what he has to do, I get back to editing at 9:50. He interrupts me through the day with questions, but then when he gets to the coding of his codes, I find that he's never done more than one card, and that only under the indecipherable code, for each underlining! So he hadn't understood my explanation OR the "bible" which I kept referring him to, and I panic, thinking that we'll never be finished, and try phoning Audrey at 4:55 but she's not there anymore, which means to me that we should try to finish it. So I phone Amy (Adam had been calling all day about her and she'd been having a tiff with him and didn't want to help, but then she says "she loves me so much" that she'd do anything she could to help me out, and I say "What do you want me to do, cry?" I mark cards for her to type permutations, and then he phones and finds he must leave at 7 to commit his blood-encrusted son to Payne-Whitney, saying he'll call me what he can get out, and Amy keeps typing, catching on fast (and I FORGOT that at 1 pm I felt feverish and took my temperature to find it was 100.6, so I phoned Alter at 1:30, got there at 2 to wait to 2:30 and then do shopping for rice/ crackers/ butter/ onions/ raisins/ olives/ cinnamon sticks/ chicken soup/ toilet paper/ dates/ allspice after buying paper plates/ napkins/ plastic eating utensils at Rexall while waiting for my prescription of Ampicillin for 20 minutes, and get back at 2:30 to find him not very far along), and I'm feeling sicker and sicker, and Dennis comes up about 8 and starts helping out, too, but it looks worse and worse and everyone's getting hungry and I'm feverish and headachy too and crabby though I shouldn't be, type index 10-11, so at 10:30 I suggest they go out for pizza (after it's too late to have it delivered) and Jim phones about 11 to say he'll be there all night and I ask him to call the next morning to say when he'll be available to work, and they drink grape juice and we sit around the table eating pizza and talking about the party and indexing and I say I'm just going to bed, and they leave at 12 and I fall exhausted, still at 100.6, at 12:05, sick!
DIARY 13654
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 22. Wake at 7:30 feeling quite a bit better, though I'd had EXTRAORDINARY chills before crawling under the heated covers last night, and it took about 10 minutes to stop shaking, and proofread the Antiviral index to get THAT done from 7:30-8:55, phone Dennis to say I feel better, and phone Hanneman, who says that Monday morning will be fine and another indexer is fine too! GREAT! Phone Amy to say "I have good news and I have good news" and she's delighted too. Temperature was down to 99.1 at 7:30, but with rushing around fixing up the table with what stuff I had by 10:45, it had gone back to 100.3, and then I subwayed out, getting off at 23rd and walking a block before realizing I'd been going to SPRINGER and I should be going to RAVEN! Decide just to walk up 6th, and that was a mistake, since the pages and index got heavier and heavier and I got sweatier and sweatier and sicker, so that when I entered at noon, Terry said I looked pale, and I didn't feel like doing anything more than xeroxing the single pages I had to do, doing NO more JOYI pages because they've sort of lost their kick by this point, and I'm eager to get back to work on the PARTY, maybe taking a NAP before, so that my FEVER will go down. Home via the liquor store with two gallons of burgundy for the punch and sherry for the chicken and a load of 3 cans of pineapple juice, 4 quarts soda water, and frozen lemonade from the grocery. Stagger upstairs at 1:20 and lay down to find that I'm up to 101.3, feeling awful, but then I leisurely step up the rest of the table, wash the dishes, get out spare chairs, clean up more lint from the floor, change ceiling lights in the living room, water plants, go out for chicken and grape juice and paper towels and OJ and rice, putting chicken in DENNIS's fridge. Shower, talk to Dennis and Amy and Margaret, find I'm down to 100.9 at 4 pm, and get a kick out of working so VERY deliberately through the things to do: scrubbing off the kitchen table, putting away nonessentials to clear off eating space for 24 people, making the bed, moving knickknacks up onto the bedroom bookcase, and at 7:40 Dennis enters to start cooking the chicken, and Bruce is the first guest at 7:55, and the evening is just MARVELOUS for everyone (see DIARY 13655), and they leave about 1:30, Dennis and Joan Ann call, and I take my temperature which is down to 98.5 at 1:45 am and fall asleep easily! Jim never phoned!
