Dangermond.org

I just had the most remarkable conversation with my accountant – a man name Bill Shine – this man is incredible. Really he is. When Steve and I were breaking up, I called him to go over how we should split our assets and he said, first thing, just remember to remain friends because you never know what will happen between you over time.

Anyway, he was calling me today because last week when I met with my contractor and got the three times the cost invoice and was having a nervous breakdown I sent Bill an email and laid out to him everything that was going on and asked him what I should do. We’ve been playing telephone tag through the holidays, but he finally got me just now on the phone.

You know what he said? He said he would lend me the money to finish the house.

He floors me. I wouldn’t want to tap that well, but knowing it exists makes me feel remarkably lucky in life.

This has been a day of shifting plans – an organic creation – LaLa all day, cleaning windows, sweeping floors, chucking trash – sorting paint. A quick reshuffle to pick up my niece from Memphis – adorable – just into college and already changing – drop her by my other niece and see my great niece (beautiful) – go by my mother’s – her birthday, sick with the flu, weak and out of breath – run home and change – go by G’s – she’s painted a painting for me as a present – elephants (of course) – into the Marigny to celebrate R’s birthday with others – I’m grumpy R says – she called me an asshole earlier to G on the phone – G and I got invited to D’s wedding – she’s marrying a 28 year old! – whatyagonnado? – nothing is ever what it seems – she’s also pregnant! – I want what I know I don’t want (is that right?) – it’s such a difficult sorting out – in the end, it was the right thing to do – to have done all those things in one day – L says C asks him how I get the energy – please – someone needs to stop me – in the past it was always the laconic still one who dialed me down – now I have to save my own self from me. Sigh.

Everytime I think the stress of my job is too much to take and I would rather use braun than brains – I have to think of this day that I got up at the crack of dawn and went to the LaLa to begin cleaning every square inch of it – I didn’t get a lot of square inches but I worked till 3PM and I feel like I was hit by a MACK truck. It makes thinking seem like a walk in the park.

For the last six years I have worked with a woman of incomparable beauty and brains and now, sadly, she is leaving me and my company for new horizons. So sad for me/us. I can’t even write about it without welping up.

So I wrote a haiku about her:

What is it with her?
She is trying to tell me
Wait, she now talks Smurf!

Found a new place for after dinner cocktails – Evangeline on Toulouse and N. Murat – it’s in my hood and it wasn’t Pal’s (with it’s smoky weird crowd) and it wasn’t Ralph’s (with it’s smoky Yat crowd). I can’t remember the owner’s name but G and I had run into him at Ralph’s a while back and he told us about his new place.

I spoke to a guy there who has spent every Christmas in New Orleans for the last twenty something years – he is trying to convince his company to let him be virtual so he can move here. I like the sound of that. I like hearing that people who love and get this city are wanting to move here now.

G and I were having dinner at Cafe Minh and talking about our stress and how we need to develop a different attitude – a different mindset – because even though we are enjoying ourselves and happy to be here – the stress of modern living is weighing on us in a not so good way. Thankfully, there are people like Larry (our makeshift somelier at Minh’s) and then Raymond came in with Megan and his friends Tom and Stacy and I adore Raymond – we had our graduation party together at Monster’s with Johnny Jay and the Hit Men playing – that was so long ago – it was Raymond, Courtney, Nancy and me – dancing like tangled weasels all night.

Walking around the bayou yesterday morning I noticed how stark it looks – the trees have dropped their foilage, the grass has turned that brownish color, even the water in the bayou seems grayer. Winter is finally here in New Orleans, even though I still can barely wear Polartec.

I was watching the mallard swim around with the dowdy hen behind him and thinking of why it is that in nature the male is so gorgeous while the female needs makeup. Meanwhile, flash to New Orleans where there is a definite trend here of gorgeous babes with trolls. What goes on?

My Uncle John writes a correction to the LaLa backstory:

BTW, after reading your entry about your rellies coming by to see your
house…. you still missed it, that Hugh was a sailboat captain on Lake
Pontchartrain, going back and forth from N.O. to Mandeville, back in those
long-ago days….. but his ‘ghost’ is possibly still there on the bayou…

Okay, now here is the timeline for the LaLa:

The house was built in 1923, so it’s 84 years old.

Kathleen Kenny was the third generation Kenny living in the house.

She put it up for sale by owner on April 3, 2005 – that evening Nancy called me and told me she saw it.

The next day Nick walked me through the house via his cellphone and said, “you’ll get it, but Steve may not.” [Meaning Steve might not understand the house’s value.]

I Fedex’d a cashier’s check to Kathleen Kenny for $6,000 on April 5, 2005.

April 6, 2005 – Steve flew to New Orleans. (He got it.)

April 7, 2005 – Steve signed for us a Letter of Agreement to Purchase.

May 9, 2005 – we closed after sweating till last minute because one Kenny sibling, an ex postal worker, refused to sign.

May 10, 2005 – Bud Logan began demolition of the house.

August 29, 2005 – everyone evacuated due to Katrina bearing down on the city.

November 7, 2005 – Bud began the remodel again and worked on the house till the end of February, 2006.

November 8, 2005 – Steve and I separated.

March 12, 2006 – I hired Kim Saunee with Schilds Construction (Nick’s contractor).

May 6, 2006 – almost a year to the date, hired Trahan & Associates as the third contractor.

July 26, 2006 at 11:45 AM – Steve and my divorce was final.

December 21, 2006 – laid T&A off and took over as General Contractor.

Went to see Dreamgirls and I’m shocked I’ve not heard of Jennifer Hudson – she was on American Idol? Okay, how can that be? I’ve heard of Kelly Clarkson, I’ve heard more than I care to hear of Jessica Simpson and Paris Hilton – but this woman – give me a break – she is raw unbelievable talent – I have never heard a song sung like “And I am telling you, I am not going to” – the song comes midway through the movie but the entire audience burst into applause – really, one of the most moving moments of music listening I’ve ever seen and heard at the same time. Reminds me of the rare talent and incomparable Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin.

Showed up at Bridge House with the entire rest of the United States to hand out food to the homeless. Tripping over each other, I think we were one for one, one volunteer for every homeless person. Interestingly enough, most of the volunteers were women and most of the homeless were men – something to ponder, but I don’t know if there is any correlation.