Nothing new or exciting in my life. I left Sunday afternoon to drive halfway to New Orleans, rather than spend my entire Sunday driving, or leaving in the small hours Monday morning and being totally frazzled when I did my presentation at noon. I am actually staying in a little town just outside New Orleans, called La Place. I feel safer in small towns than in big cities.

It happens to be Mardi Gras, and I was seriously thinking about going downtown one night to catch a parade (at my age, you only need to show a little collarbone to get beads.) But then I heard the story about the female cop trying to arrest someone. The police are still traveling alone in their patrol cars. She wrestled with the man for seven minutes, and no backup ever arrived. He finally got her gun and shot her 10 times. I decided that if the cops aren't safe in New Orleans, I'm not going to risk it. So I'm cleaning out my (always over limit) mailbox, working on my presentation for tomorrow, watching tv and re-reading a book I grabbed on my way out of the house. I don't know if I can stand much more of this excitement!

After I made my calls today I stopped at my favorite outlet center in Gonzales LA. They are re-doing it, making it more attractive and adding more stores. Sadly, the little bookstore I always frequented is gone, but on the plus side they have added an Ann Taylor and a Naturalizer outlet. Ann Taylor had a petite section and Naturalizer had some size 5 shoes, so I am a happy shopper. Apparently Houston is the home of big-footed people, because the only shoe store left that carries size 5 is Payless -- great on the budget, but unfortunately full of plastic shoes and not much variety. Other than being able to stand up in an airplane without hitting my head on the overhead compartments, there are NO advantages to being short. However, if Prince Charming ever comes looking for the woman with the small feet ... well, here I am.

I took a customer to dinner last night. I had called him last week to ask him to lunch, which I really felt I owed him because our factory did terrible things with two of his orders. (Not just late, they literally threw some of his stuff away, then had to make new ones to replace them.) Anyway, he said he couldn't make lunch because he was going to be in classes all week and as I started to tell him I'd catch him next trip, he said "But how about dinner?" So we agreed on where and when to meet. Tuesday night he called me, sounding slightly inebriated, and confirmed our plans, ending with "I'm really looking forward to it!" This had me a little on edge, but I didn't need to worry. He is such a nice guy that when he was telling me about taking his daughter to college 600 miles away, and how hard it was to drive away and leave her there, he teared up. So I had a very enjoyable evening and I think I smoothed over the factory's incredible stupidity and kept the customer. And, yes, I get paid to have fancy meals -- but I'd sure rather be eating at home right now.