On a surprisingly narrow jet, flying from LAX to JFK. The idea is to blog more than I’ve been doing, which lately has been about twice a year. What better opportunity than my book tour for Snake Lake, with all this down time on airplanes and solitary lunches? Inspired by Buddhist ritual, Jewish mysticism, poet Maya Stein’s “Ten Line Tuesdays” and the $108K in a Los Angeles-based friend’s savings account, I hereby set two rules: a blog every day, through November 20th; and each blog exactly 324 words (three paragraphs of 108 words each). That shouldn’t be so difficult. Right? (These things never seem difficult at the beginning.)

Many human beings love Los Angeles, and this visit I was lucky enough to understand why. After a stupefying heat wave that ended with my arrival, a cold front moved in. Rain fell, the skies were cleansed, and Tinseltown was transformed into the Emerald City. I spent a luminous afternoon at the Huntington Library—amazed by the love poetry of John Donne,  a Walt Whitman letter, and the infinite adjoining cactus gardens. You walk among those convoluted aloes and comical barrel cactus feeling like you’ve been transported into a Dr. Seuss book. Fantastic textures you don’t dare touch. And a strange sweet smell in the air: tacos and sage.

(And LACMA was also fabulous – I kinda love Jeff Koons.)

Jeff Koons' "Balloon Dog"

Okay, back to the tour. My Book Soup audience (on Sunset) was thin – the audience had about as many legs as two beetles. After they filtered out, Jeff Garlin walked in. The actor, who plays Larry David’s agent on Curb Your Enthusiasm, is also an author (My Footprint), and we spent 20 minutes bemoaning our respective book tours. A good man, that Garlin, but what was he doing alone in a bookstore on a Friday night?  Far more vivifying was my reading at the wonderful Distant Lands, in Pasadena. About 40 people showed up—and ten left with snakes.