Deadlier Than the Male

The panel line-up for B-con 2011 has been posted. Here’s what I’ll be up to:

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15

8:30 A.M. – 9:30 A.M.

WOMAN TROUBLE-Landmark 1,2,3

Crime fiction is rife with ‘bad girl’ characters.

Russel McLean (M), Lori G. Armstrong, Judy Clemens, Christa Faust, Lauren Henderson, Karen Olson

9:00 P.M. – 10:00 P.M.

BAD SEED-Majestic A,B,C

Sex, Violence, and Everything That Makes A Book Great

Craig Montgomery (M), Christa Faust, Chris Holm, Craig Johnson, Scott Phillips, John Rector, Benjamin Whitmer, Jonathan Woods

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16

10:00 A.M. – 11:00 A.M.

SHAKE AND FINGER POP-Landmark 4

Fight sports in crime fiction

Eric Beetner(M), Frank Bill, Christa Faust, Jamie Freveletti, Tom Schreck

The full schedule is available here.

See you in Saint Louis!

Sunday is always my favorite day at B-Con. Lazy, low-key, more intimate. Time to catch up with friends and trade war stories. The highlight of my Sunday this year was getting a chance to hang with my pulp hero Bill Crider. I tried (and probably failed) not to act like some gushing fangirl, but seriously kids, have you seen this video?

But I also had to bid a way-too-soon goodbye to Martyn Waites, my beloved B-Con husband, who needed to split early in order to usher his exhausted family through a 12 hour purgatory of airports and timezones and tiny seats. Muskego just isn’t gonna be the same without you, English.

Once Martyn was gone, we started to notice a disturbingly subtle Body Snatchers style takeover in the hotel bar. One by one, the crime writers were disappearing, being stealthily replaced by corporate drones from some kind of personal improvement seminar. “They’re here already! You’re next!!” Clearly, it was time to get the hell out of there.

So Russel and I beat a hasty retreat and took off on a long, rambling, rainy day adventure through the city, ostensibly to locate a new charger for my cell phone. Which never happened, but I couldn't have cared less. Good food, better conversation and no fucking schedule. Perfect ending to a fantastic weekend.

After I dropped the Scotsman off at his dodgy airport motel, I headed out to the Motel Muller, where I’d be spending the night. Since I didn’t have Donna and Ewan to share the drive back to L.A, my chewtoy made arrangements to fly up and chauffer me home. Because he’s good like that. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to get away until the next day and so the Czar of Noir and his lovely Czarina kindly offered to put me up at their place. That’s how I found myself reading pulp in bed with a strange pussy under my covers. Eddie’s cat Tizzy had officially claimed me as her own, burrowing under the blankets with me and making biscuits on my belly. Sadly, this was the most action I got all weekend.

All and all Bouchercon By the Bay was a blast. But, hey, if that wasn’t enough Faust for you, I’ll also be attending NoirCon and Murder and Mayhem in Muskego. Hope to see you there.

Those zillion things I neglected to mention in the first post seem to be breeding. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I can’t possibly remember everything, but there are one or two leftover memories from Friday night that deserve a quick mention before we move on to Saturday. Like my spectacular wardrobe malfunction and the subsequent emergency ladies room sewing circle. Lauren Henderson saw my distress and kindly offered to help with the needle and thread. Control freak that I am, I insisted on shoving a stick between my teeth and stitching up my own décolletage, Rambo-style. It wasn’t pretty, but it kept the big guns securely in place for the rest of the evening. Which was a good thing, considering the fact that this year’s Reacher Party was right there in the hotel bar and open to everybody. I mean every-fucking-body. So if I was gonna flash the whole convention, I’d prefer it to be intentional.

Oh yeah and remember that business about the hotel bar closing at midnight? Well, it soon became clear that this was a 7 day policy, set in fucking stone. Clearly the hotel management was more interested in following ze orders than collecting the thousands of dollars all those thirsty crime writers would have spent if they’d kept the bar open just two extra hours. I don’t drink and even I was intensely annoyed by this. Having a hotel bar where everyone hangs together in the evenings makes it so much easier to find your friends and maximize your socializing. Without that central hub, small groups disappear to alternate locations, making it nearly impossible to find anyone. Guilty as charged, since that’s exactly what I did. I grabbed the four people standing closest to me at the time and dragged them up to Eddie’s suite. So apologies to anyone else who was looking for me Friday night.

