Back from the Big Easy

I do apologize for my extended absence. New Orleans was fabulous, as always, but I’ve noticed that each year it takes longer and longer to recover. Between all of the shellfish and alcohol I gave my liver a real pounding. Ever since I’ve been back I’ve felt slow and dull like some sort of Miltowned housewife and have had little desire to do much except catch up on Tivo and stare into space.

I usually go to New Orleans in the summer when the air feels like either malarial, stagnant bathwater or sultry velvet, depending on my level of indigestion and hangover. The weather was cool and crisp this time and it was almost like a different city. Not that I mind the heat too much, since it can have restorative and healing properties, especially when it's cranked up to 115 in a Bikram class. I finally got to one and felt much better after a class where I sweated out all the lard, Hurricane residue and French Quarter sludge I had accumulated on my trip. The studio recently installed a new heater and the temperature sometimes exceeds 120 degrees. Now if I stand on the left side of the room it’s like being under an industrial hairdryer. After the class my face remained an alarming shade of scarlet for hours, and when I went to the Muslim owned convenience store I could tell that the owner suspected I was drunk and was just itching to give me a lecture on the evils of alcohol.

Exciting news. I got the job and I’m transferring down to the wild, wild Main. I have been a civil servant just long enough to have developed a great suspicion of, resistance to and fear of change, but I can’t help be thrilled. I will miss my favorite patrons terribly, but feel relief about getting away from others, especially the notorious Moleman. Lately he has been more creepy and disgruntled than usual, especially since his attempt to get the ACLU to sue me for not letting him scream the F word abusively at the staff seems to be going nowhere. He’s never seen without his walkman, and he seems all agitated by the hate radio I suspect he listens to incessantly. Every time I see him at the internet station I can’t help but imagine that he is typing out his suicide note/manifesto, and after he hits the send button he will massacre the library staff and then turn the automatic weapon on himself. Maybe I’m being overly paranoid, but I would like to get out of here before he snaps, which I feel like is imminent.