Sketchy Bill 11: Fast Forwarding Through Saturday

Luckily, Razor had a cellphone, so Bill was able to divert him in time. It was apparent to me, though, that Bill was serious about the whole "leg breaking" thing, and that Razor was, too.

Steve left, and Alex retired to his couch downstairs to watch the game. Bill showed me "my" bedroom, which was the spare bedroom that Alex would be vacating. I dropped my bag by the bed, and that's as close as I came to the thing for the rest of my stay.

I don't really like sleeping in other people's beds, if you must know. I mean, yes, girls' beds (with them in them) are OK, but "guest beds" are weird for me. I'll confess I finally slept in Axelrad's bed over at Robert's, last time I was up in The Immense Fruit, but it took me three years to do so (and Axelrad's bed has had more people sleep in it than, well, your average Motel 6. Not a bed at a Motel 6, an entire Motel 6). Maybe it's got something to do with my dislike for making up beds. Maybe it's a subconscious fear of other people's dead skin particles, or of leaving my own. Maybe I just like to pretend I'm camping out. Strange. But not nearly the strangest of my peccadilloes.

Saturday was pretty dull, actually. I spent the time talking to Bill, buying beer and a half gallon of Jack with Bill, and riding cramped in the joke of a back seat of Bill's Mercedes, to eat dinner at some sort of restaurant nearby. It was dark, but barely dark, at that point, and Bill was worried that I would catch cold. He loaned me a coat, which I still have, and insisted that I wear it out. The fogs of San Francisco, I guess.

The food was plentiful (and Italian, of course), and I found that I was hungry as hell, not having eaten for a day or so. It was raining again when we left the place, but my newly acquired coat was of oiled canvas, so it didn't faze me. Bill dropped me at the house, then took Alex to the airport. Upon his return, we started hitting the Jack in the kitchen.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, Jack Daniels sour mash bourbon is something a lot of us drink regularly. It's something that I grew up drinking (half pints on the porch at band practice, age 16, getting punched if you made a face after a shot), and something I've left behind and picked up again periodically ever since. I spent most of my troubled youth drinking Jim Beam out of bottles, because it was about half the price, but about six years ago I gave up straight whiskey completely (except for rare occasions). I'll drink a Jack and Coke now and again, but since my stomach doesn't like Coke, or caffeine for that matter, it's rare that I mess with it.

However, there are times in my life when drinking Jack Black out of the bottle is necessary for some reason or another. Saturday night was just such a night. We grabbed the bottle and headed out to pick up some drugs from his friend's place. I won't write anymore about this, because:

1) It's such an ingenious way of distributing drugs that I don't want to be responsible for bringing it down.

2) It takes such a large amount of capital investment in the infrastructure that should I talk about it, I'm sure I'd be dead before the weekend is out.

But it was really cool. Trust me.

The result of this drug buying trip was a rock of cocaine roughly the size of a golf ball, which I was unimpressed with until I saw how much powder that broke down to, sometime early Monday morning. In other words, more on that later. We also drove through the Castro District, where Halloween parties were in full swing. "Those homos have the best parties," commented Bill as we zipped by in his little sports sedan. We grabbed a 12 pack of beer (Bud in cans, which was a welcome taste of home after a day of sweet chardonnay and mind-mangling socializing), and as Bill hit his garage door opener, he looked at me with a weird expression.

"Dude, you know I love you, right?"