The road back through the bayou began at the bank,
fraught with all the typical mercury in retrograde shenanigans..
Luckily, these snaggles were all swiftly dispatched
with relative calm and the rest of our visit was hitchless bliss!

Alix the Hawtpantz and Bryan le Fey were our trusty
and talented traveling companions-
we made an intrepid departure from this monolithic bank building
mere hours later, only to crawl through the swamps at a snail’s pace..

We finally made it in to New Orleans in the wee hours,
worn and tattered but ready to hie ourselves over the to
Spellcaster Lodge when I neatly locked the keys safely in the car.

Russian princesses and dreaded sea-captains are ready for dancing
on the sparkly ceiling to the melodies of Quintron and Miss Pussycat now!

Our dear friends The Old Man of the Sea and his drownded chanteuse
who put us all up in their beautiful house during Mardi Gras

In New Orleans on your birthday everyone pins
money on you- put that in your pipe and smoke it!
Or better yet- start that tradition everywhere else too,
because it’s a damn fine one!

The lovely Alita in her incredible feathery chapeau-
she made it, and she’ll make one for you!

Giant japanese magnolia tree = liberty!

Drewzilla eats four different kinds of birthday cake.
He is one of my favorite people.

For Lundi Gras we were a gang of crimson-clad, chinoiserie-draped
scarlet harlots who eat firecrackers for breakfast and dance the can-can.

“And it may come to pass that I shall have stranger things to tell you;
for this is a land of magical moons and of witches and of warlocks;
and were I to tell you all that I have seen and heard in these years
in the enchanted City of Dreams you would
verily deem me mad rather than morbid.”
—Lafcadio Hearn, 1880, describing New Orleans in a letter to a friend.

My valentine!

Who loves ya baby?
Dr. Flummox does-
she’s preparing to go out and harass the
religious right parading around with their
crosses and signs and megaphones..
She, and all my amazing friends in New Orleans
are living love-letters, flesh and blood valentines
to a city still bursting with lust for life
and an irrepressible joyfulness.
I often meet people who think that there is
nothing left there- they imagine a flooded crater
when they think of the city, if they do at all..
Well, the following quote may be dreadfully over-used,
but only because it is still so very true..

“Times are not good here.
The city is crumbling into ashes.
It has been buried under a lava flood
of taxes and frauds and maladministrations
so that it has become only a study for archaeologists.
Its condition is so bad that when I write about it,
as I intend to do soon, nobody will believe
I am telling the truth.
But it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes
than to own the whole state of Ohio.“
-Lafcadio Hearn
Here’s a little valentine for you,
and incredibly romantic billet-doux
from the marvelous Marissa Nadler
(by way of Lord Whimsy with love and thanks!)