I'm a city lights princess myself so I can't see any downside in going from Podunk to - not just one of America's great cities, but truly one of the world's great cities. There are lots of places that are pretty much like lots of other places. Then there are places that are genuine, unique, one-of-a-kind, and not duplicated anywhere else. New Orleans is one of those places. Like Paris, New York and SF. And like SF it's the only other place in the USA that has a very European feel to it. The rural parts of the country in that entire area from Kansas/OK/MO/Miss have pretty much gone Jesusland loony-tunes. They used to be called the 'Bible Belt' as kind of a joke, but they've made it all too real. NOLA on the other hand - well even those of us who live out in what we like to call Sodom and Gomorrah by the Bay know that S-I-N in America was invented in New Orleans. The food is divine, the music is god's gift to American and the world, it's an incredibly literary place, and (like San Francisco) if you're only a little bit weird no one will notice you at all. It's pretty much required to be weird in at least one way. Hell, you will have work overtime to get noticed or stand out. So it's pretty easy to just blend into the background as 'local color'.
Laissez les bons temps rouler girl, that jerk just did you the biggest favor in the world and didn't even know it.
Oh yeah, be smart, be alert, be in-tune, and be aware, exciting places have an element of danger to them (that's part of what makes them exciting don't 'cha know), but smart people know that even if a lot of trouble's comin' it don't have to come to you.
