I was learning how to become a criminal courtesy of some guy I knew. I didn't really want to become a criminal; it was just sort of turning out that way. I was stealing a lot of stuff. I stole a station wagon and parked it in the backyard of my old house in Merced. I'd apparently moved back there, or was still living there with my folks. We were having a family reunion and I was supposed to go pick up my grandmother but I didn't, because I was feeling really ashamed about all the stuff I'd been stealing. So I feigned illness, a fever and nervous collapse or something, and fell into bed and slept for a long time.
There was also some sort of related thing having to do with studying martial arts with my cow-orkers. I borrowed a book on joint-locks from Chris; it had all these diagrams showing how to paralyze someone's arm, or hand, or leg.