Po-boy Views of New Orleans

The Way that Jazz Go Down in New Orleans

2008-07-12T10:42:00.000-07:00

The Way That Jazz Goes Down
I’ve come to believe that memory inhibits creativity and spontaneity. I kind of know this from experience; at least I think that I do.
For example, decades ago, a younger me, down on my luck, took a temp job as a dishwasher. I was sent to a club to bust suds.
There I was, up to my elbows in plate scraps, bemoaning my fate, when through the kitchen wall (adjacent to the audience) came the sounds of a gifted jazz artist and… viola, I had an epiphany. I was there, yes I was, (or at that time I was here, the lines kind of get fuzzy). And I was actually being paid to listen to one of the all time great performers of my time!
I remember this, and I remember Ahmad Jamal coming into the kitchen to scam a bite and me feeling special and a part of it all. I remember it like it was yesterday.
From that moment forward, I became a musiholic. I ate, slept, woke, dreamt, and lived music. No artist was too obscure, no venue was out of bounds, no form was ignored, no rolling stone was unturned, and I even put a full Nelson on Willie.
I started to, and still do, listen to Dylan and Dvorjak, The Beatles and Beethoven, Tom Waits, Aretha Franklin, Doctor John, Otis Redding, Neil Young, B.B. King, The Spinners, Smokey Robinson, Clyde McFadder, Eric Satie, Bessie Smith, Peggy Lee, Marvin Gaye, Nat Cole, Elvis, The Dixie Cups, The Grateful Dead, The Doors, Vladimir Horowitz, Mendelssohn, Santana, Brubeck and a thousand other artists that you can but hope in your dreams to appreciate.
Listen up! I was actually paid to tend bar and see Miles Davis perform, not once but a half a dozen times (at least)! Top that!
But, I also recall Jazz Fest being twelve dollars, phone calls being a nickel, bus rides being a quarter and my pay being not much more than it is today.
Where does that leave me? I’ll tell you. In a quandary and quagmire. Am I still gonna try my damnedest to get as much time off from work to blow my hard earned to be out there at the Fair Grounds to cram more music into my already overloaded skull? You bet your sweet ass I am!
Do I understand why thirty five years of profit can’t be accounted for so that prices go up, tickets become more inconvenient to procure and Mother Nature more unpredictable, for the privilege of seeing performances by legends of the music world and be actually there when they do their thing? Yep.
Every year I make whatever sacrifice it takes to be there or be square. Sure, there are forces at work beyond my control or understanding that put on the greatest show on earth; but I’ve got to be there! My life, my soul and my heart beats to the sounds of Johnny Vadokovitz (SP) on drums at the Jazz tent. The Dixie Cups and The Dixie Chicks melt my shorts and to be in the Gospel Tent is truly a religious experience. And I’ve got to be in the audience! This year, as in all previous, The New Orleans Jazz And Heritage Festival will not be televised …Jazz Fest is LIVE!
My policy is to get tickets and worm my way into as many and any hours that I can squeeze in, I pour over programs and maps, make the necessary strategic plans to see my favored performers and then upon arrival scap it all and go where the sounds take me. And I travel light, fast and able. There’s gut in my strut, glide in my stride and no shame in my game.
Okay, I hate the car lot in the space where a stage should be, I don’t understand why the beer doesn’t give me a buzz or how come this year they’re going to build bleachers for high rollers to get a better view than us shmucks on ground level. I don’t know why thirty something’s carry poles with flags and travel in packs. I wonder why folks buy tickets and then claim real estate with blankets, folding chairs and tarps and treat you like a trespasser and interloper should you tread on their sacred ground. I also can’t fathom why people carry so much gear with them, like chairs and backpacks and jungle fashion. And you know what? I don’t care.
In my own warped mind, I don’t think that they really get it. This is not Survivor Twelve, it’s the friggin’ Jazz Fest!
Dig this; a few years ago my step was losing its pep, my ocean was losing its motion…my get up and go was getting’ up and goin’. So I spy this rain tent, you know, one of those misting places that you stumble upon and can never find again?
So I go in out of the din and the glare and all of a sudden it gets quiet; I mean real quiet. The fine mist of cool jetted water is not quite wetting me as much as it is centering me. I can hardly make out the shapes of people around me but I’m sensing that there are them and we’re headed in the direction of this light at the end of the tunnel, if you will.
Nobody’s in a hurry, so naturally I’m not either (you know, go with the flow..?)
So, I’m cruisin’ thinking everything’s cool and this light is getting brighter, all of a sudden I can see the forms in front of me and we’re headed for this opening and we get closer and closer and it starts to open up……SHAZAM!!
The sounds of people having a great time, music all around us, the sun is shining and I smell food cooking. My body temperature welcomes the Sun’s rays and I believe, yes I do, that I have just gone to heaven!
Every year I start my Festin’ with a dozen raw oysters and the hoisting of a beer to my loved ones who’ve passed on or merely passed on by and hope that their heaven is at least as good a time as mine will be; and like I said: be there or be square. See you at the Fair.

New Orleans Pagan Buddhists

2008-07-12T10:34:00.000-07:00

Kumi Maitreya was an avatar and the last incarnation of the Buddha. If you believe it, it is so.
If you are not aware of whom Kumi was, you are not aware of a slice of New Orleans history that most grownups wish you to ignore. I say that because it was the grownups that had the most trouble with the Maitreyans. Then as now, grownups rule the world.
Incidentally, my spell check just wanted me to change Maitreyans to Martians, truly I have a grown up spell check.
Anyway, Kumi Maitreya was an ordinary Moss St. housewife here, named Geraldine Hooper, when somehow she achieved a state of spiritual enlightenment. Believe what you will; but, she formed a tribe of young followers from the fringes of society that for a time was in charge of the French Quarter. She could, and did, look within people’s souls and tell them the sound of their vibration and give it back to them as their one true name. Names like Ravi, Eldra, Elfren, Amzie, Angelica, Kutami, Dorje (yours truly), and Abraxsas.
She taught that since the Universe was infinite, everywhere (including ourselves) was, in fact, The Center of the Universe. And where exactly would God live? Exactly, in The Center of the Universe, which meant that God lived inside of all of us. Taking that thought a little further, we come to the conclusion that our bodies are temples, we are all ministers and our homes are churches. This latter conclusion had something to do with the law not being able to bust churches just because our ‘sacrament’ was a substance that was illegal in the grownup world (namely, LSD). It all made sense to me.
And so for a time, The French Quarter streets rang with the sounds of “OIA!” (pronounced OH EE AH!!) which is the sound of a positive vibration; and, the symbol of the Cardinal Cross was seen everywhere.
Kumi also taught us that war was wrong, that the Government was in fact our servants and that each of us should have an altar in our living spaces. That still makes sense to me. There was also a lot of drumming and dancing, if I recall correctly.
I have, and have had, altars at the many places that I have called home, call it a hangover from the old days. My altar is the last thing I look at before entering the asylum (the outside world) and my altar greets me when I am successfully able to make it back home from the outside world (where the crazy people live).
My altar is two and a half feet wide and goes up to a nine foot ceiling, it consists of seven levels, each level full is of holy (as I see them) articles.
On the top level is a portrait of Saint Expedite by local artist Shmeula that I bought at Grace Note, a small but perfect shop at nine hundred Royal St. The portrait depicts an aura-ed African American male with the caption “Please Help Us Immediately!”
According to legend (which as we know is not fact) St. Expedite is a New Orleans saint. It seems that we were having trouble, in the early days, getting statuary in from Europe to our fast growing number of churches being built here. Someone over there stamped one of the crates EXPEDITE, and when it was opened here, they naturally thought that it was the name of the saint. The statue is in the Our Lady Of Guadalupe Church on Rampart and Conti Street, which also houses the Shrine Of St. Jude (patron saint of lost causes).
Also on my altar are many pictures of various saints, the fender of a bike once stolen from me, three Mexican kewpie dolls named Lupe, Rosa and Pilar, silver quarters, a figurine of Batman that I found face down on Bourbon Street, dollar bills that I have made wishes on and a book titled ‘The Making Of Black Revolutionaries’ by James Forman.
There’s also a rubber snake, a sheet of stamps with the face of Audrey Hepburn on them, a photo of my dog Trudy who died, a box of marionette clown heads and a full nativity scene using everything but holy statuettes. A bottle with holy water in it (plucked from the trash), a ceramic Mayan god, tarot cards, The Book of Runes and a video made by the Dali Lama.
A Zippo lighter, a pocketknife, candles, incense, joss paper, alcohol, hot pepper sauce, photos of friends and the obituary of a close working companion. A SouthEast Asian broom, a bingo card, a head of garlic, rosaries and crucifixes. I’ve got a bottle of Holt’s Chill Tonic, the eyes of Buddha, playing cards, alligators, elephants, sea shells, safety pins, a Pabst Blue Ribbon bottle opener and a PBR tap pull. There’s also a hula dancer, some ververte weed, an empty bottle of cologne that my daughter gave me at fourteen that I saved the last of it until she married this year at twenty seven and a bear shaped container with about an inch of golden syrup that I greet each day upon reentering (“hi honey, I’m home!”). Am I superstitious? I don’t think so, a little excessive maybe, but not superstitious (did I mention the voodoo doll?).
Maitreyans believe that freedom and joy are essential components of daily life and that it is important to live a perfect life right now, not some time in the future. So what became of the Maitreyans? Well, you may call it the struggle of good against evil and you might say that, as Maitreyans, we got our asses kicked.
What remains of the Maitreyans, I don’t know. I’ve only connected with a handful in the last five or six years. I guess they’re out there somewhere. Kumi has gone on to whatever she was meant to do in her next life (if she didn’t make it to nirvana). And I sit at a keyboard wondering how I spent that many years high on life and why we couldn’t make more of a go of it. I guess once you’ve created that many centers of the Universe; it would be hard to get them to stick together. OIA!

Voting Thoughts From New Orleans

2008-07-12T10:27:00.000-07:00

In my youth I was told that I could grow up to be President and furthermore, that I could petition the Lord with prayer. Thus far, all evidence that those are true statements are to the contrary.
On a 1975 album by the Tubes, a tune called ‘What do you want from life?’ promised me that as an American citizen I was entitled to, among other things, a heated kidney shaped pool, a Gucci shoe tree, Bob Dylan’s new unlisted phone number, Rosemary’s baby, a foolproof plan, an airtight alibi and a statue of a baby’s arm holding an apple.
According to recent emails, I also deserve lower body fat, higher energy levels, wrinkle reduction, sexual potency, better memory, muscle strength and lower mortgage interest rates. Also, at my request, I can have human growth hormones, relaxers, sedatives, university degrees, viagra, lower credit interest rates, and the ability to investigate any of my friends.
Add to that, I can get Heather’s (and her pre-pubescent friends) web cam shots, the websites of young Russian and Japanese women that are just frothing at the mouth to wed me, Paris Hilton’s xxxx video (with sound), breast enhancement, a gargantuan penis and staying power; and honey, I CAN BE COMPLETE!!!
What went wrong?
Me. I must have missed something growing up. This could be equated to our politics. I know that if I lived in a Democratic society I would have leaders that would do what I tell them is best for me. And, if I happened to vote Republican, I would get leaders that I could count on to do the best for me and that no one would tell me lies. This is simply not true. For leaders and example setters, I have charlatans.
Also, I’m told, as an American, I should be able to count on the media to tell me that there are limitations specific to my economic, physical and intelligence station, and not to jerk me off. This has also not been the case in my recent memory.
Is the media Republican or Democrat? Good question. By the above criteria the media is neither. The media is a Dictator. A dictator and, in essence, a vanity manipulator.
Don’t get me wrong; I have paid my buck at the kissing booths of life:
“Hate that gray? Wash it away!”, “Lose 20 lbs. in two weeks!”, “learn the love secrets of the stars’, “A cleaner closer shave”, “Good for coughs, colds, sore holes, puts hair on anything but a cue ball!, etc. etc. etc.”
Like a lot of Americans, I play the lottery, have lost my paycheck at black jack tables, bet my life on someone to love me for the rest of my life and read books on invisibility, physical immortality, gotten drunk on the elixir of patriotism and taken the Course in Miracles. So?
So, should I not be content with the words that my parents praised my birth with? “He’s got five fingers on each hand, he’s got ten toes and, thank God, he ain’t a moron!” I should be so flattered, I should think that. I don’t.
It seems to me that it’s become more important who it is that wins than what it is that’s right. I am suspicious that, as they say, ‘something is rotten in Denmark’, I smell it, I feel it, I know it. The world I live in demands that I should BE SOMEBODY, but it never tells me how to be that somebody; or whom that somebody is. I did not come with an owners manual; so, like a blind man in an unfamiliar space, I’ve been trying to feel my way through life.
I think that there are a lot of us lost Americans, the ones who didn’t become President, the ones whose prayers have not been answered, that may wonder these same things.
It’s as elusive as a fire fly, but as pervasive as planters warts. The rich get richer, the poor have children, the criminals take what they want, the mighty are felled to rise again and the downtrodden are snatched from the brink once again to be given one final flogging. Is this goodness being rewarded? Does God move in mysterious ways? Give me a break!
By all the evidence collected thus far, it’s not a reach to say that: some people get more than their fair share; not because they deserve it, but, by the fact that they’re willing to stick it to some smaller guy, the average Joe. Period. And there are more of us smaller guys than there are them, so go figure. Greed talks and the rest of us walks.
This is not a rant or a rave, but more of ‘I’m weary of folks telling us how fortunate we are instead of letting us in on the screwing that we’re taking. Dry, hard and up against a tree.
And I know that I should be grateful, yes downright grateful, and I remind myself constantly so, that it is a miracle that I am alive, six feet above ground and warm to the touch… BUT. I see people eating from garbage cans, I read about death in the daily papers, I know people who work abnormally hard just to stay financially afloat. I know people who will never get adequate health care, whose children will never be adequately educated and whose future (if not stopped by a bullet) will be to step into their parents miserable places unless we can find a way to break that cycle. Remember, these are also people that were told that they could be President, and not told that they would never be able to afford to visit the dentist regularly.
What do I want from life? I want what a lot of us Americans want: change for the better. The truth would be a start. And yes, I’m not as tall as I appear on film.

Proof of Life in New Orleans

2008-07-12T10:23:00.000-07:00

The other night, The Weezel and I were snug as bugs between the cool sheets, half-dozing and idly chitting about the merits of sending Aunt Ethel flowers on the event of her one hundred and Third birthday. Weezel said that it might be a waste of money because of Ethel’s poor eyesight. We chatted about definitions of the words pragmatic, thrifty and cheap. I was just dozing off thinking that if Ethel had had her corneas rebuilt instead of that ‘female’ surgery last year…when I heard; “it’s not as if we didn’t have plenty when we was growin’ up; Cousin Bubba had a nursery and…”
“What?’
“Yeah we had plenty of flow…”
“No, not that: You actually have a cousin named Bubba?”
“Well yes, but he doesn’t like to be called that any more, fact is; I don’t even know how he even got that name, his name’s Andrew”.
I started to drift off again thinking about the nicknames around me in my youth and otherwise. I unearthed enough theory to write a thesis and it’s kept me up nights.
Nom de nique is from the Greek nicken, to nod or wink, and its present form is from the Old English: neke-name for eke-name. I believe it to be the bastard child of slang.
Slang is all around us and we hear and witness it every day in every culture; of course most of us wouldn’t recognize slang in many foreign languages, (I’m not gonna go there) but I’m sure it’s there. Slang is a shortcut through language. Who of us upon hearing thoughts like: ‘Drove it like he stole it’, ‘Hotter than a snake’s ass in a wagon rut’, ‘Dumber than a box of rocks’, or ‘Pretty as a speckled pup on a red rug’ does not immediately pass go and collect two hundred dollars worth of visual? How about “All that meat and no potatoes?” “Think I can get fries with that shake?”
Indigenous Americans had slang and used it to name every thing around them, like Winnamucca, Minnesota, and ‘Tall Brave Who Eat Mushroom And Talk To Tree’. C’mon, where do you think Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse got their names? Fortune cookies?
Anyway, back to nicknames. In my definition nicknames are not forms of shortened names, such as Lori for Delores, Shelly for Michelle, Jim or Jimmy for James, or Stu for Stupid (add a descriptor word to them, like Jimmy Valentine, Flatfoot Jim, or Stupid Jerk-off and you’ve got something else going). I knew an Irish kid named Whitey; a Cuban named Blackey and a few Reds in my time. These are nicknames derived from physical attributes i.e. Lefty, PeeWee, Slow Eyed or Knobby. Again: Slim, Stubby, Twitch, Shorty, Gimp, and Thunder Thighs; these are all names that I can see and understand. My sister Alberta has always been called Bonnie, my sister Mary Joanne, Mickey, and kid sister Panagiota, Penny. Go figure.
I’ve seen nicknames in the media and music all my life: Scarface, Skinny Minnie, Flatfoot Floozy, Short Fat Fannie, Baby Face, Long Tall Sally, OO Poo Pa Do, and if you add descriptors you have Little Stevie Wonder, Dolly Parton, Blind Lemon Johnson, Pretty Boy Floyd and Willie the dog faced boy.
There are also nicknames for temperaments: Shifty, Easy, Mellow, Hot, Feisty, Cuddly, Smooth and Asshole. And there are blanket nicknames that we give the world around us: Juicy, Betty, Case, Sweetie, Darlin’, Dude, Badass, Sly Fox, Bones, Elvis, Sugar Foot, Face, various canine terms and sometimes just plain ‘Sup baaaaby?’. There are also private nicknames that we use with loved ones like Sweet Cheeks, Sweet Darlin’, Sugar Tits and Honey Dripper.
There’s name names and there’s name games. Name games are like Sioux City Sue, Jake the Snake, Loose Lucy, Motorcycle Michael, Slammin’ Sammy Snead, Louie the Lump, Machine Gun Kelly, Billy the Kid, Easy Eddie, Broadway Phil, Sugar Ray, Dizzy, Duke and a boy named Sue.
Name names are when a person’s name is almost interchangeable with their nickname. The King, The Killer, The Songstress, The Iceman, The Chairman of the Board, the Godfather and the Queen of Soul. At work we have code names for management: The Preacher, Your Uncle, The Bulldog and Sparky (with all due respect) as well as for working areas: The Farm, Deuce Alley, The Gris Gris Room. I work with three Jennifers and names like Jen or Jenny are passe, instead they’re known as Jennifer/their last name or just ‘hot lips’.
Notice that very few if any movie stars use nicknames. They do use shortened names like Tom, Brad, Mel, Ben, Andy, Joe, Johnny but I think that’s to instill our confidence in them as people and mostly an affectation of male actors.
Also it almost seems obligatory to give a nickname in our TP obituary column (look for yourself, I ain’t getting sued).
We give names to our pets, for in essence, we can’t really know what their real names are; except, all dogs will go by the name of ‘Rover’, male cats can always be called ‘Tom’ and females will always answer to ‘Minnou’. ‘Old Nick was a term reserved for mules and who knows where they get the names for racehorses.
Point being, the Oxford English Dictionary took over seventy years to complete. It defines over a half a million words, and it is a work that can never be completed as long as any person speaking this language holds breath in their body. It was put together largely by the efforts of a professor and a convicted madman/murderer from the confines of an asylum. As long as you can take or make a word to describe your reality our definition of our language continues its evolution. Listen, learn. Your ‘Round’: that’s someone that lives near you. ‘Bounce’: getting out fast. ‘Betty’: a desirable good looking woman. ‘Cool’: a word with an attitude connotation, you either have it or you don’t; something that you cannot learn.
Here I am, drifting off to sleep, when the Weezel’s voice breaks through my reverie miasma. “Don’t you want to know what Bubba’s Daddy’s name was?
“Snurphhhh?
“Sump”. She says, “That’s short for Sumpter…… G’night Polecat.” And Goodnight to us all.

