Besotted again.

Us girls, catching up, leave the crowded dive in the West Village - not before friend tells me about the trader she met from Jersey while waiting on the platform for the PATH train. He has a tattoo, on his bicep, of an Italian flag overlain with a shamrock.

I find my own future ex-husband at the next bar - my friend's neighbourhood place. Owned by two brothers from Queens; one used to be the drummer for Blondie, and the other is working tonight. He's mid-fifties, wearing a turtleneck, and he's a fucking show the way he single-handedly holds it down in this diveish bar in Chelsea. I mean, just as an example, this 20-something woman walks in, and goes up to the bar for a drink. He leans over as though about to listen for her order, and without breaking stride, says "You've got about two seconds to leave this bar." In her crack haze, it takes her about that much time to process, and she bee-lines for the door.

Grace and I need food. Friend tells us there's a diner four blocks uptown. We get there, and there are xmas mini lights on the counter, and peel-and-stick snowflakes on the windows. Christmas carols are playing faintly in the background, but the sound is also up on a violent action movie playing on a 13" tv. We eat eggs benedict and potatoes and tea, and take the A train home.