I’m gonna be in that number

The beast is loose. I can feel it when I leave my house. Carnival is in full swing. And I have very mixed feelings about it this year. My friend, Lexie, who first arrived in New Orleans doing animal rescue in the Lower 9th Ward a week after THE STORM, now has the answer to her question about why every single neighborhood, no matter how destroyed, had shiny plastic beads all over the place. It was one of life’s mysteries for Lexie until this past week. I presented her before the Barkus parade with two pair of vintage 1950’s Mardi Gras beads…the glass kind…that we used to have to catch mid-air or they would be shattered on the pavement.

Being here in New Orleans it is apparent that Mardi Gras MUST go on. But to tell the truth I feel like we are faking it a little. And although I have always had a tendency to cry for marching bands, bagpipes and even the weeping Indian in the “don’t be a litter bug” commercials, I am choked with emotion beyond my control at the thought of those who aren’t with us this year. And those who will never be with us again. When I’m in the up swing of my hopefully temporary Katrina bi-polar disorder, I can laugh at the idea of Carnival celebrations and king cakes in places like Des Moines and Missoula where evacuees have landed and will no doubt celebrate. When I’m in that frame of mind. I imagine hundreds of cities in the infant stages of Mardi Gras celebrations that will take root and bloom into glorious, huge, branches of our Carnival, much the same way ours took root from celebrations in Europe. When I’m in funky town, it’s easier to think about our losses. For one thing, there will be no St. Augustine Marching 100. No St. Augustine Church for that matter.

All I can do is what I always do. Pull out my boxes of costumes and wigs for out of town visitors to borrow and get ready for the party. My bedroom looks like a Las Vegas show girl exploded in there and my new Fifi Mahoney masterpiece is ready for pick up.

ALSO, today I saw the guy with the umbrella hat and the megaphone who preaches the gospel on Canal Street. I’m not even into all that and I honked and waved like he was a long lost uncle. He smiled and gave me the thumbs up. Maybe everything will be okay, after all.

The Madness of King George

Oh where do I begin? This president has clearly stepped off the curb. Time to get the net. Imagine for just one second that a Democrat had suggested turning our ports over to Dubai. Oh there would be wailing and gnashing of teeth to be sure. On a daily basis I must resist the urge to say to any number of people in New Orleans, "Hey you voted for this bozo." Instead, yesterday I mentioned to Bambi (all names have been changed to protect the idiots...I mean innocent) that Dubbaya must be smoking crack to believe that we would all just say, "Uh, okey dokey, Mr. Prez" on the port issue. Her response, "Well, I'm not too sure what his thinking is on this, but I'm sure he has good reason to believe that this is the right thing to do." Holy shit! I feel like I'm in a 1950's novel about the state of America in 2006 and it's scary. Can I please return a la "Back to the Future" to the times when we all liked Ike (although Mamie's hairdo was a little questionable)??? Maybe I could persuade George's mama to convert to Catholicism and join a convent preventing the certain destruction of truth, justice and the American way. Hey, stranger things have happened. MUCH stranger.

Raising the Bar on Tragedy

The other day I got a phone call from a friend I hadn’t spoken to in some time. Someone who lives out of town. When I asked how she was doing, she said, “Today hasn’t been so good.” “What’s up?” I asked, expecting the usual litany of frustration, death and despair that has become our daily fare. She replied, “My computer hard drive is shot and I may have lost everything.” “Oh, wow! That sucks” comes out of my mouth, but in my head, I am thinking, “Are you kidding me??? You really have the nerve to tell me that you lost EVERYTHING because your COMPUTER CRASHED???!!!!” Then I got a hold of myself. I was reminded that prior to August 29th, having several large holes in my roof and moldy sheetrock hanging down into several rooms would have been a total catastrophe for me. But now things are different. I am one of the lucky ones with a home that didn’t take on any flood water. I’m in the “sliver by the river”. I look back with fondness upon times when a minor inconvenience like Robért’s being out of spinach dip was an all encompassing outrage for me. I have to resist the urge to dump a whole truck load of anger on those who are lucky enough to have luxury problems like:

1. My maid evacuated back to Costa Rica and I have no one to clean my house.
2. My maid is going to charge me $20 more a week or she will quit.
3. My yard looks like hell because I can’t find anyone to mow it.
4. I have to drive all the way Uptown to get my clothes dry cleaned.
5. It’s Carnival and who is going to do my hair???

