thursday july 5 2001    |    4:27 p.m.

i love mark eitzel.

the show on tuesday was in a theater in little havana which used to be a baptist church. it was towering and colorful and magnetic. inside, two balconies and rows of sloping seats in front of the stage, which was backed with blue curtains and decorated only with two prop-columns in the center and a beer bottle holding red carnations on top of an amp. the lighting was hit-or-miss, but mostly hit, and there were some breathtaking, ethereal, changeling moments.

mark was fabulous. we might as well have been sitting around in his living-room with him, the 100-odd people who showed up. broken strings, fallen guitar cords, wrong notes -- nothing daunted him. he just kept singing, even without the music.

ticketbuying was a whole odyssey though. both patrick and i were broke, so he said he's put the tickets on his credit card. but when we got to the theater -- late, in the middle of for stars' set -- we were told that we couldn't charge tickets. so we drove to miami beach, where a guy in a jets to brazil t-shirt who works at uncle sam's took pity on our predicament and bought nine cds from me for a total of $27. still $3 short, but we figured it was late already and we could continue to count on other people's pity. got to the theater during the intermission, were allowed in. whew.

after the show we were elated and in need of some serius drinks, so we went to the sandbar lounge next to norman's, which (the latter) is quickly becoming a preferred yuppie hangout. we met a man from warsaw and talked to him about europe and milosevic's trial and his life and ours and the -- how do you put this delicately? you don't -- laxative qualities of guinness, among other things. he kept buying us all these drinks and he wouldn't let us buy him any. gin and tonics, whiskey and cokes, rum and cokes, shots of scotch, heinekens... we called a taxi for him and stayed drinking and talking for a good while after he left. by the time we stumbled outside after closing, i was wasted, more than i have been in a while.

and of course the second i stepped into my house at six-thirty in the morning, i ran into my mother, who was up and worried and getting herself a glass of water. oops.

yesterday for the 4th rolando's family had a big outdoor party at their house, complete with a reggae cover band on the dock. there were friends and food and the cuban clans, but the best part came after everybody left and only roly's friends stayed behind. we pulled off our pants and jumped in the pool, with the mixed drinks and cigarettes lined up on the edges.

some people engaged in sketchy carousing, which is fine. the rest of us were just silly and drunk. rolando played sublime in my honor: can't ask for much more.

today, back to being hung over and dissatisfied. i wish i had a car. i wish my mother would shut up about the cover letters and just let me write them. i wish the dishes did themselves. i wish certain people didn't feel the need to go around trying to prove things all the time. i wish my hands didn't smell like lemon. i wish i had someone to talk to. i wish we all weren't walking around with agendas to fulfill. i miss my radio show.