Sunday, 16 December 2001 | Trap door

I took a tour through a gutted house that is now not much more than a frame, yet inside there are already the beginnings of a trap door covering a wine cellar, a hidden entrance to a tower (which I'm told will be concealed with fake books and maybe have a skull knob that activates it), a cement Jacuzzi, and a laundry chute. (And there's talk of a sliding board that connects the back deck with the ground.) I met friends of friends and talked until late; I watched an endangered parrot be tossed from palm to palm, with its crest raised on high alert; I browsed in an old comic shop while a bluegrass band played in the back room, the $10 musical notes seeping through the doorway; I took pictures of protesters and bus stops; I slept beneath a mounted deer head; I curled up and watched cable TV for the first time in months.