SATURDAY, 1 APRIL, 2000, PHILADELPHIA

I went the shopping! I went the shopping! Michele rang me up this morning (weird for her, party girl that she is, “morning” is usually 1ish) and said, “It’s such a ga-lorrrrious day. What say you and I walk across town for coffee and some quick the shopping?” Keep in mind, this was at the crack of 10:30. Who woulda guessed. So Michele and I copped a pimp walk and hit the fancy stroll down South Street in the ga-lorrrious spring morning to make the shopping at some clothes stores. It is now 8:02 pm and we have just finally returned with post-coital smirks of Retail Satisfaction on our indulgent mugs. Why is this noteworthy and worth your time in the reading? Well, I can answer the first part anyway. Because I do not make the shopping. Ever. Really. As fashionable and hip as I am (cough, cough), I have not gone clothes shopping for myself in … 5 years? Maybe the stray shirt I find in a shop here and there — see mom every couple of years and she buys me some new black clothes, but as for spending 10 hours doing the shopping, I tell ‘ya — I’m bad like dat. I’d much rather buy DVD’s or beer or CD’s or other stuff. My priorities are fucked like dat. Word. But I had no choice, did I. Michele and I are popping down to New Orleans mid-week to meet with about a dozen other mutual friends from all corners of the globe. A Convergence, if you will. And me with no new party clothes to speak of? Same for Michele? The shopping was inevitable, to do the shopping. So, man-o-man, am I rocking out with two fists in the air with my black pinstripe 19th c. Oscar Wilde pants courtesy of Daffy’s; my black velvet form-fitting sass shirt covered with a million little mirrors so’s I’m a big ole’ disco ball ready to fall on Boy George’s head; my baby’s-ass-soft leather pants which do not make my butt look fat, thank you; and my gray woven tinsel metallic supa-sparkle button-down supa-stah shirt that makes the ladies swoon and the fellas anxious. And I got through the whole damn day for under $2 hunnie by some miracle of the Magpie Goddess — she who helps one Find The Bargains. Shop smart, when you go the shopping. That’s wot I say. There’s only one thing I saw and forsook today that will haunt me. Boots. Cowboy boots, even. Black alligator cowboy boots with the spiney alligator scales down the middle, hard as nails and nearly as sharp. Bad-ass. Bad-fuckin’-ass boots. A grand. Wrong. The price is not right, Mr. Barker. But then I am going to Louisiana in a couple of days, am I not? And that is the place where one finds alligator, n’est-ce pas? So we’ll see. We’ll just see! On the walk home, we passed by our local pub, and noticed a peculiar smell coming from within. Beer! So we stopped for a “wind-down” pint that of course turned plural soonafter because we had gone the shopping. We chatted gaily about how young and fabulous and hip and in-the-moment we are, even though we’re not, and at that time we actually convinced ourselves that we were rock stars, and it was our world, and y’all are just livin’ in it, foo’s, so step awf. I don’t know which went to my head harder, the Yuengling Lager, or the tinsel and leather reeking of rubber cement from the recent hem job. All’s I knows is that there is a special kind of glow you get from Retail Satisfaction, and it has been a marvelous, marvelous day, thanks for axing. And on Wednesday night, this is what I prophesy: We will land at MSY and I will see one of the most beautiful images that haunts me and which I cherish above all others. Niki standing behind the check-in gate, a loooong way down the hallway, hopping like she has a bladder infection. My gait will quicken to a trot as I try to push past the bovine tourists. It will be a 20 second moment, but it will last hours as I fight to close the gap. Like that lame-o bluescreened scene of Ashley and Melanie running towards each other at the end of the Civil War. And I will tackle my gorgeous red-mop-topped Trik and dryhump her in the airport for a while. Then I will remember she’s married, and that I am being the bad boy. After we fix our mussed hair, we’ll zip into town, throw down our stuff at friends’ houses, wriggle into our weasle-wear, scoot down to the Quarter to be reunited with some of the most glorious creetchurs that ever escaped the womb, and, if you look very carefully in the sky around 10pm central U.S. time on Wednesday, wherever you are, you will see the sky glow a little from the south. That is the result of tinsel-on-tinsel as I squeeze, spindle and mutilate all my loves — as the friction becomes unbearably frenetic. Why did I ever leave New Orleans you ask? Why, so I could experience these reconnoitering moments, of course, when I go back. Duh. It’s positively cinematic.