I am going to make this one long. I just want to tell you beforehand that today’s narrative is going to spaced into two acts, you know the kind, paid and unpaid. I am writing this now without having any idea what I am going to talk about. I am a Journalist of the Now (TM).
It is nice to see you. Welcome to Mid-City, the Queen of New Orleans Neighborhoods (TM). No apostrophe needed, the way I never insert a middle comma when I call Mid-City, “Mid-City New Orleans.”
I certainly appreciate everyone who reads these letters to you. Yes, I am talking to you.
When I look at the ratio of paid subscribers to free ones, it makes me put the suspense-building part of my day on the free side of the paywall, and the dramatic conclusion of my day’s adventures on the paid side. I will be your best friend for money. That’s the way the world works in the part of New Orleans where I live. I don’t know about where you live.
One hand washes the other. Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.
I am stuck with a Texas-South Carolina conundrum. I don’t want to talk about it right now, but, if I seem distracted, it may be because I have something of deep importance on my mind.
A train ticket to Beaumont only costs $37 from Union Station, New Orleans. The comma belonged there. There are union stations everywhere. I want you to know where I mean.
The murals in the concourse of New Orleans’ Union Station (would you like me to point out the apostrophe use?) look like they were painted by a schizophrenic. Welcome to New Orleans!
Those murals at New Orleans’ Union Station will give you nightmares if you look at them too long. I know. I live here.
Speaking of civic pride in official artwork, as the people I encounter every day are prone to do, you should see the murals on the ground floor at City Hall. Broken street tiles and trash are depicted in permanent paint under the top molding of the main hallway. The city hired someone to commemorate the city’s crummy maintenance and poor services. Welcome to New Orleans! Celebrate the culture.
If memory serves me right, I hate to visit City Hall, the ceiling is that popcorn foam, drop ceiling, acoustic tile. New Orleans City Hall is majestic. It really inspires confidence.
I know something happened today that I wanted to talk about. Was it Bud’s Broiler? Was it Little Miss Muffin? Ah! I remember.
You know what I am going to do now, don’t you?
I wish the word “paywall,” had as many syllables as the word, “cannonball.” I could use that somewhere around here.