Mondays Missives

• File this one under good grief: I can block every single one of those stupid viagra ad emails and they keep coming like a flood after a New Orleans levee break but, my bank account statements go straight to the spam bin after allowing it as an exception.






• People think it's a shame that New Orleans isn't completely rebuilt and blame it on everything from prejudice to simple incompetence. It was ridiculous to allow that city to grow to anything larger than a support system for the port in the first place.






• It sinks at the rate of 3 inches per year.






• Politicians, writers and engineers were calling for its abandonment in the late 1800s.






• My memories of New Orleans: discarded crack pipes and vials 3 inches deep on street corners, constant gunfire, unemployed people staggering around everywhere, dirty, stinky, decay.






• It will wash or blow away again no matter what man does.





• If a person has a strong work ethic I think it will cover a lot of sins and help them do better in life regardless of their perceived personal limitations.





• Until my late 30s I only missed 4 days of work.






• I've never worked in food service at any point in my life except as a dishwasher when I was 12 years old. I would get to work about 6:00 in the evening and work until midnight and walk about 2 miles home. Can you imagine if someone allowed their kid to do that today?





• The old truck stop waitress ladies there took care of me like I was a baby. When I would ask for a cheeseburger and fries for my lunch one of them would say,"Oh no, your not going to eat that junk again." then," Al, fix this boy a chicken fried steak plate and make it a double!"





• I knew a girl who worked at the same McDonalds for 16 years.





• I looked up "rut" in the dictionary- there was her picture.