Happy Mardi Gras

A friend just linked me to this: ParadeCam, St. Charles Avenue.

I was in New Orleans for Mardi Gras once. I was 22. Huge crowds. A party, someone's house, some friend of a friend. Balcony perch, overlooking a gay parade down Bourbon Street. Leather queens. Should have anticipated this scene, but hadn't. Me yelling at a guy because I didn't like the way he looked at me. Me = 22-year-old asshole. Later: A gorgeous woman, topless except for body paint and glitter, stumbling through the French Quarter, blind drunk. Me worried about her. More crowds, parades, grabbing for beads and coins. Walking for miles, drunk, with my friend Alan, trying to find our car.

It was a bumpy ride of a day, actually. And yet I feel it would be nice to be in New Orleans today.

Here in the Bible Belt, 20 years later, I have two invitations to pre-Lenten celebrations, both of which are centered around eating pancakes. Sheesh. Protestants.