The lobby of the Chelsea Hotel is the vortex of the building’s fabled madness. I rarely spend much time there, since, well, my tender psyche can’t withstand the heavy spiritual and paranormal 
onslaught. But one night I was feeling particularly reckless, and I so I had a seat in the middle of the crowded lobby to wait while my girlfriend Susan was getting ready upstairs.
None of the regular lobby-sitters—those bold psychonauts who daily venture into uncharted reaches of the collective unconscious of the Hotel—were in attendance. Instead, it was just a bunch of tourists sitting around. But what tourists they were. A man sitting in a chair behind me announced loudly, “I’m writing a book called Women Who Read and the Men Who are Homicidal Maniacs and Kill Them!”
What?! I couldn’t resist it; I turned around in my chair to see who had made such a retarded remark. It was a sixty-year-old man, his eyelids and jowls sagging, bald on top, with long stringy gray hair on the sides. He glared at me, as if to say: what the hell you lookin’ at?
I turned back around in my seat, feeling a bit uncomfortable. A small, tidy red-haired man sitting next to me was talking to a large woman and he immediately said to her, “I have lived in two societies where the dogs and cats run wild.”
Not one such society, mind you, but two. The italics were his. He was speaking rather pedantically.
“If they were cornered,” he went on, “they would kill you.”
“Even the cats!?” I exclaimed, chuckling.
“Excuse me?” he said.
“Oh, nothing,” I replied.
My head exploding with visions of rabid cats shredding my skin, I decided to go stand outside where the metaphysical air was sure to be a bit fresher. Before long Susan came out and we walked together down the street. We were going out to dinner, but we had to stop in the deli first to get something, a pack of gum, I think.
An elderly man who had lived in the Chelsea for years was in front of us in line, fumbling with 
his change. One of the deli men from the back came charging up to him and shook an open bag of Oreos in his face. “Why did you open this bag and eat a cookie and then put it back!?!” he demanded.
“I only ate ONE!” the old man replied indignantly.
Yeah, buddy, like, I can see if it was two. Of course, the cookies were not individually wrapped, so he couldn’t have resold them. It looked like they were going to argue for awhile, so I jumped in front of the old man and paid, and we left the store.
Now, I know you’re probably thinking that there must’ve been a shortage of Zoloft at the Duane Reade or a brown-out at the shock treatment facility. I couldn’t tell you whether there was a full moon that night because the sky was overcast. But full moon or not, I can assure you that it was business as usual at the Chelsea. (Ed Hamilton)
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