DIARY 13657
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 23. Wake at 9:40, interested in the fact that I only needed 8 hours sleep after that crowded day, and at 10 am my temperature was down to 98.1. Started moving things around in the living room and in the bedroom so that only the table and the kitchen were left to handle, and started washing much over half the dishes at 11-12, having talked to Dennis and said we'd meet downstairs at 1:30 for Don's. Then I watched the first act of "The Bartered Bride," rather enjoying parts of it, and packed together all the fruit I could gather and the three cheeses for the hosts of our parties today, and he buzzed before I could get down with another bag of garbage, and we got to the subway and got off at 2:10 to find it starting to rain and up to Don's to find Eileen sitting there demurely, and we chatted nicely for a few minutes before Renee and Bill Leonard came in, and in only a few minutes they were talking about the problems and expenses involved in doing a room, so they were decorators who turned out to have one daughter who smoked grass from the age of 13 and brought friends in to live with them, and Don talked about the drug-ease of his nieces and nephews, and Dennis talked about his acting and Madame and I talked a bit about indexing and we ate lots of figs and caviar (best ever, probably the most expensive, too) and nuts and pistachios (dying fingers red, as caviar dyed them black) and celery and deviled eggs, all of which Annie cleared away as we ate in Don's baroque dining room with a chiffon tablecloth and napkins with gold threads that Eileen's bracelet kept getting caught in. Don and Ernie were lovey-dovey on their anniversary, Ernie getting Don a ring and Don getting Ernie what looked like a tie-tack that Ernie put in his collar, and the turkey and cranberries and yams and great pumpkin mushroom soup and fabulous chestnut-stuffed stuffing was all quite good, but Dennis had to leave so he paved the way with Don and we left about 6:15 into the cold rain to dash to Katherine's to find them eating already, and the evening ended up rather a full-fledged food-stuffed nightmare (see DIARY 13658). I left at 9 with an edematous right cornea, getting home and feeling SO bloated that I finished reading "The Professor of Desire" until 11:30 just to sit up to let the food go down, then re-watch "The Cobra Woman" (not having noted enough previously to say she's twins, one the evil snake queen, but volcano DOESN'T erupt, she dies, they wed) while re-reading "The Breast" and then fall exhausted, again, into bed at 1:30 for SLEEP.
DIARY 13659
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 24. Wake about 9 with a sore back and neck, but feel so well I don't even bother to take my temperature. Clear away more stuff from the party and phone Dennis about 10 to say that I'll be down with yogurt and cheese for breakfast, and that fills us up pretty well. He's due to get his lamp tonight, so he phones Arnie and chats while I catch up with a few New Yorkers and then take the Times upstairs to read for a VERY leisurely day. Had read through his Voice, too. Upstairs and watch "Yellow Submarine" between 12:30-2, which is really a great film, and then had washed the rest of the dishes earlier and filled a shopping bag with things to take down to Dennis, and still have the punchbowl and salad bowl to return to John when he gets back from Tom and Kathy's. Then get to the Times, finding it strange to read a paper and see nothing about Guyana suicides, do one puzzle in the back of the book section and the other, thankfully single, one in the back of the Magazine, and get through that in time to get a phone call from Pope, and we chat for a bit, I give him Ben and Lucy's number for people who are interested in Baroque music, Arnie calls and talks for a long time, and it gets darker and darker and I go through the mail which surprisingly came today, get out my list of things to do and almost mail off the JOYI things, but decide that I have to type these 6 pages before doing anything else, exercise for first time this MONTH! And Dennis calls to say dinner's at 8, Michael calls to want the 12 West card, and Jim finally calls to say he'll be here about 8, calling at 7:20 to say he's on his way. 99.2 at 7 pm. Finish this at 7:45. Look through Jim's index material and make notes for him, and he shows up at 8:30, I explain things to him, and get downstairs by 9:10, have lots of punch, Michael arrives at 9:30 and chats with us until about 10:30, the chicken is still great on the rice, salad good leftover, and we finish his whipped-cream slathered cranberry dessert. I'm upstairs at 11:10 and give Jim Permission to work at home if he keeps in touch with me, and he seems much calmer now that he says his household has quieted down. He leaves about 11:30 and I'm so tired I just wash and get into bed about midnight, playing with myself for a bit, but I drop off to sleep hoping my nick-crick will vanish.