Scare me un New Orleans

2008-07-12T10:17:00.000-07:00

It isn’t Halloween that’s scary; it’s everyday life
Thirty Helens agree: “there’s no disgrace like home”. In a nutshell, that about sums it up for me. No, rats are not gnawing at my brain; I’ve come down with a case of Mathematic Statistic Constipation (MSC) compounded by Sensory Media Overload (SMO).
Oh, I know that you think that I have it made with my girlfriend that drinks beer out of the can, a dog that plays pool for money and a monkey that cheats at cards; and you’re thinking “Plus, he continually gets paid to write drivel in a great urban publication, what are the odds of that?” I’ll tell you. About a hundred thousand to one.
You might add that I’m one of 4,300 people who has found space to rent in one of the 2,000 buildings in the french Quarter, that I’m not one of the 1,000 cases a day that need to be seen at Charity Hospital, or one of the ‘one a day average’ killings that take place in this city (counting those by law enforcers). What are the odds?
I’m not one of the half of the population that’s unemployed or the quarter of the population that live in poverty. I am not one of the more than 3,000,000 people that have lost their jobs since the current administration took office. I’m not one of the 46% of children born in Louisiana into single parent homes. The 60% that live in poverty and 17% that are reared in households with an income of less than $7,500.00 a year”. I’m not one out of every seven women in Louisiana that have been or are being stalked (up 20% over national average).
Statistically speaking, I am not one of the 30% of the adult population that cannot read above a fifth grade level. I’m also not part of either the 39% population stuck in illiteracy level one, or the 75% of the population (and this is all in New Orleans) stuck in illiteracy level two”. I am stuck up to my kiester in statistics!
I am part of the 56% of eligible voters that has registered and part of the roughly half of the registered voters that actually do vote.
Does any of that do me any good? No. 99% of the ideas that I have to save humanity are largely overlooked by 100% of the people who could implement those policies.
Where I work, there is a notice, posted by The Louisiana Restaurant Association about crime in the workplace. It says that there is one robbery every 46 seconds, one assault every 29 seconds, one rape every 5 minutes, and one murder every 21 minutes. Is this America?
I decided, hey, I can come up with statistics on my own. I funded a private study, retained an independent research team of expert (me), and came up with these startling, if not facts, at least, plausible statistics. This is only a small %
Life
87% of the public wish Ben and Jen would just go away.
Of the 59 parts of my body that a glamour magazine says “I want ‘her’ to know about” I can only think of 2%.
Only 12% of cars (including cabs and cops) use turn signals.
Nobody likes rap music. It’s just that 85% of young people don’t know how to sing.
Like most screaming heterosexual men, I spend 57% of my time thinking about women and glasses of beer. What do I do with the other 43%? Sleep mostly.
The Universe
98% of people think that if indeed money can’t buy happiness at least it can purchase acceptable substitutes; of those 98%, 100% think that money can buy anything.
Only one person in Flushing, Queens, New York knows all the words to “The Tattooed Lady”. What are the odds?
94% of the population know what a ‘kit’ is; these same people do not know what a ‘caboodle’ is.
There is an editorialist that can use the term ‘87 Billion Dollars’ no less than ten times in a single article.
99% of dead people do not look like they’re ‘only sleeping’.
We’re all overweight.
Every government, at all levels, lies 78% of the time about matters concerning their credibility, capability, culpability or any other ability questioned.
There is a bookstore in Austin that has 1,000 different magazines, 0% are soft or hard pornography.
100% of all the money that I should have been saving for my retirement has been spent on sex, drugs and Rock and Roll.
There are only three degrees of separation between you and someone who’s been mugged. 100% true.
Everything Else
There’s no such thing as consumer confidence to 87% of people with incomes of less than $50,000.00 a year.
It costs a family of three roughly 50% less income than it takes a single parent with two children.
99.9% of everyone you know has had a bicycle stolen or knows someone who has.
‘Canoodle’ is not in the dictionary; but tell someone that you did a little of it last night and 66% will smile knowingly.
Winking with both eyes at the same time will only upset 2% of the population.
96% of people that are alarmed by American jobs that are lost to foreign markets buy goods from other countries without checking the origin on the label.
Public littering is a way of life to 81% of the population in New Orleans. Spitting percentages are higher.
New Orleans, as a city, does not have the highest % of murders in the
U.S.A. The fact is that New Orleans is 15,000 people shy of being called a city (We’ll have to be satisfied with having the highest homicide rate per capita in the country). Question: what happened to those 15,000 people?
Probably, you’re as scared as I am about answering your door on any night, including Halloween. Incidentally, the term ‘probably’ is defined as a 40-70% chance that what you expect will or will not happen. Think about it.

Bitching in New Orleans

2008-07-12T10:07:00.000-07:00

Well, well, well. The proverbial three holes in the ground. That would be the pot hole, the sink hole and the hole that my mind fell into three years ago when the veil of illusionary normalcy was ripped from my eyes, mind and sanity. Has anybody else around here noticed that our pity party is over. Yeah, well, fires, floods, earthquakes, tornados, suicide bombers and assassinations happen, right? Why should we keep getting all the attention?
Public figures are disgraced, the crook is up for re-election and the blame gets shifted to the innocent. As usual. No good deed goes unpunished and the floggings will continue until morale improves and for god sake: hide the homeless! With a nick knack paddy whack give my kid a gun….And blah, blah, blah frigging blah.
Yes, I was gonna do another rant, but you already know the drill. You’re tired of hearing about it, talking about it and/or thinking about it and so am I, so I’m not. Got it?
No, I’m not part of the ‘Nation of Whiners’ and I’m not in a ‘mental recession’, I’m well aware of how sucky things are and how little chance we have of doing anything about it. You don’t have to use flash cards for me to know that we’ve passed the eleventh hour or that Jesse Jackson is capable of harboring thoughts of testicular mutilation on public radio about presidential contenders.
I do know that we Americans are better off than most of the rest, if not the rest, of the planet. We’ve got the Four Freedoms. We’ve got freedom of speech which means nobody can tell us to shut the fuck up about anything we want to say anything about. We’ve got freedom of religion; which means Christians rule and the rest of you keep a low profile. We have freedom from fear as long as you mind your own business and watch your back; and we have freedom from want, unless you wind up undereducated, under-employed or under the overpass. President Franklin D, Roosevelt told us about these Four Freedoms on January sixth nineteen forty-one, so blame him, not me, if your country sells you short.
So what about gangs in our streets beating and robbing law abiding citizens? Population control. What about our levees being stuffed with newspaper to fill the cracks; we recycle different from a other folks, that’s all.
I say re-elect the crook, let’s show ‘em how stupid we really are. Also let’s all start wearing clothes pins to signify how we’ve been hung out to dry by the powers that be; and, let’s re-institute the draft to give those poser kids something to really whine about. But above all: let’s quit bitching, Prudence, open up your eyes and come out to play.
Who cares if there’s no public restrooms, mailboxes or telephones? All I care about is whether or not I’m gonna get mustard greens for lunch on Sunday. I give up. I’ve got my own stuff to think about. If I don’t hear another thing about the election, the recovery, the price of oil or the war it will suit me just fine. I’ve got my own opinions and solutions and hey, they’re not doing anyone any good, not even me.
I’m falling back on my old family approach to life: “I’m okay---you’re not!” and “everyone in the world is nuts---except me”. I, along with others in my peer group, knew twenty years ago about global warming. We learned about it from Calvin and Hobbes. The controversy on bilingualism and Social Security can take a flying leap. On immigration I say ‘let everybody in!’ and on gay marriages I’ll go along with my kid sister who speaks for us all when she says: “who gives a fuck?”
What I care about is whether or not there is a friendly familiar face on the other side of the bar handing me a frosty Pabst Blue Ribbon and not about having a doctor who tells me that if I have more than two drinks a night my bones will shrivel and I will be an alcoholic loser that doesn’t deserve a decent erection.
I care that new things that I purchase either break easier or wear out faster than they used to and the instinctual reaction, now, to such substandard goods is to throw them away and buy more; and, I’m really pissed to see that there are grocery stores that want me to buy fresh garlic that is imported from China.
I care and hate the fact that our farmer’s market has such a small following, such slim offerings and such high prices. I also don’t want to see imported crap souvenirs of New Orleans (made in foreign countries) being sold in the French Market where we should have our own home grown purveyors of fruits and vegetables installed (in stalls) on a permanent basis.
And while we’re at it: open the breweries to make beer not to be cut up and sold as condominiums. What are they thinking? I know, they’re thinking that money talks and the rest of us walks, whatever that means. Does it not seem like something that everyone should care about is that New Orleans has become a pit stop for the world and were it not for the drunks, shoppers and snoopers of the world, we would have no reason or income to justify our existence. Is it just me or are we a city with a past and no future other than what some fat cat can get by bleeding our culture a little drier.
I further care about being able to sit in my yard and not be eaten alive by mosquitoes because the landlord next door filled in the culvert to increase parking for the people that have me keeping my cats inside because they’re scraping lead paint into my walkway and NOT cleaning it up properly. Is that not caring? Is that not American?
Yes, it is, because I have the freedom to bitch. I vote.

New Orleans Sitcoms

2008-06-15T15:47:00.000-07:00

Shove over Sarah Jessicas of the world, I’m not taking this insult to
my fellow fellows lying down. I’m putting to paper my own pilot
that I just KNOW HBO is gonna snap up; and yes, it’s called “Socks In
The City”! And yes, it’s about four lovable friends (guys this time) and their adventures in this big metropolis that we call ‘The Easy’. I, of course, will be the star and every episode will begin with me strolling down the uptown Frerret neighborhood past the rubble that was once public housing and I’m dressed in a cute ruffly shirt and seersucker trousers with sweet shiny saddle shoes, when BAM! a bus comes by and splashes a puddle that remains from yesterdays rain that the city has not turned the pumps on to clear, and I stare adoringly into the camera as the bus whizzes by with Emiril”s picture on it and jeering school children throw fried chicken bones at me and a sweet little ditty plays in the background by Barry Manilow because he does such sweet jingly tunes. Are you with me?
Next the tube shows me walking down a busy street (if we can find a busy street) with my three chums.
1.Miranda Pedro, my Hispanic lawyer buddy that was here under the radar until he married a stripper and moved to Metairie with his red headed step child. Miranda is his first name because his father is dyslexic and told the people at the hospital the baby’s last name first or something (we’ll get to that in a sequel episode). He’s an overachiever that adores hats from Meyer and wonders why he hasn’t had sex for the last six months and even at that, his wife is prone to faking orgasms and asking him if he’s done yet.
2. My next buddy we just refer to by his last name Carrlotte. He is a gay African American (actually half Sicilian) in a committed relationship with a sweet British bloke, Harold, with whom he has an adopted Asian child. They’ll go through some hilarious episodes as they try to get married, find a nanny, get profiled and try to find an apartment that will rent to them,
3. Then there’s Sam Hoover, a tall strapping blond fashion designer. A tall strapping oversexed fashion designer who splits his time between here and Los Angeles where he manages his cute but dumb starlet fiancée. Sam is nearing fifty and worries about ED, incontinence and going bald. His girlfriend works too hard and Sam feels neglected except when he’s around me and the guys or getting seriously laid.
Me? I’m Charlie Bradshaw. I sit around in my boxers and type one word on my computer and hope for inspiration for a column to inspire my hordes of readers who look to me to bring joy into their otherwise dull existences. I’m secretly in love with a woman that we all refer to as ‘Big’, but not to her face because she’d kick our collective asses up to our stylish collars. Ergo, I go to Paris with a ballerina and that doesn’t work out like all the other relationships that I have… do not work out (at least on the show). Big does something for a living that I clearly can’t figure out except that she’s constantly finding excuses to break dates with me. Big rarely smiles, but you can just tell that she adores me and is great in bed.
Here we all come walking down the crowded (we’ll get a crowd somewhere) street and we’ve gotten dressed to the nines with outfits from Rubinstein’s, jewels from Adler’s and as we sidestep broken sidewalks and body fluids and trash that STD is eagerly pursuing you can clearly tell that we’re talking about where to dine and how much we can drink, gossip and complain and still be our lovable selves.
Here we are sitting around the table drinking Kamikaze-poltans which are just like those other drinks (cosmopolitans) except there’s less cranberry juice and you have to drink them a lot faster. We’re all stylishly coifed and talk about relationships and orgasms and tend to get misty at the mention of movies like It Happened One Night and An Affair To Remember. Sam has his eyes on the waitress who later corners him in the john much to the annoyance of the man in the next stall trying to quietly shoot up.
Today is full of chatter because Miranda has found out that his wife, Stephanie, is selling her body on the side (explaining her performances in her own bed). Sam is explaining the best way to get those nasty stains from the crotches of trousers, and Carrlotte is ecstatic because his child has learned to fold laundry. That’s when I drop the bomb on them: “Big has asked me to move in with her” I remark, cool as the cucumber on my chef salad (dressing on the side). To which they all shriek like schoolgirls.
What do you think? Does it have legs? Of Course it does! I mean, I LOVE Sex And The City, I ADORE Will and Grace, I DIG Desperate Housewives and I think Ugly Betty RULES! I believe that I can show that guys are sensitive caring, funny and have great taste in shoes and fashion accessories.
In the show, I’ll start to get married several times in every conceivable (named) fashion designer outfit, have steamy love scenes without taking off my clothes and at the end of each episode be able to dash off another brilliant article for Where Y’at.
Sam will sleep with dozens of women of every conceivable description while searching for a true identity and inner peace instead of screwing pieces with little or no identity.
Carrlotte will redecorate his house a half a dozen times with every conceivable matching outfit, adopt stray animals, go to art openings with his lesbian chums and wonder why his husband has premature ejaculations.
Miranda will start taking a cut of his wife’s earnings, rent an apartment for his mistress, learn to tango with every conceivable guest star and become the first man to become pregnant from a toilet seat.
And Moi? I will sit back and let the money roll in, dream of syndication and practice my acceptance speech for the Grammy’s with my three new best friends.

What Do You Expect From New Orleans

2008-06-14T14:37:00.000-07:00

Well, I just put a hundred dollars in my gas tank. things have gotten ugly, real ugly. So far I’ve not heard of anyone getting as much of a raise in salary as the gas prices, food prices and indeed all prices have warranted. And as I gaze out over the fen at daybreak, I am reminded of that little voice in my head that whispers… ‘what do you expect?’
Did I expect that government on all levels is not staffed by people that can’t make a living doing anything else, not that there’s that much else to do around here while we wait for the next big one to tear us a new one. Okay, we do have three options other than politics: 1. Work selling things that come from China. 2. Wait on tables that mostly consist of foreigners that are celebrating their currency exchange kicking our butts. 3. Gaze out over the fen and ask ourselves: “what do I expect?”
It all started with the CEOs of the gas company gloating about how much profit that they make at my expense. And then the article that Abita Beer has to spend triple the money to make a beer, and even the fact that PBR has gone up in price. Yeah, the squeeze is on and I for one do not feel like putting my hands together about it.
But what do I expect (and what does Hillary want?) question mark, question mark. I want to feel like I do when I eat chocolate, when I’m having ice cream, and that’s just not happening in this climate, at this time.
Consequently, I’ve entertained the thought of entering a short story contest. Top prize: two thousand bucks. That would feel like chocolate. Actually, I had to ask my kid sister to explain to me exactly what constitutes a ‘short story’. The only thing that I remember about what she told me (and there was a great deal) is “beginning, middle and end” and, “make it short”. I guess I’ll have to do it third person and other criteria like that that I picked up at the Tennessee Williams Conference and the William Faulkner Festival. I’ve learned a lot at those conferences, mostly through osmosis. I think that what I’m supposed to do is work up some inner demon, an inner subconscious demon and let it fly with as much attention to detail (not to mention alacrity) toward a release that aims at catharsis and self-actualization at the very least. Hence, the ‘gazing out over the fen’. Let me try it out on you.
Okay, here I am in third person gazing, gazing. Perhaps smoking a pipe. It is daybreak with all the riotous colors that accompany a red sky in the morning (sailors take warning!). The first birds of the day are taking flight, chasing the first insects that are on a diet of other insects including the damn mosquitoes that are carrying about a pint of my blood from last night, rich in single barrel bourbon.
I’m gazing for signs of the mailman or the recycling truck or perhaps my lover (that no count that has made a fool of me). The radio plays in the background a forgotten song (Ques: what was that forgotten song? Ans: Brenda Lee, ‘Comin’ on strong’). That old football injury (where I got hit by an old football) is acting up and the medication is just starting to kick in.
‘When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, I sprang from my bed…. No, no Nannette, I can’t use that line. Okay, off in the distance I hear something. Jingle bells? Clydesdales? Martini glasses? It’s a belly dancer! That’s it, a belly dancer delivering a dancing telegram. What does it say?
Work with me here, two grand aint nothing to sneeze at unless your nose is full of Peruvian marching powder. Okay, we can’t describe a dancing telegram; so, what do we have? I’m gazing over the fence (in third person), at the tor by the fen in deep anticipation and with an attitude both withdrawn and recalcitrant… clearly a made man.
Naw… I’m in a wheelchair, see? A torpedo from Toledo got me with his gat when my guard was down. I think his name was Louie or Lefty or something like that and hanging was too good for him, if you ask me. But he got what was comin’ to him and I even kicked him while he was down… yeah … and then I went out shopping for towels with his moll.
You know, scumbag is not a word that you hear, let alone read, very often and I think that I should include it in the story. Do you think it too harsh? I think it brings up a good visual. Like, just picture those people in your life that you relate to as scumbags; that’s the kind of guy Louie or Lefty was, and I did him in but good…the scumbag! He won’t be pullin’ no roscoe on nobody any time too soon.
Too much drama? Okay, how about a guy who quits his job at Sprawl-mart selling stuff made in China because his other job got outsourced and he’s waiting on tables because it’s the only place to make enough money to buy gas, pay excessive rent and utilities and his girlfriend thinks he doesn’t work out enough or spend enough time with her and he forgot to file taxes this year and he thinks that all politicians are thieving scumbags and the election is coming up and a hurricane is coming and cigarettes just went up to ten bucks a pack. He’s just gotten another ticket on his car, this one for a hundred and twenty bucks, he hasn’t been to a movie in two years and the day he decides to go, he gets hit by a Ben and Jerry’s delivery truck driven by Louie or Lefty or somebody like that, who gets out and tosses a melted Chunky Monkey in his face and tells him that he was better off by the fence with the tor and the fen and who does he think he is calling him names and going off to buy towels? Too much reality? Well, what do you expect, I’ve had a tough day…where’s my chocolate?

