“4 Mississippi,5 Mississippi,6…,10…,

“4 Mississippi,5 Mississippi,6…,10…, ready or not, here I come” into a magic world where the sewing machines count the milliseconds and the clock over the arcade reads 11:07; the

next minute the ground shakes beneath my feet and loud crashes and car noises, along with the stench of garbage, bring me back to a grey reality

: it was true. The Pope said "F*ck". It was in Italian, but still. The locusts were thick now, nearly blotting out the sun. I felt another tremor and ducked under a park bench just

when the dreadful sound of earthquake makes me shiver, the ground is cracking in the shape of an asphalt river 3 or 4 meters deep, which runs the perimeter of villa Alatini reveal

ing its foundation. I am standing petrified among yelling people, while i trace, in the depth of the crack, a strange figure in a half-ripped tailcoated costume, muttering about a

plan and a half city...altered by a big fire, and about a lost chance to have a city standing durable to the requirements of modern times. I took a better look and saw something

like a roll of old paper hanging from the left pocket of his coat...Curiosity started to overwhelm me, but my politeness stopped me from the urge to grap it from his pocket.

So I just sidled up real close to him, cocking my head so that I could read that which was hanging out of his pocket, but not touching him. But he thought something else entirely.

"Good grief!" I thought to myself as soon as I realized he thought I was hitting on him. Still, I really wanted to read it, so I played along & pasted a lascivious grin on my face.

Little did I intend for this ad-hoc romantic interlude to introduce me to the world's largest underground collection of surviving Tijuana bibles.