In the end, I came away feeling like I’d missed connecting with so many people this year. I think I talked to Megan Abbott for all of ten seconds. I sat on Reed Farrel Coleman’s lap for the amount of time it took to snap a photo but that was the last I saw of him. I’m hoping to make up for that at NoirCon.

But nevermind all of that. On to Saturday.

A little backstory. When Claire Lamb first asked me to participate in the reading of Declan Hughes’ play “I Can’t Get Started,” I said no. After all, I’m a writer, not an actor. Claire assured me that it wasn’t really acting at all, that it would be easy and that we’d just be standing at podiums reading from scripts. Plus, all the cool kids were doing it. What could I say? I reluctantly agreed. Little did I know I’d wind up with one of the toughest parts, half of a husband and wife screenwriting team. The dialog was all rapid-fire snappy patter and precise comic timing. And, to add insult to injury, I’d be paired up with Mark Billingham, an actual actor whose ease with all his roles and obvious natural talent made me feel kinda like the awkward, ugly friend standing next to the supermodel. Oh, and did I mention that our first (and only) rehearsal would be at 8:30 AM on Saturday morning?

After a late night and very little sleep, I staggered down to the green room at the appointed hour, hanging onto my script like a life preserver. The cast was all friends, Allison Gaylin, Martyn Waites, Megan Abbott, Brett Battles, Declan himself and, of course, my stunt husband Mark. I figured if I was gonna humiliate myself, at least I’d be in good company. But horror of horrors, when I arrived for the rehearsal I quickly discovered that there was no coffee and no breakfast of any kind. Unless you counted the huge jar of Red Vines. Saint Claire saved my life with a large cup of Java and after securing a full pot to keep us all going, we were as ready for it as we’d ever be. Some of us more ready than others.

Mark was really fantastic and leaning on him was probably the only thing that got me through it. He even agreed to meet with me again, just before the reading, to help me go over the toughest section one more time. Thanks a million, Mark. I take back that crack about your nipples.

After all my angst, in the end it was a blast, and I’m really glad I agreed to be part of it. Declan stole the show with his cameo as the creepy brother, but I think I did okay too, all things considered. Hey, don’t take my word for it, see for yourself.

The funniest thing about my performance was the number of compliments I got on my crying. I thought I was playing it broad and camp, but all the guys in the audience thought my crocodile tears were amazingly realistic. Too bad I’m not the kind of dame who uses crying to get what I want out of men. I could probably take over the world like that.

In addition to the play, I also had my panel on Saturday. The title was “I AIN'T MARCHIN' ANYMORE-Genre Wars” and my fellow panelists were Chris Mooney, Dreda Say Mitchell, Christopher Rice, and Simon Tolkien. (Yes, Dreda was still alive at this panel, so I didn’t actually kill her on Thursday night.) A great discussion with a smart, diverse group. Also thanks to Libby Hellmann for stepping in at the last minute to act as moderator.

Once those two commitments were in the rearview mirror, I was footloose and fancy free. Done with everything official for the weekend. Unfortunately, I had to kiss the Harrogate girls goodbye earlier that afternoon, but I finally caught up with Maria again later that evening and the two of us dragged Russel off for celebratory sushi. (Dinner, you perverts! Get your mind out of the gutter.) And speaking of perversion and the Scotsman, I’m still kicking myself for somehow losing/deleting the best photo of the weekend. Even better than Erica’s blackmail photo. All I’ll say about it is that it involved Russel, a fist full of twenties and a can of whipped cream. Later that night, Russel was so drunk that he poked himself in the eye. Enough said.

So that was Saturday. Tune in tomorrow for the last exciting episode of B-Con Follies: The Big Adios, and the Aftermath.

Reading over yesterday’s post, I realize I’ve missed a zillion little things. Like finally meeting Val McDermid (was that Wednesday night?) and getting a peek under supervillain Ali Karim’s sinister white glove at his irradiated Godzilla hand (Thursday?) But if I let myself do the full on Romper Room magic mirror list of every single person I saw, we’ll be here all day. So, onward into Friday.

