ROLLING STONE called Grayson's first short story collection, WITH HITLER IN NEW YORK, published in 1979, "where avant-garde fiction goes when it becomes stand-up comedy," and NEWSDAY said, "The reader is dazzled by the swift, witty goings-on." Grayson's other short story collections have also received acclaim. LIBRARY JOURNAL called LINCOLN'S DOCTOR'S DOG (1982) "excellent" and said of I BRAKE FOR DELMORE SCHWARTZ (1983) that "Grayson is a born storyteller and standup talker." THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW said Grayson's I SURVIVED CARACAS TRAFFIC (1996) was "entertaining and bizarre" and "consistently, even ingeniously funny." PUBLISHERS WEEKLY called Grayson's THE SILICON VALLEY DIET (2000) "compulsively talky and engagingly disjunctive"; THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, reviewing AND TO THINK THAT HE KISSED HIM ON LORIMER STREET (2006), said, "Grayson has a fresh, funny voice." Grayson has kept a diary since 1969. This volume covers the first half of 1977.