2000-07-18 - 15:41:39

We left Friday and drove 7-8 hours to New Orleans and arrived at, like, 3 am. Leslie had a friend whom she had met last time she was in town so we had a free place to crash. His name was Stacey and he had been a one-night stand of hers from Mardi Gras. He actually turned out to be the most horrific creep ever and as it turned out we only stayed in New Orleans one night because we couldn't bear to be around him any longer.

I don't dig negativity, but I just want to take a paragraph or two record for all time how awful this guy was, so that years from now I can continue to make fun of him. First of all, he was a poet - I am a poet too, so I can dig poetry, but this was one of those belligerent ego-maniac poets who thinks that they have had a more tragic life than anyone and are therefore the greatest writer that ever lived and who complains endlessly about how he feels like a prostitute for publishing his work. Bob Dylan, he ain't. On top of that he just stank. I mean, I know its New Oleans in the summer time and everyone gets sweaty - but we are talking some serious funk here - he smelled like swamp ass. And the whole day on Saturday he was trying to get Leslie to sleep with him and creating all kinds of drama like she was being careless and he was heartbroken. Number 1 Leslie has never claimed to be anything but Lesbian, and Number 2 she only had sex with him once, in a car at Mardi Gras, no less. She had genuinely liked him before this weekend, but she did not like being made to feel obligated so have sex, so she didn't.

But the final straw in my anger for Stacey was that he didn't like Jim and he was rude to him publicly. Jim is brilliant. He may not be as educated as some people, but he is an astounding thinker. Jim was putting all his energy into drinking and having a good time on our little vacation and was not trying to keep up appearances or say the perfect thing - and our pretentious poet Stacey had to call him out about vocabulary like he was an idiot. Finally, he called Larissa aside to tell her how much better she was than Jim. I can be understanding about many things, but when someone is critical of my closest friends, and especially Jim, I get furious. So after that, we took Stacey home and we split town. The cool thing is that when we were talking about Stacey in the car on the way home Jim went on and on about how Stacey had treated me that morning (Stacey had put down being a writer and put down Boulder, CO) and said that he knew from the second that Stacy had put down my dreams that he was no good and Jim went on about how much he cared about me and couldn't dig anyone who treated me bad in the slightest. wow - sometimes I forget that Jim cares about me too.

But the real indicator from the beginning that Stacey was a dud was his answer to the ultimate personality test question. We asked him: If you had unlimited money at his disposal would he buy a pirate ship or a yacht? He said a Yacht because it would have air conditioning. WRONG. The right answer to that question is PIRATE SHIP. I mean, how fuckin cool would a pirate ship be? A yacht means that the person has no real imagination.

I was really glad we went to New Orleans, and we did have a great time there despite Stacey, but I don't think I'll ever go there again. There was alot of spiritual energy there that I dug, but I could also sense bad vibes. The smell of death is in the air there and everyone you meet seems tainted in some way. Some parts of the city were truly beautiful, but they seemed like layers of make-up on a death mask. We went to Marie Leveaux's grave (she was a 19th century voodoo priestess) and gave her an offering of rum. But after that things were freaky - Larissa says that she got the sense Marie wanted her snake-bone necklace -- she didn't leave it on the grave because she loved that necklace, but she's had bad dreams and vibes since and was compelled to remove it. New Orleans was a trippy place.

Sunday we drove back to Atlanta via Highway 10 - we had the most lovely day. We stopped off at the beach and swam in the gulf. The water was shallow and we waded out maybe 1/4 of a mile. It was gorgeous. Then, when we got to Biloxi, we looked out at the water and what did we see? Lo, and behold, it was a PIRATE SHIP! It was the Treasure Bay Casino, built in the shape of a pirate ship. So we had to stop. We went in and played nickel slots for a couple of hours and enjoyed free drinks and had a blast. We drove home after that in harmony, enjoying good conversation. It was truly one of the most blissful days of my life.

The one part of the weekend that is still tugging at my mind was a psychic reading I had done for me in Marie Leveaux's voodoo shop on Bourbon Street. The woman read my palm for a few seconds and then closed her eyes and started talking about what she saw about me. She said that I was creative and a poet and that I would be writing for the next 10 years. Then she saw me painting in my late 30s. She said that I would be travelling soon, and that i was going to be going to Europe next year. She saw me starting off visiting my mother (who will be going to Romania next fall forreal) and then spending at least 2 years in Europe. She said that I had to go to Germany - she said Germany was my destiny - she said I had many past lives there and Germany was where I needed to be. She said she saw me in a beautiful field there, and that I would write a novel there about a young woman in Germany. She said I would live there, and she saw me with a man there. She said that there would be one man in my life who would be my rock, my encouragement, my greatest friend whom I would know my whole life long and who may end up being the man I marry, but on the other hand there may be no romantic involvement at all. She said I may already know this man, and he would come to visit me in Germany for a while, or I may meet him for the first time there. She said she saw him in school now - either as a professor himself or as a student currently still in college. She said I would be lifelong friends with my current close group (Larissa Jim Ryan Leslie)and she always saw me living alone, but that we would have reuninions later in life. She said that I would have 2 children.

Whew! That blew my mind - what a wonderful possible life I will have. I don't know if it will come true, because your future can change, but its a wonderful thought. I have been thinking alot about who my rock is - if I already know him - and if I do, is it Ryan? Jim? Paul? I guess the only way to know is to wait and see. I am excited about my future. I have never really liked Germany and have never thought about living there - but its strange because I have said before a few times, even years ago, that if I had had any past lives, I lived in Germany during world war II. I do feel connected to Europe during wartime and postwar.

Larissa also had a reading - she said that the woman told her that she was gifted psychicly and had such a strong psychic/healer energy that she felt she was talking to her own self - She told Larissa she would have a hard life in which everyone she met would fall in love with her, and she told Larissa that she had a gift which was critical for her to develop in the next couple of years or things might turn out badly for her. Whew -- what a trippy and scary reading, but also true. It amazes me that this woman would have said that to Larissa having only just met her - the woman must really be psychic.

I have feeling that we're all about to walk off the plank this year, into unknown waters. Exciting . . .