I have actually heard all of the above and more being uttered by people here in New Orleans. For them, I guess it is easier to focus on these tiny details than on the fact that we are precariously close to another hurricane season with roofs that still need to be replaced and insurance claims that are in dispute. We have a mayor to elect and politicians to persuade. A whole city to rebuild. Our work is cut out for us. And so I am taking a deep breath and trying to be sympathetic to the trivialities that seem overwhelming for some. Maybe that darn (I’m trying to get out of the habit of more “colorful” language) maid charging $20 more a week is just the last straw for a person who has lost their real home and is living in temporary housing. After all, it’s the fact that the glass was full in the first place, not the one additional drop that causes it to overflow.

So, does anyone know of a good place to get a manicure? I broke a nail and I can't POSSIBLY go out in public like this!!!

Faking It

I realized about 5 years ago that some people spend their whole lives faking it. Embellishing their credentials for a job, claiming experience and/or college degrees that were never earned from colleges that were never even attended!

I had a friend who got so caught up in her own lies that it became unbearable to be her friend anymore. Serving as witness to her constant revision of her personal history and being called upon to back her up each time the lie was uttered was just too stressful. I never knew whether the story of the day was that when she was younger, she was a poor unwed mother (which was true except for the poor unwed part) OR she was by turns a DJ, airplane pilot, ballet dancer, heiress, cancer victim. I'm still not sure which of those versions was true, but she seemed to be enormously successful at spinning the web. She is still successful based in part on episodes of her life that probably aren't even real!

After the 2000 presidental elections I had to face the sobering fact that the truth didn't seem to matter to many people at all. As long as the spin is good and we WANT to believe, we "act as if". Consequently we have ended up with inept business leaders, mayors, governors and even a leader of the free world (or two) who push their own agenda at the sometimes criminal expense of the rest of us.

How long has this been going on? It's too scary to even ponder that question. So, I guess my feeling is that it is critically important that everyone GET REAL now. As we found out last August 29th, our very lives depend upon it. Tell the truth about the erosion of our wetlands. Tell the truth about our levee systems. And for God's sake, if you are our president, please tell the truth about the credentials of those you appoint to manage things like natural disasters and terrorist attacks. I don't care how much he contributes to your campaign or how tight he is with your peeps.

I for one don't care if our next leader visits a shrink, smokes pot or fools around on his wife. What he does in the oval office with his interns is HIS business. As long as he is capable of handling an emergency, he's my guy! He should be an exceptional leader. I don't give a damn if he sucks as a husband, father or dog catcher. Let God worry about his sins. I've got enough to do dealing with insurance companies.

The Ins and Outs of Insurance

So you pay your homeowner's insurance bill for YEARS, right??? Finally, you regrettably must make a claim. Within weeks a check arrives to make you whole again. Pouff!!! There goes THAT daydream. Today I received an itemized list from my insurance company (almost six months after the catastrophe) telling me that they are going to pay less than half of the damages caused by Hurricane Katrina. Now, mind you, we have moldy ceilings in one room and in two rooms the ceilings have collapsed. A third room is on the verge of collapse and there are water lines in two of my light fixtures. Oh! And did I happen to mention the Sumo Wrestler sized hole in the roof of my bedroom??? And the bucket or so of water that pours in when it rains despite the $2,000 blue tarp that we had installed at our own expense because FEMA doesn't want to touch asbestos shingles. I don't know what they think they will catch from my asbestos shingles that they haven't already been exposed to hanging around with the likes of Brownie and Chertoff. But wait! There's more! The letter states that I have "180 days from date of loss" to complete any repairs and make any supplemental claims. Of course, it doesn't really mention that I received this statement more than 180 days since the date of the loss.

My eye started twitching as I read it, but I have to take a deep breath and start composing my response. The first thing that comes to mind is "ARE YOU PEOPLE SMOKING CRACK OR SOMETHING???"