Vienna, Louisiana

B. had been telling me on the phone for about a week: "It's hot in Vienna."

Yep. It's been in the 90s here for several days. Unusually hot. Add to that the fact that air conditioning in vehicles and buildings isn't too common, and you get a sticky situation.

Add to that fact the fact that there were some big rains before the big heat and you get Vienna, Louisiana. Complete with hungry mosquitoes, as I found out when we strolled down to the Mayer for a drink and a couple of bottles of wine to take home. We sat outside in the beautiful patio with a hundred or so other people. The wine was fantastic (it wins lots of awards) and the food looked great (we didn't eat) but the air was dead and the mosquitoes weren't. I took a kind of delight in swatting them, insulting them as I did: "Motherfucker!" SWAT! "Asshole!" SWAT! "Taste death!" SWAT!

I told a woman friend once: "Only the female mosquito bites."

She said: "While the male mosquito stays at home watching the game and ignoring the kids."

Well, possibly.

We walked back home, me toting the four bottles of white. We poured a couple of glasses and B. turned on the TV to watch an opera, broadcast live on an elaborate outdoor stage on the shores of a big lake near the Hungarian border. Pretty impressive. A big production.

While I wrote the previous blog post and B watched the opera, a storm brewed up. Pretty soon the rain came and it was magical. The air cooled off immediately and the wine tasted even better. I joined B in the living room, stepped out on the balcony to feel the rain. We watched the rest of the opera and finished the first bottle of wine.

A good first evening back "home."