DIARY 13660
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 25. Wake about 7:20 feeling rather better, but still sore in neck. Decide I MUST look at the Calcified index, so I study that and come with a list of questions between 7:35-8:35, finding my temperature is 98.1 at 8 am, and then put other things away and get out the Orthopedics index and mark pages 1-103 from 9:10-10:55, just 105 minutes for 103 pages, and before typing the cards from that, messing up my typewriter, I type one page by 11 am. Then decide that I really want a body session for my sore neck, so I phone Bruce, who's right in the middle of his session, so he says to be there in an hour, so I phone Dennis to come up for breakfast since I want a good one, and broil bacon and fry eggs for a good breakfast that we finish at 11:45 and I don't even have a chance to shower from Wednesday, but decide to risk the "processing" smell and take off to his place by 12:15, and he gives me a great body session (see DIARY 13661) until 1:25, when I turn on "Bartered Bride" just to make sure it's on, then put on an animated version of "The Nutcracker" that includes lots of Sleeping Beauty (evil mouse-witch turns baby into a Nutcracker---and the rest of the kingdom asleep) and Cinderella (the maid, not the daughter, gets the Nutcracker from a tree), but it's not very colorful on a black and white set. Then he gives me golden seal and garlic oil and insists I buy these two with gotu kola, which he doesn't know what it does, and I go around the corner to 7th Avenue and buy them, then get home to watch the rest of "Bartered Bride" which isn't that good (see DIARY 13662) until 4:10, then don't feel like finishing the index, so I read Omni fiction and mail and SciAm until 7, at which time Dennis wants to go out and do something, but I say I'd rather stay around, so I read more until 9, watch "Question of Balance" on "Long Search" about Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism in Taiwan, then out at 10 to buy Times and down to Dennis's with the last of the punch, read the Times until 11:30, have dinner, chat, and leave at 1 am with all done except the puzzle, and do part of it until 1:40, when I'm so noddingly tired that I just get to bed and sleep on only one pillow this time, now that my cough is finally going away. FORGOT that I phoned Joan Ann about golden seal and she said it's for INTESTINAL mucosa, that the best for RESPIRATORY mucosa is raspberry leaf tea, cayenne pepper capsules for vast quantities of readily available C without overloading the liver with ascorbic acid, gotu kola is only for WOMEN, as ginseng is only for men, Olbas cough syrup great, so I'm out to buy two teas and the herb chart at Leaf and Bean, calcium and A and ginseng and selenium at Barney's, but can't find Olbas or cayenne, so I'm disgusted that I spent $20 and didn't get the things that I was SUPPOSED to get, and I'm being sucked in by the whole thing?