Friday lunch had been set aside for catching up with Vince and Rosemarie Keenan. I’m still cursing myself for not snapping a photo with them, but I want to go on public record saying I knew them when. That way, I can collect major coolness points for being ahead of the curve after their mega-bestselling mystery series takes off like a rocket. Which it will. Because it’s fucking brilliant. You’ll see.

After lunch was my turn to sign at the B-Con 2011 table. And while nobody actually asked me to sign anything, I still made good use of my time by introducing children of deprived nations to the venerable American pastime known as Mad Libs.

It was Jon Jordan’s idea to have each writer at the table fill out a Mad Lib for Jen, who was not able to attend this year. But everybody (well, everybody who isn’t some kind of foreign commie) knows that Mad Libs are no fun if you read them before filling them out. So when Russel McLean and Martyn Waites made the mistake of wandering by, the unsuspecting authors found themselves Shanghaied into Mistress Christa’s Mad Lib Grammar 101.

Martyn went first and proved to be surprisingly rusty on the difference between verbs (or “doey words”) and adjectives (or “describy words.”) I’m starting to suspect he may have made up that business about being a professor at Cambridge just to get me to marry him. On the other hand, sharing a poetic, deeply moving phrase like “Invasion of the Cucumber Snatchers” is better than crotchless panties for keeping the romance alive in a long term relationship.

Then it was the young Scotsman’s turn, and Russel managed to make Professor Waites look like Grammar Goddess June Casagrande. But I have to give him extra credit for his creative use of the word “cuntybaws.” Possibly a Mad Lib first.

Once the Mad Libs were done, I finally hooked up with buxom B-Con newbie Maria Alexander. Needless to say, she’d been fighting off amorous authors left and right from the moment she arrived, but those dorks had absolutely no idea who they were dealing with. Just because she’s new to B-Con doesn’t mean she was born yesterday, boys, and anyone dumb enough to ignore the rattle is gonna get bit.

I really wanted to make it over to the Mullholland Books party but Friday was also Toastmaster Eddie Muller’s birthday, so I wound up at his birthday dinner instead. Me and the Czar of Noir go way back. So far back that I agreed to do a write up about him for the program book. And remember, kids, I’m the gal who hates blurbing so much that I agonize for weeks over one lousy line.

Which brings me to the thing that I really hated about this year’s B-Con. No Donna Moore. Donna’s input really made that write up for Eddie. She should have been next to me at that birthday dinner.

I had such big plans for that broad. We were gonna drive back to LA together. I had Hollywood historian Kari Bible booked to give us a private tour of Hollywood Forever. Pleasant Gehman helped me plan a punk rock walking tour of legendary dives and squats. Joan Renner gave me locations and addresses for a mini Bukowski tour and was gonna meet us for drinks at Musso and Frank. I even have a pair of size 8 Iron Fist shoes sitting in my closet, waiting for Donna. Bottom line, B-Con’s just not the same without her. So get well soon, dollface. We all missed you like crazy.

But, Donna-shaped hole notwithstanding, we still kicked out all the stops for Eddie’s birthday. After we returned from the dinner, Judy, Martyn, Erica, Lauren Henderson and I headed up to Eddie’s suite to continue the merrymaking. I believe that was the infamous “elevator incident” in which Martyn and I decided to marry everyone in the elevator, including (if I remember correctly) a couple of nice older ladies who just happened to be staying in the hotel and had nothing to do with B-Con.

In Eddie’s suite, I took my second favorite photo of my wife Judy. (This is my favorite) Martyn and I also tried and utterly failed to impress Erica with our plan for a hit TV series. However, I have a most excellent blackmail photo that may convince her to change her mind. Or if not, maybe I can use it to leverage my way into Harrogate.

Tune in tomorrow for the next exciting episode of B-Con Follies: In Which Your Not-So-Humble Narrator REALLY Can't Get Started.

On Wednesday Russel and I roadtripped up to San Francisco. We had a few dicey moments with a tailgating drunk in a Jag-You-Are, but thanks to the offensive driving skills of Leadfoot Faust, we escaped unscathed. Well, mostly unscathed. I may or may not be responsible for a grey hair or two on the young head of the Terribly Alert Scotsman. I live in LA, but I drive like a New Yorker.

