Today’s theme: Fat Tuesday/Lent
Colorful Living Tip of the Day …
• If you're livin' in New Orleans and yer nickname ain't "Fats" then you really ain’t livin’
Fat Tuesday …
• If the decision were up to them, where would the people who know you best send your everlasting soul: heaven or hell? I hope mine would compromise. New Orleans!
• Often the things we most want are the things that’ll kill us the quickest if we were given unrestricted access to them.
• Woke up bolt upright with a terrifying premonition I'd suffer viral and pantsless humiliation should I ever return to New Orleans. Don't care. I'll go back in a heartbeat.
Something(s) fishy
• Consider originating a trendy food truck that relies on really seasoned vegetable oils for Lenten fish specials. Call it "Ancient Grease.”
• A swim meet is an aquatic competition. A swim meat is an edible fish.
• I wonder how many times pretentious erotic film makers have re-done porno "Moby Dick" just to use the line, "Thar she blows!”
Random Stones ref. (just ‘cause it includes ‘Tuesday’) …
• News report says New Delhi discount days failing to drive sales the way experts predicted. Know what that means? Goodbye rupee Tuesday!
Reader letter of the week …
“I can’t tell you how much I’m enjoying your “Undaunted Optimist.” I just read the chapter, “Daughter, 7, declares Bible says I must love the dog.” I laughed so hard there were tears running down my face. I haven’t laughed that hard in years!” Charlotte P., Greensburg
Zeitgust Word of the Week (a word I made up with the goal of getting it into a dictionary) …
Parroty: The conditional cliches that emerge when nearly every coach and every player from every NFL team says, win or lose, the exact same thing.
Today’s Feature Post
“Lavish lunches & the choosy beggar (from ’17)
Val’s announcement that she’d scored a Groupon for lunch Sunday at the Hofbräuhaus on Pittsburgh’s South Side drew a surprising rebuke from our 10-year-old. “Pittsburgh is too far to go for lunch,” she bitched. She is mistaken. Pittsburgh is not too far to go for lunch. Neither is New Orleans. I went there for lunch in 1999. It lasted 10 days. Paschal’s Manale is a delightful little bistro tucked away on Napoleon Avenue. They’re famous for what they call a barbecue shrimp that to me should be called grilled shrimp in spicy barbecue sauce. Served with a Joel Gott Sauvignon Blanc (preferably ’97), it’s the perfect lunch. I was ostensibly there on assignment to cover an entertainment industry convention. It was for Details magazine which fool-heartedly had bestowed me with a limitless expense account.
Read extended version here …
Related silliness …
Lenten Fridays always have me fearing we’ll run out of fish
New Orleans should host every Super Bowl
Oddly enough (stories from my story treasure chest) …
Story of the blind alligator wrestler
Of all the lessons culled from an unintentionally educational jaunt through the Everglades, one noteworthy nugget remains attached to my brain with barnacle-like tenacity: Never, ever party with Gator Man. Refuse his offers of rum, jungle juice and swamp swill. Don not be tempted by his tanned hospitality, his warm and chummy come-ons. Accept and the best — the very best — that can come from the encounter is you wake up with a pounding skull and a nauseous stomach. Drink with Gator Man — any gator man — and the consequences could be a loss of a finger, a hand, a limb and rivers of swamp-tainting blood.
Read full story here
Final thought …
Cynics who do nothing but predict doom and gloom are misfortune tellers.
All Chris’s books can be purchased through www.ChrisRodell.com