A friend gave me The Fountainhead in middle school. He’s now an entertainment lawyer.

I remember enjoying Seagull okay but I’m not anxious to revisit it.

Flirty packing ended up in a very awkward conversation. Because I am me, and I am awkward. But it’s all good.

I read both Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and The Fountainhead as a young adolescent.

I'm sure it's emblematic of something that my big takeaway from Fountainhead was the architecture stuff. I liked visualizing the buildings

CFM:

F: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance M: The Fountainhead (we'd live separate lives, but we were high school sweethearts for too long for me to choose F or C) C: Jonathan Livingston Seagull

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CFM:

I never read any of them. From your comments, I feel very positive about that choice.

Matilda took off for "Senior Brunch" this morning and was at school from 11 to 2:30, and I thought I might see her tonight.

But she called me and said her friend Mia had called and begged her to attend a concert tonight. Mia already had tickets but nobody else could go. Mia's dad would drive them to the concert in San Francisco and then bring them back home.

So I said okay.

On my way home from Haight Street I texted Matilda and asked when she was getting picked up.

Turns out Mia's brothers were also going to the concert, so Mia's dad said they should all take BART. Also it was at the Oakland Coliseum.

Okay, that's not what I agreed to but they should still be safe with Mia's two adult brothers.

Half hour ago I get a call from Matilda. Mia got scammed in buying the tickets and they were counterfeit and no good. Could I pay for the tickets for all four of them.

Matilda's debit card had a limit on it and wouldn't allow a $365 expense (even though she had more than that in the bank). So they tried to get me to pay it through PayPal by sending me a code...and it didn't work.

So basically a situation which started as a little bit of a stretch out of my comfort zone (last minute late night concert) got increasingly more chaotic with every update until the whole thing collapsed.

I am expecting them to BART home in defeat at this point, but they might surprise me by doing something stupid. Or rather some new stupid thing.

ETA: They snuck past security and got into the show.

Oh dear. I hope the rest of their evening is relatively uneventful and that the PayPal code wasn't another scam.

CFM: I haven't read the other two, but I have read all of Rand's fiction. Reading her early works helped me understand how she got to where she did, but I certainly wouldn't want to live there (or even revisit). I guess that puts her in the F (been there, done that) category.

The book I've loaned to friends most often is Station Eleven. For randos on the beach... maybe Saving Fish from Drowning?

ETA: They snuck past security and got into the show.

The whole event sounds so much like teen Laura, except I probably would have pulled that stunt at 14.

I’m glad Matilda is at a point where she can enjoy some teen adventures. And the news about her friend’s mom is amazing! My friend lost her dad to pancreatic cancer 20 years ago, and remission wasn’t even considered as a remote possibility then.

I read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance in my late teens. It left me with a burning desire for a motorcycle (preferably a Moto Guzzi), and a deep distaste for the narrator. Since my balance and coordination both suck, it’s probably just as well I didn’t have the funds for a motorcycle in my 20s. But my Cycle World subscription was nice. Hunter S. Thompson occasionally wrote for it. Thompson was an imperfect man, to be sure, but damn he could write. Way better than the Zen dude. So, FCM:

F Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

C The Fountainhead

M Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Chuck Rand as far from me as possible. I read JLS decades ago, and I remember being vaguely interested. I would be willing to go back and see if I get something more/different out of it as a middle aged person, which is more than I could say for the other two. Which isn’t quite marriage, but it’s closer than the others.

Ugh. i bought a new cellphone in March, and last night I realized the charging cable wasn't connecting: the charging port is broken. It's under warranty, but it will take at least a week to get it repaired or replaced. What am i supposed to do in the meantime? Not have a cellphone?

I wish I'd kept my old cell around as a spare...