Okay, first and foremost, I know Jamie warned me about it, but I sincerely thought it just wouldn’t happen to me.  What in the HELLFIRE is up with my period since I had the Mirena IUD emplaced? (That’s engineer speak for “baby stopper shoved up into my love canal”.) The insanity and sponteneity of said period is driving me bazonkers.  I will have my period for five hours a day, every day.  I shit you not.  Why would I kid about that?  It’s certainly not funny, nor is it entertaining.  And let me tell you what, it puts a serious DAMPER on any other sponteneity, if you get what I’m saying.

On a separate note, disaster was averted yesterday.  When we packed up our bedroom, we had (at most) three boxes.  All three boxes were packed and unpacked before Bryan’s parents came to visit.  Guess what I COULD NOT FIND ANYWHERE?  Um, that would be my sex toys.  Yeah.  I know.  So the panic of having conservative Baptist in-laws in a house with renegade sex toys was enough to give me an ulcer.  Last night, a phantom box surfaced that had been stuck in a distant closet.  And voila!  I have succesfully avoided my stepson using it as a light saber in front of company.

(So far.)

Horrible, non-existent segue: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!!

I am seriously staring at this screen because I am just so needing a break from work.  I haven’t talked about my new job a whole bunch on here because I am so busy doing it all the time.  Literally, I MADE myself leave work yesterday at 4:30, picked up the babeh, hung out with him until he went to sleep, and then logged back on and worked for another two and a half hours.  Then I got up this morning and logged on at six.  And I will have to make myself leave again tonight at 4:30.  I know this is par for the course on a brand-new program that I’m developing processes for, but it’s draining in a way for which I wasn’t quite prepared.  A day or two with NOTHING to do would do me a world of good right now.  So, maybe, in September or thereabouts.

I did not mention one glorious thing that definitely deserves a kudos: when I got home this weekend, Bryan surprised me by having painted our bathroom.  While it had been a ghastly 1992 hunter green with a mint green rag-rolled “faux finish” (that is in quotes because, DAYUM, why would anyone do that?), and while it’s a fairly roomy bathroom, the dark color combined with the lack of natural light was just stifling.  So the warm butter yellow color brightened it up TREMENDOUSLY, and I will make art work for the bathroom tomorrow night at Book Club.

Intrigued?  You should be.

First of all, head’s up: my K on my keyboard is not working well.  So there may be an errant K here and there.

Secondly, as I was driving in yesterday, I heard a Fox News radio blurb about Bush (Dubya) visiting the flood-ravaged Iowa plains.  The reporter said, “With his sleeves rolled up, Bush promised immediate help to the area.”

I remembered Bush making that same visit in late September of 2005 to Mobile, since he still couldn’t get into New Orleans.  I remember laughing that his sleeves were rolled up; you know, like he was actually going to dive in and lend a hand.

I was angered when I heard this yesterday, not because Iowa doesn’t need the help, but because I was just hitting I-10 when I heard that.  Seeing desolation all around while hearing promises of immediate relief irritated me.

We drove around a good bit today, viewing the damage from the safety of our rental SUV.  I asked that we not visit the 9th; that, I couldn’t handle.  We saw several houses with the orange DOA numbers on the front.  It’s enough to leave you speechless.

It’s just a surreal world here.  Half million dollar homes sit empty, while the white boxy FEMA trailer sits in the front yard.  Entire shanty towns of Coleman tents reside next to parking lots crammed with Hummers, Mercedes, and BMWs.

I’m doing my part to sustain the local economy.  I’m eating my weight in bread pudding and crawfish.

Man.

I didn’t realize that, you know, I’ve driven a car with cruise control since I had a license.  Until I bought my last car.  I actually TURNED DOWN the option of cruise control, rationalizing that I don’t use it that much.

Well, hell, Sarah, you don’t use airbags that often either, but damn. 

Six and a half hours later, I’m in the Big Easy.  I’m on the sixteenth floor of my hotel, which makes me all sorts of giddy, because I’m not sure I’ve ever been this high EVER.  Yes, I’m traveling on business and yet so very childish.  I’m a dichotomy like that.

I would love to tell you that I’m all psyched up to hit the streets, and I probably will be tomorrow, but now I’m so exhausted and worn out that I’ve decided to hole up with my four gossip mags I brought, order some room service, and then pass out in my king sized bed with deluxe linens.  Tomorrow night, I will definitely enjoy the Quarter as it’s meant to be enjoyed, but..

So, in truth, driving in was depressing.  The city that I loved is no longer here.  Sure, the touristy spots have been shined up so that there is a chance to get the money flowing again, but the outskirts tell a different story.. a city forgotten, given-up on, abandoned.  It’s a ghost town, half disheveled, half condemned.. it is not my NOLA.

Tomorrow night, we’ll play tourists and go visit the “safe” areas.  We’ll drink hurricanes and wear beads and eat crawfish and sing kareoke, and it will be fun.  But it’s not my NOLA.  And it makes me sad.

So tonight, I’m staying in a hotel room, which is less New Orleans and more every hotel room everywhere.  It’s safer here, in my mind.  Less prone to the reality that looms sixteen stories down.