Deja Food in New Orleans

2008-06-08T12:59:00.000-07:00

The handlettered sign on the door of the small café on Conti Street read “Closed for Thanksgiving”; and a dozen of us piled into various forms of vehicular transportation and sped to Shweggman’s and spent all of our hard earned in a frenzy of ‘day before The Day’ shopping. It was 1968. Giggling like preschoolers, we made our way uptown to our rented ‘demolition by neglect’ mansion on Chippewa Street and prepared a beggars banquet with all the love, sex, drugs and Rock and Roll in our counter culture hearts. We didn’t get back down to reopen the café until Monday. That was okay by us; after all, didn’t we own the damn place?
As a boy, Thanksgiving was celebrated by the seven members of our family on the tenth floor of a New York City Housing Project and it started at dawn’s crack and didn’t end until the kids were ready to drag themselves, half comatose from triptophane, to bed; while the grownups, with the last of the available welfare cash, headed to the bar across the street for highballs and shuffleboard and congratulations all around for getting through another Thanksgiving. No one would have even dreamed about going to a restaurant to eat on Thanksgiving; it was a family thing, and we did it BIG!
Years later, I would be Executive Chef of a hotel in downtown San Francisco serving a one hundred and twenty foot buffet to twelve hundred strangers that all had one thing in mind: eat as much as you can possibly hold. I watched while hordes of, I think, pleasant people on probably any other day, zeroed in on caviar pie, smoked salmon, carved roasts, pate, plethoras of freshly baked breads and zip codes of desserts with the instincts of wolf packs and the manners of Mongols. The results of my month long planning and work would clog the drains of the ‘City by the Bay’ hours later. What a life.
Last year as a ‘Line Cookin’ Dog’ on Bourbon Street, another cook and myself fed seven hundred people who seemed to come out of the woodwork, and who, looking for…you guessed it; turkey, stuffing, ham, lamb, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, candied yams, bread pudding… found it and put it into their faces as fast as humanly possible, giving not the slightest clue of thankfulness. That weekend, I put in one hundred and forty hours.
I’ve had Thanksgiving dinner in ‘lost and found’ bars across the country, where the good folks in charge couldn’t bear the thought of a stranger having no place to go on that holiest of holidays: the ‘Feast of the Full Belly’. Say Grace, Amen and dig in.
I’ve served the upscale neauveau riche in Mill Valley “Thanksgiving with seventeen sides” and they came at me like starving Armenians for second and third helpings; howling if one of the serving dishes were not replenished fast enough with oyster cornbread dressing or sage and giblet stuffing or parsnips, turnips, greens, peas and carrots, string beans, sweet potatoes, creamed spinach, broccoli, cauliflower in cheese sauce, pearl onions in cream sauce, corn pudding and baked squash. There was never enough pumpkin pie but there was always left over mincemeat. Pecan pie was for the ‘country connoisseur’ but, after dinner drinks were de rigoure for all. Big freakin’ deal!
“May I have more whipped cream?”
“Is there any more dark meat?”
“Hey, what happened to the wishbones?”
“Is there any meat in that?”
Gimme a break!
To mark this auspicious occasion, in my time, I’ve had my bird in jail, free kitchens, from a can and even from a pint bottle of it called ‘Wild’. I’ve done the ritual in bus stations, stranger’s houses, and with temporary lovers; and guess what? I’m just about over this killing of a ritual bird in honor of the things that I’m supposed to be grateful for that I ain’t got the rest of the year.
No offense intended; I know that we all have a lot of things to be grateful for on a regular basis, but hey, lets be real here, we work our butts off to make that happen. The rent, the utilities, the phone; yeah, that’s worth killing that imbecile of a bird for. But what about our medical, our kid’s schooling, and our daily struggle to make ends meet? Don’t they deserve a day of their own? How about a ‘Patsy Cline Day’? Where we sit around and pop some cool PBRs and smoke some Luckys and consider ‘What a HELL of a situation we’ve gotten ourselves into Day’? How about a day when we go ‘ Bowling for God’ and thank our lucky stars that we’re not like Franky ‘the moron;’ that still drools and has the I. Q. of a fence post? We need more real holidays, is what I’m saying!
How about a monthly fifth to be cracked and a celebration of ‘We paid the landlord again on time day’!? Or a ‘Freedom Day’ where the rent, phone, electricity and hot water are on someone else for a change?
Don’t get me wrong, none, and I repeat none of my Thanksgiving Days have been inconsequential. At least that I remember; they have all been like a collection of photos in a dusty, forgotten album. That one with my visiting nine year old daughter when the closest we got was turkey sandwiches at a Greek diner or the one with the one hundred and eighty pound clubfoot in Portsmouth, England (that’s another story)……..but, hey how much more of this can a poor boy take? I mean, what else can happen?
How about the sky opening and someone from the Heavenly Host asking “white meat or dark” or somehow you wake up on that sacred Thursday and somebody notices that there are no more turkeys? Short of being served by topless shoeshine girls or stripping Chippendales, I don’t think much would impress me anymore. Nope, this day has become redundant, repetitive and transparently dull.
“Oh let’s have Thanksgiving Dinner! Yeah, right! I’d rather have spleen surgery without anesthesia.
Instead let’s get knee walking drunk on Wednesday and stay in bed all of Thursday with TV dinners and make up stories of guilt, shame, triumph, love and betrayal; singing ribald songs and telling dirty jokes ‘til our sides split and order our food delivered from the Nelly Deli.
Okay, okay. I was only kidding. Actually, I got a call from an old friend in Abita Springs, we (and about ten others) used to own a small café on Conti Street. She said a bunch of the gang were coming over for a “Bird Day” celebration--vegetarian, of course. She wanted to make sure that I could take the whole weekend off, had my old corn pudding recipe and if I still had a copy of King Crimson on vinyl. She said that a few of them would come get me in the VW. She told me to remember that there’s water at the bottom of the ocean; whatever that’s supposed to mean. Oh well, here we go again. Happy Thanksgiving!

Advice for New Arrivals in New Orleans

2008-06-08T12:52:00.000-07:00

Cab drivers and communists! Cheese and crackers! Christ on a crutch! My long lost nephew has moved back to The Big Easy!
Actually, I don’t know if he’s ever lived here before; I haven’t laid eyes on him since he was knee high to a Huge Ass Beer ™ cup. But, his parents used to live here, so that’s enough for me to classify him as a replant, of sorts. There was, as I recall, a certain gleam in his Daddy’s eyes while he was here, who knows, it may have been him.
I’ve only seen him once since he’s been back, but knowing the intelligence level of his family, and mine, I feel sure that he’s reading this. I must tell him about Mardi Gras, lest he become grist for the mill.
Dear Nephew,
Welcome back and let me say, for one, that things have changed a bit since you were here last in flesh or in gleam and not, I fear, for the better.
You see, there’s this thing called Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday (not to be confused with Lundi Gras, which is the day before, or Foie Gras, which is the Friday before). Fat Tuesday has always been preceded by Carnival. It is, definitively, THE uber-experience. There’s even a Mardi Gras Cake that won $25,000.00 in a national bake off.
The word Carnival comes from the Latin ‘cruise from Hell’ or ‘flesh be gone’ which ever you choose to believe. Carnival is a time for partying, exchanging body fluids, dancing, eating and throwing up, all to excess. A lot of natives do this all the time; but, when you have millions of amateur ‘visitors’ trying to keep up, it can get real messy.
Mardi Gras in New Orleans is a tired old horse that middle-aged merchants start whipping at the beginning of the year in the hopes that by Ash Wednesday the frothing, wide eyed, sweat soaked, bleeding and exhausted mount will have generated enough profit that some of it may actually stay in Louisiana.
Carnival officially starts at Twelfth Night, which is twelve days after Christmas, called Kings Night, after the Three Wise Guys who came to see newborn Baby Jee; they had given all the gifts they could, starting with a partridge in a pear tree, had to split back to the Orient and marked the occasion as a Catholic holiday. Amen.
What we do nowadays on Twelfth Night is: bake a cake with a baby in it, smear it with purple, yellow and green icing and whoever bites into the baby gets to sue the bakery or buy the next ‘King Cake’ and continue the cycle. Needless to say, a lot of dentists make money during Carnival. This continues until Mardi Gras, which is the day before Ash Wednesday . Ash Wednesday is forty days before Easter and nobody is supposed to have a good time during that period. It’s Called Lent. Why? I don’t know.
When is Mardi Gras? Forty-one days before Easter. When is Easter?
Officially, Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox or Winter Solstice or something . So, to find out when Mardi Gras is, do the math, consult an occultist or look at a calendar.
To start celebrating Carnival, start drinking at Thanksgiving and don’t stop until the trash on Bourbon Street is waist high and everyone else looks really, really strange. The two may, at times, be mutually exclusive.
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Carnival is also celebrated with Fancy Dressed and Masked Balls (no pun intended), Parades, public humiliation, and large amounts of money going to other Third World Countries. The only thing we stop short of is human sacrifice, I think.
Parades and Balls are put on by Krewes, which is French for Crews. Krewes are made up of ‘social and pleasure’ clubs that elect a King and a Queen to lead them in parades where they cheerfully throw things like cabbages, condoms, coconuts, medallions, doubloons and strings of beads at frothing, maniacal spectators who then fight over them. The King is usually a middle-aged merchant and the Queen is usually a young woman from a well to do family who has reached drinking age. The King remains masked while the Queen wears Lancôme ™ tastefully. What’s up with that? Again, I don’t know; they’re called ‘Secret Societies’.
Another group of ‘Secret Societies’ is The Mardi Gras Indians. The fact that I consider any ‘Society’ that doesn’t invite me to join them, ‘Secret’ is another issue altogether. The Indians, far and away, would be the last group to ask me in. Why? I can’t sew and I don’t speak their language. Let me explain:
‘The Indians’ trace their roots back to the native Americans that befriended persons of color that they felt a kinship with because of the, non native, persons of non color’s rotten attitude toward anyone besides themselves, middle-aged merchants and young women who had reached drinking age. That’s how I see it, I could be wrong, it’s only my word against anyone else’s.
Anyway, Indians sew elaborate, intricate and complex Native American costumes, the likes of which would have Sitting Bull standing in his grave. They parade in groups of twelve to twenty resplendent in sequins, feathers, fabrics and heavy artillery. In their words “when you see us comin’, better get out the way!”
The Indians chant words like “Jock-imo findo hondo-wando fee nah nay”,
“Iko Iko”, “Tu-way-pa-ka-way. Oowa-a-a!” and “kick your ass on the overpass”. This either means: “my ‘Spy Boy’ spotted your ‘Flag Boy’ and ‘Big Chief’ (from the Metarie Ridge) has a shiny pistol and is “gonna make you jump in de river”, or “War, huuh, (good God, y’all) what is it good for?” (Absolutely nuthin’!).
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Anyway, Carnival generates a gazillion samollions towards the housing, education, working conditions and welfare of the needy for places like Mexico (tee shirts), Burma (sweat shirts), India (condoms), China (baseball caps), Indonesia (beads) and other parts of this country (food stuffs, plastic ware, breast implants and alcoholic beverages), none of which you’ll ever see. Content yourself with having a good time watching a bazillion of out of towners doing things that they would never do at home and remember:
Never drink anything stronger than you are, or of a color not found in nature.
Never, ever try to stop someone from acting improperly. One woman that I know did that and got her ass kicked by not one, not two but three ‘visitors’.
Don’t fight old ladies for beads. Doing so is a sure way of getting a heel print imbedded on the back of your hand.
Dress appropriately. No beads, wallet, credit cards, expensive jewelry or more cash than you care to part with.
If someone wants to bet you that they know ‘where you got your shoes’, tell them that they’re not your shoes.
Your loving Uncle, Phil
P.S. If you want the recipe for the $25,000.00 Mardi Gras Cake email me

Plamancusa@aol

2002 Literary New Orleans

2008-06-08T12:40:00.001-07:00

The P.H.D.'s daughter got her wooden leg stolen by a bible salesman that she had tried to seduce.
Here I am again, friends and neighbors; flying in under the radar with a report on the Tennessee Williams Literary Festival slash Writers Conference slash Platform for anyone dumb enough to think they can yell 'Stella!?!?!' as good as Brando (in my opinion if Baldwin couldn't………..) March 20-25, 2002.
Last year, as a literary hopeful, my ‘Main Frame’ and I had scored press passes (hint, hint) and were determined to “be there” rather than “be el-seven”, if you catch my drift. I was curious as to what type of birds these would be; and, aside from bad hair, the absence of clothing style (for the most part, Honey, I don't mean you!) and an epidemic of comfortable footwear, they were much the same as you and I, that is, weird.
I didn't feel like much of a writer, while I was there…at all. I’m confused by the difference between illusion and allusion. I don't know the difference between ambivalence and ambiguity and, I guess like my Mama said when I asked her if I had halitosis (at age nine I had read an advertisement but wasn't sure what it was), as far as 'catharsis' and 'pathos' goes: "if you don't know what it is, you aint got it". I was wondering if what I had was what it takes to have been there at all.
I went to a whole bunch of panel discussions, in fact so many, that it was hard to tell where one let off and another began. A couple of them were yawners, but most were lively, and, mostly, I just tried to keep up with the discussions on things like: 'voices', 'revealing' characters, their development and their flaws, 'juice', 'languaging', (that one's not even in my BIG dictionary) 'perception', finding a gay friendly publisher, and what Willie Morris said to who (or whom) on the telephone late one night.
I also, to my dismay, found out that practically nobody makes a living from writing, it takes up all your time (one guy said it took him four years to write eighty two pages) and that if I keep using parenthesizes, I'll never amount to much at all.
I don't think I'll amount to much as a writer anyway because, I don't keep notes on cocktail napkins, my childhood illnesses weren't severe enough, and although my mother kicked my ass on a regular basis, I wouldn't consider her 'overbearing'. I can't even begin to guess where 'third person past tense' is, let alone write from that perspective. I'm also not at any kind of 'psychic intersection'; if anything, I'm just this guy, you know?
So what makes me think I can be a writer? The panels. I can do those panels. I mean, I didn't know most of those guys, so how do I know they wrote seven books? Because the moderator said so? Hmmmm. If I had one book that I could hold up and call my latest, and then, talk about my last book, or better yet, my first book….
Also, I can answer questions, I've got a 'whole lot of opinion' on a myriad of subjects and I can cut up and b.s. my way through just about any topic, with the best of them. Or so I'd like to think.
I attended panels on Southern Culture, Good and Evil, Wit and Wisdom, Hot Properties, Alternative Writing, The Muse stops Here, and others; and I kept saying to myself "I could have said that!" Once when a question was asked during the 'Bad Girls" panel, I almost raised my hand and yelled "pick ME!"
I can see myself sitting with 'quiet authenticity' after being introduced as a writer of 'complex fiction' with a 'clear sense of the absurd' saying: " that's a very good question, Rex; but as we all know, ' you don't have stories unless bad things happen' or as Flannery O'Conner put it: " The average reader is pleased to observe the stealing of a wooden leg".
Thank you, I'll be signing books in the lobby, and I don't care whose (or is that whoms?) they are.

Valentines in New Orleans

2008-06-08T12:33:00.000-07:00

A local fried chicken restaurant (if you can call them restaurants) will be starting a gospel brunch soon. They’re gonna call it “A Wing And A Prayer”. This about sums up my love life.
Now Kids, I’m no expert on the subject, and will never claim to be (at least not in public); but, Uncle Phil has been around the block enough times that he’s worn a rut in it as wide as Bayou Saint John, so if I can’t talk about love, who can? In this rant we’re gonna explore some facts and fallacies about the ‘Big “L” Word” as reported by an independent study: mine.
First some fallacies:
Love makes the world go ‘round: what cabbage truck did you just fall off? Money makes the world go around and don’t you ever forget it.
You can tell it’s Love at first sight. NOT! You can tell it’s lust, power, domination, conquest or the need of possession at first sight: either that or you’re wearing your beer glasses and would screw a snake if someone would hold its head down.
Love means never having to say you’re sorry: Baloney! If you’re gonna hang on to love (assuming you ever find it) be prepared to admit that you’re wrong on a number of occasions, and on more complex subjects than the position of the toilet seat.
Love changes you: not for long, if ever. You’ll find yourself (or them) slipping back into the persona behind the façade that won favor; and, you may not be able to keep lipstick on that pig, if you get my drift.
You can change the person that you love: don’t count on it; and, those quirky little things that are funny now, sooner or later become a major pain in the butt. i.e. underwear on the doorknob. And while we’re at it: that new friend of yours (or possibly yourself) that’s rude to strangers, hasn’t a clue how to tip in restaurants, has an addiction or aggression challenge, likes to tell racist or sexist jokes, admires themselves in passing mirrors, is critical, abusive, unbending and just knows that it’s all about them………drop ‘em, it ain’t worth your time and make up.
Love brings out the best in a person: sure, like jealousy, mistrust, envy, possessiveness, insecurity and in some cases hives and rashes.
It’s the ‘challenge of the unknown’ that’s so stimulating about love: No, here you’re confusing love with rock climbing, spelunking and drawing to an inside straight.
Love is its own reward: right. And the meek will inherit the Earth, I’ve got the winning lottery ticket and your landlord is gonna give you free rent.
You always hurt the one you love: hmmmmm, you might want to make that: ‘you always let the one you love hurt you’
Love sneaks up on you: No, generally it sounds like the entire cast of The Lion King being thrown in to a deep fryer.

