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Note to self and others: I am not a patient person. I do not easily abide pussyfooting, bush-beating, or concensus-building. I want action, and I want it now, daddy. When things around me stall for no good reason, I can become very angry and occasionally abusive. It may seem juvenile, but I’m usually right, so stay out of my way.

<![CDATA[New Orleans doesn't always fare well with Conde Nast writers. Case in point: native son Nicholas Lemann (son of Uptown lawyer Tommy Lemann and stepson of novelist Sheila Bosworth), who's been particularly nasty to his hometown on the pages of New Yorker. But this recent GQ article by Alan Richman clearly takes the king cake:

I’ve never had much luck eating in New Orleans. I might be the only person who disliked Uglesich’s, a beloved seafood joint where I once stood in line for an hour in wretched early October heat for a po’boy containing a miserly quantity of oysters so overcooked they were like marbles. I believe most of the profits made by that establishment came about because of its periodic threats to close, which inevitably brought a rush of business. Uglesich’s finally shut down last year, to everybody’s dismay but my own.

—continued at GQ

Now, I know that New Orleans is far from perfect, and I’m more than happy to hear critiques of the city from people who know what they’re talking about. But when someone compares Creoles to non-existent “faerie folk, like leprechauns, rather than an indigenous race”, I think he deserves a swift kick to the nuts.

BTW, that article came to my attention via Pat Jolly, Gawker, and the Onion’s AV Club, which offers a delectable dissection of the piece.

And apologies to an especially dear friend at the New Yorker. You’re still a mensch in my book.

UPDATE: A considerate Metroblog reader pointed out this follow-up to the story, in which a New Orleans-based foodie interviews Richman by email. Despite being given the opportunity to clarify his arguments, Richman still comes across as a major dick.

Over in Orlando, folks are apparently tired of hearing about Katrina–specifically, tired of hearing about New Orleans and Katrina. They wonder why we’re getting all this attention when other cities and towns along the coast received far more damage than New Orleans did. They wonder why we weren’t better prepared, why folks didn’t leave, and why, oh, why there are so many goddamn telethons.

Well, lemme bring you up to speed, sister.

1. If you think you’re sick of hearing about Katrina, try living in New Orleans for a couple of weeks. Actually, make that days. I mean, we have to drive through it on the way to work, on the way to school, on the way to the grocery store. And on top of all the weedy yards and houses still marked with spray paint, we have to hear about it on the evening news, too? We have to read about it in the paper? We have to see it online on every media outlet and on the front of every CD package emblazoned with the words “Proceeds to benefit the recovery effort in New Orleans”? Enough already.

2. We understand that we’re not the only city affected by the storm. We know there are places that suffered much worse than New Orleans–places where there’s nothing left to salvage because even the slabs of houses were washed out to sea. We’re painfully aware of all that, and I think that each of us, to some degree, is experiencing a bit of survivor’s guilt. However, as much as I like to think I control everything in the universe, I have no power over the media. Nor do my friends and neighbors. Evacuees sitting around in Red Cross shelters don’t make front page news, and felled trees don’t generate much human interest. New Orleans won out because we had the best story: people in despair amid neighborhoods full of muck.

3. We were also an important story because we were a great example of the government’s inability to respond to disasters at the local, state, and national level. The human suffering that you and I and everyone else with electricity witnessed that week was not matched by an outpouring of concern from the government, and that disconnect made great news. This shouldn’t be surprising: it’s journalism 101.

4. Not to be snotty or anything, but New Orleans has generated a great deal of sympathy among Americans because we’ve given so much to the country over the past three centuries, from music to food to literature and more. No disrespect to Orlando, but, um, I don’t think losing Sea World would be as big of a story.

5. And just so you and everyone else in Orlando knows: New Orleans is not “GONE”. The parts of the city that most folks know and love–the Quarter, Uptown, and so on–are alive and well. I don’t know if you noticed, but that thing we call the Superdome reopened a few weeks ago. I think it was on TV. Don’t write us off.

