So many more New Orleans folks have come barging into my life, and I've opened the door wide for 'em, all because of blogging.

In the past few months, I've hung with Ms NOLA and her Cap'n Sarcastic, Pontchartrain Pete, and Ms Stacey at Rock N Bowl, I've welcomed Sheckrastos and Dr A, the Oyster clan, and Celcus and Cleo to my home on Mardi Gras, I've run into AshMo and family as well as Lisa over at the little guy's school's SpringFest, I saw Coozan Pat hurtling himself away from work not too long ago, I met with Sophmom at a local watering hole while she was in this neck of the woods, Karen rescued me from a lost car keys incident, I saw this fellow at a recent St Patrick's Day par-tay, saw this one at a local breakfast place recently (and don't forget to wish him a happy birthday tomorrow, folks!), and I see this character pretty much every week, if not every other day. Can't avoid him, for some reason ;-).

With all this meeting and greeting and hanging with other members of the blogpocheh, I think it's high time we develop some sort of secret handshake or something. Really, NOLA says it best:

That was all fine and good. But the next thing I knew things had taken a turn, a turn had you told me it’d have taken I would never have begun blogging. Had you said, “you will start to meet other bloggers,” I would have been turned off. I am not one to “meet someone through the internet.” And I could never have envisioned me wanting to meet other bloggers in “the real world.”

Never say never, right?

I for one am quite happy I haven't said never to all these folks.

And though things on this blog lately have taken a somber turn, and Dan will say things to me like, "Really, you didn't have to tell me we were meeting people to get me to come here!" when I consent to meet with other blogging folks and drag him along, and though I will deflate Dan's news on occasion by telling him I already found out about Al Copeland passing away from the blogpocheh (among other things), I am, overall, grateful and happy with this blogging thing.

I will say that Dan is the only one who has brought up the possibility that folks will now start suing the Popeyes spice supplier Al owned for giving them cancer of the salivary glands. Perhaps too much Popeyes chicken might have contributed...

Naaaaah.

Let Al rest in peace. He lived his life like a house afire. And Madame DB is right:

It’s funny to read the obituary of this flamboyant, ego-driven, over-the-top man and to come away thinking, “wow, Anne Rice is a real nut-cake.”

And, in more RSD news this morning:

...Vallas' superintendency could become a test case for a top-down, executive management style for urban school districts, a style unhindered by a local, on-the-ground school board or, for that matter, a strong teachers union. If Vallas succeeds in demonstrating improvements, he could bolster the case for more unchecked power at the helm of school districts. If he flounders, he could becomes a fall guy with fewer people to share the blame.

Check with We Could Be Famous to see E's take.