Now, for some facts.
Love takes work to make it stay: It does, and more than a few of us are willing to walk away rather than stay for the hard part. Then again, sometimes when your partner wants to ‘compromise’ it’s merely another way of saying “do it my way”.
Love can break your heart: This generally happens when someone has convinced you that you really are someone special, and then concludes with “April Fool!” Been there. Got the tee shirt; and any conversation that begins with “I think I need more space” usually ends with your relationship in the toilet.
Love is a many splendored thing: yeah, the walks in the park, the dinners, the smiles and the good times usually stay long after love has walked away. Enjoy them.
Love is like an oil painting: and you’d be advised to be careful with those brush strokes; there is no ‘do over’ accompanied by your lover’s amnesia. Think about it.
Love is like a song: As in Love is like an itching in my heart, I’ve got you under my skin, I only have eyes for you, you make me feel so young, knock me off my feet, since I fell for you, dazed and confused, (take another) piece of my heart, you’re driving me crazy. Are we talking about love here or dementia following a train wreck?
Love does NOT want to meet your ex: period.
You only have one ‘true’ love: but how do you know that you’ve met them yet?
There’s someone for everyone: and here’s where your friends come in, you know, those people who know all the worst stuff about you but like you anyway? Listen, they’ll go through Hell for you; BUT, if they don’t approve of your love……that’s a ‘heads up’! If you can’t trust your friends to know who’s best for you (or at least good for you), whom can you trust? And: if you haven’t learned this yet……. You will.
There are many kinds of love: but it all boils down to two things; (1) you’re thinking about something more important than yourself and (2) it gives you pleasure to do so. If you ain’t got that, you better ask somebody.
It’s worth it: Yep, as corny as it sounds, with its incredible highs and devastating lows, it’s all worth it. Besides, the alternative is to live a superficial life. Love IS the original ‘Living On The Edge’ roller coaster-drive it like you stole it-hell bent for leather-mind bending-flummoxing conundrum of your life. If you’re fortunate enough to have love in your life cherish it, guard it and protect it; because, one false move, Buddy, and it’s history (and you know it).
And, The Lady In The Glass Bathing suit? Seymour Heer writes, “She’s worth wading for”.
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Last Year's Predictions in New Orleans

2008-06-08T11:28:00.000-07:00

Good evening and welcome, yes welcome once again to the annual New Years Predictions of the next latest top stories, coming to you from the Dicken’s Prediction Agency, Polling Grounds, Gossip Central, Rumor Control and from contributions to your local W’YAT station from readers like you. Thank you. I’m your host Phil LaMancusa.
For you readers that are new to the show, let me explain. The Dicken’s Prediction Agency works on the theory that the news of the past, seen through the eyes of the news of the present leads to the news from the future. For example: in our top story tonight (or today at coffee; or whatever the case may be), the cathedral will be adding video poker machines to their vestibule to increase revenues, it will be called “Gambling for God”. A spokesperson for the church is quoted as saying, “four Marys will not beat out four Blessed Saviors, but a full house of Archangels will pay triple”.
In other news, the city has approved Harrah’s construction of a theme water park taking up the entire two hundred block of Chartres St. Using the same architect and construction crew that has worked on the restoration of the court house the park will open in 2020. Meanwhile The Largest Corporation In The World is suing the city, saying that they were promised the sale of the entire French Quarter to build a MacCola DisWalSoft World theme park, tearing down all buildings and replacing them with more durable heavy plastic replicas, a process that they said would take about forty eight hours and not interrupt business in the least.
Speaking of business, a plan has been unveiled at city hall for all plastic cups, beads etc distributed this year at Mardi Gras to be coated with a substance that smells like corn. Herds of swine would then be left to roam the streets literally eating all the trash. The plan hit a snag when Lionel Travis, a six year old, asked: “What are we gonna do with all that pig poop?”
Other breaking stories concern four juvenile robbery suspects who were captured after leading police on a 15-minute chase from uptown to mid-city.
The young males, three 10-year olds and one 8-year old were captured by the city’s elite “Under 12 Crime Unit” when they stopped in their stolen golf cart to celebrate at a sno-ball stand. A spokesperson for the unit identified detective Wenzel Denzel as the 11-year old ‘cop that got the drop’.
Iraq has opened it’s first suicide bomber speedway where loaded cars can compete using empty building as their targets. In the third day of fierce competition prizes were still unclaimed.
Elsewhere in Iraq the fighting seems to be over. The New Orleans Brigade, brought over as a last resort explained how this was accomplished.
They sighted a more streetwise approach using rap music, gang warfare, hip-hop fashion and posters of music stars to frighten Al-Quaida operatives into giving up. As PFC Freddie “Pooh Bear” Minorca, 14, put it “Sh_t….. dem guys don’t know a Mother F—kin’ thing about killin’. We can do more damage on a Saturday night in the ‘hood’ then they do here in a week!”
Back at home the local daily newspaper, promising to only show sports news and sensationalistic murder trials on the front page, has celebrated it’s first daily edition in which there are no murders reported. Said an Editorial aide based in the New York headquarters: “Good thing for us we sent all those guys to Iraq”.
Speaking of Iraq, congress has been asked to appropriate an additional Gazillion Samollians for the rebuilding effort; pointing out that schools, roads, and hospitals aren’t enough to lift the morale of these oppressed people, a White House aide pointed out that we need to build “Shopping facilities, multi-plex theaters, fast food outlets, and amusement parks as well”. The Largest Corporation In The World, that controls both houses, assured Americans that this was a good thing for the economy and lowered interest rates another half a percent.
On the health scene a final touch has been put on the Medicare bill. Seniors will now be charged for services whether they receive them or not. The money will go directly to drug companies and vacationing doctors. A spokesperson for Pharmaceuticals-R-Us, a subsidiary of The Largest Corporation In The World, announced that a ‘Get Tough Or Die’ policy has been implemented and needed “no ‘splaining”. Senior Presley went on to point out that this was a principle that the country was built on and introduced legislature of a bill call ‘No Work, No Food’, aimed at taking care of the nation’s problematic five million Americans that are out of work.
In sports the local teams have agreed to lose all games before they are played to cut down on fan disappointment. “We’re getting back to the original idea of guys getting together to drink beer, paint themselves funny colors and yell stuff, you know?” said Andy Randy of the ninth ward. Not to worry though; public floggings, executions and half time shows will keep the crowds amused. Way to go fellas.
After a word about the weather, rotten, anchorperson Mrs. Aurelia M. Lampo will return with the progress report on the oil drilling scheduled to begin Monday in the courtyard of Commander’s Palace. But first here’s a twenty minute commercial from our sponsor The Largest Corporation In The World.
Thank you and have a pleasant evening.

Beer Drinker Blues in New Orleans

2008-06-04T11:51:00.000-07:00

I stopped off at The Royal St. grocery store with bated breath. ‘The whisper on the street’ had it that Schlitz beer had been sighted (“The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous”). I planned on having one of my favorite lunches: a ‘Tall Boy’ and a frozen burrito, yum yum!
Oh, sad day. Oh, bitter disappointment. Oh, sad singin’ and slow walkin’. Oh, wailin’ in the wikki-yup.
Yes, Schlitz beer had been in, but it had been a one shot thing. Now what they had was an esoteric, eccentric line of far fetched, far flung ‘designer beers’ with the gamut of multicolored Abita’s as vanguard and foreign ‘non alcoholic’ beers bringing up the rear. By ‘non alcoholic beer’ I mean: any beer that no self styled alcoholic would drink! Can you imagine any of your friends saying: “Boy, I went on a bender, and did those Coronas f--- me up! Missed two days of work after hitting the Dos Equis, musta been the limes!”
Nonononono! MY friends would be more apt to say: “Leon, found Schaefer at the ‘Pac ‘n Sac, Pic ‘n Pay, Put It In A Bag ‘n Git Outa Here’ store and bought ten cases! Four of us watched the Twilight Zone marathon, thirty pounds of boiled crawfish and didn’t even know what city we was in!”
Let’s get it straight from the gate; I’m an American. My beer is American, I smoke Lucky Strikes (non-filter), I chew Dentyne gum, I drink coffee with all the caffeine I can get AND half and half AND PLENTY OF SUGAR. I wash with Palmolive soap, I use Colgate toothpaste and when I want a mint, I go for LifeSaver’s, End of story.
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Thirty years ago I worked for a man that was to become my mentor. It was at a country club in Denver and he had a keg of beer on tap in the walk-in refrigerator for the cooks. The beer was (and still is, when you can find it) Pabst Blue Ribbon. He said that it was the first beer that he had thrown up on and that was good enough for me. Since then, PBR has been, and remains, my beer of choice. Why? I like it. And, you know what? I have a slogan for that brewery: “Pabst Blue Ribbon--- It works!!”
Also, PBR comes in a nifty red, white and blue can. What can be more American than that? But, what is a red blooded American supposed to do in a world of beers that include weird ingredients (like berries fergodsakes) as incentives for doing what all beer drinkers are about (getting drunk)? Naturally, in direct opposition to this, I look for and buy when I can, American traditional, brewskis.
Anyone who is well over the drinking age (such as moi) can remember when the beer you drank was the beer that was brewed close to where you lived, made with the local waters. It wasn’t until the giant breweries started mass marketing that you started to get swill that came from afar.
Beers like Rhinegold and Ballentine and Oarlocker in the north. Black Label and Schlitz and Miller High Life in the mid west. Hamms on the left coast, and others. We knew where we were by the beers that were favored.
I come from a very disciplined family, if any of us kids acted up at the table, our mother would reach across the table with her soupspoon and whomp us, admonishing: “just drink your beer and shut up!”
I also come from a family of religious drinkers; not only do we drink religiously, but my mother told us that when God created beer, she put it in packs of six so that we would be aware that that was a portion. You can’t go wrong with a parent like that; although go wrong I did, it wasn’t her fault
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Be that as it may, Falstaff, Regal and Jax beers are a thing of the past here, even Dixie is no longer brewed here (Blackened Voodoo beer? Gimme a break!). Rolling Rock, to my taste, is the closest thing to a traditional American beer that you can get and still be in a class joint.
I have a personal boycott going with the Bud and Bud products since the seventies when I found out that they were major funders of marijuana busters in Humbolt County, so they’re out. Miller will never taste the same unless it’s in that clear bottle. ‘Lite’ beer I dislike on princable, just as I disdain ‘sugar free’ anything. Red-Dog is for curb sitters and breakfast brown baggers. Busch and Miliwaukee Best are for ‘old man crotch scratchers’ (and is a Bud product). Foreign beers I’ll drink in foreign places, thank you. And the day that I willingly pay more money for a non-alcoholic beer than regular ones, just shoot me.
Tell me why I should want to drink beer any color, going in, than I want it coming out. Tell me why I should want a Thirty two-ounce can of beer???.
Have you even noticed that finding beer in twelve ounce cans has become a rarity? If you have, then you didn’t tell me. What’s gone wrong in this world? Barqs is even claiming to be a ‘root beer’! What’s up with that?
I was passing that newsstand on Decatur St. and saw the sign in the window proclaiming the availability of a gazillion beers. Do they have PBR? Nooooooo. Why bother?
And now, ‘the whisper on the street’ is that Coors is going to start brewing here. Hello! What, I ask you, am I to do?
In heaven there’s a barmaid that serves icy mugs of American beers for a buck. It won’t get much better that that.

New Orleans Restaurant Rumors

2008-06-04T11:46:00.000-07:00

Okay, by now we all have graduated from Gossip Central and are ready for courses in Rumor Control. Soon you’ll be able (with my help, of course) to move on to Hearsay University with, shall we say, impunity; to go forth, unchallenged among the unsuspecting, with insider traded information about local eateries.
I’m not talking about the basic skinny on restaurants like underpaid kitchen staff, lack of health benefits, tough working conditions, chefs that can go from zero to ballistic in four seconds, bounced paychecks, alcohol and substance challenges (not abuse, only the challenge of keeping supplied), and wait staff that are required to come to work ready to kiss everyone’s ass from the dishwashers to the Chefs before they even get to the customers. This is a documentary yet more expansive and in depth.
I’m talking about, for example, this conversation that I had recently with a cab driver friend that is Professor Emeritus of Hearsay U.
Moi: “So they shut down that brothel on Canal St. and the Madame is gonna name names, one of whom, rumor has it, is a local Chef. I wonder who he’ll turn out to be?”
Prof: “What do you mean HE? It could be --------------! You know She’s a nymphomaniac, don’t you? It could just as well be her!” (You know who that is don’t you? Not to worry, the answer to these and other gems will be given towards the end of this sermon. I promise)
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Okay, now that you’ve cheated and found out who the nympho chef is, let’s get on to some more juicy stuff. Test your knowledge and ability to pick up the ‘whisper on the street’ by answering these:
1. Name three French Quarter restaurants that have just or are about to lose their leases and close.
2. Name the restaurant that, when the waiter thinks that the customer is a bit drunk, will add drinks and food to their bill (to be shared by the waitstaff).
3. Name that place that as a prerequisite to being assigned to lucrative table sections, sex with the owner (or his son) is required.
4. When installing the new computer system, at this high profile joint, it was necessary to teach the staff to read and write as some had been actually drawing pictures previously. Where is it?
5. Where do residents go to peer into windows, after closing, to watch the rodents frolic on food counters?
6. Name the restaurant that the management takes a percentage of waiter’s credit card tips (off the top) and if you complain….you get fired.
7. Where do they lace fried chicken with lye as a rat poison?
8. Where is it a common kitchen occurrence to see the ceiling drip into the salad dressings? The soup?
Now, you see, if you ask a waiter those questions they’ll probably look at you like you’re stupid and rattle off at least three answers, for each question, right off the top of their pointy heads. Ready for more?
9. Where are insects such a common factor that if you watch the kitchen as they send out your lunch, you won’t be surprised to see the waitress flick a roach from the cutting board?
10. Smoking while cooking? Sweating into your food? Spitting into the trashcans? Excessive drinking on the job? Paying off the health department? Not having current licensing to operate? Too easy!
11. Discrimination by gender, ethnicity, age, or the size of your-------? Where have you been?
12. Sexual (and other) conduct that can be viewed as ‘misconduct’? That subject goes so deep that you’d have to have a seminar to explain to the uninitiated the complexities of social and sexual politics that occur behind swinging doors. Neither pros nor cons come into play here (we’ll save that for the seminar), it’s there. Has been. Will be.
13. Is it rumor or truth that the Chef of this restaurant is part owner of that building (on Chartres and Toulouse) that is suffering demolition by neglect? The (possible) answer is at the end of the article.
14. What white tablecloth restaurant’s customers had the occasion to be served by the bartender working in her bra and undies for about an hour a coupla weeks ago and why?
15. Name the latest DWIs, adulterers, breakups? Who am I not talking about?
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Restaurants are virtual Galapagos Islands of human behavior and to categorize and extrapolate and rationalize, let alone try to explain that aberrant behavior would take a combination of Messieurs Freud, Darwin and Rodgers (Roy, Fred, Buck and Will). The question remaining is how come that in the year 2002 no one has thought to change that mentality? Answer: It has been tried over the last hundred years to bring sanity to that chaotic world, but thus far, has met with little success. Why? Simple. The restaurant business attracts weirdoes, misfits, transients, runaways, renegades, idiot savants, non-conformers and those of us that are just plain perfect. We know that it’s not Kansas, Toto; but, to a lot of us, it is home.
Well, so what’s one of the main things that keeps restaurant staffs going besides the chance of the elusive hundred-dollar tip, drinks before, during and after work or being gluttons for punishment? Living on the edge, you know, where things happen! Where else can you hear things like: “She got him in the liquor room while he was on the ladder taking inventory and you know how small that room is; took down his pants and did him right there! Said that it was part of his job!” or “Yeah, they (the owners) did a drug test on the staff and they all failed!” or “He came in to work and they had changed the locks, he’d been stealing, from his own restaurant for almost a year!!” or “I swear, I saw it with my own eyes(!), they took the ladle out of the turtle soup, beat the rat to death, you know, blood (?), and then put the ladle back in the soup!” (Guess where this occurred?).
In any case, here’s the answers to the questions (and in some cases, names of places I’ve added to throw you off the track just to keep things interesting): Antoine’s, Arnaud’s, Bayona, Brigtsen’s, Brousard’s, Café Marigny, Central Lock up, Cobalt, Commanders, Court of Two Sisters, Déjà vu, Elizabeth’s, Embers, Emeril’s, Felix’s, Frank’s, Gabrielle’s, Galatoire’s, Giovanni’s, Grill Room, Indigo, Jaeger’s, K-Paul’s, La Crepe Nanou, Le Rouge, Mr. B’s, Morton’s, Muriel’s, Napoleon House, Oliver’s, Outback, Pat O’s, Pelican, Peristyle, Quarter Scene, Redfish, Remoulade, Santa Fe, Vaqueros, Victor’s, Wolfe’s, Zoe or none of the above?
Oh, and our lascivious, lewd, lustful, libidinous, lecherous, licentious Lady? Ooops! Out of space.

Sunday Newspaper Blues

2008-05-25T12:53:00.000-07:00

Question: Name the one thing on Sunday morning that is common to most all New Orleanians, and possibly everyone else in the universe? We’re talkin’ everybody that’s anybody, that is with the exception of brunch cooks, ne’er do wells, runaway princesses, pirates, the mentally challenged and those of us that are ‘Proud To Crawl Home (after Saturday night)’.
Answer: Church? We would hope so. Coffee? Could be. Grits and grillads? Maybe so. Cleaning our powerful handguns? Wondering who that is sleeping next to you? How about: r e a d i n g t h e S u n d a y p a p e r ? Bingo!!!
The Sunday Paper!
I LOVE the Sunday Paper, in fact that’s what my costume is this Halloween, I call it ‘all the news that’s fit to stink’.
To honor of that rag that we affectionately call our TP (pun intended), and, as close to my dead line as possible, I’m going to pick up Sunday’s paper and point out how a ne’er do well (mentally challenged) brunch cook pirate (and his runaway princess) after crawling home (proudly) go through the locally published information at hand. I give you: ‘THE TIMES PICAYUNE’!!!
The first thing you need to do is to heft the paper, get a feel for the weight of the thing, consider the sheer amount of words that you are about consume, retain, dismiss and forevermore live with the possibility of regurgitating at the most inappropriate times ( oooh Baby, oooohhhh Baby……did you read how fares are dropping to the west coast? OUCH!! What was that for?)
Now it’s time to cull the stack. All that stuff that you know you’ll probably never read, unless you’re being held hostage at your in-laws annual brunch ‘get together’ without a decent cocktail in sight; get rid of it. Out goes the ads for Rite Aid, Lasik surgery, The Celebration Station, the K-Mart two day only white sale, Eckerd, AT&T wireless, Office Depot, Sears, Lowe’s, Circuit City, BestBuy.com, and the ads for Pope Paul the second coins, Dachshunds painted on plates and Classic Comfort bras (“so comfortable you’ll forget you’ve got it on”….WHAT?) Personally, I do keep the Walgreens’ section, as Walgreens is the only store that I would actually come across in my wanderings. I suffer from the ‘if it’s not in the Quarter do I really need it’ syndrome.
Next, my favorite to get rid of (though possibly not yours): Sports. As far as I’m concerned, any part of the paper that bandies about words like ‘dominating’, ‘trouncing’, ‘dousing with a powerful surge’, ‘pounding’, ‘shutting down’ and ‘annihilation’ along with ads for muscle cars, penile enlargement, and the Hustler Honey Amateur Contest better be in color and show blood or frontal nudity. And while we’re at it, why is baseball, basketball and football season happening simultaneously?
Next to get the axe is the Parade section with the cover boasting The 2003 Cars & Trucks, the inside answers the burning question of whether Roy Rogers Jr. had to sell his daddy’s saddle to pay the IRS, I’m presently not in the market for a minature ceramic St Nicholas, Laugh Parade doesn’t give me a chuckle and the last time I bought five books for ninety nine cents I received junk mail until I had to relocate. It is interesting to note that gas guzzlers in this time of the oil wars, come with twenty inch aluminum wheels, leather bucket seats, navigation systems and optional DVD entertainment systems; all for about twice or three times my yearly salary!
Real Estate? “This exquisite Country French home showcases wood flrs. Gourmet kit. 4 bdrm 3 ba 1+ acre, Spacious living & magnificent views for the price of a small South American country.”
Jobs? Classified? ‘Split shift, exp necc. Drug test, 6days/week, now hiring, apply in person, EEO/AAP, M/F, call Lisa or Amy: M-F 8am-4pm, 401K and hospitalization’. Do I want to be a Buggy Driver, Associate Professor of General Surgery, Legal Secretary/ Exp Line Cook that much? Nah, and most of us already have jobs we don’t want.
TV Focus? I don’t have cable, I’m a PBS junkie, end of story.
Comics? I read ‘em all. Especially Peanuts, Garfield and Doonesbury. After that Zits, Mother Goose and Grimm, B.C. and Rose is Rose. Generally I find it hard to be amused, but it’s better than the News. Why is the Piranha Club banished to the week day Classified section?? Now that I can relate to!
The Money section? If money were dynamite I wouldn’t be able to blow my nose.
The main News section? Reading it is rarely rewarding and generally reminds me of an Adlai Stevenson quote: “There is nothing more horrifying than stupidity in action”. In a nutshell Edwards is still out, the War’s still on, Louisiana ranks worst on everything, and we’ll never be prepared for ‘The Big One’.
That leaves the Travel, Living and Dead (Metro) sections.
The Travel section had an article on the Natchez Trace that I’d love to hike. It also had cut rate ads for going anywhere and the book section which had the first three best sellers touting “After her husband leaves her for a younger woman, a fourteen year old looks down from heaven when the young caretaker of an estate finds a newborn girl in a box. A 45 year-old woman finds romance in a small town on the North Carolina coast as she describes what happens in the aftermath of her kidnapping and murder, his employer, an 80 year-old matriarch, helps him keep the baby”, (but not in that order).
The ‘Dead’ section, or Metro as it’s called, will, more often than not, give you a cheery front page on Sunday. Monday thru will give you mostly the details on how New Orleaneans are brutalizing each other or the real horrors of living here. Yes from a man shot twenty five times and living to a seven year old being murdered in the street by his mother’s boyfriend.
However on Sunday, it’s mostly cheery stuff on the cover. Once inside we have pregnant woman steals man’s truck (at gunpoint), N.O. man arrested in shooting of woman (get this, he shot her because she was smoking while pregnant), 3 men wanted on burglary warrants, asbestos in the air, roll over car crashes and the like; also we have the death notices.
Frankly, I read the death notices because I’m sure that one day I’ll see my picture in there. I simply do not trust myself to tell me when I die, and as for my friends, hah, they keep me in the dark about everything!
I do know from reading the obituaries that a large percentage of eighty to ninety year old corpses once were homemakers or retired merchant seamen. Fifty to sixty year olds die usually of heart attacks or cancer, the men were all veterans and the women had promising careers. The Forty year olds usually succumb to lung cancer or heart ‘failure’ or the mysterious undetermined causes. In their twenties and thirties, violence usually accounts for mostly sudden demises especially if their nick names are ‘Boom Boom’, ‘Big Man’, ‘Slick’ or ‘Fast Betty’. If politics continue their merry way, I predict young folks in uniform appearing. Children are the saddest to read about and we won’t go into that one here.
Lastly the Living section: entertainment, horror-scopes and puzzles. After the Comics, it’s my favorite. Dave Barry is here, my personal hero as well as advice from Carolyn, Abby and Miss Manners. A calendar of events and photos from the past live in this section.
In all, the newspaper is a nice place to visit with its horrors and heroes, and if I had more room I’d wax eternal. Look for me on Halloween and if you don’t give me candy, I’ll probably tell you to “read my hips!”

