Partir, c'est mourir un peu.

Friday, August 1, 1997

Today was one week since my wisdom teeth extraction. I had a checkup with the oral surgeon, and he said I am healing as expected. I had been concerned that there might have been infection, since I had antibiotics in June and I was worried that the bugs might have developed resistance to the antibiotic he perscribed me. I still do feel it if I let up on the ibuprofen.

My appointment was downtown, at 7 AM, so driving to work took me over part of Highway 520 which I don't usually cover. It was backed up due to a disabled vehicle on the bridge, cleared by the time I got there, but compounded by a chain reaction accident that happened in the backup. That reminds me, I was practically right next to an accident in the Mercer Island tunnel last week on the way to the Clarion West reading. All I heard was this loud "BOOM!"; we weren't going very fast, and as I edged forward I saw the two cars in the next lane, already out and examining the damage. Moral of all this: Don't Tailgate!

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Vanguard Lunch was at the Pebble Beach Cafeteria, which is where I eat every day anyway. I was a little late because a former Microsoft worker was joining us, and I needed to wait at my desk till she arrived. (The Pebble Beach name derives from the code name the construction project had. The office buildings have numbers, but the cafeteria is its own structure but has no number.)

Glenn brought chocolate chip cookies baked by himself, which he can't eat due to his food allergies. This was his last day at Microsoft; he and Kate will be setting off to drive around in an RV soon.

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Driving to the last Clarion West party of the summer, I forgot that the Seafair torchlight parade would be staging in the neighborhood I would be driving through. But taking a slightly different route didn't prevent me from arriving half an hour early! I was so eager to get there that I had convinced myself that the Clarion parties started at seven thirty, rather than the eight o'clock hour that is customary. When I found the front door latched, I thought "Oh! I'm the first one here!" This wouldn't be unusual due to my neurotic promptness tendencies. So I trailed around to the back of the house and poked my head in the back door. "Hello?" I called. Kate was in the basement doing some last-minute prep work; she was stunned by my arrival. But she took it in good part, and I offered to just sit in the nice garden in the back yard, reading my book, unless there were tasks she needed help with.

After a few minutes she did call for my assistance, moving a few items of furniture to a better party spot, etc. Then Glenn finally got there (on his last day at work, he stayed until 7 PM!) and folks started arriving.

Almost all the students were wearing the class tshirts (oops! Delany's name is misspelled!) and drinking martinis. Part of that lounge fad, I guess, or perhaps a recommendation from Nicola. There were gag gifts for each student, selected by Lucius Shepard at Archie Mcphee. A few of these were squirt guns, and he bought one for himself, so the party became rather wet for a while. It was like a Tarantino film with water pistols; people standing at arms length, soaking each other.

It's tough for the students to decompress at the end of Clarion. They have been through a lot together, and now they go back to their separate worlds. These connections can last, though.

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Andy Hooper said to me, buffeting me on the shoulder in a friendly way, "When are you going to pub your ish?" I do have some material written now, which could be massaged into a perzine (personal zine). If I am thinking about going to Corflu next year, it would be a good idea to have actually published a zine. This will happen before then.