No sleep. It was so fucking cold on Ian’s couch. I think at 6am I had to turn his air conditioner up from 60 to 66 degrees. At 7 or 8am I had to turn it up from 66 degrees to 70 degrees. At 9, when Ian woke up to take his dog for a walk, I was already laying awake on the couch. I knew it was going to be a very long day. When he returned from the dog walk we dressed (and by dressed I mean I changed my shirt and put my shoes back on. Breakfast was a bagel with butter from the bodega a block or two from Ian’s apartment with a bottle of Wild Cherry Pepsi. East Coast bagels equal multiple orgasms. How the hell can I eat a bagel in LA and convince myself that it’s not dreadful? Your guess is as good as mine.
Got to the record fair before my boss! Pete from the UK was milling about, and I asked why he hadn’t gone to Nevada Smith’s to watch the Liverpool v. Man. United matchup as he’d planned. He claimed he’d wanted to but he couldn’t break himself away from the table. I told him to go and that I’d watch his stuff. He seemed very thankful and relieved. Liverpool won two nil so he returned very happy. Soon after my boss arrived, so I had a few minutes to survey the scene beyond just our table.
It was very slow today. Not too much foot traffic, and the number of dealers peddling their wares was miniscule. The amount of empty tables was quite sobering. Looking through a random box called “Brazilian / African” I found a copy of the super-hard-to-find, self-titled Soggy record. I bought a copy of The Entheogens’ Gnostic Mass and a numbered Swedish re-issue of the Justen O’Brien and Jake album Time WIll Tell from a super-nice collector from New York. Turns out we know many of the same people. It made me feel like a huge nerd. That’s all I bought today.
Chris Brokaw played a beautiful set of 12-string acoustic tunes at about 3pm. Afterwards, he was walking around looking at records. He stopped by our table and I told him how much I enjoyed his set and his albums. He made a joke about how I could buy one from him for $180 if I wanted. I asked if he’d take three Mystic Zephyrs 4 singles as a trade, and when he asked who they were, I told him the group’s story. Again, I felt like a huge nerd, but he humored me and listened to my spiel. He responded to my tale of scarcity and desirability with a story about a skateboarding shirt he owns. Rather than feel like a loser as I did when Scharpling dismissed himself yesterday, I told Brokaw today that I was sorry for keeping him from shopping and sent him on his way. Ha.
Things really started to die down by 5pm, so we began the arduous process of packing up all of our belongings to be shipping back to the store in Los Angeles. I saw WFMU Station Manager Ken pass by, so I followed him back to the volunteer area near the Metropolitan Pavilion’s entrance and introduced myself to him, and thanked him for the opportunity to blog for WFMU. He introduced me to Liz Berg, and since I didn’t know what that was supposed to mean I thanked her too for the opportunity to blog. After an awkward silent beat, I dismissed myself. When did I become so socially awkward? Oh, right. At birth.
After the show, definitely overtired and running on fumes, Ian and I raced up to Harlem for burritos the size of your head at Taqueria y Fanda. It was delicious. There are some LA burritos that I prefer to that one, but it was really, really good. I’m so grossly full right now I don’t even feel like writing any more about the meal other than to say that the chips and house-made salsas were very good. The burrito was fucking huge. I had the “baby” size, Ian had the “supreme” size.
We drove back to SoHo via Broadway, lamented on Times Square, and found a spot right outside Ian’s apartment. I went inside to wait for Z. We listened to some of Ian’s records he purchased today, and then I drove Z back to Jersey. I’m finally home again, dizzy with exhaustion. I’m going to retire to bed very, very soon.
Now the real vacation begins.
