I was at David and Lisa’s, but it wasn’t the house where they really live. This one had a very narrow kitchen with rooms along one side and cabinets along the other. It also reminded me for some reason of the house we lived in in Brecksville from 1980–83.

There were a lot of people there, but not people I really know. For instance, there was a Japanese man and woman, very well-dressed and polite, very short, who were introduced as “the top two people at Smith Barney.”(footnote a)

We were cooking or something. I had been on a trip recently, to or via a place that was simultaneously the L.A. airport (but not LAX—if they have a “second” airport, like Gatwick or Midway, it was that one), England, or the set of “Deadwood.” In this place, which was like a set and like an exhibit, there was a train robbery. The train was smaller than life-size. The fields around the train tracks had all this weird old rusting stuff (footnote b). One of the old rusting stuffs was a set of stairs with wheels (footnote c), but not the kind with a truck. Just a big wheeled set of stairs, that folded at the top. I was livid about this, because OBVIOUSLY “Deadwood” takes place in the 1870s and they didn’t have planes then, let alone the kind that were boarded with these stairs.

I was really mad about the stairs, and from Lisa’s house, I called the police. I called the police in England for some reason. I think I may have consulted my parents before calling. I explained my problem to the man who answered the phone, and his response was, “in season four? I saw that!” We discussed “Deadwood” for a bit (it’s only in season two, by the way), and how stupid it was that those airline stairs were in that field, but obviously he couldn’t really help.

There were so many people in the house that I began to feel unimportant (footnote d), and I decided to go home. I decided to put Josie to bed before I went home. I put her in the crib, and she lay there crying. I got into the crib with her and snuggled with her. Eventually *I* fell asleep, and she did not. When I woke up, I couldn’t find the baby, there were two tall, straight piles of pillows in the crib, and I was kind of nervous. For one thing, I thought everyone thought I’d gone home hours ago, and for another thing, I couldn’t find Josie.

I eventually found her, under the crib, where she had put a pillow and a blanket and made a little bed for herself (footnote e). After, presumably, stacking the pillows just to creep me out. When I came back out into the kitchen, no one seemed to notice I was gone, and there wasn’t any gratitude for having put Josie down, which is always a huge undertaking anyway.

There was a package for me, though. For some reason I was certain it was four in the morning, and there was a package for me. It had something to do with the L.A. airport, like an apology gift or a prize or something. In the package was a bottle of Lancers. Not the light red bottle like usual, though. It was blue. It was this coffee-flavored liqueur stuff. Sort of like Bailey’s, or like a White Russian, but “black” coffee instead of creamy. It was really, really good. Footnote f.

a. I think this was because all week I’ve been working on the Wolfensohn legacy book and hearing our contact refer to Shengman Zhang as “the number two at the Bank.”

b. Like those boats they had to find in the Amazing Race a few weeks ago.

c. I think this is because of the stair truck the Bluth family drives around in on “Arrested Development.”

d. This is because this is what always happens. I do not understand how Lisa maintains so many friendships.

e. A lot like the drawings of Sunny Baudelaire.

f. I think this has something to do with that AWESOME espresso chocolate bar Linda and I got the other week.