I have been ordered to remain calm, coolest and collected. But! How can anyone remain calm, cool and much less collected about my Heavenly Hermits!! Now I ask you, isn't that the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard? So, forward, onward and etc. with this installment of Hermitdom U.S.A.
      Charging into my four wheels and power steering, I crashed down Sunset to The Hollywood Palace and smashed into the nearest parking places I could navigate (crunch!). I flew out of the car, raced through the building and screeched to a sudden halt . . . right in front of Pete's feet!
      "Hi," I gasped.
      "Hello, I remember you! How are you?!" Pete bubbled, I preened.
      Keith grinned, "You look pale!" He noticed! More preening. I was just about to explain about my driving when a man suggested that they get back stage.
      "I'll see you right after the show," Keith smiled. Pete started to leave and then wheeled around.
      "Aren't you coming?"
      I skidded up behind him and fell in line. Just to be safemost, I asked the guard if I could go with Pete. His answer was a resounding negative. I pleaded to no avail. Then, Pete stepped in and took command of the "nasty" I'd let myself in for.
      "Of course she can come. She's a friend and she's Press!" I tore off behind Pete and promptly became confused in the maze.
      "Pete? How do you keep from getting lost around here?"
      "Easy. Just follow your great white leader!" I did and found myself in a conglomeration of record albums, stuffed animals, guitars and Keith Hopwood. Deciding that there just wasn't room for all of us, I struggled into the hall, followed by Keith. As we were chatting, Karl bounced by wearing a pink shirt with paper towels around his neck. I commented on both and he explained that the towels were to keep make-up from getting on his peach shirt! ("It's not Pink! It's Peeaach!" I mumbled that it still looked pink to me and continued to fill Keith in on the Hollywood scene.
      Lek sauntered over and promptly appointed himself my personal guide and protector. He marched me into another dressing room. Karl spotted us and threw that famous Green grin my way. Barry, tapping his drumsticks on his knees in time to his musical tapes, nodded hello. Just as Lek was getting me settled, you know - Bubble Up, a chair and goodies, Manager-friend Harvey Lisberg came dashing in with the astounding news that Pete and Keith were both wearing "dirty camel shoes" with their black pants! Oh, horificus disasters! Everyone groaned at their atrocious taste and made sour facial comments as Pete came strolling into the room searching for a comb.
      Karl turned to wash his hands and Lek nearly helped himself into Karl's yellow, black and gray striped Carnaby-type jacket. He looked smashing! Karl ignored the whole thing completely and slipped into some else's red, yellow and blue-hued jacket. Naturally I decided I'd write down everything they were wearing and "Kapable" Karl along with "Helpful" Harvey started dictating each item. Suddenly I found I was describing my own clothes - not theirs. After stomping up and down a bit I pulled out my specs and jotted down the whole fashionable mess. Suddenly, I was writing in mid-air . . . no pen! Barry smiled - he'd borrowed it to scribble an autograph on the back of a playbill for a couple of fans. I grinned back, but it didn't do any good. I didn't see my pen for hours! (Gross exaggeration!)
      Suddenly, wild starvation hit me and Karl. We had just gotten the word food out of our mouths when Pete pointedly pointed out that Karl had lost a lot of weight. I asked him how (thinking of all the dresses I couldn't wear) and he growled, "I stopped eating!"
      I decided to try that diet much later as Lek insisted that I definitely "could stand to lose some weight . . . now!"
      I huffed over to the door and Harvey (Who'd been in-out severally) charged inward.
      "Tell her about the trousers, Karl." (O.K., so I'm not totally connected upstairs but, I really couldn't figure out what trousers had to do with "Dandy", the song Pete was singing and weight, but Karl carefully explained that they all started out in the baggiest pants imaginable and they got tighter and tightest.
      Lek started humming a song and Harvey and Pete told me that it was "East West." Then Harvey tried to balance a drumstick on his fingers. Barry showed him how, promptly dropped the stick, laughed and covered by tooting "76 Trombones." Harvey became a drum major and "boom-boomed" around the room while the others became a chorus.
      Pete had finally recovered the comb and asked me how I liked his hair.
      "It's the shortest it's ever been in the States," he explained. I dug it. As I was admiring Karl's trim, Lek chortled, "Karl has had three haircuts in four days. They glued him to the chair and let the lady barber go to it."
      "It grows fast," Karl retorted. I ducked out to the balcony for air and some fans spotted me. They started yelling for the Hermits and Lek and Karl poked their heads out. Pandemonium!! The girls spotted the fire escape ladder - so did Karl. A blur whizzed by me and locked the ladder safely in place, and Lek leaned down to console the disappointed birds.
      Shoosh! Karl scooped me up and was swinging me toward the side of the fire escape. Screams, yelps and other mass confusion as I turned palest! Finally Lek came over and Karl swung me back to safety. I wasn't going to give him another chance to throw me to the lower depths, so I escaped to Pete's dressing room where I found Keith. He beamed and removed the records from the only available seat and told me to sit down. I was all ready for a good gab when . . . the stage manager stepped in and ordered the Hermits on stage for rehearsal.
      Complete depression set in, I would have to leave right after the rehearsal. I wouldn't see them until Christmas. I was just about to weep pails of salt water when Harvey, Pete and Lek invited me to stay for the rest of the evening. I leaped for joyousness and my note pad tumbled over the stairs in the garbage can!! Will the sanitation department please return it to . . .