Crayons in the French Quarter

2008-05-25T12:35:00.000-07:00

Rejection and despair. That’s the sound that is made when a crayon hits the floor; and, Green was face down in a pool of dust. Again. And, that was the sound that had just interrupted a story that I was trying to compose.
But, I digress, (as an aspiring writer, I’ve always wanted to watch myself, coolly detached, type ‘but, I digress’ into a story, along with other phrases like ‘It gave me great pause’ and words like ‘trepidation’ and ‘indigent’) and since you asked, here’s the story:
I had put aside my borrowed copy of George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. In the book, he talks about his misadventures being indigent in these places in the nineteen twenties or very early thirties. I had decided to do a piece on the people who fall through the cracks here in New Orleans. I have a current passing, and sometimes personal, relationship with about a dozen local ‘unfortunates’ and recently it has given me great pause, I think because, on some subliminal level, I can relate to them and their missed fortunes.
I was also marveling at how much so little has changed for the poor over centuries of progress for mankind; as if the impoverished, being one of the lost tribes of Israel, passed their misery from generation to generation.
I was listening to Mozart’s Requiem in D minor and reflecting on how, with one twist of fate, we are all a step away from living on the street or relying on ‘the kindness of strangers’. I’m convinced that, without my consent, an event or, series of events, could have me (like others that I know) eating from trashcans, sleeping in doorways and carrying my life in a black plastic garbage bag. Possibly, my ‘twilight years’ would be spent lying in a mental ward getting my Pampers changed, as I bark like a duck. One degree of separation, that’s how I was seeing it.
I considered getting a cell phone, surely that would save me from a future of cheap wine, generic cigarettes and asking that cute couple from Des Moines to give me money for standing still, on a milk carton, painted silver. In New Orleans being a living statue on a street corner is a vocation; one step above begging, they do not have cell phones. People hurrying from paying jobs to warm hearths have cell phones. The upwardly mobile, drinking snappy cocktails at swank joints, have cell phones. I do not have a cell phone.
After a recent conversation with my older sister on whether poverty was hereditary or contagious, I came to the conclusion, that in my case at least, it is both. I know no one who is not living from paycheck to paycheck, when they’re that lucky, including every member of my family. You can probably guess what I have to say to that smart-ass that coined the phrase that “money can’t buy happiness”!
In addition, I’m not aware that I’ll have an alternative financial plan, should some mishap occur in my life. I don’t even have a primary financial plan. As I see it, I’m living in a world where college buildings will get millions, and the benefactor’s names will be emblazoned on them, possibly along with their cell phone numbers. Meanwhile, the majority of the population; the impoverished, the insufficient, and the undereducated (the un-cell phoned) will get minimum wage, (at best) and no benefits, ignored by the very people that have it in their power to help them. Maybe the folks with cell phones are hooked up to a higher power, or something. Maybe folks with cell phones never slip through the cracks. My head was hurting; I was obviously putting a strain on my brain.
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Then, between Introit and the Kyrie Eleison, as if by design, a crayon, known only as Green, bit the dust.
I kept the basic box of eight crayons by my desk in the hopes that remembering all of their names would be proof enough that dementia wasn’t setting in. What do I know? Twice before, I’ve found Green out of the box and thought ‘that’s it, I’ve got Alzheimer’s’. This time though, I caught them red handed! Who? The other crayons, of course. What were they doing? Practicing color discrimination! Why were they doing that? I don’t know, maybe it’s just what they do where they come from, kinda like us. Where do they come from? That parallel universe that I’m always talking about
From now on, my theory that there is a parallel universe that is invading us with bad tippers, digital watches, haters and cheaters will include crayons with their own agendas. How else would you explain a CEO who builds a house for a hundred million dollars while John Q. Shareholder takes it in the shorts, if certainly not for a parallel universe and its invasion? These types certainly can’t come from this planet. Period. No member of Homo Sapiens could think or act like that. It belies the term. For the unenlightened, ‘Homo Sapiens’ literally means ‘wise man’. I certainly don’t feel very wise, but, I also didn’t consider myself the type of ‘homo’ that would strap on a body bomb and visit a shopping mall for a little ‘catch back’. That, my friend, takes an alien.
I wondered if there was a correlation between the secret life of crayons and man’s inhumanity to man. To this end, I decided to take my color discrimination theory a step further and perhaps learn something that would be of use in my future, and possibly the future of the world.
I went to Walgreen’s and parted with my ‘hard earned’ for a box of sixty -four Crayolas™. There are other, less expensive, brands and bigger boxes, but, sixty four is the largest quantity you can buy in the French Quarter and Crayolas ™ come with a handy sharpener and are made in the good old U. S. of A. (non toxic, of course). I was hoping to surprise the invaders and learn something about their culture, and perhaps save our planet.
Walking home with my purchase was a joy. It was a clear, warm afternoon in the French Quarter and the smells of Tea Olive and honeysuckle were in the air, and the air was full of expectation. The slight breeze whispered of great potentials and happy endings. I was content to meander in a southern miasma of partial amnesia, if you catch my drift.
‘Drifting’ my way through the narrow streets, past centuries old cottages and ornately ironed balconies brimming with ferns and flowers, I wondered how much had changed over the years in crayon land. Was the color ‘Flesh’ expanded to include ‘Asian’, ‘Hispanic’, and a myriad of ‘African American’ colors? Or was it now called ‘Band-Aid’ or ‘Caucasian’? Were the Greens grouped with Blues because envy was safe with melancholy? Were the Yellows now cowering in their own section, and was ‘Aqua Marine’ now in a ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t tell’ area? Were the crayons of my youth ‘toxic’ (we used to eat them, you know)? The possibilities were endless.
The box sat on my desk unopened for days. I pictured an uneasy truce between the colors being so closely confined and sealed to boot. I wondered what terrors the opening of the box would unleash. Would they behave? I recalled finding a Yellow Penway ™ Crayon in the street a few days earlier; it was broken in three places, obviously the victim of turf wars.
I read the box. Did you know that in Easton, Pa. there is a factory that makes Crayolas? And, that you can call them toll free at 1-800-crayola for a seventy five-cent coupon off your next purchase, you can tour the factory if you ever get up that way, and that, no, they are NOT made by Oompa Loompas. I called them, and they told me that stuff. They have a website, and, of course, it’s www.crayola.com. I also called their marketing firm (not toll free) and I’m awaiting a call back or press package or something.
See, isn’t that better than dwelling on the fact that a third of the adult population of New Orleans can’t read above fifth grade level? How smart does that make you?
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I finally decided to open the box. I mean, hell that’s more important than the fact that less than half the registered voters actually vote here (and only a fraction of those eligible even register).
First I stood the box on its head for a couple of hours to disorient them. I don’t want any oriented crayons, not on my watch.
And then for the moment of truth.
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I opened the box slowly, carefully, with extreme trepidation, forgetting to breathe.
“Holy Cannoli” I exhaled, “they’re in four smaller boxes and there’s no rhyme or reason to their distribution!” I said to no one in particular. The cat eyed me suspiciously from her perch atop the computer printer. I cleared some space on the desk, dumped the crayons out and tried to make some order, or at least get some sense. I started by looking for ‘patterns’ and some emerged.
The Greens were outnumbered, the Red family that drifted into the Oranges held the power, Yellows are almost extinct having inter bred with every other color. Purples were uppity; Silver was being treated like a red headed stepchild, while Black and White simply did not give a shit.
The colors will boggle your mind. There’s Orange, Red Orange and Yellow Orange. There’s Macaroni and Cheese, Purple Mountain’s Majesty, Timberwolf, Asparagus (looking a little overcooked if you ask me), Tumbleweed and Granny Smith Apple! I kid you not. There’s even a color called Bittersweet; I had wondered about that.
But, it was the family of the Blues that blew my mind: Cadet, Turquoise, Pacific, Sky and Robin’s Egg Blue. Cornflower, Cerulean (?), Periwinkle, Blue Green (not to be confused with Green Blue), and of course Blue. I wondered how many shades of the blues there were, and, would B. B. King be able to sing about them all?
Putting them back (in order, of course) I didn’t see Aqua Marine and there were no flesh tones of any ethnic group in evidence. My neighbor assures me that there’s a box of ninety-six out there and has intimated that the next time she leaves the French Quarter she’ll look for it for me. As a hard core Quarterite, I live with the shopping policy that: “If it’s not found in the French Quarter, I don’t really need it”
There, that’s easier than trying to figure out why it seems that The American Dream is being filmed in Myopic-Vision and is being directed by Frederico Fellini, from beyond the grave; hang on……, I thought I just heard Raw Umber telling Olive Green to “Stop whining and get a !@@##$$%%*8* Job!!”
It’s time to reseal that box, there is such a thing as too much information. And besides, who’d believe me?

Satchmo in New Orleans

2008-05-25T12:26:00.000-07:00

I may not be the picture of wholesomeness, watching Fred Rogers at 5:00 a.m. with a beer, a cigarette and a blank expression on my mugg; but you know, I get some of my best thinking done on an all-nighter. Then again, I like New York in June (how about yew?).
Well, whatever; take this ‘Satch-fest’ thing, or whatever it’s called. This is a subject that I’ve been avoiding for the last five years. Avoiding talking about, avoiding writing about, avoiding thinking about. Why? Because a New Orleans love affair with Mr. Armstrong is like that of a faded harlot, after making nothing of herself, bragging about an ex-lover who, when all stories be told, spurned her. I mean, is this the same man that told reporters, about a half century ago, that if he never set foot in this town again that it would be too soon for him (or words to that effect)?
To prepare myself for this writer’s hell, I immersed myself in the subject of Louis, the myth, the legend, the man. I read books, both in his own words and that of others, I played recordings over and over again, I heard rumors of cosmetic surgery, homosexuality and ties to organized crime. I know about at least one of his illegitimate children. I’ve had him for breakfast, lunch and dinner for the last friggin’ month, okay?
What did I come up with? A headache.
Was he a sell out, a philanderer, a musical Buddha, a pawn or a king? Yes. Did he lie about his birthday? Did his Mama ‘sell fish’ to keep bread on the table? Yes. Is his 1927 recording of ‘Hotter Than That’ and ‘West End Blues’ an epiphany of musical innovation? Yes. Did he mind slapping around his old lady if she beefed about his chippies? No. Did he bend over to the Guy Lombardo school of music? Yeah, man!
Let’s start at the beginning. Let’s draw the shades, open a bottle of cheap champagne, disconnect the phone and light up a Lucky. Also let’s chow down on a three-pound meatball po-boy from Matassa’s.
Louis was born a poor black child here (go figure), hustled anyway he could, and was fortunate enough to raise himself up in a time of ‘anything’s legal if you don’t get caught’ New Orleans (same as now).
Then, as now, there were three ways out of the ghetto (in those days most of this town was a ghetto): sex, drugs or music. Period. Racism was taken for granted by him for at least fifty-seven years.
Conflicting reports of how and when he got his first horn, put aside, does not diminish the ability he had for coaxing sounds from that ‘thang’. He simply could, so he did. A New Orleans hustle if there ever is one; take what you got and work it.
His second wife, Lil Hardin, schooled this overweight numbskull in the subtler ways of gaining acceptance to a wide variety of audiences (read ‘white’ here). Louis soon learned what could butter that scrap of bread he had to offer. White America. (you oughta look up ole Lil if you want some schoolin’) Basically he became a twentieth century minstrel, a clown with a horn.
New Orleans is a place that genius’ can live and die in, even now, you can’t throw a rock without hitting a musician; but ‘they be po’. Ya gotta leave town to make it. So he did.
And he never came back! (‘cept once or twice)
He was, and still is, a musical genius’ genius, BUT, the fact remains that our city is a graveyard for people like Buddy Bolden, Kid Ory, Bunk Johnson, Baby Dodds and their ilk .We play lip service to, and take credit for the roots of that thing called Jazz. But, like me, we’re too drunk, lazy, or complacent to nurture and keep it here.
Louis left the country to escape racism and mob control, did you know that? Louie criticized the President about civil rights and the white washing that it gave to Jim Crow. And got blacklisted for it. Hell, neighbor what are we celebrating?
You don’t know Louis like I know Louis: Louis was a dumb kid from the third ward who suddenly found out that he had the talent and ability to not only reach the expertise of a master, such as Joe (KING) Oliver, but to surpass it! What are you to do then? Who do you play for?
Louis played for the world.
But he had to sell out. It’s as simple as this: say that I’ve got a whole alphabet to hip you to, but you can’t dig nutthin’ but the A B Cs? Guess what? Then as now, I’ll go where the do re me is and, like the farmer said to the potato: “plant you now and dig you later”.
A hundred years later, and if you’re lucky, if you’re very very lucky, if your listening ear has not become as prejudiced as Louie’s South is. If you are that lucky, you’ll put this rag down and put on the Hot fives and Hot Sevens, light up a Lucky, pop a cool one and dig. If not, you’re a dumb Mother Cracker and only deserve to read Dick and Jane for the rest of your life.
If you’re a woman reading this: Louis was no better than that loser you’ve got now: don’t envy his women. If you be a man reading this: If you ain’t blowin’---you ain’t knowin’ …………and if you can’t get somebody to hear your LMNO’s, how are you gonna get to your XYZs?
Think about it. Myself? I’m gonna put myself to bed with the Saint James Infirmary in my head and wish I was more like the ‘Satch’. Red beans and ricely yours. Amen.

Essence Festival New Orleans 2003

2008-05-25T12:15:00.000-07:00

The 2003 Essence Music Festival is here and it’s sponsored by Coca-Cola. That says a lot to me, although I don’t know what. Perhaps I’m unclear on the focus of the event; I mean, is the purpose of the ‘Party With A Purpose’ to party or to pursue purposes? I seem to recall (here I go again) that when I was first made aware of this event, it was described as a convention by and for African Americans to network, share experiences, and to work on/out cultural, political and economic challenges mutually exclusive to African Americans. Music was thrown in to help unwind after a day chock full of workshops and empowerment seminars. I don’t know, I’ve never been to Essence. I guess I felt like it was a place that an old white guy would be out of place in. It’s just that I don’t remember it as being…commercialized.
So, here I go, ready to pull my foot out of my mouth (where it’s sure to wind up) and write, again, about something I know nothing about. I may even have to get ready to ingest a little crow.
I have the credentials of the un-empowered. I was raised inner city, in the projects, on welfare, broken home, physical abuse, public schools…the works. But I’m not a person of color; in essence, I’m not black and have no birthright to the blues. And while my ‘roots’ did not fling open the doors of an affluent mover/shaker American society, many of those doors were left ajar, mainly because of my color, or lack of it. The same cannot be said for my many colored friends. As much as we need workshops now, we needed them more then, and, maybe if we had had them then, we wouldn’t need them now. Hmmmm.
Ask random New Orleanians about Essence and they’ll probably confuse it with Bayou Classic, which is mistakenly likened to a Mau Mau uprising. Am I prejudiced? Are we prejudiced in the Big Easy? Are we prejudiced in the South? Hell, while we’re asking, are we prejudiced at all in the good old Yew Ess of A? The answer is a resounding NO! (Anyone heard of ‘Racial Profiling’ though? Shhhhhh!)
One restaurant manager (White) explained to me that it wasn’t the out of towners that caused trouble. It was ‘our’ blacks coming in to prey on their own, or ‘them’ (black people in general are referred to as ‘them’ or ‘those people’ by whites). The restaurant was going along at a good clip that night, if I recall; but, when the call came in that it was “getting dark” up the street, we promptly closed.
Recently a woman (Black), who is much more intelligent and articulate than I am, made the point that Essence was a good thing…for the tourist industry. She also pointed out that the seminars and workshops did have a positive effect…for those that attended. We agreed that, in essence, it could be called a “Black Jazz Festival”. If she ever runs for office, she’s got my vote.
One point is that it’s easy for the rest of the population to make assumptions about African Americans. Blacks generally don’t go explaining their ‘Blackness’ to us dumb Crackers, or anyone else for that matter. We get our information from the examples that are set in public, and, the media. We are left to draw our own conclusions. Our conclusions generally run the gamut from Jack the Ripper (they haven’t proven that he wasn’t of color) to the idiots on Sanford and Son.
Well let me tell you: I don’t go there. If there are any Blacks that read this column, (gotcha!) let me tug on your coattail. I personally have seen persons of color ordering meat cooked medium rare, wine other than white Zinfandel, and then tip grandly. I know Black people who can’t dance, don’t spit, do vote, hold down steady jobs, marry and are faithful to their spouses, and don’t wear their trousers with their undies showing. I personally have seen a look of disgust cross a brother’s face when I mentioned that I actually liked pigs feet! And look, if I don’t say that some of my best friends are Black, it’s because I have no best friends. Hell, I’m as liberal as anybody else! It’s just that I don’t know who these people are!
If you saw me get out of my Eminem blaring ride, in FUBUs, with my baseball cap on sideways, gold crucifix around my neck, drinking a 40, smoking a blunt and grabbing at my crotch would you take me for a ‘Brutha of Anotha Mutha’? Probably not.
I know what I’d take me for: someone who needed to turn that damn music down and get to a seminar because I’d obviously got Black mixed up with stupid. But heck, a lot of folks display, in their image, their level of intelligence.
That also goes for overweight hicks in Mickey Mouse shirts, Asians that dye their hair blond, white kid pierced/tattooed gutter punks, Italian stallion goombahs, war perpetuating nationalists, public drunks, misogynists, self-serving hypocritical evangelists, people that take unfair advantage, plantation mentality bosses, breast beating liberals, those that don’t play fair, and Albanians in general.
But I’m not prejudiced.
I like to think of myself as… biased.
A while ago Calvin told Hobbes that he was writing a self help book called “Shut Up And Stop Whining: How To Do Something In Your Life Besides Think About Yourself”. Hobbes advised “You should probably wait for the advance before you buy anything.”
I’ll go one better: “It’s The Twenty-first Century: Stop wearing Other Peoples’ Names On Your Clothing” Or “Behave Like You ARE A Song In The Key Of Life. There’s still a lot of work to do”.
But that’s just my opinion.