DIARY 13663
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 26. Wake at 7:20 with a cough, then get out of bed at 8:40 to get back to the puzzles and work through most of them even though I decided that I had to clean up the place, brush my teeth, wash my face, and get ready for Rolf, which took from 8:40-9:15, and then he didn't arrive until about 10:05, and we talked about his progress on "Mood-Altering Drugs" and he decided to see if he couldn't do the 44 hours of work needed on this by Thursday evening to TAKE IT IN on Friday, when they wanted it. He's got lots of good ideas and sympathizes with me for the fuss with Jim. Phone Jim at 1:05 and he said he'd dropped off to sleep about 6 am, so he'll leave in 15 minutes and be here in 1.5 hours, but he's not here at 2:50, after I tossed Rolf out at 1:10, phoned Dennis to come look at the index but Arnie was due over at 1 to help him put up the lamp, so I have some beef oriental (awful) from LaChoy for lunch, with soy sauce, and more pills, and then decide to catch up with these 3 pages before getting to the index at 2:50. Type 260 cards from 2:55-3:30, then start marking the second hundred pages and find that the substitute pages I've gotten don't seem to fit in with the book! Make a note to phone Sophia about it and about that time Jim enters, after I'd phoned Amy NOT to come over at 4 since he hadn't showed up by 3:35! Amy phones at 4:15 and says she's going for a walk, and I tell her to walk for 15 minutes and then enter here, and Jim seems to have things more under control now. Explain the typing format to Amy (after trying to have Jim do it and he can't), and she's about to start typing at 5 when Dennis phones and says to come down to see the lamp that Arnie's put up. So we're down and oh and ah appropriately, Jim looking a bit lost, and Amy thinks it's marvelous, and then we're upstairs and she gets down to typing in earnest at 5:30, and Jim and I sort through quickly to get in front of her, and then I let him do it much more slowly as she goes nicely, and then Dennis is up at 8:30 to cook up his chicken and rice for 4 of us while we eat and watch "A Question of Love" about lesbians losing their children to a stupid judge and adulterous husband, until 11, and Amy finishes typing at 11:30 and Jim's started on the proofreading, and I proofread along after and he finishes at 1:10, and then I put some things away and take more pills and wash a bit in order to get to bed at 1:50, still feeling under the damned cold!
DIARY 13664
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 27. Wake at 8:20, not the most chipper from sleeping only 6 hours, but shower quickly to wake up, put on hamburger to have breakfast, shave, having washed my hair, and get out at 9:30 to get to Audre's office the back way-round again at 10, and she says it looks just fine, but she's not willing to let the two indexing books out of her sight for xeroxing, even though I can't order them anywhere else. Out about 10:15 and go over to the Guild to find that "Watership Down" starts at 11 and is over at 11:30, so I walk over to 5th in the DRIVING SNOW, which accumulates to about TWO INCHES by mid-afternoon, when it slows almost to stopping, intending to find the new Baxter's (or whatever) bookshop, but forget that it's in 666 and turn south to find myself outside Barnes and Noble, so I go in and buy "The Art of Walt Disney" for only $3.95, and buy the Coover "Public Burning" for 20% off, and then leave at 10:50 to get to the Guild and read today's News about the latest concern over Guyana, then "Watership Down" is rather disappointing, but as the book was: episodic, not well-defined characters, too cutely anthropomorphic for rabbits to raise birds and travel to a new place and particularly to wage WAR against each other, since "they will be prey to everyone" didn't obviously include "even THEMSELVES." Out at 12:35 and slog to the subway to Nevins, to buy humidifier liquid, wooden fork, and two tea balls at A&S, to the health food shop to buy more tea when they don't have Olbas and cayenne, to the bank for $250, to the post office for stamps for the JOYI mailing for November and pick up a complaint from George Val, then buy hamburger and pork for roasting, and get home at 2:10 for a list of 10 messages. Phone some and watch "The Band Lesson" on "Mickey Mouse Club" as suggested by Arnie from 2:30-3, interrupted by the announcement of the shooting of San Francisco's mayor and his gay aide, then phone Arnie to thank him, talking to him until about 3:30, phone Pat Mandino to postpone more body sessions, Dennis to talk about his jazz article, Bill Fuchs to try to set up another IBM demonstration date, Ute for her to tell me she wants glossary before index, and I keep talking about "we" though I haven't told her about AMY yet, Arthur to say I'm having a session tomorrow so don't want his body session opening, talking to Jim and saying the index looks good but the money has to come in MY name; Sophie will call back on pages, and she made a mistake numbering them and I have them all, leave word with Calcified Tissues because she isn't in today, and phone Amy to say that it went well. By this time it's 6 and I settle in to read People while eating muffins and peanut butter, and keep taking pills and pills, stuff 46 JOYI envelopes and mark cards accordingly, read the rest of the paper, more of Arnie's Time on "Superman" and put some things away until 9, when I watch "And I Alone Survived," a rather silly story of a night on a mountaintop where two friends died in a piper cub crash, then wash dishes till 11:30 and Rolf calls and I tell him how to edit until 1 am, when I FALL into bed.
