The weekend rites of indulgence began with the purchase of a new camera, the most expensive I've ever owned, yet in my hand it feels more like the plastic Fisher-Price model with the revolving flash cube that I had when I was 4. At noon, T swings by with a full tank of gas and a plan to visit Boston. Despite having many ditches to dig & fill today, I agree to join him on his secular pilgrimage to the east, and with gigantic cupocafes in hand, we roll & bounce down Route 2 in T's red lawnmower-like Festiva - East German style. A jarring bump and spilled coffee strafes the dash & drips onto an old grimy Radio Shack cassette tape labeled Stereopatheticsoulmanure.

We meet J&J in Davis Square, a place I've visited often since the merely astounding ARU show at the Somerville Theater in '91. Lunch at the Burren marks the first time I've been inside that Irish cave during daylight - I can actually see the pine floor - yellow wood dulled & darkend by one million coats of Guinness varnish. There is literature scrawled on the grout in the green-tiled men's room - a limerick about the Prince from Peru.

We meet M, the guitar player from T's old band, in Cambridge at the shabby studio where Weezer recorded Pinkerton. M telephones R, and we all converge at J's Somerville apartment in the city-soiled twilight. J's apartment is densely populated with good books & CDs & Tetrahydrocannabinol, and with the Soft Boys' re-creation of Vegetable Man thumping in the backround, I am told of the sad demise of Ben, the calm & smiley boy who was once a friend - who was always generous and engaging - who was a hopeless & well hidden junkie - who had kicked in Martha's Vinyard while building houses for the wealthy - who silently & unexpectedly relapsed amid family holiday merriment - who died alone in his room the day after Christmas - whose empty body was discovered by his poor mother.

At 9 o'clock, the company of J & J & T & M & R, the shade of Ben & myself, deftly negotiate the shadowy & miniature streets of greater Boston. One drink here, two there; we zigzag to & fro, visiting various bars - in old buildings crowds of bodies stand amid billowing smoke - hazy & obscured boundries are demarcated by eyes, smiles & gin-scented breath.

Late night - T is very drunk - I'm at the wheel of the peppy red Festiva searching for recognizable landmarks among the complex network of tiny streets and alleyways. The driving is comic and now feels much more Italian than East German as I dart up & down the narrow streets. The air is moist & thick & heavy and the sky luminesces - all the colors of Boston bleed brightly into the Charles. On Memorial Drive, while T snoozes, I pull the little Festiva off the road and snap a picture with the camera I had bought in the morning.