My plan for Friday night is simple enough: steak and martinis. Buy a good steak, grill it with just a dash of kosher salt and some black pepper, do up a couple of good martinis afterward. I could go off to the Zeppelin Pilots' Club, but while their martinis are well-done, their steaks are...variable. I'll do a good porterhouse all on my own. And I don't make a bad martini.

The lovely Caitlin at kissmecaitlin has a steak-and-martini dinner available for her any time she and I are in the same city. There's a Smith & Wollensky in Miami Beach; I suppose we could rendezvous there. And there's a Ruth's Chris in Denver--- I've always liked their lamb chops and their porterhouse. Though I'd trust Caitlin's recommendations on any steakhouse in Denver--- and especially her recommendations for an old-guard chophouse. Caitlin has dinner on me--- for a couple of years of friendship and support, but also for any advice she might care (ahem!) to impart to me about discovering and neutralising security cameras.

I watched a little documentary about Paul Bowles tonight. Seventy-three minutes--- reticent about some things (Bowles was always a private man), excellent interviews. I always liked that about Bowles--- the distance in his writing. I'll be reading "The Delicate Prey" again--- one of the most disturbing stories I've ever read.

Denver Chop House & Brewery--- 16-oz. NY strip, crusted in smoked peppercorns, sauteed and dressed in cognac cream sauce...or the aged porterhouse with bourbon butter. Any comments from Caitlin at kissmecaitlin?

I have Estonian vodka tonight. Somehow it's ended up being mixed with...Sprite Zero. I have no idea how that happened. I had a carton of takee-outee noodles with black bean sauce earlier. Pork and black bean curd--- I miss that at the old Hunan's.

The vur' clever Lena Chen at Chicktionary and Sex and the Ivy gets points from me tonight. Lena posted a camera-phone photo of herself just after oral sex--- just after a facial ("pop shot"--- I'd never heard "pop shot" before). I don't know if that actually was semen on her face--- though my own thought was that she should've used some bright-green goo and captioned the photo "I'm Dating A Martian". Anyway... Lena writes vur' well about sex and romance and her own Adventures. But of course Gawker.com instantly attacked her over the photo, both for sluttiness and for "terminal oversharing". Though of course they did use the photo to draw hits. Lena commented at Chicktionary that "I mean, I’m not marketable in love and not marketable in the labor force and not marketable in civilized society, really. And when you begin to realize that you are the antithesis of everything acceptable or American, that your Ivy League resume is chock full of life experience but nothing more, that the only people who will love you are the rare ones who forgive first impressions, it’s then that you stop giving a shit and start living the way you want to live." Good for Lena--- and for Suzanne Breslin for supporting her.

Debauchette's Tumblr has posted some excellent shots by Autumn Sonnichsen--- I think I recognise Sasha Gray as the model. I do keep thinking of Debauchette in London hotel bars or cafes in Aix-en-Provence, writing in her Moleskine with her trademark Lamy fountain pen. I do wonder what she writes in her notebooks--- and I hope that one day she will publish her diaries--- or at least work them into short stories and essays.

Debauchette packs Ester-C when she travels. Is that for...skin care? I do remember packing lists from Alessandra at bel_ebat and Liz V. at nightmareteeth and Lexie at and of course Ms. Flox at besideserato. I did make notes. But I do wonder--- soft_melodies, or even Siobhan in Adelaide, or windupsushi... What do they pack for intercontinental (or even transcontinental) travel...? Lists are key. Just like Details.

Lissy at emigree writes that she's being unwillingly dragged back into quotidian life. I'll take that to mean that she's sleeping alone again...or at least no longer kneeling in pre-dawn doorways to demonstrate her command of the oral arts. (Alessandra at bel_ebat and Alice at a1icey used to boast of being Head Girls at the Academy of Oral Arts--- a much more selective school than Hogwarts) I hope she'll find time to write about her Stories and Adventures... Lissy takes a raw delight in passion that's brilliant...and of course she's a fine writer.

I will have to master making pink gins this summer.

I still wonder if Ms. Flox at besideserato and warmscars are the same person... That's vur' much something I want to ask Ms. Flox. After all...she did do the lost Free-Leis D-Land diary...

Rachel Ray is apparently in trouble for wearing a keffiyeh in an ad for some donut chain. The loathsome Michelle Malkin apparently had a seizure about it on Fox News. Malkin came vur' near to accusing Rachel Ray of being an Al Qaeda shill. Why did no Designated Serious Person just walk onto the set and smash Malkin out of her chair with a rolled-up copy of the Asahi Shimbun? I'm no fan of Rachel Ray--- one of the weaker points of Food Network ---and it's well known that I despise jihadis and Paynimerie in general. I'm on record about being a serious believer in a Shari'a v. Civilisation worldview. But I've owned keffiyehs since the early 1980s. I've never seen a problem with despising Hamas and Hezbollah and all their ilk on the one hand and wearing a keffiyeh on the other. It's a fashion accessory--- nothing more. They're also vur' useful in the desert--- or for those of us whose dreams run to being American political advisor to a warlord in the hills near Balkh'. They're dashing on males, sexy on lithe and elegant girls. I've always had contempt for Michelle Malkin, who's an odious little moralising prig--- the little Foreignette Who Hates Foreigners, I always call her. Malkin reminds us all of the true etymology of "hysteria". In any case--- I'll still wear a keffiyeh both in the high desert and in winters here...and I'll still carry copies of Bernard Lewis with me and support war against the jihadis.

I do hope that Caitlin at kissmecaitlin will tell me all about disabling security cameras and searching out where the watchers place their gear. And I will keep her down for dinner at an old-guard chophouse somewhere. And I do promise her that I'll make sure to have my martini skills honed should we ever meet.

Steak Friday night, then--- and Paul Bowles.