DIARY 13666
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28. Wake at 8 and out of bed at 8:30, very aware that I only have 2 hours to do what I want, and get into the shower, washing my hair for the first time in a couple days, putting on hamburger to eat, finishing reading New York Magazine, then get to putting things in order, but there's no time to phone the people I made a list to phone, and get out at 10:10 to take out laundry and mail 46 JOYI letters and OMNI questionnaire saying I want to be on their panel, and get to Actualism at 10:55 to chat with Lea about the good party and have a difficult session till 12:35 (see DIARY 13665), then down to 14th Street to walk to 5th to buy Olbas cough medicine and cayenne pepper (bought THAT up at 72nd Street) from Brownie's, then across to the Science-Fiction shop where I buy Clarke's "Serendip," Ballard's "Low-Flying Aircraft," and "Compton" by Sheckley, for $20.80 and 4 subway tokens, and then subway home to bring my booklists up to date from 1:30-3, then start phoning people again, phoning Calcified and getting part of the answers before she has to talk to someone and never calls back, Terry DOES want freelance medical editing from Joan Ann, who phoned, set up body times with Susan, call Fuchs again, Dennis made reservations for us for 7:30 at the Ballroom, Laura says Eating should be in by Friday for Dennis to pick up for the weekend, Amy says we definitely have only up through chapter 8, so I phone Ute and sway her by saying I've got someone else working with me, she'll send chapters 9, 10, and 11, and Joan Ann calls back about 6 to chat about freelance work and medicine, and then I have only time to type 3 pages to catch up before leaving for the Ballroom at 7 pm! The "Evening with Groucho Marx" isn't that bad (see DIARY 13667), but the tiny bit of fillet of sole around crabmeat isn't really redeemed by an interesting hot carrot salad with almonds with an interesting adjoining COLD carrot salad with almonds, and with a disappointing Almaden house carafe at $6.25 and desserts of a chocolate walnut cake for $2, we end up paying $52 with assorted music charges. Chat with Nancy Evers and Denny Martin Flinn, who has amazing long torso and short legs, went to San Francisco State just before Dennis, and we leave about 11, feeling quite tired, and get back to go to separate apartments and I phone Rolf and he comes over at 11:45 and stays till 2:45 going over editing rules!
DIARY 13668
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 29. Wake at 9:30 and have such a glorious hard-on that I get out the porno for the first time in ages and jerk off, and it feels good, too, and then I even exercise for the second time this month, but I'm really despairing that I'll be able to finish everything. Try phoning Cathy again and asking more questions, getting some answers, enough to get an idea that it'll be simple, and work around the apartment trying to get things into order, reading lots of stuff from Omni when I don't feel like doing much else, and phoned Andre and find that he'd turned everything over to Larry Price and said that if I didn't just GO TO BED for a week, my bronchitis would hang around forever. Look up bronchitis in the Pediatrics book and don't manage to find much. Sat down for a Reunion in Consciousness for an hour this morning, too. Phone Richard at 11:30 to ask whether I should come or not, and he says yes, so I have to. Leave word with Dorothy. Call Amy on glossary and tell HER to call Ute and talk with her. Shower---no, I don't have time to shower, I just make out two checks for the afternoon's activities and get the mail and read some things and get out at 2:10 to get to Richard's at 2:55 and he takes me right in and we have a good class (see DIARY 13669), but since my lower abdomen's sore, he says I shouldn't sing anymore today, and I leave at 3:20. To the library with the author-list I've brought along and to my chagrin find that I add 38 books to the list of books to catch up with authors, and I don't know QUITE what to do about that (see DIARY 13670). Also read a number of magazines when I call Dorothy at 5:40 and she says she has someone scheduled at 6, but we'll meet for lunch at the East-West at 7:10, so I walk down and we have a FABULOUS shrimp tempura and vegetable fritter kakiage (cocky-ah-je) for only $5.75 and she has some soup and a salad, and I tell the woman next to move her cigarette and then she later thanks me for maybe making her stop again, a widow with a son who wants her to stop polluting her air. Out at 8:10 and down the block to find that we have one of the first classes in the downstairs room, which isn't that comfortable, and neither is the session, the initiation into Second Advanced (see DIARY 13671). Out at 10:30 and home at 11:10 to get back upstairs for the keys and take in two bottles of wine, and Dennis has made Adaloo and Foofoo, two African dishes, and the corn and red peppers are crunchy, the tomatoes soft and hot with cayenne pepper, but there's no meat, and the cornmeal foofoo is dry without its wet topping, and I quickly have enough, with finishing the punch and having another bottle of American May wine which isn't very good. Someone calls to jerk off with Dennis, who's started smoking, and when he hangs up we start playing and necking, then we kiss, and he jerks off on my chest and I say I came Sunday but am tired, bed at 1:15 am.
