5:15PM: got off the phone with mom. when i asked how she was she said ‘your mother is currently dealing with a fly, that is the one thing going on with me!’ i said ‘like a fly fly, a bug fly?’ she said ‘yes! it’s been in my apartment for two days now, two days. and yesterday i said to it, i gave it the option—i went to the balcony and opened the door and i gave it the option: you can either fly out now, or i’ll kill you. and it didn’t fly out! so i’ve been after this…thing! it’s just insane, it’s flying into mirrors and pictures and just…bumping into everything. it woke me up this morning on my face, i must’ve had some really bad breath.’ i said ‘it woke you up, oh no.’ she said ‘i know! so i’ve been getting rid of just everything i think it could be eating, i found an opened sesame oil container—from the sauce i make for the dumplings, you know—and i threw away my toothbrush. i’m thinking it could be living off the things in my toothbrush or, oh it’s so bad. i’m thinking it’s thinking my apartment is an ikea eatery, everything in my apartment! your mother and the fly, it’s the only thing i’ve got going [laughlaugh]!’ she said something about finding crumbs behind the toaster. we talked more about other things and i emptied all the old cat litter into a bag and started washing it in the shower. mom said ‘hold on a minute, i’m at the bank’ and i heard an automated voice. mom said something about burger king. i took the empty cat box to the shower to wash it and said ‘remember when we found the maggots? in the jeep?’ she said ‘oh no. oh no, what was that?’ i said ‘at…i think it was at brentwood drive, in the garage. the car smelled funny and we opened up the backseat and there were all the maggots and the mcdonald’s fries, oh no.’ the water from the faucet was kind of loud. i forget how we started talking about the next thing. mom said ‘what is that thing, miss canada? it’s not miss america, it’s…’ i said ‘miss universe?’ she said ‘yeah, miss universe canada? well, i don’t know, it was the new miss universe canada last night, and she won. but they found out today this other girl was actually the winner, and she was handling it very well, you know, philosophically, she was saying ‘at least i got to know what it felt like for a day.” i said ‘well. at least she got to know what it felt like for a day, though.’ mom said ‘yeah, i guess so.’