The Rhinestone Dandy leaves a bedazzled trail in his wake where every he goes. I know because I find plastic gemstones everywhere that I hang out. Happily, no one complains, at least not to me. Plastic gems are reminders of the pleasantries I spread to and fro as I crisscross my parts of New Orleans.
There are no gemstones where I am hanging out today. I am gone underground, embedded. I am on covert assignment. This is not private investigator work, but, truth be told, it is P.I.-adjacent. I have got to go it alone. Details to follow.
All this secrecy reminds of the time I met Vladimir Putin in New Orleans. Like George W. Bush, I looked in Putin’s soul, too. We shared a breakfast, Putin and I. I have never dined with George W. Bush, though I have been to Kennebunkport, the one in Maine.
George W. Bush ate breakfast at Betsy’s Pancake House. There is a whole display commemorating the event on the far wall. It used to be on the wall close to the door, where Betsy’s photograph is (may she R.I.P.). People used to draw mustaches and goat horns on Bush’s photo so the ladies who work their moved the display to the middle of the riverside wall, between the television and the special’s board.
I found a green rhinestone at my usual counter seat at Betsy’s Pancake House this morning. This is why I am thinking about the trail of jewels the Rhinestone Dandy leaves in his wake like the breadcrumbs of fable.
I hobnob with glitterati.
I will tell you more in a moment about the time Vladimir Putin was in New Orleans.