(See how the alphabet came in handy?) The refugee, Joe, "a girl would giggle and I'd turn red, a boy would laugh and I'd bust his head; the worst-thing-my-daddy-ever-did-was-name-me-Joe" Dalton piped up:

Her name was Retina, and I knew when I seen her

I wouldn't need much of a shove.

I knew I was mad to, but my heart said I had to Become her pupil in love.

Now that's country.

We were stuck. There was lots of Coke-buying, cigarett-bumming and flooding the bathroom in this interlude. We weren't even drunk, and we had to explain howthehell Retina the Arab ever acquired her blind-faith blind-drunk opthomalogic condition anyway. Tim came up with a suicide pact right out of the grand old Haemon/Electra Hamlet/Ophelia blues tradition and all we needed was an introduction.

The dawg dragged us home, and she told me her story.

I listened real eager, but it was too gory.

A suicide pact with her loved she signed:

She hit and he missed and she cried herself blind.

It was 10:30 already and the parties were in second gear going into the first hairpin turn, yelping at the little mechanical rabbit and jostling for position. It was time to move to a new location, close the shop out, hold a 50 per cent sale. The only pun we could dredge up concerned the cataracts of the Nile, but all the Egyptian suntanned silt fucked up our upstairs wiring...rinse it out, waterfalls, going over the edge of the abyss...

Last time I heard ol' Retina's call

My love rushed out like a waterfall.

She left a shroud on my soul, like a dirty cataract.

Cause she walked out and she never looked back.

It was time for the Jim McKay 11 o'clock roundup--corral the heifers, clam, the dogies, make one last summary plea'to the jury, drive our moral home so the Baptist preachers down in Dry Prong. Louisiana don't immolate the album when we get it released.

Beware of blind love--it's the very worst kind--It starts with a chomp on the ol' behind From the droolin and snarlin and nasty pink jaws Of an Arabian refugee's seeing-eye dawg.

Aaah. Finis. Apres moi le deluge. It was off to the Hong Kong. "Bourbon, please. No water--never drink water, fish fuck in it." Cozied up to the bar we started our recitation. The guys with the mai tais over in the corner started throwing ice. So it was out on the street again, and off to the parties, on our way to Nashville. See you at the Coop, when we get to sign the album covers.