DIARY 13672
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 30. Feel awful when I wake and have adalou and toast for breakfast, and I think he's sorry I don't feel sexy this morning. Get upstairs at 9:10 to find that Susan's coming at 2:30, so I have time to do what I want, so I finish reading all the sections of Omni, putting it away at last, getting word from Amy that Ute and she got along very well, a call from Bruce when I was out, and I keep trying to get RID of the pile of stuff to DO. Type 2 diary pages sometime during the day, get down for the mail and have Soho to read, which I'm doing as Susan comes in at 2:30 on the dot, and I'd taken a shower and eaten something for lunch, but I didn't have a chance to even form Hierarchy, which I did quickly when she was on the table. She's greatly activated, with a cold, and we have an interesting talk and body session (see DIARY 13673) until 4:30, and then I'm reading Soho and at 5:05 notice that "Patchwork Girl of Oz" is in last showings today, so I quickly dress and zip out the door to the subway and get there JUST after it started, and it's fabulous with Gottschalk music, and then I'm suckered into watching "The Wizard of Oz" again with a script-memorized audience, and I get popcorn and milk duds to help pass the time. Out at 9 and back home at 9:30 to call Dennis and he says he's vocalizing, so I vocalize a bit and put on TV at 10 to watch "Fame" with Richard Benjamin in a silly play by Arthur Miller: he's asked for his autograph by women who later quibble about shopping, gets a ride with Raf Vallone whom he thinks is going to kidnap him and he turns into an adulatory high-school teacher, and Jose Ferrer is an Italian director who wants to make his romantic fluff into a showcase for a dynamo of a 4-foot female JOCKEY the part must have been WRITTEN for. Dennis and I finish his Adalou, now great with smoked ham, and carrots, and Rolf enters at 11:15 and Dennis goes downstairs at 11:45 after I explain to both (AH, I typed two JOURNAL INDEXING pages this afternoon, getting NEWER instructions by telling them to Catherine Mackay) the journal indexing, and check over Rolf's cards from 12-2:30, feeling tired and headachy, and he goes off to sleep and I fall into bed feeling that there's so MUCH to do and I HOPE I can finish all the indexes for MYSELF and for THEM in time by MONDAY! Bruce later says EVERYONE at the center and in the WORLD feels that there was too much to do this last week.
