The heat index is over 100 degrees in New Orleans today, so of course N. and I decided to take a bike ride.  Fortunately, while searching music listings this morning, I discovered that Tres Jazz, the International Jazzercise Convention, was meeting at the Morial Convention Center downtown.  N. is game for anything, so we tooled over there, fully expecting to be asked to leave for failure to register, but hoping to sneak in to watch.  I absolutely love the many mini-worlds out there, the ones that you don’t know about unless you are in them.  I have only recently discovered, for example, that there is a whole world of bicycling blogs dedicated to taking it slow.  When I quit smoking, I joined what might be seen as a cult at quitnet.com, where I found real community and saved my own life.  When I drop in on a convention like this one, part of me is clowning, sure, but I also have a lot of respect for the intense hobbyist, being one, in spurts, myself.

And the Jazzercisers were incredibly welcoming, from the many women from all over the world who grabbed the camera out of my hand to snap photos of N. and I (one doesn’t need to speak the same language to understand “I’ll take that picture for you”) to these fine gentlemen, all the way from Carlsbad, CA, who took a genuine interest in the novel I was carrying around.  No one looked askance, even though I was clearly not dressed to Jazz.  After strolling through the Convention Marketplace we sat–or rather, danced–in on the Street Jazzercise session where I managed to pick up some moves, the Motorcycle, the Bow and Arrow, and the Bounce, to name a few.  It might just be my former intense step aerobics habit, but I felt myself being sold on the thrill of the giant group dance.  Today’s ride brought me this totally unexpected pleasure–thanks International Jazzercisers!