Returning to the Valley after a visit to Mom I visited my favorite news stand, located in the mighty zip code of Sherman Oaks, to buy one of my British music magazines. Maybe not "mine" but a copy now is. Just before crossing the major intersection which marks the stand I spotted, on a bus bench and lined up from front to back, a half-eaten poppy seed roll, a pro forma state license plate---the lead number was "5" or "6", indicating painfully recent vintage---and a Toyota hub cap.

It was all there when I returned, the lady waiting next to it apparently not involved. I'm thinking of a snipe hunt on which someone gave up, quite characteristic of the roiling meeting of shops and somewhat upper suburbia that characterizes this neighborhood. What was the snipe hunt? On the cover of the magazine is Bob Dylan. It could all be a chunk from a spewing of words that comprises many of his lyrics, colorful but hardly explaining.