You know you're from New Orleans when ...

• Your sunglasses fog up when you step outside
• You save newspapers, not for recycling but for tablecloths at crawfishboils
• When you give directions you use "lakeside? and ?riverside' not north &south
• You stand in the "neutral ground" (area of ground between a two sidedstreet) "by ya mommas" (by your mother's house).
• Someone asks for directions and you stop and help them with a smile
• You think a lobster is a crawfish on steroids.
• You take a bite of five-alarm chili and reach for the Tabasco.
• The four basic food groups are boiled seafood, broiled seafood, friedseafood and beer
• You are asked to name the holy trinity and your reply is "onions,celery, bell pepper."
• None of your potential vacation destinations are north of the oldMississippi River Bridge (US 190).
• You refer to Louisiana winters as "Gumbo Weather."
• You sit down to eat boiled crawfish and your host says, "Don't eat thedead ones," and you know what he means.
• You don't know the real names of your friends, only their nicknames.
• You don't learn until high school that Mardi Gras is not a nationalholiday.
• You believe that purple, green, and gold look good together
• Your last name isn't pronounced the way it's spelled.
• You know what a nutria is but you still pick it to represent yourbaseball team.
• You like your rice and your politics dirty.
• No matter where else you go in the world, you are always disappointedinthe food.
• Your loved one dies and you book a jazz band before you call thecoroner.
• Your accent sounds nothing like Harry Connick, Jr's.
• You can sing these jingles by heart: "Rosenberg's, Rosenberg's, 1825Tulane;" "At the beach, at the beach, the Pontchartrain Beach..."
• When a hurricane is imminent, you have a lot more faith in Nash Robertsthan some Super Doppler 6000.
• Your town is low on the education chart, high on the obesity chart andyou don't care because you're No. 1 on the party chart.
• Nothing shocks you. Period. Ever.
• Being in a jam at Tulane and Broad isn't the same as being stuck intraffic.
• You have sno-ball stains on your shoes.
• You call tomato sauce "red gravy."
• Your middle name is your mother's maiden name, or your father'smother'smaiden name, or your mother's mother's maiden name, or yourgrandmother's mother's maiden name, or your grandfather's mother'smaiden name.
• You've done your laundry in a bar.
• You don't show your "pretties" during Mardi Gras.
• Your Santa Claus rides an alligator and your favorite Saint is afootball player.
• You suck heads, eat tail, sing the blues and you actually know whereyougot them shoes.
• You know why you should never, ever swim by the Lake Pontchartrain steps(for more than one reason).
• You cringe every time you hear an actor with a Southern or Cajun accentin a "New Orleans-based" movie or TV show.
• You waste more time navigating back streets than you would if you justsat in traffic.
• Your one-martini lunch becomes a five-bloody mary afternoon... and youkeep your job.
• You're walking in the French Quarter with a plastic cup of beer. Whenitstarts to rain, you cover your beer instead of your head.
• You eat dinner out and spend the entire meal talking about all theothergood places you've eaten.
• You greet people with "Howzyamomma'an'dem?" and hear back "Dey fine!"
• When you refer to a geographical location "way up North," you arereferring to places like Shreveport, Little Rock or Memphis, "where itgets real cold."
• You've ever had Community Coffee.
• You can pronounce Tchoupitoulas but can't spell it.
• You don't worry when you see ships riding higher in the river than thetop of your house.
• The four seasons in your year are: crawfish, shrimp, crab, and KingCake.
• You describe a color as "K & B Purple."
• You know those big roaches can fly, but you're able to sleep at nightanyway.
• You assume everyone has mosquito swarms in their backyard.
• When out of town, you stop and ask someone where there is adrive-through Daiquiri place, and they look at you like you have threeheads.
• You have flood insurance.
• You get on a bus marked "Cemeteries" and don?t think twice.
• You eat sno-balls instead of throwing them.