I am on the train headed to Rome. I am surrounded by Asians. Me and these Chinese guys have been having fun taking pictures of each other. You know that joke that you don't go to Europe in the summer? But everyone goes anyway, and then you get the joke? O.k. so the joke has been on me this time. Its true. You definitely, definitely, definitely, no matter what you think, no matter what you're going to say, do not go to Italy in the summer. I love Venice. in fact I could see myself living here sometimes now and then. But not in the summer. there are so many people that it is not like being in Italy, it is like being in Disney world. And it is so hot that you actually feel sick the whole day. And none of the museums or churches have air conditioning, so you spend a lot of the day trying to remember why you are dripping wet in this hot museum when you could be at home in the cool ac. I went to the Academia today. A very large museum. With no air conditioning. It really wouldn’t have mattered what they had in there. they could have had recently discovered live aliens in cages and I wouldn’t have been impressed. It was just too hot. But all they really did have was more and more paintings of Mary and the baby Jesus, and the crucifixion of course, which I haven't seen enough of since I have been in Italy. I joked to a British couple every now and then when we would get to a new room, “Ah hah! We haven't seen that before.” and of course it’s a joke. Because all the damn paintings are the same damn painting. Hundreds of paintings. Four basic themes. Jesus as a baby with his mom. Jesus at the last supper. Jesus on the cross. Jesus being taken down off the cross. And that's it. going to the museums n Italy is almost like a Saturday night live skit. You walk and you walk and you walk from room to room to room. With the hope that the next room with offer something........... and then you get to the next room and you see this mammoth painting and you think oh my god I wonder what its going to be and you turn around and bam its Jesus on the cross. And it just goes on and on like that. especially at this one in Venice. you walk into a room and there are like twenty paintings of Mary and Jesus all lined up next to each other. And they’re all almost in the same pose. It really is like a SAL skit. 

Man this couple just got on the train and the woman is so hot. I'm talking beautiful. and the guy she is with is this big goofy bald guy with a belly. One assumes he/they are rich. Its first class. But still this woman is amazing. and what sucks is now I have to sit across from them. so every time I glance at the girl and you really can’t help it. you just want to stare at her. The guy is going to see me staring at her. Five hours. I'll just try not to. me and the Canadians were talking about this a few nights ago. how you see these really hot girls with guys that are just average. But you never see hot guys with just average girls. They always have really hot girls. We concluded that girls are able to see past the looks more than the guys are. A guy can sell his other strong points and still get the girl. Which is good news for us guys.

Now me and the Chinese are comparing all of our toys. we keep reaching into our bags and pulling out some gadget. But they don't speak English and I don't speak Chinese. So its really funny. Because we can’t understand each other. But we are making all the other passengers on the train laugh like crazy at us. because we are miming everything to each other. He has a talking translator with him that has four languages in it, so that was pretty impressive but my Sony clie has five dictionaries in it. and a lot more words per dictionary. Just doesn’t talk. Then we compared laptops, and then cameras, binoculars. Voice recorders. He pulls out this amazing Japanese digital video cam that fits in your palm. I conceded on that one. these guys are cool. The Asians are the nicest and most polite tourists you run into. they are almost not there they are so quiet and gentle. It is nice to be in their presence. The worst? Well I drive a German car back home so I'm not going to say anything. Put it that way. no I'm just kidding. I don't think they're the worst. Maybe just the scariest. When they speak it sounds like growling, you know? Not a very mellifluous sound. And when there’s like five of them or more coming at you from behind it can sound uncannily like a pack of wild dogs or even monsters from a horror flick. The women aren't exactly beauty queens. And the men of course usually quite large. You don't really see small Germans like say with the Asians. Usually the German guys are like six feet tall and really big and have these piercing blue eyes. and of course they all have these crew cuts and shaved heads and these shorts that go just above their knees. So you imagine that at any minute they're going to pull out a knife or a gun or something and start hacking everybody up like in the movies.

I just ate on the train. That was cool. They have this little dining room. Great dinner. Tasted like my grandma used to make. Southern Italian cuisine. Eating and watching the sun go down over the mountains. Very nice. Riding the train for five hours like this, you get to see the whole country. Vineyards galore. Sunflowers are wild here. They’re just everywhere. Little Tree called me to say hello. I am very lucky to have her friendship. 

I have to start thinking about the new album and making some money. All I've done for six weeks is hang out and study and write etc and spend money. Its time to motivate. We gotta sell some CDs. 

The new album is probably out by now in the states. Soon it hits radio. At our level we don't have a lot of money to pay promoters and stations for airplay so it’s a real shot in the dark. Thousands of songs fighting for precious airplay. If you got bucks its not so hard. A lot of times they just slap down a hundred thou or more and say ‘here get this song played. And in a month or two you hear that baby everywhere. which sometimes sucks because the song just sucks, but they play it anyway. and then sometimes a song just rocks and it shoots to the top because its so cool. Like In Da Club. You hear that song once and you know its going to blow big. It was just a great track. I hope we have at least one hot track on the new CD that can blow on radio. We need it. We made a great album. We know that. we’re happy with it. we like the work as a whole. But that one hot track. Which one is it? I'm not the only one, superhero girl, sleep with you, guilty, Minnie Driver? Soon enough we’ll know.  

Holy shit. I just got to my apartment in Rome. Only its not some furnished but vacant apartment that people rent out. Its someone’s house. They live here but they are away on vacation. this is fucking way creepy. I guess it’s a lady and two kids. All their stuff is everywhere. and she told me to sleep in her bed. I don't even know if she changed the sheets. That is so gross. There is a piano here which is cool. But no ac. I really don't know how they do it. it is so bad when its this hot. This place is so dirty. I don't even know if I can stay here tonight. But I am so lost in this huge city! Rome looks like New York. I might as well be back in the states. They better have something cool here besides city. I need to make some serious money, because I don't like this kind of living. Going from the nice hotel in Venice to this. this is not cool. This place is like a hippie pad or something. Listen to me. I lived in a hippie pad for years. now I'm all whatever. but seriously. I don't like that feeling of feeling like your stepping back. and that's what this feels like. The price is right. 150 a week. You can’t beat it. but I swear to God there is patchouli incense on the fucking piano. I feel like I just time warped ten years. and how are you supposed to live amongst all this other stuff of other people and still have your own experience? I need something generic and aseptic. Like with nothing in it like in Florence. So I can build my own scene. I'll play the piano tonight till I pass out from the fucking heat and exhaustion. Maybe the school can find me a place in the morning. As Madelyn would say, at least you have a roof over your head. She always looks at the positive. 

It’s a few hours later. Its past one am. I cannot sleep. It is so hot that I am perspiring from head to toe lying in this bed which has a huge sag in the middle of it. I fell asleep briefly from reading Peggy Guggenheim’s book. It is a fun read. Very bohemian. So it helps in the adventure. They are traveling all over Europe hitting all these countries. Everyone getting drunk all the time. And sleeping with each other’s husbands and wives. She led a very eccentric life, if not a very immoral one in her early years, like many of us. Reading her stories help me deal with the strange fate of this evening. All the windows of this apartment are open because it is so hot of course. So as I am lying awake sweating to death in some strangers bed in some strange apartment in this big strange city listening to twenty different conversations and television sets all at once, in Italian, from the surrounding apartments, I can take comfort in that I am not the only who has ever found themselves in such strange circumstances. Peggy’s book assures me of this. just another adventure.