Come to the Mardi Gras!

Mardi Gras KICKED ASS last night. SO much damn fun. I met Anya at work and ran home, hitting the Mexican grocery store for ice and powdered sugar--I only had a half cup for the frosting on the king cake, and I needed a cup. Weirdly, they did not have the sugar--I'm surprised a Mexican grocery store (a big one) doesn't have that staple. Anyway, so we ran home and I got dressed and hurried around, setting everything up. I'd made the cake and all the non-sweet food the night before since I worked yesterday, so I pulled all that out of the fridge and set it up on the table or the stove--luckily it all seemed to taste fine. I actually did not have that much to drink or eat since I was busy being a busybee hostess.

People started arriving around 8:20 and then it just never stopped. I think in the end we had around 25 people--let's see Duncan, Chris, Tesse, Jason (Specland), my friend Joy and two friends of hers, Katie Stodd, my friend Katie Hall from work, Paul Martinkovic, Ryan, my friend Jennifer, Tim and a friend of his, my friend Jim Denny, Calvin--I know I'm forgetting a few because I counted up to like 22 today. There were fewer than last year because of the weather, and also Lori didn't invite people. I'd set up a table in the living room--not against the wall (like last year) but sticking out for easier access. This was decorated with party favors (geaux cups + beads), food and glittuh, all atop an improvised purple table cloth. The Big Easy was playing on my TV, and my laptop was spewing zydeco, dixieland and blues. Some rowdy times. Lots of little groups here and there, on the lips couch, by the TV, in the kitchen, in the hallway. Yay! Everybody nomnomnomming on red beans and rice, shrimp jumbalaya, crawfish dip, king cake. And washing it all down with disgustingly sweet hurricanes, of course!

The great thing is this--even with fewer people, Tipitina's MADE OUT. We surpassed last year's take (which had many more people). We almost cleared $100--$96! I'm so proud! Thanks so much, guys--can't wait to mail this off to them!

The season's a-coming

It's 36° and we'll be hitting the low 40s today and for the next several days. And sunny! Yesterday morning it was very sunny--though still cold and damp, and of course by the afternoon it had gotten cloudy again. I'm probably way too optimistic but I think we may be seeing the first signs of spring--yay! I am SO ready for winter to be over!

And St. Patrick's Day is in less than a month!

Holy Crap

An Austin, Texas, resident with an apparent grudge against the Internal Revenue Service set his house on fire Thursday and then crashed a small plane into a building housing an IRS office with nearly 200 employees, officials said.

Holy. Crap. He also set his house on fire and left a long, rambly, incoherent letter with one theme: "I is angry, hate taxes and the government, rawr!"

What a f-ing loser. You know who this reminds me of? The Bath School bombing Another loser all angry because he had to pay property tax to support the local school. So what did he do? Killed his wife, set fire to his farm killing all of his farm animals (in fact he tied them in so they couldn't escape), and set off a series of bombs at the school, murdering more than 40 schoolchildren as well as some adults. You know what his note said? "Criminals are made, not born." 'Cause, you know, they drove him to murder 6 year olds. Taxes drove him to it. It's all someone else's fault.

I just don't understand people sometimes.