Wednesday, 12.22, 3:50 pm: Last night I “slept” fitfully (not really sleeping, in and out, waking up about 16 times)) for nine hours. Then I got up, thinking I might be feeling “better”, but that notion quickly faded. An hour or so later I went right back to sleep. Just woke up an hour ago (3 pm). Sniffles, sneezing, a little bleary. But I’ve been sicker.

Anthony Quinn during the second-act interrogation scene in The Guns of Navarone: “I’m sick…I’m sick!”

Yesterday evening: My Covid test came back late this afternoon, and I’m infected all right. Omicron, I’m guessing, but who knows? All I know is that after.defying Covid since March of ‘20, my German genes have let me down. Omicron is more infectious than Delta or generic Covid — I know that much.

Jordan Ruimy found out earlier today that he’s been infected also. Ditto a producer friend.

I actually feel a lot better now than I did early this afternoon. My temperature was at 100 around 2 pm — then it went down to 98.9. Then it went up to 99.1. I feel a little weak and achey right now, but it’s like I have a mild flu. I had a Christmas flu last December, and it didn’t last for more than a couple of days.

6:40 am update: Same. A bit weak and a bit achey but not awful. I can feel an alien presence in my system. Cough persists but I have cherry-flavored cough spray that helps. You can’t sleep all that deeply with this damn thing so I’ve been lying here (fitful sleeping, in and out, floating on the surface of the pond) for nine hours. And of course I’ve got Tatiana furious at me — how dare you potentially spoil my trip to Russia? My Malibu producer friend and Jordan Ruimy and me and a certain Brooklyn-based journalist getting it at the same time means a LOT of people are suddenly infected. Omicron!

I’m triple vaxxed as we speak.

For years I’d known of Beatles roadie/manager Mal Evans but I never had a good look at the guy or felt more or less acquainted with his vibe and manner until I watched Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back last month.

He seemed amiable, nice enough, a decent sort. A big galumphy guy. Six-foot-six. Black-rimmed glasses. Adaptable, good natured.

As I’m not a Beatles obsessive, I somehow never read that poor Evans was shot to death by a couple of L.A. beat cops on 1.5.76. He was stoned and irate and holding a rifle and wouldn’t put it down when ordered to do so by the fuzz, so they drilled him four times. Instant cosmic consciousness, but what a weird way for a trusted friend of the Fab Four to slip this mortal coil.

I can’t recall if Evans’ bizarre death is noted in the 468-minute doc’s closing credits, but if not it seems like an odd omission. He was primarily a gofer but was also a peripheral part of the late ‘60s elite rock cosmology…peace and love and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi mysticism…all of that. And he went out like Tony Montana.

I’m triple vaxxed, but starting this morning I began to have feelings of profound fatigue. All I want to do is lie down and nap. I now have a temperature of 100 degrees. Plus I have a hacking cough. Obviously this could mean I have the big “o.” Or perhaps I’ve merely succumbed to a run-of-the-mill “bug” — who knows? I was just tested a couple of hours ago — results within 24 to 72. Plus I forgot to buy sour cream at Pavilions.

Behind every Hollywood Elsewhere post has been some form of pain. Certainly in the sense that one can’t recognize pleasurable, high-craft, top-of-the-line films without suffering through thousands of mediocre or awful films. (Truffaut: “Taste is a result of a thousand distastes.”) Plus: Every funny joke is rooted in some form of pain. Plus: Every mediocre or awful film is rooted in the belief that pain must be denied or avoided or laughed off, etc. The emptier or more shallow you are, the more banal your convictions, the more terrible your films are.

A somewhat old-school hotshot studio exec (i.e., not a straight-to-streaming guy) recently blurted out the following to The Ankler’s Richard Rushfield:

One unvaccinated 50something Texas guy has died from the Omicron variant. The first such publicly acknowledged death in the U.S. Panic in the streets! Terrible, ruthless Omicron has snuffed out the life of one…fucking…guy.