I got my book signed...

I slammed into LA, did the packing job...which turned out to be harder than I'd expected...and came home, all on schedule...and I haven't been able to focus, since. My mind's been on vacation the last few days, and I'm pretty pissed it didn't bother to let me know till it was gone.

I also read a friend's screenplay, on this trip, and proofed it so he can send it to the Nicholl (I never mentioned I had also entered), which also took longer than I expected. Seems like that's how it's been for the last few weeks -- everything takes longer.

BUT...I had a first edition of City of Night and John Rechy signed it for me. He was part of the gay scene in the 50s in NYC, LA, Chicago and New Orleans...an actual hustler and his book was about that life. Some of the people he met along the way...two really stand out. One, a guy named Pete who was gay for pay but really wanted a connection...only he can't handle it when he finally makes the attempt with John. Second, an unnamed man in Santa Monica on vacation from his family, who wavers on the brink of allowing himself to be gay only to pull back for the sake of his family.

John's a lovely man who's managed to live 88 years and is working on a new book. What made it even better is, he shared a story with me about the copy I have -- it's very rare. Seems the publisher was printing it with one word wrong in the description on the flyleaf. He stopped the printing and had them change it...but a couple got sent out with the wrong dust jacket and I have one of those.

I can't believe it. It's almost a parroting of what happened with John Tenniel and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. In a vague way. I didn't tell him any of that; I felt like it would be taking away from his moment, because he was so pleased he could tell me about this...tell me I had a true first edition, not the followup. I'm keeping that little beast safe.

Regarding the script -- it's one I worked on years ago for this writer in Chicago, and I don't think I did a very good job on it. He worked it into something interesting, even though the story is still pretty much the same, so all I did was check grammar and consistency...but it still took a lot of work. He has a new version of Final Draft and I can't open that file on my old FD program, so I pdf'd it and went through and then wrote out the changes by page number to send to him.

I do wish him luck on it.