6/3/09

p 17-27

Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment [2009]-- month?
place near Boston
narrated in third person

synopsis:

The episode is told in third person, but the narrator is clearly inside the head of Erdedy who is waiting for an unnamed woman to bring him $1250 worth of marijuana. She is supposed to get the pot from an unpleasant guy with a harelip in Allston. Erdedy has tried many times to quit smoking pot, and each time he starts again he has to locate a new source, because he has asked all of his prior sources to cut him off. The scene is frequently interrupted by descriptions of an insect that goes in and out the holes on the girder holding up the shelf on which his stereo sits. Erdedy is nervously fretting as he awaits his dealer, because he's not entirely sure that she will show. As he does each time he goes on a bender, he has assembled everything he needs to hole up and do nothing but smoke pot for days on end-- a new bong, snack foods, vaseline for masturbation, etc. He remembers the last woman whom he had engaged as his source, an unnamed 'appropriation artist' whom he had tricked into scoring pot for him, by telling her it was to keep from indulging his methamphetamine addiction. After she scored the pot for him, he quickly disposed of her, ending their sexual liaison. He has also had sex with the current supplier, even though she lives with her partner. As he waits he prepares his supply of 'entertainment cartridges' for his bender. The scene ends when the phone and doorbell ring at the same time.

notes:
introduces the paranoid addiction theme and also the idea of the entertainment cartridge. interesting technique of zooming in/out by way of shifting to/from the insect. it's not clear who this character is or how he might relate to characters from the previous scene, other than by proximity to Boston, where Hal was a student at the time.

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