Finally, my two weeks of incessant activity came to an end on Thursday, as I completed all the stuff I'd set myself to do. During the previous five days I'd:

• Had dinner with Jed.
• Had dinner with my brother, twice.
• Worked almost every day at a dot-com in Marin.
• Gone to the gym three times.
• Gone running twice.
• Had my first film class.
• Installed a network for my two computers at home.
• Watched "Nurse Betty".
• Had a wild romp in the hay (er hmmm).

I say this not to impress you with what a whirling dervish I am, but to explain why I was so looking forward to my long weekend in LA - four days without stress, and without running around trying to squeeze two much into too little time. The plan was that Cecilia and I would have a nice, slow drive down 101, taking our time, and enjoying the sun.

Nature, unfortunately, had other plans. When I got up on Friday morning, the streets far below were already glistening wet. That was as nothing compared to what was in store: Winter's last blast was to pummel us all the way down to LA.

By the time I headed over to the Castro to pick up Cecilia, the rain was coming down very heavily.

Still, we decided to try the slower more scenic route, at least for the first part of our journey. And it ended up being the right decision. We drove down the coast, on highway 1, as far as Watsonville, and then cut inland along 152 to eventually join up with US 99. Until we reached 99, there was little traffic, and the scenery was gorgeous in the spring rain; trees of unlimited variety perched atop slowly rolling green hills, the rugged, plunging cliffs along the coast, and hilly roads through redwood forests.

It was fun to be heading off on a short road trip like this, listening to each other's CDs, stopping at suburban malls for Starbucks, not feeling opressed by an agenda.

Road trip :)

Highway 99 was another matter entirely. Like it's better known cousin, I5, it's a long narrow freeway through mostly flat, ugly farmland, stripmalls, and industrial plants. You spend the drive either boxed in by trucks, or fleeing the smell of cattle ranches or american-cheese production plants. The weather didn't help - howling wind and lashing rain threw the car around. Yet, as I grew tired after five hours of driving, I had no choice but to let Cecilia take over. I was a little worried, since I'd not only given her some driving lessons several years ago, but I'd also been with her when she'd failed her driving test for the first of three attempts. Since then, she'd probably driven only a few times.

She seemed confident enough as we pulled out back onto the freeway, however, and, indeed, apart from a few violent swerves, and muffled cries of "oh dear", we made it to the outskirts of LA in one piece.

"Objects in mirrors are closer than they seem." That has always seemed like a bit of an over-generalisation to me.

We were to stay with Cecilia's friends, a married couple, Maggy and Larry, in the Miracle Mile area of LA, near Beverly Hills. We finally got there so late that they'd already gone out for dinner, leaving us just time to both collapse on our beds. It was only when they arrived that I found we were locked in, as the door knob twisted and turned but contributed nothing to actually opening the door. Once freed from captivity, though, I was able to meet my hosts for the first time, and plan dinner. We settled on making do with cheese and crackers and wine for now, while ordering out for Thai later on. After dinner, feeling extremely tired, I made my excuses and went to bed, while Cecilia and Maggy stayed up chatting (loudly) until midnight.

After Cecilia finally came to bed (not my bed, silly), I finally fell asleep and slept straight through to 6.30 a.m. By then, the rain had stopped, and the grey clouds seemed to be breaking up finally. Maggy had arranged an early morning drive over to Santa Monica with her friend Lee, to go running on the beach, and Cecilia and I were both supposed to go along. In the end, though, we left Cecilia along, still snoring, in bed. It was cold on the beach, but beautiful, and I did the best run I've done in months along to the end of Will Rogers State Beach, and back.

Ocean Light

There were quite a few other runners, but not the vast numbers you'd expect in Los Angeles. And no shirtless adonises, either. Strangely enough, many of the runners I did see seemed somewhat flabby and out of shape, despite their imposing, Gucci athleticwear and grim, determined faces; a collision of the sins of vanity and gluttony perhaps.

Now I'm back at Maggy's house, just waiting, and waiting for my friend John-Paul to call. He says, "Oi, I haven't seeen you in ages, Keith" over the phone. So where the hell is he already? :)