I lost perspective tonight. I was driving and I started to notice it like the first twinges of psychedelia: blurriness and shaky edges, things that looked more realistic than usual... and then turning my head I found a green motel sign floating among green branches, and then all third-dimension spatial relativity was gone. I started up a long hill and you know there was no hill at all. The streetlights were not far away, just very small, and one perched above the other.

So I closed one eye and enjoyed it. A spray of rocks, littered clumsily across the road this afternoon, now jumped out beside me and grew heavy with sodium light. The manhole cover sped toward me at knee level, and the yellow moon swooped down talonlike and barely missed me as I turned left.

I let myself surreptitiously into the building, dressed in green sweatpants, an oversized white sweater, argyle socks and cheap sandals. I wandered and snook a little, committed a minor act of illicit thievery (which, sorry to say, may benefit me greatly in the long run while causing no inconvenience to anyone else) - and then I returned an item which had previously been mishandled. Not on purpose, that one.

Driving home, I made a mental list of admirable and non-admirable qualities, just in case a certain person needs any compliments this weekend.