v

2.28.2007

batting a thousand: texas hill country

Okay so when my best friend Maria and I went to L.A. in the early 1990s, we rented a white convertible and drove up U.S. 1 with the top down รก la Thelma and Louise. I kind of can’t believe I drove that treacherous route without fainting, that I was willingly behind the wheel. One false move, one miscalculation, and we would have been decimated, crumpled like an accordion against the rocks.

It’s a showy affair, the Pacific coastline. As we barreled along, Maria remarked that the dropoffs (hundreds of feet, no chance of survival) reminded her of Greece. Her family is from that spectacular part of the world, Cephalonia, a mountainous Ioanian island, so she knows a thing or two about precarious routes. During our drive north – we spent the night in Big Sur and went on to Santa Cruz -- we jokingly mentioned Thelma and Louise more than once. That seemed appropriate. The movie was recent, our exchanges private.

Yesterday I discovered, in the circuitous way of the Internet (Gadling an article on travel websites in The Guardian Thelma and Louise), a British concern called Thelma and Louise. This Thelma and Louise is a computer-matched, women-only travel buddy “community” that pairs like-minded women travelers. I’m all for separatist activities, spas for instance, or book groups, but I don’t think I would ever want to travel with a woman I did not know. I don’t think I would ever be that desperate. But what’s with calling the business Thelma and Louise? DON’T THEY REMEMBER HOW THE MOVIE ENDED?

I have a Letter to the Editor in today’s L.A. Times.

It’s in response to this editorial about Craig Ferguson’s decision not to mock Britney Spears’ breakdown ten or so days ago. Imagine that. Compassionate stand-up. Here’s Craig Ferguson’s monologue, quite touching as he recounts his path to rehab when he was 29. This is the third Letter to the Editor I’ve sent, and the third that’s been published. (If you’re curious: I had one in People when I was 18. It was about Stevie Wonder. I had one in the Boston Globe several years ago, about Ed Klein, the former editor of The New York Times Magazine who writes PARADE’s Walter Scott’s Personality Parade.) This is the only area of my life where I’m batting 1,000.

Today’s sweeps is for three days at the Hyatt Hill Country in San Antonio, Texas. Hills as in cliffless hills.

To enter, click HERE. The deadline is May 17. One entry per email account.