When we hit the city, I ditched the Scotsman and the luggage at the con hotel and met up with Darren McKeeman. I didn’t want to pay the outrageous parking fees at the hotel, so I’d made arrangements to park outside the city and take public transit back in. Darren kept me company along the way, since I knew there was pretty much no other chance of escaping Planet B-Con and seeing any of my local friends.

Once I got back to the hotel, I did manage to sneak away for a quick dozen at the Hog Island Oyster Bar. But then it was back to the hotel bar, where the crime writers were already stacking up and causing trouble. They stopped serving at midnight, but I didn’t complain, since I was pretty worn out from the 5 hour drive up. Little did we know, this closed-at-midnight thing wasn’t just a weekday policy. But more on that later…

Thursday started off like it always does; lunch date with my B-Con husband Martyn Waites. (Though it must be noted that our natural inclination towards polygamy reached new and absurd heights this year. By the end of the weekend, we wound up married to nearly a dozen different people. But don’t worry, English. You’ll always be my primary. Well, you and Judy Bobalik.) Anyway, Martyn had already been in SF for nearly a week with my sisterwife Linda and their kids, but somehow he’d managed to restrain himself from visiting Kayo Books. Needless to say, that was our first stop.

Here’s what I picked up:

The Computer Kill, by Raymond Banks (!) – “Private eye Sam King tangles with a brain – electronic variety – and a flock of bodies – some blonde, some brunette, some dead.”

Run, Killer, Run, by Lionel White – “A hunted hood, a wily wanton and a frenzied flight into hell!”

Strip Alley and Sin Doll, by Orrie Hitt “A novel which focuses on the hot picture racket, boldly revealing how girls are recruited – and why!”

The Woman He Wanted, by Daoma Winston “She begged for his brutal caresses.”

New York Confidential, by Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer “The big city after dark.” (Map back!)

Rump-Mania (!!!) by Cliff Barrett “A documentary (HA!) of anal sodomy perversions as experienced by women to attain incredible forms of sexual pleasure.”

And, yes, I really did buy that novelization of Zardoz.

Pulpdrunk and semi-delirious from pawing through stacks of sleaze and huffing the sweet smell of foxed paper, we staggered down the hill for lunch at the awesomely old-school Tadich Grill, the city’s oldest restaurant.

The rest of Thursday was mercifully free of serious commitment. I wore my tightly tailored hound’s-tooth dress from Pin Up Girl Clothing and hung around the hotel bar, stirring up more trouble and catching up with everyone I hadn’t seen since last year.

Later that evening, Martyn introduced me to Sharon Canavar and Erica Morris, organizers of the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival. I in turn introduced them to the tikilicious Tonga Room. I think I almost killed poor jetlagged Dreda Say Mitchell by dragging her up Nob Hill, but she graciously forgave me, even though she ended up tapping out early on the evening. In the end, after several indoor thunderstorms, Polynesian Marvin Gay covers and deceptively strong fruity umbrella drinks, a good time was had by all. We even managed to catch a streetcar back down to the hotel, although we did have a slasher movie moment when Erica, who had been behind me just minutes earlier, suddenly disappeared. Fortunately we didn’t split up to look for her, and no one went into the basement or took their top off. Well Mark Billingham took his top off, but clearly the homicidal maniac who’d nabbed Erica wasn’t interested in man-nipples. I think Mark was more than a little disappointed.

We made it back alive, but the con hotel insisted on closing the bar at midnight again. (Are you starting to see a pattern?) A bunch of angry authors took off in search of a more accommodating bar, but that juicy stack of pulp was calling me, so I decided to make it an early night.

Tune in tomorrow for the next exciting episode of B-Con Follies – Doey Words and Describy Words: In Which Professor Faust Teaches Mad Lib Grammar to Foreign Exchange Students.

The traditional panel schedule for Bouchercon 2010 is finally posted. Here are the ones I'll be doing:

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 16
11:30 a.m. - 12:30 a.m.

I AIN’T MARCHIN’ ANYMORE
Writing for the market place, or not
Genre Wars and Why They Matter. Or Not.
Chris Mooney(M), Dreda Say Mitchell, Simon Tolkien, Christa Faust,
Christopher Rice

4:30 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.

I CAN’T GET STARTED
Reading of a play by Declan Hughes
Clair Lamb, Megan Abbott, Brett Battles, Mark Billingham, Christa Faust,
Alison Gaylin, Martyn Waites, Declan Hughes


Hope to see you there!

