I am drunk on Handel and Midsummer. Kristen, incidentally, fed me a fine supper of spareribs, noodles, and fresh peas (I helped shell them)--the wine being a crisp, oaky/fruity Chardonnay--and a crunchy lettuce salad for which I made the soured-and-sweetened half-'n-half dressing, such as I remember my mother making, of a midsummer's eve more than half a century ago. It's hard to believe the extent to which affairs in the Great World have gone to hell in a handbasket; while here in the timeless abode of the River Dragon we still drift and expatiate, play music and speculate, unhindered and unthreatened--or, at least, fairly certain that I'm hardly worth the bother of threatening. One remembers, of course, that the four vagabonds randomly chosen by Dan Mitreone as victims in his infamous toruring-to-death seminar in Uruguay were, precisely, persons of no consequence....

It could happen any day,
So be careful what you say
And do.