2001-02-01 || .42 hours until i break outta th

|| so if karma serves me, i will get lung cancer, but i won't have to get a tracheotomy. ||

every day on my break i cross the street at the crosswalk and sit at a bench in the plaza between zellerbach hall and the student union. the exact bench shifts according to the position of the sun. eleven o'clock break = east side of the plaza, four o'clock break = west, although there isn't direct sunlight at four. only ambient.

you can see the bay from the crosswalk on bancroft street.

i sit on my bench in the plaza and read or write and usually smoke. i am trying to cut down. really. but there is something to be said for sitting in your designated patch of sunlight reading or writing and smoking. it makes everything feel like a movie. that is the secret.

so i am in my movie, reading or writing and smoking, hugging my coat because it is usually cold, putting my elbows on my knees and occasionally looking up to see the students parade before the camera. and this is another secret i have discovered: berkeley students are goddamned moochers. and this may be an advantage to my health, but without fail someone asks for a cigarette. almost daily. and i hold my cigarette with my lips (a bit to the side, squinting a little, because i am in a movie adn it is a french one) and give them one and offer a light. today i was reading a borrowed copy of mcsweeney's (mcsweeney's = so very nice. full of secret hide-outs and decoder rings) and pulling up my knee sock when this guy walked straight to me and asked for a cigarette. so i gave him one and handed over a tattered matchbook. and i felt a little embarrassed by the condition of the matchbook, with the flint strip gouged out on the left side and the matches weathered and the cover creased down the middle. he turned away to light his (my) cigarette, cupped in his hands, proceeding to use every last match. and it wasn't even windy. and then he handed me back my empty sad matchbook and told me to have a good day.

and i put the empty matchbook in my pocket instead of throwing it away. even though one of my pet peeves is drinking all the soda and putting the bottle back in the refrigerator. p.s. neenay wanted me to add a notify list. i hope you don't think it's obnoxious. and you rilly should write to me more often.

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