We are all struggling here but we are going to make carnival wonderful this year. I received a rather bummer of an email last week from a member of the krewe of Muses. Nothing like sick and depressed when you’re already sick and depressed. The Zulu Vice-President is soliciting help from other krewes, offering a limited number of riding positions for people interested in participating in their parade. I know what an honor it is to ride and I feel bad for all the regular members who are unable to ride. I suggested perhaps people donate funds to sponsor a regular member so that they may ride. However, this could leave some riders out in the cold if there wasn’t enough for every member. So the krewe is allowing non-members to fill the vacancies.

Apparently, eighty percent of the membership of the Krewe of Zulu has been significantly impacted by Hurricane Katrina, with many losing their homes and possessions. This has put the krewe in a financial bind.

For those (if any!) not familiar with them, Zulu is a predominately African American krewe, formed in 1909, which has had a major impact on Mardi Gras history. They parade rolls on Fat Tuesday, before Rex.

Just to let readers unfamiliar with how Mardi Gras actually works, it’s locals who make it happen. Yes, some members invite friends from all over the country too. The fee for riding is $1,500, which is average for Mardi Gras krewes. Riders receive a complete ride package, including all throws, a costume, makeup and an invitation to the Lundi Gras Party. Both men and women are allowed to ride in Zulu.

I am happy to report that I followed up with Vice-President, Naaman Stewart, today via email and he said things are going well regarding rider recruitment.

Zulu coconuts are always, THE throw to get . . . this year more than ever before.
Here’s their website: http://www.kreweofzulu.com/
The proclamation is interesting.

And this year marks the 150th Anniversary of Mardi Gras so it just had to happen.

There were two important stories today about things that are very likely going to alter the fundamental way that Louisiana has historically dealt with eminent domain. The first one I read was in Gambit, and talked about the prospect that Louisiana voters would be asked to alter how eminent domain payouts are figured in the narrow case of land seized for hurricane defense projects. Money quote:

Sen. Reggie Dupre leans in close, waving his finger over the aide’s notebook: “Tell them we want a constitutional amendment on the ballot that would allow the state to take private land for hurricane-protection projects, and we pay only fair market value for it.”

Dupre, who has been involved with most of the constitutional amendments related to natural waterways over the past five years, says he would base his new proposal on the 2003 model — only this time, it would apply to hurricane-protection projects, such as levees, seawalls and floodgates.

In short, such a proposal could translate into fewer dollars for landowners standing in the way of hurricane-protection projects. Legally, the measure would alter the way courts are allowed to compute the value of lands that are seized.

The “2003 model’ refers to the last alteration of eminent domain in Louisiana, in which fair market value was adopted as the standard for figuring payouts for coastal restoration projects.

My initial reaction is to reject such proposals, because the concept of private property is such a vital plank in our democracy. But one quote from the article gives me pause.

“This is a major concern,” [Newman Trowbridge, Jr., a Lafayette-based attorney and general counsel to the Louisiana Landowners Association] says of the proposal, which is still in its conceptual stage. “Hurricane protection levees are often placed in areas that are economically developable. In a lot of instances, this is very valuable land that could be income-producing for the owner.”

I tend to agree, with a caveat: without the hurricane protection levees, this isn’t very valuable land. So where do you draw the line? No matter where that line is, someone is going to get screwed, and, under the current situation, someone is going to enjoy a nice windfall on otherwise worthless property.
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Fist of all, is anyone else just tired? I mean really tired. Tired in a possibly brand new form that tired has never taken before? It may be that we’re witnessing, first hand, the evolution of tired. A new, more complex form of tired that is impossible to fight off and to which sleep will no longer remedy. Fascinating!

I’ve picked up a few new driving habits as well. I now look both ways when crossing a one way street because there’s a better than 50/50 chance some fucktard is flying down the street at 60 miles an hour the wrong way, talking on their cell phone, chomping on a hamburger, and drinking Jack Daniels right out of the bottle. I am more than a little bothered by this. Luckily, the NOPD feels no need to enforce anything resembling traffic laws – though they will frequently pull over attractive young women for doing very little, if anything, wrong. We need a new police department.

I also now wait to see if crossing traffic at an intersection will actually stop when the light turns red having almost been t-boned on three occasions in the last four days for assuming they will. My frustration with the traffic in New Orleans has lead me to keep my shotgun in the trunk, loaded. If I am in an accident where someone was clearly being an asshole I will crawl my bleeding, broken ass out of the car and open fire on everyone and everything around. If people don’t want to play by the rules in New Orleans, then I suppose I would be a fool to not follow suit.

