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hot tub at La Mirage
Sunday, January 10 1999
The day had trouble getting started, and by the time it had, Kim and I were recovering from yet another of our fights. This one concerned her interest in a certain bonus I probably won't get from my workplace (given my employer's knack for setting fantasy land goals for me and my fellow workers). Kim wanted to know if I could get it the bonus entirely in cash, and then we could go traveling and oh wouldn't it be so fun. I reacted angrily to this suggestion (of course) since I have no interest in blowing my hard-won income on unenjoyable transcontinental airplane joyrides. Predictably enough, her response was that I was being greedy and stingy and not at all the man with whom she fell in love.
At this point I would have happily gone for a solo walk down to the Appletree to purchase breakfast goods, however, Kim came after me in a sad emotional state, making it clear that this was not the sort of fight from which I could simply walk away.
I don't recall the specifics of how we patched up our problems, but it involved the purchase of a rather large amount of Rite Aid tussin DM and a container of Red Devil lye. We got to talking about one of her old boyfriends back in San Francisco who used to prepare his own cocaine freebase in the kitchen, and I said that I had done very similar things with tussin. Kim was intrigued by this idea and wanted to see me do it, though the idea of anything being made with Red Devil lye made her uneasy. In a half gallon vodka bottle, I added dissolved lye to diluted tussin DM and watched the precipitate form. But I needed some kind of centrifuge to get the dextromethorphan to concentrate out of the solution. So I set up a swivel chair on top of the kitchen table and crudely balanced the tussin-filled vodka bottle diametrically opposed to some weights and gave the thing a spin. It was pathetic and didn't really work, but I could see how it might be improved and made useful. For one thing, a swivel chair with four caster legs instead of the usual five would be much easier to balance. I'll have to keep my eye open for one either at a yard sale or being thrown away. In the mean time, I've put the tussin-filled vodka bottle aside to sit.
In the evening, despite our intentions to the contrary, our social schedule filled up rapidly. Earlier, of course, Ludmilla the Brazilian girl had been calling and asking if we wanted to drive out to the desert, enticingly adding "I put gas!" But by evening, my co-worker Kevin had called us several times to encourage us to come to a movie night at La Mirage, the hilltop development wherein he lives. The end result of all these rumblings was Kim, Ludmilla, and me riding in a car driven by co-worker Al out to Kevin's place. Having kissed each other once back in late December, Ludmilla and Al can barely tolerate each other these days, but they have to make due if they want to hang out with Kim and me.
La Mirage is a vast fancy complex of dismal four story apartment buildings on the north rim of Mission Valley above Qualcom Stadium, almost directly across Mission Valley from Normal Heights (where Kim and I lived only a few months ago).
Finding Kevin's place wasn't easy. We went to one of the buildings, Kim coerced a somewhat reluctant resident let us in, and then we went to the four digit room number that should have been Kevin's. But it wasn't at all. The guy peering through the blinds had a look about him that suggested a fear that his time had run out.
Kevin's 4th floor apartment was surprisingly well furnished, considering the fact that he's only lived there a couple months. Among the decorations was a huge sailfish mounted on the wall; he'd caught it himself and had apparently shipped it from Atlanta. Kevin was the perfect host; fetching us Miller Lites, wine, etc. whether needed or not. We all went out on the balcony and had a look at the stunning view of Mission Valley, the headlights streaming by on the 8 like blood cells in an artery sustaining a massive growing cancer on the face of North America.
We walked down to a building that served as some sort of community center for all the overpaid yuppies of La Mirage. The movie being featured on this movie night was Zorro. In a darkened activity room, people sat on chairs or lounged on bean bags. Trash cans full of popcorn and coolers full of softdrinks were spread out on a back table, there for the taking. It all looked very high school, so much so that I felt kind of funny bringing my Miller Lite(s) in with me.
Kim and I lounged for about a half hour on the bean bags before she became bored and hungry for real food. She and I went out to the lobby and where she tried to track down a delivering restaurant utterly without success. So she went back into the activity room, suggested to Kevin that he was bored, and led us all back to his place. From there we drove to a nearby Greek restaurant and ordered some grub.
As we waited, Al and I were sitting around cracking sexist jokes, talking about our fondness for dark teenage girls and otherwise failing to rise above the intellectual level of Beavis and Butthead. (In terms of appearance, Al closely resembles Beavis, by the way.) Kim, who is always locking horns with Al, was further appalled to hear evidence of my immaturity. In abject disgust, she stormed out into the night a few times, even locking herself outside the restaurant at one point (the place was closing). Meanwhile Kevin and Ludmilla had headed off to a nearby Carl's Jr.
Back at La Mirage, Kevin led us all on a walk to the hot tubs and pools, one of the many luxury accommodations available to the residents (and any gutterpunks who know about them). The walk went along the edge of a cliff above a fairly major highway leading into Mission Valley. It was like being on the edge of some sort of futuristic world in the year 1999.
We found our own little hot tub, turned it on, and prepared to jump in. My preparations consisted of removing all my clothes, a pattern repeated by Kevin and Kim. Ludmilla didn't get completely naked, but at least she got into the water, unlike Al, who sat on a bench and sulked. Al always seems to figure out a way to have a miserable time no matter what the activity may be. For his part, Kevin was convinced that a single white man in an adjoining hot tub was gawking at us, but Kim didn't think so. Kevin seems to be afflicted by the grand old southern masculine condition of over-reaching paranoia.
Kim and I entertained some hopes that maybe Ludmilla would hit it off with Kevin and spend the night. But it wasn't to be. The next day Ludmilla, in her typically blunt halting English, said that though Kevin has a nice apartment, she thought he might be gay and have "hair transplants."
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