We are  kicking (drinking) off a new aspect of our BDBP world; 1st, I have updated things for the first time in about 900 years; more importantly, I have added a new section! New section = "poet of the year!."  We have now poets of the year because I'm too busy to inaugurate a poet per month!

Another exhalation into the humming out of balance ceiling fan and turn to the juke box playing that Kristofferson tune that goes "the going up ain't worth the coming down" and the butt bends but won't extinguish and your hand stinks like nicotine as the sky swirls outside and you wonder out loud whether you are going to do this for the rest of your life.

Standing now leaning on the oak bar with the brass plaques bearing the names of patrons just like me who are now dead quaffing another stoli and tonic and looking at the bartenders in their identical tan jackets who move between the racks of booze in a choreography of reluctant service and there is a sculpture by rodin at the end of the bar depicting two boxers frm the 1890s with bare knuckles in a fighting pose that isn't designed so much to hurt but to show honor and I flip the plastic swizzle stick expertly launching the wrinkled lime out of my glass and onto the monogrammed napkin and michael the bartender looks over at me and nods his approval as the cigar smoke curls lazily upward and then disappears into the draft from the door that opens onto the frigid street in midtown with its bright lights and I look outside for a moment and remember the cactus and the granite and wonder how the hell did I get from westwood to here.