Saint Charles Trolley in New Orleans

2008-05-25T12:07:00.000-07:00

To all my friends that haven’t seen me in a while: I’ve taken employment uptown. I know, I must be nuts, but it’s a good job and only has two drawbacks. 1. It takes me away from my beloved French Quarter many hours a day and (b) having given up private transportation; I must rely on public.
Rely probably isn’t the operative word here. One cannot rely on something as nebulous as a trolley schedule and, at the end of the day (and the beginning and middle), those rumbling sardine cans rarely keep a schedule that logic and reason can fathom. Also, I seem to posses the unique talent for getting to the corner just in time to see the darn thing leave without me. Perfect.
Waiting for the next car (that’s what they call trolleys) can be maddening, especially in inclement weather and after dark when there’s no light to read by. It’s an especial challenge when I see from three to eight of the beasts going in the opposite direction before one comes going my way. Sometimes the fifteen minutes between cars, that the company promises, turns into forty-five or more.
Try waiting thirty minutes, watching one uptown car after another go by, it’s raining, there’s no shelter, your not dressed properly for the sudden chill and the car that stops for you explains that he’s only going to Lee Circle. And another twenty minutes passes before you can catch one going your way and finally get out of the wet and the cold. It borders on cruel and unusual punishment.
It seems to me, in my pea-brained intelligence, that, if we can time the movement of heaven, earth and the very stars themselves, then running a Municipal Railway shouldn’t be rocket surgery. Needless to say, I have a lot of time to think as I undertake my daily odysseys.
I was thinking about how, in the old days, you could stick out your thumb and easily catch a ride; and how, that ride would be more often than not with a longhair like you. Not so today.
Well, what happened to those happy hippies in their flying Volkswagens, with peace and ecology stickers, playing loud Rock and Roll heralding the coming revolution and vows to save the world with nothing more than the love in our hearts? I’ll tell you. At least fifty-one percent of them went over to the dark side.
Think about it and humor an old fart. In the sixties and seventies we didn’t just disapprove of war, ecological suicide and greed: we marched against it! We didn’t just sit back and let the status quo get off with easy victories at the polls we protested!
Our music told us that we had “questions about hate and death and war”, and that the Times They Were A Changin’ because we knew that we were on the Eve Of Destruction and that “it’s been a long time comin’ but I know a change is gonna come”. Each group was musically subversive.
A lot of us sat in at lunch counters, refused to sit in the back of the bus, sang songs and carried signs. A lot of us got our asses kicked and some lost their lives; where are all those children now? I’ll tell you.
They work for special interest groups that rape and rip off our planet and people. They’ve formed religious coalitions that espouse an expeditious hastening to their heavenly home that can come only after the destruction of our planet and all of it’s resources. And some, having lost all the fight in them, sit by bathed in ennui and complacency and allow it to happen without using their hard won vote and voice to change things. They never dare speak a word aloud about any insanity.
How many of you know that this administration refuses to accept and comply with other governments that are concerned with global warning? How many know about human slavery still existing, both economically and physically?
How many of you read about genocide, hunger, ignorance, poverty, violence and hatred and sit by, not raising a voice? How many of you know that we are destroying the only planet we have in the name of ‘economic stability’?
We murder animals and eat them. We buy gas-guzzlers for the tax incentives while the government reaps huge profits on the tariffs that they impose on gasoline sales. We roll finely shredded vegetable matter in thin paper, place it in our mouths, light it on fire and die of cancer. CEOs reap millions while children go to sleep hungry…in America!
Another example: if you own a car (at least in my neighborhood) you pay out the wazoo for gas, insurance and upkeep. Furthermore, you run the risk of being given tickets by parking Nazis that don’t even work for your city. Towing, stealing, breaking and entering, keying, antenna damage and that jerk from out of state that uses it for a urinal or worse, some homeless or street person using your bumper for a latrine are also considerations. For what? So you can go to work and work and work; without health benefits, equal pay for equal work, a threat on your Social Security and the possibility of your kid coming home maimed or wounded as a reward for fighting in a war that we started? In my day, ‘Supporting The Troops’ meant ‘Bring Them Home!’
Chase the American Dream like a dog chases its tail and hope only that you live long enough to see your kids through college and your house paid for and, I’ll tell you what. You have violated everything that we fought for forty years and more ago: the responsibility of changing the world for the better.
I have no pension, no benefits, no 401K and I’ll probably pay rent for the rest of my life. Yet I still listen to the old music; and yes, I’m the guy waiting for the trolley in the rain. What’s more; if I ain’t got nuthin’ nice say… I’ll say it anyway!

Pre- Katrina lunch in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:52:00.000-07:00

Let’s get serious here for a minute. The ozone layer, homeless and jobless rates, the stock market, the energy crisis, pattern baldness and who the heck should honestly be our president (can you use those two words in the same sentence?) doesn’t amount to a hill of beans when mid morning comes, now does it?
The question really, as Douglas Adams put it in his sequel to Restaurant At The End Of The Universe, is, basically, “where shall we have lunch?”
I think of that, as the weather turns warmer and I wander from room to room, considering that empty feeling, that ‘hunger not of the soul’, picking up stray socks and blaming the mess around here alternately on the dog and/or the cat. Pondering, playing and toying with and on the eternal predicament: ‘where shall I eat? What do I feel like having? And, how far am I willing to go to get it?’
Running down the mid day meal is an experience and an adventure; I know, I do it an average of eight times a week. The criteria being that I should be able to begin my quest with an eleven-dollar bill and finish with a full belly and a fresh pack of squares (make mine Luckys, please).
Sanely enough, in the French Quarter, you can walk toward your destination, change your mind half a dozen times about where to stop, and wind up eating somewhere completely different than all of them.
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All places, from Annie’s Chicken Shack to Vat O’ Gumbo have things that I consider great and only with trepidation, and a great deal of faith, do I stray from requesting (I never ’order”) any other offerings. For example: Fiorella’s, on Thursdays, has a butterbean special that can’t be beat; but if you want their ‘famous’ fried chicken, you’ll have cramps (and maybe die) from hunger by the time it gets to you. Ergo: I go there on Thursdays AND I have butterbeans. In the same vein; if I recommend to someone the fried oyster po-boy at Mr. Johnny’s, I don’t want them to come cryote-ing to me because they didn’t like their red beans!
Go where you will for red beans, I say; those of us that ate Buster Holmes’ beans can’t eat them anywhere else, and he’s long gone just like a turkey through the corn. Opinionated? Me? You bet your blue plate!
Also, lunch requires some ‘splaining. For example, if I tell you that the most beautiful cook works at The Royal Street Gro. and the best sandwich maker works the counter at the Quarter Gro. That doesn’t mean to say that she doesn’t make a dynamite six-inch alligator (she sure does!) or that he’s anything that you’d kick to the curb (his club sandwich! Yes, yes!), it’s just my view; and if you don’t like the news (or views), as they say, feel free to make some of your own.
Speaking of Grocery stores. They are where most of us Quarter Rats excel in culinary savvy. They are where the true heartbeat of local cuisine (we like to call it ‘cookin’, thank you) is found. Ask anyone that’s had the crawfish pasta that is the Friday special at C&C, or the well thought out specials at Matassa’s, the roast beef po-boy at Peoples, the mac and cheese at Verde Mart, the chili cheese fries at the Nellie Deli, the alligator po-boy at The Royal Street (did I mention that cook, or their gumbo?), or the ‘pot cookin’ at J.C.’s
Is the muffelatta better at Progress or Central? Do you opt for the service (?) at Napoleon House? Who’s been to Frank’s lately and why? Ever wonder what natives discuss over coffee? Guess no more, we talk food and the discussions are as passionate as great foreplay, and it’s even sanctioned in groups (God, you give great menu!!!).
Speaking of menus. Have you tried Jaeger’s Back Kitchen? It is probably the best new place to open in a long while, maybe years. The ‘pot cookin’ is second to none, the prices are good and the service friendly. It’ll make you want to throw rocks at the Old Dog, just up the alley, but that’s another story.
If you’ve guessed by now that I have a lot to say on this subject, probably so much to say that I just will not have room for little things like addresses, phone numbers, business hours or the names behind the faces, BINGO! You win the Cuisinart! You’d be amazed how fast a thousand words go by. I’ll just leave it up to you to find out where these gems are; hint: they’re all in the Quarter.
Speaking of the Quarter; this is not to say that I don’t enjoy lunch beyond it’s boundaries. Like the Pho at Nine Happiness, the Pad Thai at Singha, a Menage a Trois at the whorehouse (The Sporting House), or the gumbo at Dubon’s. That’s just not so. Like I said, I just don’t have room to write it ALL.
Mena’s, Oh My Lord, Mena’s; have you ever had a better ham hock with cabbage, boiled potato and cornbread? And it’s just across the alley from Country Flame. What to choose? What to choose? And where to go to go to choose it. How do you choose it? I stand outside 1212 Royal St. for half an hour, rubbernecking the menus of Midnight Express and Mona Lisa’s, like a sailor in a red light district, trying to decide where I’ll get my kicks. They both get my vote for great food and they treat you like family.
The Gumbo Shop, twenty five years ago , had a banner inside the dining room that proclaimed in big letters: “Ici On Mange Bien” that is, “Here One Eats Well”. That’s still true of the Gumbo Shop and, for that matter, my French Quarter. If I had room for another thousand words… I would go on and on and on. But, I don’t.
Next Month: How the President saved the day by moving the French Quarter over there to solve The Mid East Crisis. (“betcha I can tell ya where you got that towel… on yo head! hahahahahahahaha

Statistics in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:43:00.000-07:00

Thirty Helens agree: “there’s no disgrace like home”. In a nutshell, that about sums it up for me. No, rats are not gnawing at my brain; I’ve come down with a case of Mathematic Statistic Constipation (MSC) compounded by Sensory Media Overload (SMO).
Oh, I know that you think that I have it made with my girlfriend that drinks beer out of the can, a dog that plays pool for money and a monkey that cheats at cards; and you’re thinking “Plus, he continually gets paid to write drivel in a great urban publication, what are the odds of that?” I’ll tell you. About a hundred thousand to one.
You might add that I’m one of 4,300 people who has found space to rent in one of the 2,000 buildings in the french Quarter, that I’m not one of the 1,000 cases a day that need to be seen at Charity Hospital, or one of the ‘one a day average’ killings that take place in this city (counting those by law enforcers). What are the odds?
I’m not one of the half of the population that’s unemployed or the quarter of the population that live in poverty. I am not one of the more than 3,000,000 people that have lost their jobs since the current administration took office. I’m not one of the 46% of children born in Louisiana into single parent homes. The 60% that live in poverty and 17% that are reared in households with an income of less than $7,500.00 a year”. I’m not one out of every seven women in Louisiana that have been or are being stalked (up 20% over national average).
Statistically speaking, I am not one of the 30% of the adult population that cannot read above a fifth grade level. I’m also not part of either the 39% population stuck in illiteracy level one, or the 75% of the population (and this is all in New Orleans) stuck in illiteracy level two”. I am stuck up to my kiester in statistics!
I am part of the 56% of eligible voters that has registered and part of the roughly half of the registered voters that actually do vote.
Does any of that do me any good? No. 99% of the ideas that I have to save humanity are largely overlooked by 100% of the people who could implement those policies.
Where I work, there is a notice, posted by The Louisiana Restaurant Association about crime in the workplace. It says that there is one robbery every 46 seconds, one assault every 29 seconds, one rape every 5 minutes, and one murder every 21 minutes. Is this America?
I decided, hey, I can come up with statistics on my own. I funded a private study, retained an independent research team of expert (me), and came up with these startling, if not facts, at least, plausible statistics. This is only a small %
Life
87% of the public wish Ben and Jen would just go away.
Of the 59 parts of my body that a glamour magazine says “I want ‘her’ to know about” I can only think of 2%.
Only 12% of cars (including cabs and cops) use turn signals.
Nobody likes rap music. It’s just that 85% of young people don’t know how to sing.
Like most screaming heterosexual men, I spend 57% of my time thinking about women and glasses of beer. What do I do with the other 43%? Sleep mostly.
The Universe
98% of people think that if indeed money can’t buy happiness at least it can purchase acceptable substitutes; of those 98%, 100% think that money can buy anything.
Only one person in Flushing, Queens, New York knows all the words to “The Tattooed Lady”. What are the odds?
94% of the population know what a ‘kit’ is; these same people do not know what a ‘caboodle’ is.
There is an editorialist that can use the term ‘87 Billion Dollars’ no less than ten times in a single article.
99% of dead people do not look like they’re ‘only sleeping’.
We’re all overweight.
Every government, at all levels, lies 78% of the time about matters concerning their credibility, capability, culpability or any other ability questioned.
There is a bookstore in Austin that has 1,000 different magazines, 0% are soft or hard pornography.
100% of all the money that I should have been saving for my retirement has been spent on sex, drugs and Rock and Roll.
There are only three degrees of separation between you and someone who’s been mugged. 100% true.
Everything Else
There’s no such thing as consumer confidence to 87% of people with incomes of less than $50,000.00 a year.
It costs a family of three roughly 50% less income than it takes a single parent with two children.
99.9% of everyone you know has had a bicycle stolen or knows someone who has.
‘Canoodle’ is not in the dictionary; but tell someone that you did a little of it last night and 66% will smile knowingly.
Winking with both eyes at the same time will only upset 2% of the population.
96% of people that are alarmed by American jobs that are lost to foreign markets buy goods from other countries without checking the origin on the label.
Public littering is a way of life to 81% of the population in New Orleans. Spitting percentages are higher.
New Orleans, as a city, does not have the highest % of murders in the
U.S.A. The fact is that New Orleans is 15,000 people shy of being called a city (We’ll have to be satisfied with having the highest homicide rate per capita in the country). Question: what happened to those 15,000 people?
Probably, you’re as scared as I am about answering your door on any night, including Halloween. Incidentally, the term ‘probably’ is defined as a 40-70% chance that what you expect will or will not happen. Think about it.

Feruary in the French Quarter

2008-05-25T10:38:00.000-07:00

Well, I was gonna do the story about how our dear friend Marrinette completely wore out her welcome in Saquine, Texas (where she had gone for the funeral) by running over (and killing) her dead brother’s deaf dog (from the dog’s point of view). But, no…
Then I thought about doing a piece on where to find the best gumbo in the French Quarter. Maybe next month.
Or, what about the time, while out walking, I saw my life flash in front of my face in the form of a blonde, on a bicycle, headed in the opposite direction and hopefully into my past? Alas and alack it’s just not to be. Why? Because it’s February; you know… February, Valentine’s Day…..Love and stuff. And so, I am compelled by greater forces than I care to admit to, to compose a Po-boy view of love; you know, that four letter word that we feel as adrenaline when we’re young and nausea as we get older.
Don’t get me wrong; I believe that true love can be found, and God knows, I’ve found it hundreds of times; and forgive me if I sound jaded; but, I haven’t found any future in it?
Yes Lord, it’s the ‘Love makes the world go ‘round’, ‘Love is a many splendid thing’, ‘Love is like an itching in my heart’ and ‘Who wrote the book of love?’ (and where can I get a copy?) time of the year.
Well, it’s happened to me again; and I don’t know whether to sing show tunes or to run screaming.
The last woman to run through my emotional house was carrying scissors and left me with a bad liver and a broken heart (it’s my pate and I’ll cry if I want to), but that’s another story; suffice to say (as Tom Waits said) “I lost my equilibrium, my car keys and my pride”.
That said, and just in time for the big V.D. (Valentines Day), I’m going to dispense some wisdom, wit and a sick mind’s road map on how to tell when love is coming, going or just passing through.
First the words of wisdom: To the men: if you think that you will ever learn any more about women than the fact that they use more toilet paper than you do; forget it (!) you won’t.
To the women: if you think that (a) ‘still water runs deep’, (b) he’s smarter than he looks, or (3) he can guess what you’re thinking: it just ain’t so, and will never be. Likewise, if you think that you can change his unenlightened attitude toward everything that you hold dear: get real, girl; it won’t happen in a lifetime of toilet paper.
Now for the bad news.