I’m not even going to bother to mention some of the other crap discussed in those posts. How many times do we have to explain to others why residents didn’t leave–residents who didn’t own cars or even know friends with cars? How many times to we have to explain that the New Orleans/Katrina story was not so much about a natural disaster as it was about government ineptitude, from the Corps of Engineers’ faulty levees to Brownie’s botched rescue/recovery efforts? When you folks come up with something new to say, some new criticism that you wanna level at New Orleans or the media or whatever, by all means let us know, but until then, please, give us a break.

What the hall? Even Margaret Cho knows you can’t text-message breakup, betch!

LETTERS

To the woman in the white Corolla at the corner of Chartres and St. Ferdinand: put down the banana clip. Immediately. You’ve had more than a year to play the disheveled, disoriented, post-K card. No more excuses.

To the Commander-in-Chief: your hubris was cute and catchy back during first few months of airstrikes and shock-and-awe, but if you’d ever read a history book or watched The Princess Bride, you’d have known that it’s always a bad idea to fight a land war in Asia.

To Cormac McCarthy: I wrote that review of The Road before I’d finished the last ten pages. I’m done now, and all I gotta say is: wow, you’re a real pussy. You give me 230-some-odd pages of brilliance, and then that? …It’s perfect movie fodder, though, and I’m sure someone’s already paid you, like, a zillion dollars for the rights, so what do you care what I think?

To this morning’s forgettable, generically blonde newscastress: I don’t know what they teach you kids in school these days, but thin stripes–especially horizontal ones–are a bad choice for TV. You’re hurting my eyes, bitch.

To all the circuit queens who came to town for this weekend’s Halloween in New Orleans party: thank you. Now, please, pack your coke spoons and get your tweaked, cock-gobbling asses back to Dallanta or San Somethingorother. Our city’s need for tourism revenue doesn’t change the fact that I think you’re all a bunch of middle-aged ‘tards.

To anyone who cares: as the only magazines to which I subscribe are now National Geographic and Southern Living, I have officially turned into my grandmother. (As if you couldn’t tell that from #5 above.)

FIVE THINGS TO CONSIDER BEFORE READING
CORMAC MCCARTHY‘S THE ROAD

1) You cannot put it down. For people who have 9-to-5 jobs, this is a problem. For people who are easily spooked and who live in creaky old houses, it’s an even bigger problem. The Road will keep narcoleptics up past bedtime.

2) It is impossible to shake off. For days afterward, the world feels just as dreary as the one McCarthy has created. If you’ve read The Handmaid’s Tale, you know what I mean. You’ll never look at a can opener the same way again.

3) For New Orleanians, it hits close to home. Do I really need to read about a world of destruction and chaos and limited resources and no leadership and a reduced population of survivalists when I have two perfectly good windows that face the street? I mean, things are definitely, totally getting way better down here, but yeah, it’s a little soon.

4) For readers of a certain age, it dredges up childhood fears. Remember Threads and The Day After and Where Have All the People Gone? and about a bejillion other 70s/80s movies about the extinction of mankind via natural and unnatural means? Remember the nightmares that crap used to give you? Well, get the Tylenol PM handy, that’s all I’m sayin’.

5) It makes you worry for those you love. I might be alone in this, but when I think about potential tragedies, I don’t think about myself too much; I think about the boyfriend and family and friends and pets and everyone else in my life. See, when you worry, I think you’re concerned about loss, and you can’t lose yourself, can you? So, basically, unless you’re one of the girls at Mrs. Meers’ Hotel for Young Women (i.e. all alone in the world), The Road may cause an ulcer or two.

So, this arrived in my mailbox yesterday:

I’m thrilled that Egana’s challenger in the run-off for House Representative/District 97, J. P. Morrell–son of perhaps the dumbest, orneriest, most egomaniacal, most corrupt politician Louisiana has ever seen–chose to take the high road this election season.

