Swelter

Too much fun all over, as South Beach becomes one big Bourbon Street, full of dissipation and hectoring evangelists on every corner, ready to spoil the party. The religious impulse evidencing itself in the oddest places lately, the edgy jag grinding to a halt at 5:00 a.m. in one club or another, with an attractive woman suddenly erupting in an impassioned monologue, cutting through the boozy, fuck-it-all squalor like a vision of the Madonna: "I've been a model and a dancer, and I've seen every kind of decadence and evil behavior. But it's possible to be good in all of this, and better yet, being good is rewarding. Real evil is rare; mostly it's misguided people who've chosen the wrong path. Shouldn't it make us suspicious that evil is so easy and good is so hard?