how malu-ating! to have to depend on darryl to tell me that von is arriving tomorrow! when accused, von said, nonsense i told you a long time ago! this made me wonder if i was going mad, because of the roommate incident, when on her return she insisted she had told me she was going away and i in turn was adamant she never said a word about it. perhaps my brain has stopped registering the comings and goings of people. (then later he said, oh, i was about to tell you when i got distracted. oh? i said meaningfully, but you remembered to tell darryl. von: i don't even remember telling darryl.)

but he is here tomorrow, and we are not giving him a dinner party because we have no time or money, and he won't take us out to dinner (me: ah! you're staying on charles street? let's go to dinner at lala rokh! von: hah. i am not going to buy you dinner.) so we're at an impasse, and will have to go sit out in the yard and eat bread and butter and toscanini's ice-cream.