No, just because I am here too, and happen to be walking through the Quarter, and DON'T look like I slept in a dumpster last night doesn't mean I'm a god-damned tourist waiting to hand you money because I should feel sorry for your sad-face and open hand.

Yes, this means you you obnoxious, loud-mouthed gutter-punk who immediately let's fly with a string of insulting accusations and bitterness once I ACTUALLY LOOK AT YOU, ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR PRESENCE (which is more than many in the Quarter will do) and politely tell you I can't help. If I was only mildly sorry for not helping you before I'm certainly not regretting my decision now. Good riddance!

This is my home too, although whereas I have actually lived here in this city for a time I can only assume you have flocked here from somewhere else... well, welcome to New Orleans, but when you are an entitled, white millennial I can't really feel sorry for you if you wind up like this. I will not be driven out by the likes of you.

Next time I too will SHOUT BACK.

Post Convention Exhalation

"It's Monday morning and the long weekend of party is over."  -- This could probably be said more times per year now, here, in New Orleans, than at any other time in my life...or of any of the places I've ever lived.

This past weekend was the Saints & Sinners Festival, an annual gathering of LGBT writers, poets, readers and various hangers-on. Now that we live here we can see many of our friends from all over who descend on the conference.  It's also nice that with each passing year we meet many more friends in the business, and some of whom ALSO live here, like right down the block.

It has become an annual thing that with Saints & Sinners comes our friend Felice, who we only get to see once each year. I deal with him much more than Dave does, as I manage his website, but the special 'Felice is in town' stories make the weekend that much more memorable.

I'm simply amazed.

Should I be? No. Because not only has Facebook shown me the ugliest side of humanity it has shown me the ugliest side of politics I thought I subscribed to. I can honestly say I have lost faith in the 'Liberal Masses.' I've spent the past 12 months sparring and ranting almost on a daily basis with those whom I would generally consider 'on the other side of the fence' politically... usually comforted at the end of the day with an assumption: people on my side of the spectrum aren't as dismissive, aren't as 'easily duped,' aren't as single-minded or lead down the garden path. I was wrong. And I'll admit, it was hubris, plain and simple. We always want to think 'our kind' infallible.

The details don't matter, suffice it to say that it all started with a posting from a group I had subscribed to months and months ago... a group that has a heavy left-leaning bent to everything they post. Some things are funny, some things are sad, others make you instantly take notice and say, 'WHAT!?” This was one of those times when my attention immediately had my knees jerking under my desk. What should have tipped me off immediately was the fact that what was being reported about so-and-so saying something was so inane, so ridiculous I couldn't believe anyone would in all seriousness print it. These days I've gotten into the habit of drilling down to the original of ANY article as blog posts and re-postings tend to add an extra layer of spin along the way. The entire time I kept thinking, “My GOD, did this reporter actually SAY that?” In the end, the words were there. All of them, exactly as they had appeared in the fury-bating, attention-grabbing post that caught my eye minutes before... but there were in fact more. And what I instantly realized was that I'd been duped into flying off the handle. The author wasn't actually proposing anything of the sort. She was making a 'modest proposal' of sorts. Yeah, ever hear of satirical reference? I know we are surrounded by it all the time these days, it's too bad so many people (it seems) can't even recognize it when it's smacking them in the face.

Perhaps I just commented too much. Or something. All I get when I try to log in is, "someone is trying to log in" YEAH, it's ME!

Just another thing that makes me think, "Fuck Facebook"

You fucking fucks.

I've been trying to come up with SOME reason to ditch Facebook. And the only reason lately is that you CAN'T get rid of the things you want to. It's theirs. (Although they say it's yours.)

I'm just not comfortable with that.

I want to be able to delete whatever I want, when I want, without jumping through hoops. That's what Facebook has become. Because they know that without YOU... they are dead. And actually... many, many MANY of their reported users are..... not real.

So I encourage ALL of you out there. DITCH Facebook. Seek alternatives. Call your friends, EMAIL your friends. TEXT your friends. Just be more 'real.'

</end of rant>