In retrospect, I think I might've passed up a good chance to get laid this morning. Dammit. My next shot with Deb won't be until Saturday night (not likely�it's a work day for her) or Sunday. *smacks forehead* idiotidiotidiot.

Woke up twice in the night with tingly hurting arm syndrome. The second time, a little after 5 a.m., I noticed that Sara wasn't home from work yet. I was sitting at the dining room table reading a trashy romance and waiting for the blood to flow back into my arm when I heard a teeny-tiny tap tap on the front door.

It was Sara getting home from working her first homocide. Well, not officially a homocide as of last report, but expected to be one. A 90-year-old lady had gotten beaten and strangled, and they didn't expect her to live more than another couple of hours.

I'm kind of in a difficult position because I want to relay the cool parts of the story that Sara told me about the investigation, but then she'll be pissed that people had heard about it from my diary before they could read it in hers. So, all of the people who read both our diaries, skip down until the next section break. 'Kay? Sara will tell it better anyway. And probably more factually.

And no, I'm not providing Sara's diary address.

So, the cops are pretty damn sure about who did it. They got a search warrant and went through the guy's apartment. The suspect is the victim's crackhead tenant. Cops and Sara are looking through the place, and in the kitchen there's one of those huge blocks of butter out on the counter, the kind that's four stick's worth in one chunk. There's butter smeared all over the place.

There are also two chairs set up facing each other. Each chair has a mirror propped up on it. They can't figure out what the hell is with the chairs and mirrors. Sara steps between the mirrors and says, looking from one mirror to the other, "You think he stands here and says, 'Does my butt look fat?'"

But one cop made a plausible, if disgusting, association between the chairs, the mirrors, and the butter. You're already there aren't you? Cop: "You think he uses this shit to whack off?"

Ewww. eww eww eww.

Evidence gathering takes on a new disgusting tone.

So I got to hear this story in my jammies, bathrobe and Homer Simpson slippers. Cool.

If I've got any lesbian Legionnaires who live near San Diego, there's a fabulous opportunity waiting. Miguelito desperately needs to experience the Lesbian Pancake Breakfast ritual. Though I've never met Miguelito face-to-face, I can vouch that he is indeed witty, fun, and deserves Lesbian Pancakes.

I don't have the heart to tell him that I've never met any other lesbians who do the fabulous Sunday breakfast thing that we do. He'd have better chances finding some brunching fags who weren't strung into an X-coma on Sunday morning.

If he ever gets to our neck of the woods, we will definitely whip-up a big time breakfast. We'll have bacon whether it's bacon day or not. I don't know if he's a vegetarian, but I don't care. I want bacon. Last Sunday was supposed to be a bacon day, but we didn't have bacon. Do I sound bitter?

My poor decrepit dog is not doing very well. At 15, it's not really a surprise.

The last two times I've taken her outside, I've had to wake her up (she's deaf and old, so you have to shake her) and stand her on her feet to get her to get off her bed.

It's like working with the smelly dog version of those old-fashioned card tables with the rickety legs. I know I remember a Three Stooges short involving one of those. You pick up the table by the top, all the legs flop down, and then you spend 10 minutes trying to get all four legs to lock into place while you do lots of pratfalls.

I lift Katie's shoulders and try to brace the two front legs on some floor surface with traction. Then I pick up the butt end, and position those two legs. She sways a little bit, looks up at me with those big brown eyes, asks me if she could please just finish her 12 hour nap.

She didn't each much for her last two meals either. Tonight she gets a bath and a little dog massage. Maybe that will help.

I didn't tell you that our neighbor Ricky, the one who works for the gubmint, besides just drinking wine and telling jokes on Tuesday night, also asked what we would want changed about laws and such within his realm of influence.

Of course we asked for gay marriage, and partner insurance and stuff like that. Ha, ha. That's not going to happen on a statewide basis any time soon.

But we also asked for tougher penalties for habitually bad drivers. The tailgaters, and four-lane-with-no-signal-changers, the morons who drive like they're in a freakin' video game with lots of extra lives or something. And LOOK. He did it! In two days. Now that's a good neighbor.

I just finished reading Blanche on the Lam by Barbara Neely. I recommend it highly for all white people.

The writing is consistently decent and sometimes exceptional. It's also the first of a series, so I'll be looking for other Blanche books. Imagine Miss Marple if she were a late 20th century black domestic services worker with attitude. Blanche has the same sort of associative knowledge of human nature through her acquaintances and relatives that Marple has with her "small village life." Except Neely doesn't play the sleuthing as close to the vest as Christie did with Marple. Fine with me.