Someone is screaming. While the rational brain knows it's a kid having a meltdown as kids are wont to do, it sounds so horrible that the distress receptors are convinced that someone's life is on the line.

So I live in a blue-collar neighborhood, right. At any given moment of any given day you will hear: dozens of barking dogs, a cat fight or two, people yelling at each other, lawn mowers buzzing in every direction because all the houses are slightly too close together, loud music, parties and laughter, and packs of wild kids running through the streets. I don't like all the noise, but sometimes, on a Friday night, hearing the narcocorridos from the yard across the way while I sit in the dark outside with Basho, I feel wrapped in this community.

I went to Chapel Hill last night to see my buddy Adam whom I've not seen in over a year. Driving to and fro, I listened to Coleman Barks reading his Rumi translations and talking about mysticism. Oh oh oh.

Whilst there, Adam and his friend Josh and Josh's girlfriend (Marti? I can't remember) and I ate burritos and drank margaritas and wandered around campus, which is ok to do with Adam and Josh because they both grew up there and have strange memories of that campus which helped to ease my anxiousness at being anywhere near Davis Library or the library school building (I hate that school and that town, irrationally, I hate it). Then we saw the movie Barbershop. We were talking beforehand about how Jesse Jackson is so opposed to it because of some talk about Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. We all died laughing when some character in the movie said Jesse Jackson isn't going to like this and then Cedric the Entertainer says "Fuck Jesse Jackson." Oh boy. Rosa Parks and MLK my foot, Mr. Jackson. I'm afraid I started to lose a bit of respect for that man over the last couple of years with all his media-whoring. I think he'd say he's media savvy, but I can't get on that bus. I like that movie. All the parts where everyone, all these different kinds of people, are hanging out in the barbershop, were my favorites. I wanted the movie just to be those parts. I do love Ice Cube. Those eyes, man, you could sink in those eyes.

Adam has recently returned from Japan where, he tells me, he worked 6 hours a day, got paid $3000/month and paid no rent or taxes. Oh, I said. He's moving to DC next week, into a house wherein he will pay only $240/month in rent. He said he could live there for at least a year without working. Hunh, I said. He told me that he wants me to move there too, into the cheapo house and I said, what about Bashi and the cats and he said bring 'em. Adam's a good egg. We made a pact back in 1996 that if neither one of us finds a mate by the time we hit 35 we'll be getting married. And frankly, that offer ain't looking to bad from here. Adam would make an excellent spouse. He's one of the best roommates I've ever had--laid back and nice and terribly smart and interested in all sorts of things. He was the only one I knew in DC, besides dearest Blythe, who was interested in going to poetry readings and talking about books and writing. I also like for him to explain his studies to me--he loves to do research and to know things. Plus, he is a morning person so he never makes fun of my bedtime. Plus, we like the same movies and music and what I'm trying to say is that he's the perfect companion. Good conversation and fun activities and no tension or grouchiness. Even when I'm feeling misanthropic, Adam is good to be around because he never tries to intrude. He is peaceful and he is kind and good and self-contained. If you want to chitchat he's your man. If you want to sit quietly and read, he's your man. Plus he's neat as a cat and finds cleaning soothing and doesn't mind cleaning up after the likes of me. He has nary a passive or aggressive bone in his body. Unfortunately we both want to be the stay-at-home parent. I have tried to convince Adam that he'd be the better breadwinner between the two of us, but he remains firmly unconvinced. So marriage will have to wait. Oh and plus the part where I'm not in love with him and he's not in love with me, that is also unfortunate. We are both long-suffering in our unrequited love for other people. He loves a girl named Margaret. And I love a boy named sfitz. Oh well. I told him we would grow to love each other for sure and he said "you're probably right" and I said "let's wait and see." Margaret's a silly fool for not loving him back.

Adam traveled around in Mongolia after his stint in Japan was done and I asked him if Mongolia smelled like mint chocolate chip ice cream, as one of my students claimed in paper she wrote last spring, and he said no, it smelled like mutton.

Josh and I made jokes all night that Adam is in the CIA. They wrote him a letter last year after he finished grad school, asking him to join the team. The letter was signed, mysteriously, by a man simply known as Andrew. Adam says he declined. Uh-huh. He told me "Andrew" called him up right after he returned to the states requesting his services again. He says he would never work for them. Uh-huh. What I want to know is why the CIA is so hot for Adam. The peaceful Asian studies scholar. Hmmmm?

Now that Adam is moving to DC I'm definitely going to visit more often. Unfortunately Adam is moving in with the evil Mary F., who I refuse to write about here. Adam says he wants me to bring Basho when I visit but I know Mary would never allow it. He is the only one who has not realized the extent of her evilness and it makes me a wee bit sad because I lived with her and Adam for a time in DC and all she did was excoriate Adam to me and passive aggressive Adam to him (which he, thankfully, refused to notice or play into). This, I take, as a sure sign of Mary's evilness because if there is anyone who is the antithesis of horrible, it's Adam. If there's anyone who is easier to get along with, I've not met him. Or her. He's wonderful. And he's also the only friend she's still got from the old school days and she better not be mean to him. But of course she will be and he, godblesshim, won't even be phased by it--probably he won't even notice. Good for him. He said he'd throw a Halloween party for me just so I could dress up and just so I'd come visit.

Today has that first-cool-day-after-the-summer snap in the air. Basho loves it, I love it, Harold really loves it. Everything feels clean. Today I'm going to finish my unfinished tasks--grading and vacuuming are on the docket. In the end yesterday, I did return my library books, I did gave Basho a bath (he has the most remarkable coat--it's a little shaggy and so soft, but it dries in about five minutes and even though he's not had a bath in months, he wasn't even dirty--his lovely coat repels dirt and water but is still soft as a fluffy puppy), I did wash all my dishes, I did clean up, and I did read and read and read. All told, I'm a happy camper.