Playing With Matches

Zombie Gras

Perhaps there is no better way to understand the nature of the magical city of New Orleans than by examining its nickname: The Big Easy. Because, upon closer observation, it is not a particularly big city by any metric, and it's famously hard to navigate, even as a neurotic, disembodied spirit. 

And it is not because renaming it "The Small Hard" would summon images best left for a late-night Google search that would best suit a non-PG 13 story like this one — a certain human company named "Microsoft" managed to pull it off without so much of a giggle — but because messing with people's heads is New Orleans's greatest pastime. 

Built on the back of hustling casinos, the French, pirates, corsairs, the occasional mobster, the French(Canadian-flavored), and filled with pick-pocketers, ne'er-do-wells, and other horribly hyphenated ruffians, it is considered one of the most violent cities in America. 

We at "Playing With Matches" recommend you keep at least three eyes on your fanny pack as you make your way through the beautiful sights of the city. If you can manage that, at least. 

One of the biggest scams the people of New Orleans play on visitors is pretending they have even the slightest semblance of direction and spatial awareness, as they seem to arbitrarily decide where cardinal points should be, and we end up with things like the sun rising each morning on the West side of the city. 

Theoretically — and we say this in the loosest terms — the city takes its geographical cues from the Mississippi River, which runs through the middle of the city, dividing the whole thing in two: the East bank, and the West bank. 

The problem is that the Mississippi river snakes through town like a toddler snorting sugar with the same gusto as a Wall Street executive, as such, things like up and down, left and right get arbitrarily decided depending on where you're standing. At some parts, the East bank dips West, North, And South of the West Bank, while the last one is mostly South of the East Bank, except in the very few parts where it is North of the West Bank, dipping even more West if you can run fast enough. 

It is not uncommon to see tourists on the ground in a fetal position while clutching a compass and a map to their chest while muttering Flat Earth Society propaganda. 

We at "Playing With Matches" highly recommend that, in the event that you visit this glorious and magical city, you kidnap a local and force them to reveal their secrets on how to move around without getting mentally insane. 

Lucky for us, this chaotic geography gets significantly simpler when you strip down any human settlement and focus on those areas inhabited by magical, spiritual, or otherworldly beings. 

"The a-brid-gud vershun, commin' right up!" said the jolly ghost. He spun like a ballerina, if said ballerina was made of farts, and circled an area for Chuck to see. "That the French Quarter. It be free grounds for all us para-normal folk."

"I never go there," said Chuck. "Too many people. It always smells like piss and bad choices."

"True dat, true dat," said the ghost. "But you gotsa know where belon' to who here." 

The ghost moved a few inches left to show everything next to he French Quarter. "Everythin' left of the FQ, Mid-City and Down-Town be the Spell Disstrit. That be where them Witches, Voodoo priest an' other unsavory folk tend to go 'round."

"That's where I work," commented Chuck. "Or worked. Will work again."

"You were one of them film critics, wasn't you? That doesn't sound too much fun."

Chuck glowed a deep pink of shame. "Well, It ain't supposed to be fun. Fact is, movies are the one thing that keep me sane. It helps me deal with the real world."