Pompeii (2)

Rudolf Nureyev (1938-1993) 

We're still held back in Positano, and this morning we learned that this island, yes, this one (picture taken from our hotel room)...




...was once owned by Rudolf Nureyev, the Russian ballet dancer, who lived there...and we suddenly remember, having read Gore Vidal's memoir...Vidal mentions that he could see the island from his villa, and that Nureyev used to come over for dinner to tell tall, yet true stories about gay saunas...

Gore Vidal  (1925-2012)

Pompeii (1)

It's a bit complicated, but we're basically travelling to Pompeii at the moment, having had dinner tonight in some restaurant on the beach of  Positano just below the Hotel Miramare where Patricia Highsmith conceived of the idea of Mr. Ripley while staying there in 1952.

The view of Positano  and the Amalfi coast in 2017 from our hotel, Villa Sofia.

The cloud bank --- This Is Heaven --- teaser (26)

A few more weeks, and This Is Heaven is available on pre-order. At that point, we're going to consolidate all teasers into a separate page, so enjoy this one---one of the last teasers we're posting. John, forsaken John, has spent the night stumbling through the lonely streets of  his hometown, and now he's returning home.


Dunno what happened to my house keys. I’ll have to ring and hope somebody will buzz me in. Maurice will buzz me in and say nothing and plop down on a kitchen chair and refocus on his cornflakes and a cup of tea.
This is Day Four of the festival but the first without palaver on my bed. “Where’s everybody?” I ask. “What happened to Alex?”
“What happened to you?” Maurice replies. He arches his eyebrows.
I arch mine.
He raises the teapot. “Tea?” he asks.
I shake my head and proceed to make coffee. Somebody has operated the dish washer and there’s a clean mug inside. “What time is it?” I ask. His eyes travel to the clock above the kitchen cabinet that shows the correct time twice per day. “You’re up early,” I say.
“Indeed.”

___________________

"Why did you run away? Can't you handle a little neighborhood orgy?"

___________________

I sip my coffee and peer at the water tower outside. I’ve been fairly downbeat on the thing throughout this soap, but it keeps you busy in its quiet way—-like trees keep you busy, or nervous flies, or the thought of an afterlife.
“Day Four,” I say, “day four.”
Maurice tries his campy laugh: “Why did you run away? Can’t you handle a little neighborhood orgy?
“I’m less experienced than you are,” I say.
“Taylor will have brought you up to speed, shouldn’t he?”
“Taylor, Taylor,” I say.
“Not to speak of Ben. Or the master himself.”
“Master?”
“Alex. Yes.”
Maurice beholds me with a mix of annoyance and reticence: “Are we jealous?”
“Alex ditched me.” I say (croak). "Sort-of."
“Yes, his remark yesterday. I thought he was joking.”
“No, he wasn’t.”
“We shan’t blame him, or shall we?”
“No.”
“And you, whom did you ditch? Sort-of? You look tired.”
“I didn’t sleep.”
“You didn’t sleep, darling. Alone, or with somebody else?”

I close the door. I close it softly.

There are two types of billionaires --- Florence (5)

Michael is working on a new soap consisting of a series of flash stories featuring Jamie and Dex, the heroes of his flash Jamie 1.0. The whole thing is set in Florence, Italy, which we visited recently. Here's a brief fragment of the second part...hold on, let's start with an illustration again:

There are two types of billionaires

And now the fragment:

There are two types of billionaires: (1) unhappy billionaires, who are each unhappy in their own way, and (2) happy billionaires, who answer “whatever” when their valet inquires as to today’s attire and are then served with a bespoke Bond Street summer costume in understated grey. Our man belongs to the second category. What’s special about him: he’s faceless. You couldn’t even say he looks like a choir boy (hedge funds), or Osama bin Laden (family money), or Donald Trump (family money). He looks like somebody who refuses to look like anything.

“Huh?” I said.

“They’ll look anonymous. Totally. They could be caught on CCTV robbing a bank and broadcasted on cable networks and nobody would recognize their face on the bus or on the buffet of the Mar al Lago. They’ve had a face job. An expensive face job.”)

We don’t always get it right, but this time we do. Mr. Bond Street finishes his phone conversation, makes a beeline for yours truly, and introduces himself as “John.” He asks whether I like art. “Real art. Botticelli. Da Vinci. Warhol.” He chuckles. Of course we like art...

You find more of this on the pages of LustSpiel, here.

Today...

...the view from the Pic de l'Ours across the bay of Cannes, with the city of Cannes on the shoreline and the city of Nice (next bay, in the background) on the shoreline of La Baie des Anges. The back-background is provided by the Alps. From here (500 m elevation), you get a view of the entire Cote d'Azur.

He's clad in widely-cut pants --- Florence (4)

Michael is working on a new soap consisting of a series of flash stories featuring Jamie and Dex, the heroes of his flash Jamie 1.0. The whole thing is set in Florence, Italy, which we visited recently. Here's a brief fragment...hold on, let's start with an illustration:

"He's clad in widely-cut pants."

That's actually Savonarola being burnt on the stake there, in the background, but never mind. And now the fragment:

A black guy has materialised next to the fountain and is taking pictures of the Loggia, meaning he’s taking pictures of me taking pictures of him taking pictures of me and so on. It would be a new come-on for me, and the fun part is in the wuzzy reciprocity—who is to say who is coming on to whom? Whether the guy is actually aware of my presence remains to be seen (the Loggia holds a dozen statues and six dozen sightseers as we speak), but I am becoming increasingly aware of him, unmistakably. I’m a natural.

He’s the Kenyan type, long and stalky, ebony-black, clad in a half-open Hawaii shirt that leaves nothing to the imagination, wide strong shoulders, shiny tapered pecs, the torso funneling down to the small of his back along effortless abs. Obama has a beautiful, round crane, infinite lips, infinite teeth, and wears stylish grey flannel pants, widely cut, much wider than the fashion on the Via Tornabuoni. I know about these pants: guys wear them to hide their third leg. He’s also wearing elaborate sandals about which more later...

Back in Bürchen for a week

This evening...

...at the nearby restaurant Le Mizuna in Mandelieu.

This afternoon in the Esterel

On Sunday in St. Raphael

Too late

This is real --- Eric Clapton --- Double trouble (1994)

This is how we feel

(Glenn sends this:)

It's not funny

This morning