Eureka!

This is Gabby. It isn't even a current picture, but it sums up how I feel right now so what the hell. Our vacation is over. It was perfect for me. Barry came down with a nasty case of poison oak acquired during his week in Mendocino with Smooth Bubba and Jason prior to my arrival, but aside from that, it was heaven. October like temperatures (by New Orleans standards anyway). Every night I slept like an innocent child (and I am neither).

We spent a few days in the city with Rebecca and Ivan and I walked til I thought my legs would turn to water. But for the most part my trip was spent relaxing in Marin. Had lunch with an old friend from my advertising agency days who now owns a shop in downtown San Anselmo. Weird walking into those shops and hearing people talking about flooding and FEMA. I guess I thought that was the excluive fodder of Gulf Coast residents, but downtown San Anselmo flooded on New Year's Eve. Funny. It's all perfectly repaird and pristine! I guess you don't fuck with the prosperous like you can with the poor. The little shop with the $75 dollar tank tops is up and running without a trace of the 3 feet of mud it held 8 months ago. Maybe if we had Ahnuld as the governor. No. Nevermind. I'd rather tread water in New Orleans. Truly, though, I don't know how long I can hang in on the home turf.

The trip home sucked kind of hard. A 3-stop flight out of Oakland. The first leg (to Burbank) was uneventful until we hit a flock of birds causing the cabin of the aircraft to smell like charred feathers. The repair crew from Southwest was dispatched but ultimately we had to change aircraft (after a 3 hour delay) and then headed without further incident to Phoenix, Nashville and finally New Orleans. Deplaning felt like walking fully clothed into the sauna at New Orleans Athletic Club.

And did I happen to mention that my boss hired a fork-lift to transfer a u-haul sized pile of binders, folders, maps, scribbled notes and Cherios that were in her office into my humble little cubicle??? I think that's kind of passive-aggressive personally, but I'm plowing through the mountains of paper anyway.

At any rate. We are home. I need a major distraction and I'm trying not to shop.