"NASHVILLE -- The strobe lights pulse and the air vibrates to a killer rock beat. Giant screens show mayhem and gross-out pranks: a car wreck, a sucker punch, a flabby (and naked) rear end, sealed with duct tape.

Brad Stine runs onstage in ripped blue jeans, his shirt un-tucked, his long hair shaggy. He's a stand-up comic by trade, but he's here today as an evangelist, on a mission to build up a new Christian man — one profanity at a time. "It's the wuss-ification of America that's getting us!" screeches Stine, 46.

A moment later he adds a fervent: 'Thank you, Lord, for our testosterone!'"

The atmosphere at Mimi’s Café evokes the spirit of a strange and ahistorical place, an engineered assembly of cultures where--the odds be damned—an eccentric sort of harmony is actually achieved between rural France ca. the late 1800s and the poor backwoods towns of New England before the second world war. That does sort of taste at first of good old “noo-AW-linz,” and, in fact, so does the establishment at first, but very quickly it is apparent that there is nothing of the unique culture that sprouted up out of the swamps in Louisiana (whatever the intentions may have been of the chain’s owners), and instead the restaurant creates its own subtly unique context. The back of the chairs are made of polished driftwood and the walls are cluttered with everything from old banjos to tin tea kettles to hollowed out guitars turned into wine racks and pastoral watercolors of dusty vineyards, and any sort of sign, poster, advertisement with French writing on it. Watery jazz plays over the loudspeakers.

I love the restaurant because it has such a non-Las Vegas feel to it, and reminds me of being on a vacation. It was also something of a ghost town at the hour that I arrived this morning, which I also love. And finally, it was, as I had suspected, a good way to start the day. Though, while I was there, relishing in the very non­desertness of it, I think I came to the realization that I am at last deromanticized with Las Vegas. I don’t mean all the glitz and glitter, the great neon signs and slot machines in grocery stores, the “Viva Las Vegas”-ness, the looming shadows of Elvis and the Rat Pack, the shows and extravagance… I came here at too young an age for any of that to ever hold any romance for me. I just mean the romantic idea of home, of a definite place where I belong, and where, when I a elsewhere, I am striving to return to. In all honesty, I’m a little tired of this place.

I spent most of the day reading the first part American Pastoral (which is nothing short of phenomenal) and watching a few episodes of Daria that I happened upon and which I had choice but to download. Somewhere during grades seven through nine I used to watch that show every day after school, more or less because it was a show that was on directly after school ended. It’s less entertaining than I remembered, but who doesn’t love a nice helping of bullshit nostalgia?

And one last note: Home Depot is a wonderful store. I had to abandon this post mid-way through the birthing process to fetch an 80lb bag of stucco, and I adore the place. Everything sold there is catered towards goals of restoring, building, growing, improving. The walls are practically oozing with optimism!

Oh! And before I go: Here is a fun site, with a nifty visual guide to imagining the 10^th dimension. Just select “Imagining 10 Dimensions” from the navigational bar on the left. You won’t be sorry!

Take care,
Spencer