How To Tell When Love Is Beginning
The phases of ‘Love Beginning’ are when: you are least expecting it, aren’t looking for it, could care less about it, and possibly would prefer to avoid it. Usually it’s when you happen to glance up and think to yourself “I wonder if fries come with that shake?” Then comes the eye contact, the mutual smiles and hidden dialog in your first bits of conversation. I.e. (a)“What do you think about sex, drugs and Rock and Roll? (b) Had your blood tested lately? (c) Is that a gun in your pocket? Or (4) Do fries come with that shake? These and other subtle bits of repartee usually get answers like (a) Beat it, loser! (b) I think I hear my Mother calling me. (3) I’m sorry, you obviously have mistaken me for a complete imbecile; now go away. (d) What part of NO don’t you understand? Or (e) Let’s keep this pleasant and I’ll be real if you will.
With any luck at all it will be the last one and you start to ‘accidentally’ run into each other, which leads you to have a date or a few, then you find that you actually like each other (although you fail to understand why), share a drink, a laugh, a song, and then a kiss (another four letter word). Now you’re getting in to deep water and you recall that the last time you saw a light at the end of the Tunnel Of Love it was on the front of an oncoming train that became known as The Heartbreak Express. So you bolt.
But you come back; why? Duh! You’ve been bitten by the Love Bug! It’s like an itching in your heart. It’s about Love and Happiness, and all of that R&B stuff. How do you know?
How To Tell When Love Is Moving In
Well, now that you’ve chewed on each others faces, maybe even shaken a few covers together; you’ve discovered that you have more in common than you thought. You call each other for no apparent reason, adopt each other’s friends, like each others cats/dogs/small farm animals, have a favorite eating place, steal kisses even though they’re freely given, and started holding hands in public. You’ve considered using the ‘L’ word. So, naturally you have a meltdown. You get the ‘Lover’s Bends’.
It’s kind of a cross between The Long Dark Teatime Of The Soul and a Tractor Beam from the Starship Enterprise; those of us who have “been there-done that” know immediately what I mean. The rest of you just haven’t thought about it that way or are in for one friggin’ growth experience. To make a long story short, you’re reeling in your heart on the chance that it won’t get it’s ass kicked and your heart, quite naturally, is resisting because, eight to five, it will.
The conversations that you have with yourself, your friends, your analyst/bartender, panhandlers go like: “I can do this….I don’t want to do this…I’m no good at this…I’ve done this..can I do this(?)…what will/do you/I/they think of me doing this? And finally: ‘to hell with every body, I’m gonna do this! (should I be doing this?)
Chances are you survive the emotional mugging. You take the plunge. It’s forever after again; the whole enchilada, the brass ring….Ready, set, go! SH_T!
You write notes, you send flowers, you pick out towels. You tell your family, your previous lovers (the ones who are talking to you again), the people at work. In short, you cut off all your exits. It’s barefoot in the park time. Right?
Wrong. Do the words “I need more space” sound familiar?

A View for Obama from New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:30:00.000-07:00

In my youth I was told that I could grow up to be President and furthermore, that I could petition the Lord with prayer. Thus far, all evidence that those are true statements are to the contrary.
On a 1975 album by the Tubes, a tune called ‘What do you want from life?’ promised me that as an American citizen I was entitled to, among other things, a heated kidney shaped pool, a Gucci shoe tree, Bob Dylan’s new unlisted phone number, Rosemary’s baby, a foolproof plan, an airtight alibi and a statue of a baby’s arm holding an apple.
According to recent emails, I also deserve lower body fat, higher energy levels, wrinkle reduction, sexual potency, better memory, muscle strength and lower mortgage interest rates. Also, at my request, I can have human growth hormones, relaxers, sedatives, university degrees, viagra, lower credit interest rates, and the ability to investigate any of my friends.
Add to that, I can get Heather’s (and her pre-pubescent friends) web cam shots, the websites of young Russian and Japanese women that are just frothing at the mouth to wed me, Paris Hilton’s xxxx video (with sound), breast enhancement, a gargantuan penis and staying power; and honey, I CAN BE COMPLETE!!!
What went wrong?
Me. I must have missed something growing up. This could be equated to our politics. I know that if I lived in a Democratic society I would have leaders that would do what I tell them is best for me. And, if I happened to vote Republican, I would get leaders that I could count on to do the best for me and that no one would tell me lies. This is simply not true. For leaders and example setters, I have charlatans.
Also, I’m told, as an American, I should be able to count on the media to tell me that there are limitations specific to my economic, physical and intelligence station, and not to jerk me off. This has also not been the case in my recent memory.
Is the media Republican or Democrat? Good question. By the above criteria the media is neither. The media is a Dictator. A dictator and, in essence, a vanity manipulator.
Don’t get me wrong; I have paid my buck at the kissing booths of life:
“Hate that gray? Wash it away!”, “Lose 20 lbs. in two weeks!”, “learn the love secrets of the stars’, “A cleaner closer shave”, “Good for coughs, colds, sore holes, puts hair on anything but a cue ball!, etc. etc. etc.”
Like a lot of Americans, I play the lottery, have lost my paycheck at black jack tables, bet my life on someone to love me for the rest of my life and read books on invisibility, physical immortality, gotten drunk on the elixir of patriotism and taken the Course in Miracles. So?
So, should I not be content with the words that my parents praised my birth with? “He’s got five fingers on each hand, he’s got ten toes and, thank God, he ain’t a moron!” I should be so flattered, I should think that. I don’t
It seems to me that it’s become more important who it is that wins than what it is that’s right. I am suspicious that, as they say, ‘something is rotten in Denmark’, I smell it, I feel it, I know it. The world I live in demands that I should BE SOMEBODY, but it never tells me how to be that somebody; or whom that somebody is. I did not come with an owners manual; so, like a blind man in an unfamiliar space, I’ve been trying to feel my way through life.
I think that there are a lot of us lost Americans, the ones who didn’t become President, the ones whose prayers have not been answered, that may wonder these same things.
It’s as elusive as a fire fly, but as pervasive as planters warts. The rich get richer, the poor have children, the criminals take what they want, the mighty are felled to rise again and the downtrodden are snatched from the brink once again to be given one final flogging. Is this goodness being rewarded? Does God move in mysterious ways? Give me a break!
By all the evidence collected thus far, it’s not a reach to say that: some people get more than their fair share; not because they deserve it, but, by the fact that they’re willing to stick it to some smaller guy, the average Joe. Period. And there are more of us smaller guys than there are them, so go figure. Greed talks and the rest of us walks.
This is not a rant or a rave, but more of ‘I’m weary of folks telling us how fortunate we are instead of letting us in on the screwing that we’re taking. Dry, hard and up against a tree.
And I know that I should be grateful, yes downright grateful, and I remind myself constantly so, that it is a miracle that I am alive, six feet above ground and warm to the touch… BUT. I see people eating from garbage cans, I read about death in the daily papers, I know people who work abnormally hard just to stay financially afloat. I know people who will never get adequate health care, whose children will never be adequately educated and whose future (if not stopped by a bullet) will be to step into their parents miserable places unless we can find a way to break that cycle. Remember, these are also people that were told that they could be President, and not told that they would never be able to afford to visit the dentist regularly.
What do I want from life? I want what a lot of us Americans want: change for the better. The truth would be a start. And yes, I’m not as tall as I appear on film.

Essence Festival in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:22:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Essence! Boy, do we have a time in for you, and yes, you may make it back to wherever you come from in one piece. I hope so.
Some have been here before. Many have not. This column is to try to school you on the ways of the Big Easy and how to avoid growth experiences that you may wish to postpone, possibly for some future incarnation.
Fact one: everyone in New Orleans is running a hustle of one kind or another, it’s how we make a living. You see, out of town visitors are basically our only source of income. From experience I can swear that our folks will accept your last nickel whether you are willing to part with it or not. Don’t feel special, we do the same to each other and we smart locals have perfected the art of simultaneously holding on to our wallets, watching our backs and not believing everything we’re told by strangers. But, being the homicide capitol of the country indicates to me that not all of us are quick studies.
I’m told that it is refreshing to find such a major city steeped in black culture and as you see us going about our daily business you may want to consider that with our quaint third world attitude, a certain plantation mentality can sometimes be seen slipping through the façade. But face it, you probably can’t offer better where you come from, hey? But, we are special; we rock twenty four seven, you can drink in public, gamble your hard earned away and go to church, oftentimes on the same street. They say that shame and pride are two sides of the same coin; you’ll be hard pressed to find that coin in any of our pockets.
Oh, there are optimists here…somewhere, and if you see trash on the street, people spitting, car music blaring and the occasional sound of gunfire or sirens; please be assured that we don’t like it any more than you do, but we weren’t taught any better manners. Blame it on the lead-based paint.
You may think that we can’t find correct fitting trousers for our young men. Not true. Wearing pants six sizes too large, holding them up by the crotch and walking as if you have diaper rash is a ‘style’. Why? Got me! There is an elected official that has proposed a law against it and we don’t know which is the more ridiculous.
As far as national averages are concerned we rank just above an andouille sausage in intelligence here; although, I would not live anywhere else even if you could find me a job. And yes, unemployment is an issue here, so we’re building more hotels and expanding the convention center to put more unskilled locals to work, of which there are more than a few.
Speaking of personal safety, take a lesson from the natives: don’t wear beads, walk on unlit streets, get drunk in pubic or consider that friendly stranger your new best friend. Don’t take money out in an uncontrolled environment; I keep different denominations of bills in different pockets to be ready for different purchasing situations: I don’t pull out a wad of twenties for a cup of coffee or a pack of smokes. ‘Nuf said.
Drinking alcohol here is expected, encouraged and invited at every turn you take and with that comes an element of our population ready to take full advantage of your lack of experience and vulnerability. And I know that it would be really cool to follow your new friend up the street for ‘a little something extra’… don’t. I’ve found more than a few discarded wallets on the street on Sunday morning, not surprisingly with out of town driver’s licenses and no money.
Speaking of driving, you may also may want to know that this city makes an awful lot of money on parking tickets and the towing of illegally parked vehicles. Read posted signs and under no circumstances park within twenty feet from any street corner. Period.
Also, on our streets you’ll see and smell urine, blood, vomit, syringes, condoms and glass from car break-ins; it’s something us residents have gotten used to, would like to change and don’t often boast about. When you have tourism, poverty and ignorance in the same mix, it’s bound to happen. Consider us a dysfunctional Disneyworld.
You really have the opportunity of having a wonderfully great time here, there’s music everywhere, gaiety and laughter; just don’t get stupid on us; you can get yourself hurt and somebody can land in jail.
Now here’s my disclaimer. I write this column monthly and I am fortunate to have editors that allow me to air my views about this city and related subjects. More than once I have pissed someone off and I’ll apologize in advance if this be the case with you. Once again I hope that the powers that be will read me and ask me for suggestions, so far as I know they haven’t and I’ve given up expecting them to. I love this city, but as I tell people, living here is like taking a warm bubble bath with a martini and a snake.
Everyone that I know or have talked to can relate an experience with someone unlawfully or inconsiderately interfering with their peacefully inclined lifestyle. It’s a fact of life here. For a glowing example I suggest that while you’re here, pick up our daily newspaper and read the Metro section. You will see our daily reports of crime and in the obituaries see another one of our citizens felled by violence. Multiply that by three hundred sixty five and you have the Big Easy quality of life.
So go and enjoy the Essence Festival. Attend a motivational seminar, it’s the only time of year that we have them on that scale. Then go home where often as not you may not have to lock your house, your car, your bike or your heart. Just for God’s sake be careful out there.

Dinner in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:19:00.000-07:00

I had another restaurant dream last night, I usually get one when pulling double shifts or training new recruits, which I did last week. For those out there that have never had a waiter’s job, it goes like this: it’s a super un-naturally busy restaurant night, the place is packed, the kitchen is three miles away, your station is full and everybody wants something. You’re racing full tilt to get things done and nothing is what it should be, food is coming out wrong, customers are asking for strange things, have strange questions and identical faces. You can’t tell where you are except that you’re balls to the wall busy and running your ass off and nothing is getting done.
It’s really loud, by the time you make the distance to the kitchen, other waiters are rushing everywhere, you’ve forgotten what you came for and the cooks are screaming in a language unintelligible to you.
I imagine if someone was to look at me in the midst of this nightmare, I would appear like my dog Ginger does when she has her dreams: whimpering and jerking like she’s hooked up to an electrode. Perhaps dogs are reincarnated waiters. Things that make you go hmmmm.
I did not waken refreshed. Pensive and not refreshed. I went on a wonder and this I wondered:
What is this thing about waiter’s nametags or introductions? The “Hello, my name is Jeremy and I’ll be your waiter tonight” type of action. Personally, I go with the guy who doesn’t want to know a waiter’s name unless the waiter is going out with his daughter and maybe not even then. Specifically, I don’t go out to eat to make friends; that’s what I go to bars for. I go out to eat to be with good company, have someone cook me something yummy to eat and then have somebody else do the dishes. That’s what I’m in a restaurant to do, and unless the waiter (male or female) treats me like either one of us has the intelligence of a box of rocks, that’s what I’m here to tip well for. Customers should be like me.
Let’s start with this, what’s with these parties of eight, ten or more that think they can get a table with no reservation on a busy night and who are the boneheads that move heaven and earth, and the chair that my date has her purse on, to seat them? Those people are gonna get loud, they’re gonna throw the kitchen out of synch, with my food, and, they’ll never get the good service smaller parties do. AND, a word to parents; your two, four, six, eight, ten or twelve-year-old does NOT want to come fine dining on a Saturday night. They want to go to Burger King, Don’t get me started on split checks, cell phones or hot tea.
How about those people that drink bottled water? Don’t they know that every food they eat and every cocktail they drink is made with our local sludge? I want to say: “would you like local water, bottled water or a margarita? because you’re gonna pay as much for foreign water, with or without carbonation, as for some first rate tequila: get a clue .
And while we’re at it, what is it with the lemon with water? to me, it’s like kissing your sister, and what waiter has not spied a customer slipping some Sweet and Lo into it (or into their pocket, I might add).
Allergies? I don’t understand them. I once avoided going out with a stunning woman after she volunteered the fact that she was allergic to garlic! What kind of future could you have with someone like that? Diets? Listen, if you want to lose weight, eat less and exercise or be comfortable with who you are. Period. Especially when you go out to eat: Going out is either a sensual experience or a forage, and hopefully you know the difference. In either case, and above all, you should know why you’re there. Attention shoppers: it’s only dinner! Rule number one: the Chef knows what they’re doing. Chef know that smoked pork chops go with greens and mashed potatoes, and that Adkins was a culinary misanthropic sexually repressed pervert and the Pastry Chef considers Sugar Busters an abomination to nature. Deal with it, like I said: it’s only dinner!
You’ll be hard pressed to find a waiter that will sing the praises of most of their client’s cognizant reality concepts in and of real time. Mostly, it’s like they’ve been dropped from outer space into an eating establishment with no clue as to how they got there. Example: “Hello, (with a flourish of napkin) welcome to Chez Nez, I’m your waiter Anthony and I’ll be serving you tonight (and kissing your ass for money); can I get you a wine list or a cocktail before dinner?” Blank stare. You’re who? I’m what? We’re what? And do I want a huh? How do I work this?… You get this very very very often.
I’m of the school of “I don’t care who you are, I’m here with someone and I want strong drink right now!”
And here’s the big one: tipping. They (whoever they are) should pass out this information at our borders: waiters are paid less than half our minimum living wage by owners who insinuate that gratuities will make up for that inequity and are taxed by a government on that assumption. Simply put, I, as a server, depend on you, as a customer, to supplement my meager wage with money based on my knowledge and expertise of service. Tips (To Insure Promptness) is how I make my living. It’s a sick concept; but, it’s in place and a reality to me and the people that I am financially responsible to. To stay afloat, unless I’m a complete bonehead, you need to consider, as a client, that my service is worth a reasonable compensation, at least fifteen to twenty percent above your tab. That’s the reality of it. If you think that this is easy you’re welcome to try it. Me? I’m gonna go soak my feet and wonder why, if that overweight turkey with the cigar minded me looking down his trophy wife’s cleavage, he didn’t think to dress her better.

Gumbo Logic in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:15:00.000-07:00

‘Wasted and wounded; it ain’t what the moon did, and God what’m I payin’ for now?’
I resisted the temptation of having a beer for breakfast. Well, almost. Then again, what was I supposed to do, leave it by itself in the fridge and me on the verge of a hangover…..question mark, question mark, question mark. Oh, the choices we have to make when we’re on our own, especially when we have the whole day off.
Speaking of choices, is it just me, or is anyone else out there feeling older by the nanosecond? I mean, I hear folks talk about computers that will do everything but wipe your behind and my response is to go out and buy my landlady flowers to help her overlook the fact that I sit out late on the porch smoking Luckys, drinking PBR and listening to Buddy Holly on my turntable singin, “ that’ll be the day-hey-hey, when I die.”
I read in the paper that because Chinese people have to learn how to write all those squiggly kinds of handwriting (whatever it’s called) that they suffer from a lack of creativity. Who knew? Yet it figures, ten thousand years of civilization and the best that they can come up with is Moo Goo Gai Pan? C’mon my yellow brothers, we, on the other hand, know how to butcher people in the street as well as in other countries, and we’ll go you one better…. our children can do it as well, even in their schools!! Just think, maybe because our kids are dumber than dirt, they can concoct ways of smuggling AKA 47s into the gym without being caught… way to go guys.
In the same newspaper, I learned that if we stopped spitting and urinating in public, our crime rate would go down. Well, I tell ya, this American did his part only as recent as last night. That’s right, I could’ve whipped that bad boy out and let’er rip on the fence post, but did I? Not on your tintype! I held it!!! And I just know, that the world is a better place for it.
AND, just yesterday while listening to the plan to rescue a three-legged dog (anybody want one?) I heard about a State Trooper who apprehends an alligator, lassoes it, drags it behind his pick up to a ditch and puts a bullet through its head. Let’s see, what reading level would you put that role model at? Is it just me?
It seems to me that I come from a simpler, more gentle time; a time when singers were harmonizing “could it be I’m falling in love?” as opposed to grunting “gotta find me a Project Girl uh, uh!”
I’ll tell you how it was when I was growing up as opposed to how I see things now.
1. Then: I believed that by dressing smartly, learning to converse intelligently (on a variety of subjects), having skills on the dance floor, speaking politely to everyone but my peer group and, later on, knowing how to handle my alcohol intake would gain me the respect I thought that I deserved.
2. Then: I considered crossing at the corner, saving a candy wrapper for the next litter can, and finding a reason to compliment the next person I spoke with.
3. Then: I considered asking questions instead of demanding answers, meaning “excuse me” instead of “get out of my way” and never to taking a kindness as a weakness.
4. Then: I put romance before finance and even politeness before truth. I had never heard the phrase “talk shit, take none” and wouldn’t have believed it if I had. I practiced patience. Go figure.
5. Then: I didn’t trust anyone over thirty or younger than seventy, weighed my words before I spoke them and knew that this was ‘all about me’ but tried not to let anyone else see it. I believed in miracles.
6. Now: I don’t know. It seems that not only am I out of step and time, but that the drummer that I’m marching to got shot in a cosmic drive by long ago by weapons of mass distraction. I wonder if that last beer had a buddy in the box?
7. Now: good guys do finish last, bad guys won’t get what’s coming to them and being meek does not insure me of any inheritance what so ever.
8. Now: the phrase “have a nice day” means nothing. No one is having a nice day. What are you looking at? You know that it’s true! Do the terms ‘two weeks to live’, ‘ got mugged on the corner’ and ‘there is no cure’ sound foreign to you?
9. Now: I look a someone riding a bike to see if it’s mine that was stolen, make sure that I lock the door behind me and look over my shoulder when I walk home at night.
10. Now: I just don’t know.
Here’s what’s in today’s paper, and I’m not making this up.
1. In the 1990s New Orleans lost 9,000 jobs, mandatory helmet bill killed in House, Panel OKs easing video poker rules, they’re clearing out Tallulah Prison, SARS fatality rate higher than thought, Malvo’s confession can be used and a man is arrested after a ten hour stand off.
2. In the main section there are ads for one-day sales, no interest or payments till June 2004, you won’t believe our low prices, sex for life and it’s the laser procedure you’ve been waiting for.
3. In other news: man shot, killed after visiting friend, New Orleans man admits to 1976 rape and killing, man, 81, booked on obscenity charge and 4 are accused of beating deputy in a parking lot. There’s a woman arrested in a shooting, a man sought in a slaying, and, a girl, 16 sent to jail after shooting her boyfriend claiming that they were in bed and she was merely ‘playing’ with the gun. Oh, and a seventeen year old student died Thursday of blows to his head. Do you wonder why I drink?
4. Here’s one on the front page of the sport section: “ The 1-2 punch of Hurricane Lili and Tropical Storm Isadore last year accelerated the ecological nightmare known as coastal erosion.
On the lighter side: Jade Jagger designs jewelry for the stars, plasma screens are so sleek, they hold a sophisticated, almost artlike allure, Ben and J. Lo have found a Georgia retreat and there’s a new computer that will wipe your butt (alright, I made that one up)
Oh, and if you needed to know: my horoscope advises me to write in a journal, Snoopy is starting on a book entitled ‘The Dog’, the answer to 27 down is not ‘Rosebud’ and today is Jimmy Ruffin’s birthday.
Excuse me while I fetch a beverage.

