The red cloak diary. (Off the Map).

San Francisco, California, which is a little more real than Los Angeles, where everything it's known for is fake. Movies. Theme parks. Anna Nicole Smith. At least our dot.com bust was real.

Dear American Cardinals:

Thank you for responding so promptly to the Unprecedented Special Conclave. His Holiness has called you together in order to wrestle the phantom runaway bull of false accusations to the ground and smother it like a venial sin in a blanket full of indulgences. His Holiness understands the pressures you are under, accepts your assurances the whole mess is nothing more than a media circus, and is pleased as punch to welcome you to Rome, home of the best gladiator movies ever filmed.

Please fill out this questionnaire before proceeding to a short reception in the catacombs where a light buffet dinner will be served before this evening's presentation of La Cage Aux Folles by the Vienna Boys Choir. Tonight's theme: Red, Red, Red is the color of my Miter.

1. Parishioners often nickname their clerics. Select the one that fits you the closest:

A. Spencer Tracy.

B. Blotchy thighs.

C. Father schmoochie-lips.

2. When asked what's under my robes, I always say:

A. A steel chastity belt, and Jesus has the only key.

B. Just enough to frighten Satan.

C. There's a little puppet town down there. Would you like a visa?

3. Hearing confessions is the most fun when:

A. You can lighten the load of your fellow man.

B. You later listen to the tapes on your headphones in the dark.

C. You feel the clinging swish of your fishnets rubbing against each other.

4. Altar boys are:

A. Essential tools to give proper glory to God.

B. Sinfully smooth.

C. Scrumdidillyumptious.

5. After our little confab here in Rome, I most want to:

A. Visit the sainted sites of Christendom's martyrs or see the musical Tony and Tina's Wedding in the original Italian.

B. Arrange to fly back home a couple cases of decent communion wine.

C. Go to one of those Caligulan Court recreations I've read so much about in the Vatican newsletter.

6. I am a special apostle to:

A. Jesus.

B. Sister Aloysius.

C. Jason and his brother Jeremy.

Anybody marking 5 C's or more, please take the time to write up your most memorable encounter, which will be placed in The Vatican's private pornography collection--the largest in the world! Thank you for your cooperation, and go with God's grace.

San Francisco, California, where childproof bottles are considered less of a deterrent and more of a rite of passage. "My son was finally able to break into my Vicodin. Now, he is a man."

"What the hell is wrong with these people? They've gone plumb loco, if you ask me. All this fussing and fighting over a tiny barren spit of land nobody's ever given a halfway decent crap about until the last fifty years. Not Napoleon. Not Alexander. Not Khan. Nobody. Not even Moses. He stalled for forty years before finally, reluctantly, pointing it out to what was left of his people. `Somewhere over there. Can't miss it. Look for the really coarse sand.'"

"Don't they know we got more important things to worry about right now? We don't need any distractions. We're occupied. Sorry. Bad choice of words there. We're busy trying to find one six-foot, five-inch bearded skinny Saudi undergoing dialysis accompanied by a one-eyed Mullah. And may I impress upon you we will find the two of them if we got to flatten the Khyber Pass to parking lot smoothness and then stripe the somabitch on top of it. These petty squabbles half a hemisphere away are not helping us at all! Everytime Dad asks for permission to bomb Saddam Hussein back to the Stone Age, they keep bringing up the Goddamn West Bank. West Bank. I'm sick and tired of it. So Colin, you get over there and kick Arafat and Sharon in the ass. You got it?"

"Yes, Mr. President."

"Good. Now who are the Rangers playing today? The As? Again? Christ.".

Will Durst figures he's probably permanently off the bus now and he knows the first step is to accept that.