By Sunday at b-con, I’m usually pretty punchy. This year was no exception. Another well-documented phenomenon in b-con physics is the “black hole bar effect.” This is why it’s so hard to achieve escape velocity no matter how late it is or how tired and burnt out you feel. You fight your way to the perimeter, determined to call it a night, but the next thing you know the gravitational sling-shot effect has funneled you back into the center of the bar. This mysterious force is particularly powerful on Saturday nights.

Despite the late night in the black hole, I still managed to get myself up Sunday morning for the free book feeding frenzy. I didn’t sign up as an author and didn’t want to brave the crowds to try and score five free books that I’d need to squeeze into my already overstuffed suitcase, but I was curious to see how it would work out.

It was nuts!

Best moment of the morning was Anthony Neil Smith tossing his free book tickets off the second story walkway into the rock-concert crowd.

Afterwards, Jon Jordan was talking about taking a field trip to a local comic shop and invited me along. I had to get packed up and check out, since I needed to be at the airport by 3pm, so I bowed out. Unsurprisingly, I found they were still there in the lobby bar when I returned. I guess the black hole bar effect is still hard to break, even during the day.

I was still waffling about going along with the large group by the time they broke free from the bar. I did have a little time to kill, but not all that much and didn’t want to get stuck out in the wilds of Indianapolis and end up late to the airport. In the end, I’m really glad I went because a) I needed to break out of the habitrail and breathe some real non-recycled air and more importantly b) that was really the only time I got to spend with Peter Rozovsky. Last year, it seems like I spent more time hanging with him than almost anyone else, and so this year I felt severely deficient in the Rozovsky department.

The punchline to this little outing was that the comic shop was closed. We wound up wandering like lost souls through the huge Borders down the street, but I did end up buying Volume One of The Walking Dead, which I read on the plane to punish the uptight yuppie broad in the seat next to me. She deserved it. She was reading Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.

All in all it was a great con. Looking forward to San Francisco 2010.

Saturday. Right.

Well of course the big event on Saturday was the Anthony Awards. I managed to lose gracefully to the very sweet and funny Julie Hyzy’s culinary mystery State of the Onion but I’m still bitter over losing Best Cover to Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I mean, really, it’s not a bad cover, but better than Money Shot? I think not.

Later than night, the Reacher party at the amusingly named Slippery Noodle. Very cool place with a live blues band, but way too loud for me, since I was already well on my way to developing the inevitable b-con Wolfman Jack voice. I tapped out after about twenty minutes, but not before having a chance to meet and shout briefly at Jason Pinter.

But the really memorable moment that night was sighting the astounding and now legendary Chicken Limo!

Don’t expect strict continuity here. I’m still way too jetlagged.

Of course, since our zombie walking tour of Indianapolis has overshadowed the rest of Thursday in my jetlagged brain, I neglected to mention that I also accepted the Crimespree Award for Money Shot, didn’t win the Barry, and nearly fell out of my dress.

So, on to Friday. I had a nine am panel, which after our misadventure the night before seemed particularly cruel. “More Noir Than You Are.” I had no idea what I could possibly say about noir that hasn’t been said before and better, but in the end, I think it went extremely well. We had a packed house, and the sharp, funny and always entertaining Victor Gischler kept things lively. Donna did a fantastic write up of our panel (so I don’t have to) and made me sound like I actually knew what I was talking about. (Must have been the foot massage.) It was also a real pleasure to meet my fellow panelist Charlie Newton. He’s a genuinely fascinating character and I can’t wait to read his novel Calumet City (next on the TBR pile.) I wish I’d gotten more of a chance to hang with him.

After that, I was off the leash. No more responsibilities. I celebrated my freedom by indulging in another miraculous one-on-one lunch, this time with Reed Farrel Coleman. It’s such a rare treat to be able to sneak away from the b-con crowds for a meal with less than 47 people and I’d already gotten away with it once. Of course, I’d pay for my presumption later that night…

I managed to hit Megan’s panel “The Dark Side of the Fair Sex” and met some new kids on the block, including Guthrie stablemate John Rector and fellow vintage shoe whore Carolina Bertrand. I hung in the bar and caught up with old friends, avoiding all the publisher parties and being generally lazy and unmotivated until the dreaded dinner hour rolled around.

