???

 It’s been hot. Before noon, today, it was already 97 degrees Fahrenheit. Someone told me the forecast called for 109 degrees today, and 110 tomorrow.

How do the homeless manage? How’s that elderly man, the one I pass most mornings, as I drive around a corner? His life seems to be contained in a shopping cart, and in his gaze, which meets mine, now and then. Walking past him last Sunday, still glowing from my cousin’s birthday party the day before, I heard, “Hey, man! What th’ fuck you think you doin’!?” A homeless kid was confronting the man. His eyes locked with mine, for a split second. Then, he kicked the man in the chest, then, twice in the abdomen, six feet or so, from me and my grocery bags. The man was bent over. The kid was fast, and dangerous. Then, I heard what sounded like the man’s shopping cart being pushed over, glass shattering. I had no cell phone with me, but I saw a lady across the street, on hers, seeming to report the incident.

The homeless are my first thought, when it’s hot, cold, rainy, and when I contribute. I watch for that man, on the corner, but I haven’t seen him, since Sunday. 

- PJ

Happy Birthday, cousin

One story that prompted me to put Half Italian into writing was the homemade electric chair. My cousin, whose dad made the homemade electric chair, celebrated her seventieth birthday, yesterday. He’s gone, but she continues to sparkle.

Wouldn’t have missed her party for anything! 

- PJ

Lots of living

Crazy year. I was sick, off and on, until summer, from respiratory to digestive. Probably the stress of my family situation, my leaky roof, and last December's sting at work caught up with me. Oral surgery is next, this Friday.

Lots of trips, this year: La Jolla, New Mexico, France, Northern California, and possibly Vancouver.

Crazy weather. Not a typical California summer, we’ve had June gloom, perfect skies, June gloom again, winds, rain, a humid heat wave, and now morning June gloom again.

No luck, yet, on my newspaper submissions. If the US newspapers don't bite, I’ll try the UK, perhaps there’s more interest in articles on France there. After that, I’m done.

So there’s lots going on. At least it’s a full year, if it’s to be my last one to attempt getting published.

I’m using time wisely. 

- PJ

June Gloom

My work requires that I speak to people all over the U.S. and Canada. Yesterday, someone in Quebec told me the temp was 38 degrees, Celsius (about 100 degrees, Fahrenheit) and humid. I’m surprised by how many people in the U.S. haven’t heard of June Gloom, which is now.

June Gloom means gray mornings, clearing somewhat during the daytime, if we’re lucky. But the gray pushes back, late afternoons.

Here’s yesterday afternoon, as June’s Gloom fills the Los Angeles Basin, just over that hill.

It takes longer to reach “the other side of the hill,” the San Fernando Valley, where I live. But here it is, this morning.

 Soon, the days will be clear and sunny, cold June Gloom gone. 

- PJ

Auto-response and France

One auto-email response received; they’ll contact me if they want to publish my submission. If my US options deplete, there’s always UK newspapers and magazines. With France so close, the UK may present greater interest in articles on France.

Speaking of France, opportunity presented itself, in the form of airline seats, using miles, and this morning we booked. Alsace, here we come, in September. This trip will make obsolete the statement I make in Half Italian that I’ve not yet been to Northeast France.

No Amalfi Coast, this year. Flights to Italy seem harder to come by than Paris. No complaints here. 

- PJ

Chopped and sent

All three articles are chopped, the last two submitted to Boston Globe Magazine and The Washington Post. Now the wait, since these are exclusive submissions. I'm restless.

- PJ

Chop, chop, chop

My writing is already somewhat dense, but reduction is needed on the three articles I mention in my last post, if I’m to meet newspaper and magazine word limits. So I’m chopping left and right. A bit of flow was lost on one article, perhaps a bit of grace, but the story remained intact. And chop I’ll continue to do, until my material meets what’s requested. Compliance is part of an accountant’s job.

I made one submission today, to the New York Times.

- PJ