Ciao bella

Last night a friend of a friend came by to visit, he was here from Ancona, Italy at a cardiologist convention. His first time in New Orleans. He had flown in and been holed up in the Monteleone for three days and had one evening free. Conferences – pishaw – what kind of life is that? We talked about his specialty, cardiac intervention – stents, angioplasty, etc. I told him my two brothers had stents and had stents been around for my father he would have lived beyond his 62 years. He asked how old my brothers were when they got their stents and I said mid-50s and he was shocked. He said in Italy, most of the interventions are performed around the 80s.

Then he asked what was the situation with my father and two brothers and I said – those particular ones in the family carried the most tension which manifested itself in rage and hence caused the heart to over churn. I said I imagine there is not a lot of stress in Ancona, and he admitted I am right.

At that moment, an hour after hearing there was a tornado warning for Orleans Parish, the sky outside grew ominously pink and the wind was making a sound that reminded me of the Wizard of Oz, and suddenly I was a little scared and we came inside and I closed the door. Tornado? I could tell he got a little anxy too.

A huge storm passed over whipping up the bayou into large waves and darkening the sky to almost pitch black and the electricity blinked on and off. I drove him home later down St. Charles Avenue where streetcars stood dead on their tracks and oak branches were down along the avenue. He said this is an interesting city, and I said, these are some interesting times.

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