And lastly on this sad, little, list of bullshit is really more of a story. I was sitting in The Saint getting drunk and wishing for the return of corndogs very late the other night when some old strung out bastard asked me if I was a carpenter. This was odd, because I was actually wearing a suit and tie, which I believe is the International Carpenter’s Association uniform of choice. (Incidentally, I was only dressed that way because I had to go to a friend’s engagement party. Usually, a smelly T-shirt is my uniform of choice – pheromones, ya know) So being bored, I thought I’d go check out the ware’s of this fine old, junkie. Of course, he had to run down the street and pick it up, so my mind drifted back to dreams of late-night corndogs. He returned and I stepped outside see this shit. He had, indeed stolen a radial arm saw, a rip saw and a small sander from some contractor who undoubtedly still thinks he’s in Burrito, Texas or somewhere with no crime at all. The stuff wasn’t very nice to begin with, though there was still sawdust on them from the day’s work. Well, jughead only wanted $15 dollars for the set – not bad. The thing was, I didn’t really need the shit. Besides, the radial arm saw didn’t move to and fro, it only moved up and down and turned at angles. I tried to explain this, but the gentleman didn’t have a clue what the tools even were, let alone anything I was saying. By the time I finally passed on the deal completely and walked away, I had him down to $8. I don’t know what eventually happened to Crackrock Andy and the power tools he’d absconded with, but I like to think that in the wee hours of morning, fear of getting caught with the stuff lead him to throw it into some bushes or in a nearby trash can. See that way, everyone looses, and anymore, that just seems fine with me.

I have been on hiatus. I had planned on taking a reading vacation which us bibliophiles do occasionally, to get caught up. But as it turned out, I was on a ‘try not to hack up a lung’ vacation. So while I was convalescing, I put together a basic reading list on New Orleans. Octavia, Maple and Beaucoup Books are all up and running uptown.

1. Beautiful Crescent, Garvey and Widmer
2. New Orleans Then and Now, Richard and Marina Campanella
3. Missing New Orleans, Phillip Collier
4. Rising Tide, John M. Barry
5. Bayou Farewell, Mike Tidwell
6. Neighborhood Story Project, series of five books written by students: http://www.neighborhoodstoryproject.org/

7. Obituary Cocktail, Kerri McCaffety ~ Which is an actual organization as well:http://www.obituarycocktail.org/

8. Jazz in New Orleans: The Postwar Years Through 1970, Charles Suhor (A complete and comprehensive book hasn’t been done yet, thanks to Tom Piazza for his input)

9. Mardi Gras Indians, Michael P. Smith
10. Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy O’Toole

This post is a continuation of the discussion from “I’m not chocolate dot com.”

Yes, it would make for a better world faster if black people could somehow overlook the need to organize on the basis of race. But I have some understanding about why there remains a need for them to do so. And I’m inclined to be indulgent in a way that I’m not to posters who go by names like “nagin is a racist.” I don’t believe that black people are inherently lazy, but I do believe that they’ve been somewhat conditioned to believe (by their own leaders as well as current reality) that they’re still getting the short end of the stick. Some people, faced with that perception of reality, react by trying to prove the perception wrong. Others react by succumbing to the apathy that perception can generate.

Eventually, we will conquer every form of bigotry, of that I have no doubt. People of my generation may even now be raising the generation that definitively rejects racism, sexism, homophobia, and every other major form of bigotry. Or we may be raising the generation that raises the generation that does that. But it’s going to happen, and it’s going to be a change for the better.

I would like to say that I’m free of bigotry, but the reality is that I’m not. I grew up without the exposure to other races and cultures necessary to think in a post-bigotry language, much less live a post-bigotry life. Because while I wouldn’t necessarily preclude dating a black man, or an asian man, or a person of faith (any organized religion), I would always be translating, so to speak, in my head from the way I was raised to the way I want to live. Because translate is all I can do.

More after the break…
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This next Saturday night, the king of this year’s Krewe Du Vieux parade and ball, Walter Williams will present a comedy show at Oswald’s.

What: An Evening With Walter & Mr. Bill
When: Saturday, January 28, 9PM
Where: Oswald’s, 1331 Decatur St. 504-218-5953
Cover: $5

Go on out and support this year’s KduV king! Also, don’t forget to mark your calendars for Saturday, February 11th, when Krewe du Vieux rolls through the Quarter* starting at 7PM. Look for the CRAPpy Indian woman with a blonde wig and a bright-orange blouse!

*New and improved parade route forthcoming.

Had to go down to the FQ to get wedding rings today. We went reasonably early (10:30ish), only to discover the tourist resurgence in full bloom. In the 30 minutes or so we spent walking around on Royal (between Dumaine and about Bienville), the amount of foot traffic kept getting heavier and heavier. And these weren’t the construction guys on a day off either. Most of these folks were pretty well dressed and had money to spend.

We dropped a little of our own for lunch at The Clover Grill at Bourbon and Dumaine. Good greasy burgers and a wiseass server. Shared the table with some other local who buried his face in the Sunday paper. But after a total of about an hour, we’d done our FQ Quota for the month, so we left.

