Such a Toothache!

Cousin Seattle, Pacoima is where the plane crashed into the grammar school, the one that almost killed Richie Valens (not the one that did kill him). Of course it's 108 degrees. It ain't paradise there, La Bamba Girl. Stay out of Pacoima.



Meanwhile, here in S-Plot (the Hip Hop name for Saint Plotniko), the weather broke last night. Driving home from Vallejo, Plot and Duck could see the welcome sign of fog collecting over the Bay Bridge, the columns already half hidden in slowly-drifting mist. That always means tomorrow will be cool. Even though it was probably 20 degrees cooler than the night before, there were still at least fifty people waiting in line outside Mitchell's Ice Cream at 11PM.

Plot and Duck had dinner in Vallejo with The Great Zinfandini and family, and also with their good friends the Vallejo Tomato People. The VTP have planted a backyard garden with at least 20 gigantic tomato plants (it's HOT in Vallejo) as well as every other vegetable in existence. Plot is so jealous he can spit. Come August we're talking bushel after bushel of big, red juicy guys. Lots of tomato sauce to be made, lots of gazpacho.

Sadly, the VTPs, who are filmmakers, are going through the same misery with their collaborators as Plotnik did with his a few years ago. It's hard to explain to people who haven't gone through it, but the disappointment when a collaborative relationship blows up, having been built on creative trust, is hard to take. It's not a marriage but it's somewhere close to it, especially when you wrote with that person for more than 20 years, which was Plotnik's situation.

The Plotnikkie lexicon does provide nice homilies for situations like these. You stare the person in the eye, for the last time, and you say: "E-chhha e-chhha e-chhha!" This means: "May God remove every tooth in your mouth but one, and in that one SUCH a toothache!"