DIARY 13675
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 1. Wake at 9 with the telephone man at the buzzer, and I say Dennis is probably there, so he lets him in and I phone to find that Dennis wants to leave for work, so I collect things I want to do out and go down at 9:10, telling Bruce to call back, and write a quick note to George Valivicius and when the phone man leaves at 9:20 mail that, cash my $99 check in one bank and am on the way to the second bank when I remember I didn't pick up the mail (though I did buy 5 postcards), and get a return and the first return for the JO group from Mark Barton with $5, not thinking of opening it when I deposit $70 of checks from September and October and November in Manufacturer's Hanover account. Pick up groceries and meat at the market, lug them home with the laundry I pick up, in at 10 to get a call from Bruce while I'm eating breakfast of hamburger, and he calls back, and I'm DETERMINED to clear off the desk so I send two responses to the last two (again) JOYI requests, bringing folders up to date, adding one for the JO group, and then make out file cards for all the drugs and herbs, checking EB to find not much information on them, phone Virginia Martin in a last gasp to overcharge on the drug index, one hour session from 2-3 at LAST on lightwork, scrub the kitchen floor still scrubbing PAINT off and reducing my fingernails to stubbles and talk to Pope for 30 minutes just before Pat enters promptly at 3:45, ruining my chance to see "It Happened One Night" on TV, which I don't need, and I phone Arthur for a body session myself and we chat and have a session (see DIARY 13674) and she leaves at 5:40 and I make another hamburger and eat peanut butter while reading MacPhee on Alaska, putting more things away, and then finish typing 7 pages by 8:20 after Dennis called at 8 to say he'll be up for dinner at 10:30 and there's lots of INDEXES to do still, yet I'm caught up with MOST things, except dishes and vacuuming. Actually spent about 15 minutes very lightly vocalizing, too. I get to marking pages 105-184, but Rolf calls, I say I'll look at pages on SUNDAY, I'm making dinner, and finish at 9:40 and make rice pudding of a sorts and start cooking carrots, and then type 179 cards from 10:00-10:25, not a bad average, and start putting things on the table as I hear Dennis's gate crash. We eat until about 11:30 and he puts on his new Dorothy Donegan record and we listen to that, but I'm more and more tired, and he knows Dorothy Hunter's coming over at 10:30 tomorrow, so he says he'll just go downstairs and sleep and come up tomorrow morning, and I get to bed at 1, setting alarm for 9:30 just in case my excessive need for sleep doesn't get me up in time.
DIARY 13677
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 2. Wake about 8 and doze till 8:30 and do some lightwork until about 9:25, when I get up and shower and have some hamburger for breakfast, and Dorothy enters about 10:45, saying she'd been rushed, and she likes the new apartment arrangement, she said she'd had an intense thing with Michael, and Dennis had called saying he had to go to the post office and he'd be here at 11, but it's 11:15 and I HAVE to leave at 12:15, so she gets on the table and he enters about 11:20, so I cover her up, and he makes coffee and starts typing on the pages, after I tell him what to do for a few minutes, and then I get back to give her a more responsive session (see DIARY 13678) until 12:05, answer more of his questions until 12:15, get her up, and she decides to stay for some coffee with Dennis, and I leave at 12:20 to just catch the subway to 72nd and get into the ground-floor meeting room at 1, for the note-crammed last session of the class (see DIARY 13679-13680), and it's over at 4:55, the longest by far, and Michael had wanted to eat dinner with someone, but by the end we're George and Arthur and Michael and me, so we're up to O'Neal's Balloon for a rather boring set of conversation, except that George says that ONLY Carol Ann teaches 4th Advanced, so more teachers for THAT have to be taught, so Alice might not be here long, and the chili is pretty good, but it takes a long time. We leave, paying the other guys, at 6:15 and walk up to 79th to just catch a bus across and I get onto the table at 6:35 for an O-V from Arthur (see DIARY 13681) until 8, just at which time his friends come in and I've become VERY spaced, so I buy some Famous Amos chocolate cookies (one pound) for $3.89 and eat some on the way to the subway, taking three trains to get home at 9, and there's Adam to talk about the Caribbean and indexing businesses (see DIARY 13682) and Dennis works away until 11:30, when he leaves, and then he's starved so I make quick spaghetti and awful "natural" glassed-sauce and we eat and I try to describe just how I DO feel at this time about things (see DIARY 13683), and we're so tired we get to bed about 1 am without even thinking of having sex, and I try to do some lightwork but drift off to sleep without having done anything.