My head is spinning between love and hate for this city so much that I am nauseous.

I had another fun Mardi Gras. I dressed up as the Borderline Madonna with some other friends who were the various other Madonna personas over the span of her career. After a very cold weekend, the weather was perfect. We even got a cab home, not always a guarantee. The cab dropped me near the Bridge Lounge where I left the car earlier that day to march with the Krewe du Julu. Right there, at the Magazine Culvert area, I came upon emergency vehicles at the scene of what has been referred to as a ‘justifiable homicide’ at the corner of Terpsichore and Magazine St. It looked like murder to me. But I guess if you and your neighbors are drunk and your neighbor tries to set your car on fire, it’s ok to stab them repeatedly in the chest. Stabbings are becoming more en vogue recently. I thought maybe this trend is due to the inability of our new immigrant residents to get guns as easily as their local counter-thugs, except this particular murder victim was reported as a white male. It might just be that stabbing people is simply more fun than shooting them.
(more…)

Date: Monday, 2/26
Location: Louisiana Supreme Court, 400 Royal St., at 10AM

Senators Boxer (CA) Chair of the Environment & Public Works , Isakson (GA), Vitter (LA), Cardin (MD), Klobuchar, and Whitehouse.

There will be 3 panels:
(1) Debris Management - Wilma, Father Vien, Secretary DEQ
(2) Coastal Restoration, and
(3) Hurricane Protection (Corp of Engineers)

[Via Editor B via Wynecta Fisher]

It is very, very good to be back in town. To stay — without being concerned about having to leave quickly again.

We arrived this afternoon on I-10 (after missing ALL of Carnival’s last weekend, Mardi Gras itself and countless other wonderful stuff) to get off the Pontchartrain Expressway to the sound of a po-leece siren and the wafting aroma of urine from the French Quarter. Lord, it’s good to be back home to our familiar twisted reality. But it’s no more twisted than others — at least we know the rules here.

Further connection — our very, very close neighbor who has been a stalwart of friendliness for two years was on his front porch as we walked home from dinner at Byblos on Magazine. I greeted him and he says, “fuck you.”

“What?”
“Fuck you. Get out of here.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Fuck you.”
“Well, if you’re going to say that, at least tell me why.”
“Fuck you. Get out of here.”

Okay. Amazing what too much whiskey and cocaine can do in such a short period of time. Poor bastid.

Did I mention how good it is to be home?

Well, I didn’t know either. I lived in Virginia Beach for awhile before coming back to New Orleans pre-Katrina. Didn’t really know or pay attention to what was going on in Richmond frankly. Who would? Well the morning show at the radio station has been focusing lately on cities the same size or close to the same size as New Orleans, not to see if we can be like them but to see how they are overcoming some of the problems that we are facing here.

Doug Wilder was the Governor of Virginia at one time. He is currently the Mayor of Richmond. Morning show host Shane Warner had Mayor Wilder as a guest Thursday morning. You can listen to the interview here: http://wistradio.com/shows/swarner.php

It should be required listening to everyone who loves New Orleans, especially Ray Nagin. We don’t need 400,000 people here to be a great city and also to be the cultural influence that this city has shared with the planet Earth for the last 200 years.

Published over the weekend: an interview with Ken Foster, one of the most rational, thoughful, and–above all–talented writers living in New Orleans today. His assessment of Our Fair City comes as close to my own as anyone’s–right down to the dog-philia….

Everyone has their own idea of the Good ol’ Days and everyone has been talking about making things “the way they were” and or “better than they were”. I’m a pretty big fan of New Orleans history so I’ve given it some thought and come up with some ideas of what I’d like to see the city become based on what I’ve determined to be the high point in New Orleans history. I’ve tried to base my ideas on fact, but some of it is just a hunch and some of it is just a big pipe dream. In the end though, I just hope people think about it and come up with their own idea of what the city should be that’s more concrete than “the way it was”
(more…)

Out and about today I saw these guys. The very nice young ladies I spoke with say their organization have been coming here during Mardi Gras for a few years but this being only my second Mardi Gras in the city This is the first time I have seen them. Their group offers free water and clothing along with other services that are free to the public. My favorite offering is the free haircuts. Things like haircuts are over looked as a daily necessity for those who may be less fortunate but these girls have it covered. I was temped to sit down and do it myself just for the Hell of it and the good spirit of things but although I desperately need a haircut my judgment got the better of me. Happy Mardi Gras Everybody!

P.S. if someone from the organization sees this please leave the link to your website as a comment or send it to me and I will add it to this page, I could not find it. Thank You.

I went to Natchez Mississippi again for the second time in a year. The last time I went there, the city seemed deserted. I noticed how that city is like a mini New Orleans with houses and architecture that actually predate our own. Where are the people? Where and when did they go away? What caused the mass exodus of citizens from a bustling river port from the turn of the century? The city of Natchez is a truly beautiful town that has been stopped in some sort of time warp. It seems like such a waste that a town so pristine with hundreds of empty turn of the century store fronts would not have been rediscovered by hipsters or the Gay/Lesbian community and completely taken over. The real estate is rock bottom cheap.You can buy a home built in the 1870’s for a little over $100,000.
(more…)