What I did on my vacation

This is the wrong part of California, but something here puts me in mind of Raymond Chandler. Maybe it's the storefront Ocean View Card Room, or maybe the sun-bleached stucco of the Neptune Apartments -- just the place where a dame like that would live, I thought. People came here looking for paradise and found the end of the earth instead.

But they didn't come in brand-new Duesenbergs that must have cost five grand. And they didn't wear fedoras. And their name wasn't ... Eddie. I ducked behind a palm tree, but there were no palm trees in this part of the state, and that damned species wasn't even native to California. So I went next door, ordered a double mocha decaf latte, and sat down to wait ... and wait ...

© Peter Rozovsky 2009