The Profiler offices are in Culver City, and my apartment is in the Valley, a significant drive away.

So I leave my apartment one morning, thinking, hmm, yes, I do have to go to the bathroom a little, but I don't want to be late. So off I went, up over the top of the hill toward LA proper. The usual route I try, Benedict Canyon, was backed up nearly to the top of the hill. I turned around, went back, and tried a second canyon, Beverly Glen. That was pretty backed up, too. I fought my way back to the top of the hill to try someplace else, but there was a traffic jam in the other direction.

Meanwhile, I was trying to call work and getting beep-beep-beep. In my phone frustration, I failed to notice that I'd finally passed Mulholland, the road I needed. There I was heading all the way back into the valley I just came from. I decided to turn off onto another road, Valley Vista, while remarking aloud to myself in the car (always a bad sign) about the stupidity of what I'd done.

Finally I found myself on a road I'd never seen before, which ended abruptly in a cul-de-sac. Still, one of my calls to work actually went through, and I told them I was working on the problem. I retraced my path from the dead end, driving east along the elusive Valley Vista, seeking another canyon. But Valley Vista proved to be a tease -- as it happens, the thing curves all the bloody way back to Ventura Boulevard, which meant that I'd pretty much made no headway at all since leaving my house 45 minutes before.

It was then that the thought occurred to me that I was under a curse, and would never get over the hill to Los Angeles, but would live and die in the San Fernando Valley. I'd seen movies like this. Escape From the Hell Valley. Island of Terror. Of course, I couldn't make any such movies myself, now that I was trapped in some Escherian land of twisted physics, so I'd have to confine myself to an essay. "Some Thoughts On the Commuter As Satan's Plaything." Yeah, they'd take that seriously...

Under the circs, I decided to stop at a Starbucks to use the bathroom. I maneuvered into this postage-stamp parking lot, weaved past trucks, parked, and made my way inside. I pushed past the line to find there was an "out of order" sign on the bathroom. I ended up going into a vitamin store and asking succor of an Asian woman who didn't speak much English, but who led me mercifully to her half-storeroom, half-bathroom.

Back on the road, my allergies kicked in, and one eye started to burn and tear. So there I was, an hour after leaving home, still on the wrong side of the hill, driving with one eye shut.

Well, there were more adventures, but I got to work eventually -- at 11:00 AM. I walked into the story meeting to find my four writerly pals hard at work. I told them of my adventures. Then -- and this has never happened to me before in my life -- I leaned back in my chair to reach for my portfolio, which I'd left against the wall. I leaned so far that my chair tipped backwards and landed against the wall, and I was left like a turtle on its shell, crying, "Help, help!" They sprang to assistance at once and hauled me and my chair up. ("One, two, three," said the compatriot who coordinated the Mass Yank.) "Doris," said another, "why don't you lie down on the couch and not touch anything."