strange days not only find me they hunt me down and pin me to the wall like a specimen in some cosmic joke. i have given speeches before, managed teams of people and comfortable in most situations but there are two times in my life when i have had to give a talk to a bunch of older ladies, alone, in a room with about 8-10 of them. the first time ended badly, i was running a book / writers club in palm beach hoping to meet cool sylvia plath like girls, i'd advertised in the local paper and told all the guys the group was full. the females turn up and they are all old ladies. 
anyway we talk books for a while and talk about our own endeavours as aspiring poets and writers but for some strange feeling they all focus on me, and ask me to read my story. 
(as part of the group we would all bring a piece of our work and read it to the rest of the group) 
i was literally bullied into reading my piece first and it dawned on me that the short story i had printed out was highly inappropriate, it was entitled, 'the definitive head job' and as i started reading, one by one they began to walk out, leaving their digestives and ginger nuts, a slice of tea cake and half emptied tea cups.
this morning i was at the gnostic universe and found myself in a group of older women all expecting me to give a talk. i had nothing planned but the idea of ayahuscia sprung up to mind, yeah psychedelics and santana with a group of women to whom a ipod was an exotic and esoteric icon. i guess they were familiar with yoga, chanting and meditation but once again i found myself going into auto pilot and delivering a semi coherent transgressive narrative about my strange relationship with machine elves and south american goddesses. 
well knock me down with a feather, these women were really interested and asked some great questions, and i did hear someone walk out at the end saying that was the best talk they have ever been to. as i left i was given a lovely bouquet of flowers from the gnostic people. 
i like that place, great energy, great staff and quite lovely people. 
on the way home i picked up two plants and dug a big whole and planted them, then watered the garden, played frisbee with pan and smoked a spliff and listened to 'the escapist' then i had a nap, the wonder of it all baby.