And, in Los Angeles, John Dillinger calmly loaded his revolver, dropped it in his briefcase and set a Panama hat on his neatly combed silver-gray hair. He was humming a song from his youth: "Those wedding bells are breaking up that old gang of mine ..." I hope that pimp is where Hagbard says, he thought; I've only got eighteen hours before they declare martial law. . . "Good-bye forever," he hummed on, "old fellows and pals . . ."
I saw the fnords the same day I first heard about the plastic martini. Let me be very clear and precise about this, since many of the people on this trip are deliberately and perversely obscure: I would not, could not, have seen the fnords if Hagbard Celine hadn't hypnotized me the night before, on the flying saucer.