Let me tell you something. When you are old enough that any overly ambitious dreams you had aren't a possibility anymore, when you know that you just hadn't tried hard enough, or were simply unaware of your own lazy gluttonous nature; constantly trying to convince yourself and everyone around you that you were working harder than you were, when in fact you spent most of your time dreaming, is when things get better.

There are all of these old schmucks at Winston's, a bar on O'Connor st. that the fragile, sad, old drunks I visit hang out. I mean really, I wouldn't sit in the same room with them if I could help it, but I can't. The one thing that is a fucker about being old is the loneliness, making you settle for some substandard bar that smells like bleach and piss, and people that do too. Although come to think of it, loneliness is what motivated many of my half-assed friendships throughout my life. The only difference I suppose, is that when you are younger you have other things to occupy your time, so the moments of loneliness are less numerous. You are too busy fucking, working, drinking, writing, and thinking about love to want to sit in the same bar for six hours a day, everyday, with a bunch of flaky flaccid old men. But like I said, when you are 84 you're okay with it, have come to terms with yourself. Things finally begin to look up when you're looking the end straight on, staring at it and laughing at its snarly grin.

Damn, fucking Ray's here already. I can't seem to recall when our drinking started at 10:30 am. Probably when Angel, Ray's wife, died a couple of months ago. To think they still fought about his habit after all of these years. I mean, sometimes she'd even phone me when Ray left his house, a few blocks down, to come pick me up on his way to Winston's. Pick me up, yeah right, I mostly kept an eye out for his busted leg on our way back from the bar. Angel probably had such a problem because Ray still drank like a twenty year-old, getting all swaying and shit. She'd phone and start screaming some nonsense at me about being a bad influence, the same thing she used to do thirty years ago. I'm sure a part of it was some game they were playing. She'd get all flustered and lonely at home, wondering what and who we were doing until 2 a.m. and then he'd get home and she'd open the door before he could knock, having been watching him from the behind the curtain. She'd scream and tell him to pack his things, every time, and he'd restrain her flailing arms, heavy breathing the scotch onto her face. They'd both be trying to catch their breath, her huge tits pushing up against his chest as he held her against the wall. Come to think of it, his drinking is probably what kept their sex interesting enough to want to fuck after all of these years. Want to fuck, they didn't actually, another impossibility now, but to imagine fucking is enough when you're this old. The moments you feel like you'd pound her if you could, are like the hours you spent kissing her body until she couldn't stand not having you any longer.

'Ray, come in. I haven't even finished eating my fucking breakfast yet.'

Ray just stared at me without saying a word, standing at the door like some dumb-ass who had to think long and hard before stringing a few words together, to communicate his rudimentary thoughts.

I just let the door close on him. Don't want my eggs to become tasteless, rank smelling, wobbly matter.