Every May my friends Laura and Gayle and I (and later Monty) have been taking trips together. For two years in a row we went to Los Angeles and had ourselves a good old time:

We, THE LA ANGELS, rent a room somewhere with absolutely no itinerary and drive around wearing cool sunglasses and drinkin iced coffee while listening to Dad Rock. Sometimes we get drunk or smoke or whatever. Sometimes we walk around dead sober . . . or at least highly caffeinated. That’s pretty much the head, the tail, the whole damn thing. It’s just something to do is all, and it is good the whole way through.

Last year we stayed in this huge apartment right on Hollywood Boulevard, and Laura and Monty and I slept on a California king-sized bed in this pitch-black climate-controlled bedroom while Gayle volunteered to sleep in the living room on a massive sectional couch. We would wake up every morning and get breakfast and then just go wherever we felt like going. Wherever someone said they wanted to go, we went. There was no voting, for god’s sake, or really any discussion. We just did it, because anywhere we went would be cool since we were all together. And if we did get to a place and none of the strangers around us were having any fun, we went ahead and had fun anyway. With the undying spirit of fun at any expense burning in our cute little hearts, we made our way to Santa Monica and Venice Beach and Silver Lake and Mulholland Drive, and on and on—all the while, yes, wearing each other’s sunglasses and drinking iced coffee. In a sense we did nothing. It was beautiful. It was one of the best trips of my whole life.

THIS FRIDAY, The LA Angels are renting a car and driving to Tahoe. We are staying on the lake there, in a sort of resort which was so suspiciously cheap that I’m wondering if it’s even real. All signs point to yes, but then you never know. It has free parking and free breakfast and I think there’s a fireplace and a fucking hot tub in our room. And two big-ass queen beds and huge pillows. It really is right on the lake. You step outside and there it is. We’re gonna get in Friday evening and GRAB DINNER and get stoned and walk around, or whatever, and then wake up the next day and do more or less the same thing. However! When we check out at 3 p.m., we cease to be The LA Angels and transform into the Reno Bambinos because: we’re driving to Reno, Nevada for no reason other than the fact that none of us have ever been to Reno. And there I have booked us another cheap room in the Sands Regency Casino Hotel, which, yes, has a god damn Mels Diner on the ground floor:

And maybe this goes without saying, but it’s a CASINO HOTEL, so we can gamble our balls off before we even hit the streets that evening.

We have adopted personas and pseudonyms. I have decided my name is GORGEOUS JACKPOTS. My fellow angels / bambinos Laura and Monty have adopted other money / gambling-related names, but for the time being I have forgotten them. (I should note here that Gayle is not coming because she signed up to be a harlequin clown at a children’s birthday party (???).) We’re bringing fur coats and boots and huge sunglasses and makeup, and so on. Monty and I are going to chain smoke using Hunter S. Thompson cigarette filters. I anticipate us staying in character the entire time, which I imagine will be easy enough since we’ll be ripped out of our heads and goofed up on desert delirium.

What a beautifully idiotic weekend it will be. And why not? It’s like the fella said: You’ve got to do something. Yes, well, this is what my friends and I do. We’re idiots, and it rules.

I’LL REPORT BACK IN A FEW DAYS WITH PICTURES OF OUR AIMLESS EXCURSION.

Until then: Stay frosty, my angels ☆~