I’m not one to brag, but I gotta say: the super-secret birthday blowout I put together for Jonno over the weekend was pretty damn cool. With surprise guests arriving from the other two coasts, numerous great meals, and ringside seats at Saturday’s Big Easy Rollergirls bout, the only thing missing was a couple of trained elephants performing Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song”. (Although from what I hear, my friend Matt’s band now performs a washboard/sousaphone version that’ll soon make the elephants obsolete.)

The highlight was clearly the roller derby. Set among the glittery, papier-mache, Carnival glamour of Mardi Gras World, it was an adrenaline-filled, only-in-New-Orleans spectacle that even had sissies like me leaping to their feet, screaming, “Kill her! Trip her! Knock the bitch out!” But then, girls in bloody Carrie costumes and rollerskates probably have that effect on a lot of people.

The pièce de résistance of that particular evening came when my pals and I tottered out to the car at halftime to replentish our beer supply (from the remains of the tailgate party) and witnessed two lesbians in an F-150 driving smack into my pal Lisa’s Camry as they exited the parking lot. In her PBR-induced stupor, the passenger admitted that she’d been going down on her girlfriend at the time, and that’s what caused the accident. Frankly, I’m not sure what’s worse: the fact that Lisa’s fender fell victim to a sloppy muffdive, or that the only reason we witnessed the accident is because we were too cheap to pony up for beer at the bar.

Anyway, the boyfriend seemed to have a good time, and even took a few pics along the way. Enjoy ’em, then go buy your tickets for the Rollergirls’ November derby before they sell out. Like, seriously. Don’t be stupid, yo.

So there we were last night: a bunch of fags and one ladyfriend watching the PR finale. We were chatting and drinking beer and snacking and being catty, and then the shows began. And I don’t know about the rest of the folks in the room, but I felt this uncontrollable desire to critique absolutely everything that came down the runway–like I was some kind of authority on the fashion industry. Like I was Elsa Klensch’s goddamn boyfriend. Oh, that hem’s falling apart! Look at that poorly made inseam! Jeez, that model’s fat, and that one can’t even walk in heels!

In case you’re wondering, Sherlock, this bitch could sooner hotwire a car than cut out a Butterick pattern. But for some reason–probably ’cause I’m a big ol’ nellybeast and secretly believe that fashion is embedded in my genetic makeup–I felt like I had the right, nay, the duty, to share my insights. Like Tony and Tia discovering their magic powers, I was suddenly imbued with a complete understanding of clothing, from design to production to the channels of distribution. By some fluke, though, I kept my mouth shut–which is good, because truly, I don’t know shit.

I can be quite a pretentious tard when I wanna be. Luckily, one of my personalities tends to keep that in check. Mostly.

New Orleans’ gallery season kicked off last Saturday night, with ateliers across the city slingin’ cheap hooch for the hipsters, homos, and suburban hordes. And the hands-down hoppin’-est place in town was Arthur Roger Gallery, which featured the work of flashy, trashy, cinéaste, John Waters.

You probably know Waters as the director of low-rent masterpieces like Polyester and Desperate Living, or perhaps as the author of some witty social commentary, but in a triple-threat move worthy of Rita Moreno herself, Waters is also a conceptual artist. In fact, when he’s not making films, you’ll often find Waters at home, taking pictures of films as they play on his television.

As you might expect–I mean, this is the guy who convinced Divine that eating fresh dog shit on film was a fabulous idea–Waters ain’t afraid to get his sass on, and many of his photographs are like big teabags in the face of middle-class values. Highlights from Saturday’s exhibition included “Eat Me” (above), “9/11” (a shot of title scenes from films scheduled to play on the planes that crashed into the Twin Towers), and a “sculpture” that was essentially an oversized hand towel embroidered with a message that was once a rallying cry for AIDS activists. Say what you will about the slow, steady decline of his movies, but J-Wizzle still got game where galleries are concerned.

P.S. I’d have snatched a photo of me standing beside the man, but I couldn’t get near his pants. Honest to goddess, they glowed like the tractor beam in Galaga–and not in the good way.