Why is going out to eat so damn complicated at conventions? It’s like there’s some form of inescapable particle physics that clusters everyone together at the atomic level, making it impossible to get away from the hotel with less than nine other people. At least two people you meant to include end up getting left behind and the one person you actually wanted to have dinner with ends up at the opposite end of six pushed-together tables while you end up sandwiched between someone you were hoping to avoid and a well-meaning but socially challenged fan who’s already had seventeen beers on an empty stomach.

That night I managed to get sucked into TWO consecutive group dinners, both at the same mediocre chain restaurant, like some weird, culinary version of Groundhog Day. I didn’t actually manage to get anything to eat until nearly 10 pm. Fortunately, I wound up with Sean Chercover on my end of the table, who was still relatively sober, hygienically inoffensive and, as always, great company.

After my clean shaven companion and I returned to the con hotel and went our separate ways, I realized that the cool bar recommended by the cute counter girl at the barber shop was the very same bar in which the Black Mask party was set to take place later that evening. I’d already made plans to meet Donna Moore for dinner and for lack of a better idea, we figured we’d give the counter girl’s Tapas place a try and then hit the Black Mask party.

I met Donna and Martyn at the allotted hour and we headed out into the wilds of Indianapolis, armed only with this map:



The black dot on Washington is the barber shop. The unreadable blur near the center is the Tapas restaurant. The X in the upper right is supposedly the Dorman Street Saloon.

I have a very good sense of direction and rarely get lost, even in cities I’ve never visited. We figured we’d head in the general direction of the Tapas place but stay flexible in case we saw something we liked better on the way. We didn’t, and the restaurant turned out to be exactly where the cute counter girl had indicated. We found it without a hitch, which clearly made us cocky. Donna and Martyn got a few pomegranate margaritas into them (I had no such excuse) and we decided we’d hoof it to the Dorman Street Saloon. On the map it looked like we were already half way there.

The map is not to scale.

The first leg of our epic, post apocalyptic pub crawl took us through clusters of empty “Luxury Condominiums” stuffed between raw, industrial buildings and sorry-looking gas stations. It felt like we were on an abandoned movie set. Once we passed under the freeway, we wandered into even grimmer territory. Shabby Victorian houses and more unmarked industrial buildings. I kept expecting to see Mrs. Bates silhouetted in an upper window as we passed. We only encountered a single live human, who immediately ran away from us as we approached. We were convinced that zombies were about to come shambling out of the shadowy alleys and eat our brains. At that point, it didn’t seem like such a bad alternative.

Also, keep in mind, Donna was wearing these shoes.

Although it isn’t obvious in the lousy phone photo, the pattern on her shoes is tiny ice cream cones. Horribly appropriate, since by the time we got to the intersection where the saloon was supposedly located, our feet were nearly frozen solid.

So there we were, standing at Michigan and Dorman street. There was nothing even remotely resembling a bar for as far as we could see in any direction. Still no humans, but we eventually spotted an empty cop car. No idea what had happened to the occupant (zombies?) but by the time we had given up all hope of ever finding this damn bar, the missing cop came out of a nearby house. Checking out a prowler report for a beautiful young housewife who’s husband works nights, maybe? I figured we should send a Brit over to ask for directions, but the cop was not swayed by Martyn’s “posh” accent (note the thick layer of sarcasm between those quotation marks.) He tried to blow us off by claiming he couldn’t help us unless we had an exact address. Lucky for me, I’d put the addy into my phone when I got the Black Mask invite and the uptight bastard was shamed into admitting that the bar was four zig-zagging blocks north.

Possibly the longest four blocks of my life. In fact, the less said about those last four blocks the better.

Amazingly enough, we made it. The Black Mask party was already in full swing when we arrived, full of happy, tipsy writers who had been ferried to the bar in a warm, cherry ‘38 Cadillac. I wanted to kick every one of them in the shins, but my frozen foot might have shattered on contact.

Since I felt responsible for leading my foreign friends astray, I bought them a round and gave poor Donna a desperately needed foot massage. Normally you’d have to pay $4.99 a minute to listen to the kinds of sounds that were coming out of her over the course of that massage. That and the ride back to the hotel in the ‘38 Caddy made the whole crazy misadventure worthwhile. Plus, it does make for a pretty entertaining story.