An Open Letter to the Citizens of New Orleans
My Fellow New Orleanians:
You are all a bunch of pussies.
Actually, let me rephrase that: you are all a bunch of water-hoarding, Margaret Orr-loving, I-10-clogging evacuation monkeys.
For days, every meteorological model has shown Dennis hitting the Floribama coast, but still, you’re closing up shop. You’re cancelling events. You’re running for the hills (literally, since Monkey Hill doesn’t count).
You’re on the streets at 7:00am, eyes wide with hysteria as you make one last run to Home Depot for plywood. Your minivans teeter from side to side, piled high with children and pets and shabbat candles (the only ones you could still find at Robert’s). At the Shell station, you pump gallon after gallon of gas, remembering your evacuation in the face of Ivan and hoping that it doesn’t take you another eight hours just to reach Aunt Judy’s house in Baton Rouge.
And so I ask, could you pantywaists stop with the kvetching and the tsoris and the powerdrills before dawn and please listen to Bob freaking Breck? Yes, I know: with that shrill little voice and those unfortunate hair plugs, he’s sometimes tough to stomach, but underneath all those Cassandra-Complex trappings, he’s a rational guy, and he’s saying “Sit your ass back down.” (I paraphrase.)
Seriously, if you’re gonna fly into a tizzy every time a low pressure system creeps toward the Gulf Coast, maybe y’all ought to move someplace else. There’s Minneapolis, for example. Or St. Louis. Or Hershey, Pennsylvania–you like chocolate, don’t you? Fact is, there’s a zillion places unlike New Orleans where you could live, so do us all a favor and hit the road. We have enough to worry about with crime and public schools and those goddamn new parking thingamajigs without you screaming gloom and doom in our ears every other week.
Good riddance. Don’t forget to drop us a line now and then from whatever godforsaken Midwestern hellhole you land in.
Sincerely,
Your neighbor, who is trying to get some sleep
sturtle [dot] com 