Weathered

I can't much complain about the weather in New Orleans right now, but I sure do want to. I'm no fan of biking home in the winter night's rain. I'm sure it's more fun if your cycle is equipped with hurricane-proof flood lamps. All I have is a failing yellow light that is more for looks that anything. Scratch that, it's hardly aesthetically appealing. It mostly reminds me of cheese and hunger is something I don't want to evoke right now. I'm far from my kitchen and I'm about to voyage to Walgreen's. The combination of which (and an arsenal of plastic payment) will only amount to eating one soggy twinkie while I bike headstrong in the falling misery on Canal Street.

This is short and sweet. Sweat. Brevity is the winner tonight.

Anonymous Gifting

When a surprise package of boots shows up at your house, the natural reaction is glee mixed with suspicion. The mystery of the gifted boots. They feel so new, is someone trying to glam me up? Maybe it's the neighbors and they're tired of my tired style. Maybe it's your parents who are (im)patiently waiting grandbabies and acting this out through rampant internet purchases. OR maybe, you've been spending too much time staring at the internet to realize that your fingers are clicking their way to new boots for your feet. However this is resolved, the mystery of gifts in the mail is always, and I do mean always, a welcome one chez moi.

Last night I went rustic and ate some cactus. The electricity to the gas stove is out. The igniter does not work nor does the exhaust fan. This is problematic when you have roommates who like to make their own salsas out of hot chiles that when cooked create a sort of pepper-spray-like effect in the kitchen. The upside is that it tastes delicious. Deliciously burning your mouth so good that don't even realize tears are streaming down your face into your food. This is explicitly, not a lesson in how to avoid excess salt in your food. No, this is a lesson, or rather a confession, in capsicum addiction.

Kate is crafting us a new salsa container because our current one is underdeveloped. She took measurements the other night but swiftly noted that any salsa dish she creates for us will most likely be too small too soon. We have a habit of buying most anything that says hot, habanero, fire, 'can also be used as an excellent industrial cleaner'...you get the idea. We crazy. We addicted. I don't want no rehab. I just want those pouty lips that are so hott right now. Pouty eyes that are burning from capsicum coated fingers are an entirely different story. Nothing glamorous about chileye.

I thought I'd be more prolific

That is to say in blog posts. I'm very prolific in other areas of my life. Such as consumption of bread, cheese, wine, beer and hot sauce. I can impress your mother, no doubt about that.

I've been busy biking around and not being on the internet when I'm not working. Sometimes the cold makes my feet freeze at the same time that my forehead is beading with sweat and I can feel my heart palpitating through my chest. It knows only a simple 1-2 rhythm. The jazz sounds of New Orleans have yet to enter my bloodstream. Probably because they are being roadblocked by a gang of angry daiquiris.

I made a map of all the journeys I made yesterday on my two-wheeled love. Give me a 14!! That's how many US miles I made in one day in the wind. The wind is perhaps my enemy. The silent muthafucka beats me down and I look a-fool tilting to one side while grimacing to stay upright as cars pass me with lights all fancy-like. Who stole my bicycle light? How many times must I replace thee. Don't hit me because I'm dark and definitely don't hit me because I'm on the road. It's a shared space, would you, as a pedestrian, hit a wheelchair person? I don't think. Mind the gap and slow down. It's only going to cost you the price of one saved life.

That turned into a unplanned rant. You'll understand when you visit. So when are you coming? I've got many hats and sombreros you can borrow. Try them on for size. FOR STYLE!!

Monday nights are family dinner nights. There will be food, there will be fortune and there will be excess, unless you all show in which case there will be fiesta.

In other news, I'm back on the couchsurfing circuit. Soon to the proud host of travelin men and women from across the globe bringing me their stories and their stank. It's ok we got us a nice lil washing machine now.

Enjoy this and give me the next one's deadline. I work well under pressure....

Epiphany!

Welcome back to the new year of 2011. I congratulate you if you still come to my blog hoping for sweet internet ramblings of a wandering little earthling. It's a strange urge to write and I can feel in slowly building up in my elbow, cramping my joint and forcing its way down my ulna onto my wrist ultimately exploding out of my fingerprints. I suppose, technically err anatomically err blogtochincally, we all write with all fingerprints.

Tonight, after a merry month in an old pink house in the 7th ward, we are having our first official house party. Having invited everyone I know over to celebrate the arrival of the 3 kings and the grand start of Carnival season, I expect pure magic to happen. The magis would have it no other way. This morning I cleaned the bathroom floors with paper-towels while talking on my cellular to a friend in Dallas about assisting in the development of a childhood obesity cessation program. That last statement is obviously irrelevant to the previous ones but does signify that I have been cleaning. We don't have a chore wheel, so we gotta yell it when we get some chores done round our casita rosa.

Fiesta activities will include: outdoor foosball, outdoor standing while drinking, outdoor sitting while drinking, exclusive outdoor smoking (cigars, cigarettes, and hookah), indoor drinking while standing, indoor sitting while eating, music dancing, music singing, chitchat, light banter, celebratory embraces, leftover holiday cheer, newfound appreciation of the gluttony preceding lent, and fuzzy memories for the following day.

Anyone who reads this and has not been invited, is now invited. You are the reason we celebrate.