I’m going back to Denver today. I’m glad I came to LA.

After a mix up and a friend not knowing that I needed to sleep on her couch, at midnight Friday night I was resigned to sleeping on my folded up yoga mat, in the back of my rental car, on a street off of the mod and swanky portion of Sunset Ave. Andy was insisting that I get a hotel room and I was trying to explain that I was fine, safe and comfortable. The thought of getting up, searching for a place, getting my stuff together and checking in just seemed like too much. Fortunately couchsurfer Erika got my message of distress and Andy was spared a fitful night of sleep dreaming of my murder in the rental car. I drove twenty minutes to her driveway and snoozed there until she got in.

Saturday night I stayed at a friend’s place that I knew from Detroit. She lives in Venice Beach. She had every cable channel known to man plus OnDemand movies, something I have never experienced. It was a glutonous evening of visual entertainment. If anyone is interested, I highly recommend Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and do not highly recommend A Diary of a Mad Black Woman. Sunday morning when I woke up, I walked ten minutes to the beach and baked in the beautiful sun for most of the day.

Sunday night Erika and I went out for sushi and I slept at her place again. She introduced me to some red cactus-y fruit that we had to chop off of huge rubbery plants overflowing the wall from her neighbor’s house. What I didn’t know is that these little suckers had hairy barbs that I got all over my palms and fingers. I guess you learn something new every day. We watched her favorite movie, Muriel’s Wedding and then stayed up way too late and talked.

This morning I woke up early to make an 11:30 Bikram yoga class, ate an order of fried plantanes (tostones) for lunch, took a shower at 24 hour fitness, filled up the rental car with gas and spent twenty minutes in the Hertz lot shoving all my stuff back in my pack that had been exploded all over the puke gold Mazda. Now I’m at the Travel Right Cafe across from gate 43 at LAX. There’s a sign on the wall that says, “The highest recorded temperature in Honolulu, Hawaii was 95 degrees. The highest recorded temperature in Fairbanks, Alaska was 96 degrees”. The New Orleans football game is on the televisions. It’s the first game there in the thirteen months since hurricane Katrina. I have an hour before boarding begins for my flight.

If you’re reading this then you can assume I made it back to Denver to post it, since I’m not going to pay $7.95 for internet access here.

There are five more days of regular season baseball left.