Friday

I awakened to a blizzard of emails from my anorexic nutcase, former top model and actress “friend.” She wants to commit suicide. She slit her wrists two nights ago but it wasn’t enough and she’s healing rapidly. She has heard there are books telling her how to kill herself with pills. Would I be so kind as to get that sort of book for her?

“Absolutely not,” I said. “Not a chance.”

“Will you come and see me?” she asked. “And make me barbecued chicken?”

“Honey, I haven’t seen you since Bush 43 was President. Do you think there might be a reason?

“Is it because I’m too fat?”

“What are you now? Size zero — is there a smaller size?” I asked her.

“I’m fat,” she said.

“Okay. Don’t kill yourself for two years and I’ll make you barbecued chicken. How’s that?” I suggested.

“I’ll try,” she said.

“Should I call the Malibu Sheriff’s station?” I asked her. “Are you serious?”

“No, don’t call them. I’ll have an Ensure.”

“Great. Call me when you’ve done that and not before.”

Then off to lunch at the Beverly Hills Hotel with my friend Glenn Miller. (His real name.) We sat by the pool. I had a chopped salad. It was called a “McCarthy Salad.” Not named for “Tailgunner Joe,” alas, but for a chef. It was dizzyingly expensive but really, really good. We could use Joe McCarthy now. Compared with today’s politicians, he’s Socrates and Abe Lincoln rolled into one.

Then a long nap, and then a trip to the Pavilions Grocery in gay West Hollywood. It was fantastic. Store after store had up signboards saying, in big letters, “BLACK LIVES MATTER.” Every kind of store, especially ones selling expensive toys like classic cars.

By total chance, I happened to be with a man of color, whose name is not important. “They have to do that or they get looted or vandalized or burned down,” he said sadly. “It’s come to this. And then they get hit up for money. The money is for ‘protection.’ It doesn’t go to any kind of charity. It goes to a few thugs who run the local Black Lives Matter organization.”

Frightening. It reminded me of newsreels about how in 1930s Germany stores had to have up Swastikas to show they were pro-Nazi. Otherwise the Brownshirts would vandalize the stores and beat up the owners, or so the documentaries say. It’s come to this. You have to show homage to a completely bu–s– outfit that does nothing, absolutely zero, to help the black people of America.

And white people are scared and angry about this. A dear friend from Yale used to say, “People don’t like to get pushed around.” Brilliant. Black people did not like being pushed around and now white people don’t like being pushed around.

I called a close relative in New York City from my car. She said she was exhausted. “The whole situation is exhausting. The Covid, the looting, the tension. It’s all exhausting.” To me, nothing is more exhausting than seeing the media and the Democrats in Congress kiss the ass of people who promote looting and arson. Fear is exhausting. Watching the greatest nation in history laid low by gangsters is beyond exhausting.

Oh, by the way, the would-be suicide called me as I was writing this to tell me she had spent the day at the beach working on a perfect tan.

Be seeing you