Score of the day — one of the Mardi Gras warehouses near Lafitte and Broad put like a dozen bigass pallets of beads out on the curb to be hauled off because they’d been underwater. But inside each travel bag-type container, there are like two dozen sealed bags of beads. I’m sure there are about a million strands of skank-free beads on these pallets and they’re there for the taking, so if you’re into Mardi Gras beads, have at it. We certainly took our share to give to wedding attendees.

That’s what the real estate biz is all about, right? Well, in our post-Katrina world, this article says it doesn’t make any difference.

I don’t know who’s getting boned worse — the average American taxpayer or the family who’s stuck living in a high-dollar icetray instead of getting a little help toward actually cleaning up their home (and these folks are also average American taxpayers). I know if it was me, I’d certainly much rather the feds spend less on a trailer and advance me a little cash to buy lumber/wallboard/lights etc. $3300 a month, on average? Jesus Roosevelt Christ.

Now, I know plenty of folks are glad to have these FEMA trailers. At least it’s a roof and four walls, as flexible as they might be, so they can live on their own property while they do work on their place. But there’s gotta be a better way. So many homeowners have yet to see bupkis from their insurance and their personal repair dollars have about run out.

Speaking of insurance, it has been nearly four full months since I saw the initial adjustor at my place of business. He died shortly afterward, so let’s say it has been over three months since Adjustor #2 visited my place. Have I seen Dollar One? No. The weird thng is, my insurance company WANTS to pay me, or at least that’s what they say. They’re all falling all over themselves every Friday when I call, but it seems the holdup is with the independent adjusting firm in Baton Rouge, which never returns my calls. There are thousands of others of us are in the same boat — everyone feels sorry, but it’s always someone else’s fault you haven’t gotten help yet.

And, again on the subject of insurance, I have received my homeowner’s insurance bill for the coming year. Not surprisingly, it has doubled. Good thing I didn’t have enough damage to file a homeowner’s claim, so I’m counting myself highly lucky there.

I keep telling myself how lucky we are that we’ve had so much go right for us in all this. But we’re coming up on the five-month anniversary of this storm, and that’s a long time to wait (too freaking long) when so many folks are self-financing themselves out of a disaster. My business landlord, my next-door neighbor and seemingly two-thirds of the people I talk to are still waiting on some kind of help we’ve pre-paid for.

I guarandamntee you none of these companies are willing to wait five months for us to pay our premiums.

Just a couple of definitions:

Racism: Racism has many different definitions. Historically, it has been defined as the belief that race is the primary determinant of human capacities that a certain race is inherently superior or inferior to others, and/or that individuals should be treated differently according to their racial designation. Sometimes racism means beliefs, practices, and institutions that discriminate against people based on their perceived or ascribed race.

Racist: a person with a prejudiced belief that one race is superior to others.

Criminal: someone who has committed (or been legally convicted of) a crime

Insensitive: deficient in human sensibility; not mentally or morally sensitive

I don’t blame myself for all of the anger posted around here lately. I do feel bad that I wrote a piece that caused so much hate to be spewed around.

Before you call someone a racist or call something a racist statement, please read the above definition. Does that person’s action’s or words fit the description?

Looking at the above definition of a criminal, I do not see anywhere in there that someone’s skin color makes them a criminal. If I say I don’t want the criminals to come back, that’s what I mean. Person’s who commit or have committed a crime. If you think that by me saying I don’t want the criminals back is somehow tied into someone’s skin color than maybe you need to check yourself. If you think that criminals are only black or only white then you’ve got some issues that this blog cannot solve.

There is a HUGE need for actual discussion in this area about race. If we could keep the name calling out of it maybe we would get somewhere.

We are not all that different. I know that we can not only return the city to where it was, but we can make it better. We can have a better foundation of education for our children. We can have a better job market with higher income jobs and at the same time keep our character and our unlike anywhere in the world personality.

I know these things can be. But I also know that things have to change for us to get better. We have to talk to each other. We have to communicate. We must hold our own communities responsible. The good-ole boy network must be removed. And that means whatever network-the uptown political base or the 9th ward ministers. We must stop giving groups our “power”. We have to stop relying on government to handle our social problems. We all must “tune in” to each other.

I also know the way to not get there. We don’t return this city to health if we do what we did before Katrina. If we close our eyes to the violence and anger that was taking control of the city again- then we, all of the people of New Orleans are doomed.

Before last night, I had heard the Pfister Sisters on the radio a few times and in fact, I had run into them caroling in Washington Park just before Christmas and in truth had never really liked them. The radio recordings were awful and the caroling was evidently just not their thing.
Last night however I found myself in The Spotted Cat, an interesting little place on Frenchmen Street, being entertained by none other than the Pfister Sisters who I come to learn are not sisters at all. All this time I had been hearing about them and wondered how a city with such good music could seem to love the Sisters so much and finally I got to see them in action. The live show changes everything.
I now see what all the fuss is about.
Pfister Sisters = thumbs up.