08 December 2013: R. Starsailor, having come from a bar in Berkeley, where he met with a young woman who was wonderful and solid and genuine and warm-blooded, and where people were friendly and nice to each other, making him think, “Well, maybe we’ll be all right after all”—witnessed, while on his bicycle, moving swiftly in subzero temperatures (strange for California), twenty (20) heavily-armed Oakland police officers patrolling the streets near 35th and Market while a search helicopter made passes overhead.

At home, in bed, nearly a half hour later, the helicopter could still be heard way the hell up there.

And his cat had curled up on his lap in the darkness, singing his rumbly cat song.

And everything, just then, wasn’t altogether terrible (for a number of humans on earth, maybe, except for the poor bastard being hunted like a dog several blocks away).