New Orleans Pagan Buddhists

2008-05-25T10:11:00.000-07:00

Lottery Dreams in New Orleans

2008-05-25T10:06:00.001-07:00

You know, it takes a great man to realize when the time is ripe and right to change the fundamental principles of his life.
I’m not talking about things like explaining my extensive ‘bald spot’ as a solar panel to my sexuality or my claim to women that I am actually a lesbian trapped in a man’s body. I’m talking, you know, fundamental principles like swearing allegiance to your after shave (Old Spice), hair tonic (Vitalis) and whether you want your toilet paper with the sheets rolling over or under (under, definitely UNDER)! Or even the big one, (thanks to Buddy Nordan) the drive to know the difference between good and evil and how to break into show business. I am speaking of what exactly I will do when I hit the Lottery.
True Lottery players never think in terms of ‘if’ they will hit the big one, only ‘when’. Hithertofore (I love that word) I was intrigued by thoughts lewd and lascivious, loud or lament-full, ludicrous or lucrative. I promised the Gods that I would be thankful and true, that I would help mankind and only use the dough for good. It hasn’t worked so far. I finally settled on a great umbrella outcome of my windfall: I would reward my friends and punish my enemies. This fundamental principle has been the guiding light of my eventual economical freedom. This too has not panned out… thus far.
Well, I’ve got a new one. I am going to open up one hundred bars; you know palaces of pleasure, institutions for imbibing, homes of hangovers (contracted and cured), altars dedicated to alcohol. But now, I am not thinking locally… I am dreaming globally. I am not thinking generic… I am dreaming specific. I want to give Pabst Blue Ribbon to the world!
Recently I was given a book by one of my students, the book is One Hundred Great Wonders Of The World. I thought that, as a goal, I should visit each and every one of these wonders, and, that I could do, easily, when I hit the Lottery (Powerball—whatever). Can do, will do; but, what in the name of God’s Balls (or as the English say “Od’s Bodkin) would I drink when I got there?
Okay, what I need is to be able to have my favorite drink (Pabst Blue Ribbon) available at each stop. Okay, suppose that I am a Gazillionaire or a Bazillionaire? Okay, I could have brewskis delivered where I wanted them. What about the rest of you?
Well hey, I got the bucks, why not open stands where you can tip back a cold one too (happy hour five to seven)?
So, Eiffel Tower is easy, likewise Yosemite, Grand Canyon and the Golden Gate Bridge. But how about The Great Fjords? How about The Nile River? How about Versailles? Mount Fuji? Angor Wat? You can bet your sweet Bippy that there no frosty mug at Stonehenge, Volcanic Iceland or Carargue! Forget about the Matterhorn and there’s no PBR on the Danube! And it’s no joke that you can die of thirst on the Sahara.
Listen to this: “Madagascar is an island of staggering biological diversity. When the island ripped away from Africa 165 million years ago, animals and plants continued to evolve without interference from outside” Consider visiting an island that is able to get away from a continent. Consider the people that you know that would chew their arm off to get free of that one night stand that they stupidly went home with…the coyote (much worse than an ordinary dog). Consider doing that, or visiting there without a cold one in a frosty mug. To me it’s plainly unthinkable.
Here’s other places that you’d not think of visiting without a beer handy: Giant’s Causeway, Edinburgh Castle, Versailles, The Grand Canal, Peter’s Basilica, Neuschwanstein, or Pamukkale. They scream for a great beer as a chaser. How about The Great Wall, The leaning Tower of Pisa, The Colosseseum or The Parthenon. Unimaginable without an icey cold PBR!
The mind reels with names such as: The Kremlin, Alhambra, The Temple Of Karnak, Mount Kilimanjaro, The Okavango Delta and Teotihuacan. My spellcheck has just had a meltdown.
Anyway, what I would do is fly in my private plane and view these wonders, have a cool one while my jets are cooling and, after dining locally, plan my next destination. I could do this until the whole hundred were seen. All the while I would be mapping out the list of a hundred more ‘Not Quite Ready For The Top One Hundred Wonder’ locations. Places like Dogpatch, Gasoline Alley, Abe’s Barbecue, The Shrine Of Donald Freeman’s Favorite Tweezers or the location of the world’s biggest crouton.
I’d like to visit an escargot ranch at roundup time, the place where they put them tiny stickers on tomatoes and a Survivor Island (where I would kick everybody off).
How about going to The North Pole to see if Santa is really there, tracking down The Easter Bunny (does he really live on Easter Island?) or going to the place where God’s final message to mankind is:
(“SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE”)?
Oh, the places we could see! The things that we could find out: what makes an elephant charge his tusk in the misty mist or the musty must, what makes a muskrat guard his musk, what makes a king out of a slave, what makes a flag to wave, what makes a Hottentot so hot and who put the ape in apricot? And: what do they got that we ain’t got? It certainly won’t be the good old dough ray me!
Who is we? Why it’s all my friends that will be along for the ride, laughin’ and a scratchin’ and a drinkin’ some beer!
What about my enemies? Why… we’ll send them postcards! Who knows what evil lives in the hearts of man? The Shadow do…Hahahahahahahah!

Big Red Is Dead

2008-05-14T11:18:00.000-07:00

Big Red is dead, and wherever she went, I’m sure she’s not happy about it. In fact, I believe that she’s pretty pissed off. She’s gonna miss Jazz Fest.
I got the call that she was circling the drain a couple of weeks earlier and had composed my excuses to miss the wake and burial when the email came about the demise (computers are great, aren’t they?). Reluctantly, I resigned myself to the fact that one did not miss Big Red’s funeral, especially if one were one of Big Red’s sons.
Of course, if you had known Red, you knew that extended periods of mourning were not to be expected or permitted in our family. The next tragedy, at least in our family, doesn’t get put on hold while you take time to get over the last one, if you get my drift. Big Red had seen four siblings, three husbands, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin go before her and never missed a beat raising the five children she bore and dominated. In fact, if anyone could be counted on to not cry in her beer over ill winds (for long), it was her.
So, this year, as usual, I’m going to Jazz Fest. But with different eyes, with different ears and with a new sense of smell. You see, when someone or something that you take as constant and indestructible, an undeniable presence if you will, is somehow permanently, and here I repeat, permanently removed from your life, you must face your own death. Spooky, huh?
Now, you know me, it takes a lot of whiskey for me to get maudlin. If Red’s passing has taught me anything, it’s taught me the importance of savoring the moments. Here’s what I mean.
I go into my stash to see how many Fest days I can afford (I believe in conspicuous consumption) and wrangle my way out work (trading shifts, bribing coworkers coverage, whining to the boss, whatever it takes) for those days. And then, having begun what has now become my spring religious experience, I go through the Jazz Festival rituals.
Standing in line for tickets at the Municipal Auditorium may not be everyone’s cup of gin, but I, on the other hand dig it. I see folks from last year and the year before, eavesdrop on conversations of ‘he said, she said’, watch women with long legs on shiny bikes glide up. The day is naturally clear, as blue a sky as we ever get here (with the natural ‘scattered shower’ prediction), robins egg blue to be precise. It’s a bit breezy, but we knew it would be. I’ve already asked about to see if anyone I know wants me to score for them, it’s cash only, and nothing feels better or more vulnerable than having a few hundred bucks in your pocket. The ticket sellers are distant and aloof, but who gives a rats whisker, this is when it becomes MY Jazz Festival, when I get MY tickets, in MY hand. It’s the beginning of it’s all about ME. If there is anything I hold dear of in my life, it’s my Fest tickets. I watch over them like a mother hen from the time I ritually purchase them to when I hand them over at the gate for the ritual tearing.
Next, the ritual of the packing for the day. Nothing too large, bottled water is allowed and any other food or beverages will have to be consumed before entering the gates or snuck in. You know about ‘The Search’, don’t you? Should I eat before going? Big question. Should I wear baggy pants with shorts underneath? Sweatshirt or light sweater? Sunblock. Hat. Dark glasses. Sittin’ towel. The right footwear. Don’t get overburdened but by all means cover the butt. There’s only one in and one out per day.
The morning of, I’m like a kid going off to camp. Where’s my hat? In what pocket are my tickets, my money, my bus fare, my friggin Chap Stick?
I’m also, if you’ve been reading past Fest issues, a Jazz Fest maverick in the true sense of the word. I don’t herd, I don’t camp and if I see anyone I know with one of those long poles that have flags or fishes or cows horns on top of them……….(what is it with that anyway?)…….I head in the other direction. I kinda don’t get the wearing of matching clothes, ‘I’ll meet you at the water fountain at such a time’, ‘ we have our spot picked out’ attitude. I guess I’m missing some kind of bonding thing, but not much. The way that I get Fested is by roaming the grounds, wind in my receded hairline, sun in my face, gumbo on my shirt, mud on my tennies.
I’ve already had coffee for an hour before the bus ride; I know what stop to get on and where to get off. I’ve gone to the bathroom. I’m a veteran of thirty years. This year Big Red’s gonna miss it.
Like I said, I come prepared. I come prepared for an exhausting day of avoiding crowds, sunstroke, food lines and pit stop delays. I come prepared to see my music idols and icons, some of whom now resemble Jabba the Hut. I come prepared to be restless and to roam free, as free as the grass grows.
I’m mentally composing this riding in my brother’s car as we follow the hearse. Big Red was buried with a six pack at her feet (in the coffin), Lotto tickets, TV guide, rosary and a ziplock of sand from her favorite beach. The procession passes her favorite bars, Bingo parlors, past domiciles, and then a slow pass in front of the Track.
Big Red was also buried wearing bright red lipstick. She claimed that you never know when you might meet a millionaire at the mailbox, I’ll always remember her words of encouragement after reading (against her will) one of my (as I considered it to be) more witty columns: “The only thing funny about you is your face”. Say goodnight Gracie.

Wasted in New Orleans

2008-05-14T11:03:00.000-07:00

News from the front: no progress has been made and the wind, my friend, is howling at your doorstep, down your chimney and up your assets like the Dire Wolf, all six hundred pounds of sin. It’s hotter than July (go figger) and the perfect storm is forming in your aura, if nowhere else. I’m at a category three myself.
I know what you’re thinking: what else can happen? Well, this: we got a bunch of yahoos wanting us to believe that their temporary agendas, with outcomes that we can or cannot predict, alter or effect are dialogue that we should consider considering. Go ahead, they seem to say, use what few brain cells that you have left to store useless information about the inhumanity (on all fronts) of our lives and conditions. But, you know what? All of our challenges will not amount to a hill of beans if we don’t take care of the hill itself. The rest is, after all, just mental masturbation, Capeesh?
Shot at and missed, shit at and hit. The war, the economy and gas prices, sure are important; but, do you really concentrate on socks and shoes if you aint got no feet? Do you lock the doors when the walls cave in? If you ain’t got a planet left to wage war on…what’s the point of having peace talks?
The big ‘E’ word. The environment. And how would you like to come see the poster child for environmental dysfunction? Well, ‘c’mon down!’ Come on down to New Orleans and The French Quarter!
As residents and workers here, we can’t help but chuckle when we see a tourist, inebriated or not, trip over what should be a smooth walking surface. The city says the sidewalk maintenance is the responsibility of the landlords, the VCC says it has a say on what goes on there and not to fool with blockage or adornment. Landlords and residents shoot the bird at any responsibility and say that if they are city streets, let the city take care of them. It’s the big ‘not my problem’ all the way around and then I trip and bust my butt.
Oh, and watch out for fallen light posts (or non existent ones). The city says to report a missing or broken light post just submit it’s identification number (?) The story of our lives here – submit a number. By the way, THE LIGHTING DEPARTMENT ONLY INSPECTS DURING THE DAY!!!
Demolition by neglect? Where would you like to start?
Add to that, the dark corners where disrespect and crime flourish and there’s no better example of environmental disaster than the vomit and blood and urine and condoms and used hypos on our streets; unless it’s the frigging trash, like the drunk passed out in your doorway or dog shit on the sidewalk.
I know what you’re thinking: “why Phil, it’s a hell of a lot cleaner now that we have a trash company looking out for us”. Nooooo, Fool… we’ve got ten times the number of cleanup elves sweeping up after us… so fast that we can’t let a hint drop without someone being there from SDT to catch it before it hits the ground. We are NOT better citizens about cleanliness, we just have more baby sitters. With your eyes open you can still see trash being tossed everywhere; cigarette butts, chewing gum, chicken bones, go cups and a zip code of spit being left on our streets to be hosed down and picked up by our bazillion dollar trash service.
Paint, kitchen grease and construction mediums being flushed down our storm drains and ultimately to the lake? Let me count the ways.
Recycling? In your dreams, Sucker. One of the other things we have not come to grips with is that you can’t just throw something away… there is no away! It has to go somewhere, and if something that can be recycled is not recycled, you wind up wasting one resource and exploiting another to replace it.
Glass, cardboard, plastic, paper and even compost are parts of reclamation in any civilized community. Simple stuff like a deposit on a bottle, money for cans and cardboard or at the least, an environmental Nazi to fine the shit out of people that don’t take the life of the planet seriously are ideas that haven’t even occurred yet.
Yes, we’ve got trouble, right here in River City. We’ve got an epidemic of complacency that IS stuck on stupid. We have people that know the difference in right speech, right thought and right action with their ears in a cell phone and their pants around their asses. We have parenting with no skills, models with no roles and lots of work with no pay.
We’ve been hung out to dry on every level and now the long slow hurricane season of the soul sets in with flash flood watches covering the southern portion of my disposition and a line of thunderstorms developing in the western region of my mental health and the northern regions of my ability to deal rationally with my precarious emotional situation. Severe weather well into the afternoon except for a lone gust of wind in my bedroom in a high pressure zone with a 103 and millibar and weak pressure ridge extending from my eyes down to my cheeks.
We know what needs to be done, what needs to happen and yet with daily life and every indiscretion that we allow to happen, another nail is driven into the coffin of the planet. It is said that an impotent person, an oppressed person, a beaten person does not make waves, and the ignorant get away with crimes against nature. Not one of us is truly enfettered and alive until we complain about the stuff that bothers us… the things around us that insult us.
Our sensibilities have left our sensitivities for dead and put vice grips on our hearts and minds. Well, my forecast for the extended period of time until we wake up and take it all back is high tonight, low tomorrow and---
precipitation--------is-------expected.
(Excerpts of this piece lifted from Tom Waits and others… but, of course, you knew that.)

Creole seasonings from New Orleans

2008-05-11T13:15:00.000-07:00

So you want to know about Creole Seasoning? Well, before the 1980s there was no such thing and then along came Paul Prudhomme and his blackened fish and stuff. Actually I cooked for Chef Paul at Commander's Palace in the early seventies where he had us mix up two seasonings, one for meat and one for seafood. From thence sprang forth a plethora of seasonings: meat, fish, shrimp, vegetable, poultry, blackening, pork and veal and magic sauces also. Some claim that there is an 'Opening your mail' seasoning out there. Well, here's our all purpose seasoning that we want you to make up for yourself. Just go to that market that has bulk spices with yout measuring spoons and bag up your own or contact Kitchen Witch at kwcookbooks.com and have 12 jars shipped at no tax and no shipping.
KITCHEN WITCH CREOLE SEASONING
2C. SEA SALT
4T CAYENNE PEPPER
4T BLACK PEPPER
3T WHITE PEPPER
3T GRANULATED GARLIC
8T PAPRIKA
2T DRIED LEAF THYME
2T DRIED LEAF OREGANO
2T DRIED LEAF BASIL
1/4t GROUND CINNAMON
1/4t GROUND NUTMEG

DIRECTIONS: MIX ALL TOGETHER AND GRIND IN SPICE GRINDER TO DESIRED CONSISTENCY (NOT TOO FINE). STORE IN AIRTIGHT CONTAINER AND USE WHEREVER YOU PLEASE, i.e. soups, stews, beans, grilled items, macaroni and cheese, avocado, popcorn, dressings etc. etc.
Try rimming Bloody Mary glasses… Have A Ball, Season With Abandon and Care: It’s powerful stuff!!!!

The homeless in New Orleans

2008-05-11T13:09:00.001-07:00

Twelve thousand or more homeless people are estimated to be in town and they ain’t having any fun! There were six thousand before the storm and it went down to two thousand the year after Katrina. Count them, identify them, help them? How? There’s no housing, unless you consider sleeping under an over-pass; on a park bench; or in an abandoned, mold filled house as a place to hang your hat. And lord help the hapless, homeless fool who works his ass off washing dishes or sweeping our streets that has the audacity to not be able to afford the reaming that most landlords are ready to supply. Adequate medical facilities or services are not available; not before, not now, maybe not ever. .
Why, you might ask, is someone who works…homeless? Ask your city administration, your councilperson--- your mayor. We were told that rather than have any protection from skyrocketing rents, that we would have an ‘economy driven recovery’. What that means is that, unless you’re working for $15-20.00 an hour, you cannot afford to live here. Okay, here’s your next question: what do you think a dishwasher, porter, maid, cleanup person or even gravedigger get paid? At minimum wage ($5.50 an hour), forty hours a week ($220.00) after taxes (about 25%) a working stiff has what? Do the math. Did you know that waiters get paid $2.15 an hour and rely solely on the kindness of strangers?
Folks back from evacuation moving into abandoned buildings? Yes. Teenagers back without their parents? Yes. Runaways and job-seekers looking for warmer climes? Construction workers, your average Joe, and folks thinking that there was actually a road home. Fools.
Want to hear a story? A ballet dancer with a rent paying side job gets shot in the face, spends months in the hospital, and becomes homeless. Guess what would happen to you if no one was there to pick up the tab for your rent? How long do you think your boss would hold your job? And what are city services when you’re discharged from a hospital? A one way ticket to nowhere. AND pretty soon you’re not presentable enough for anyone’s consideration.
The dignity of clean clothes, a clean body, a phone to call home; these are, for 12,000 people in New Orleans not commonplace. What you and I consider basic, are to 12,000 people living here luxury. How close are we to being number 12,001? Closer than you might think. Ask someone in the camp under the mayor’s window, there’s estimated to be about 150 of them (until they’re booted out). Ask one of the hundreds that live under the freeway on Claiborne Avenue. Oh, by the way, a homeless person’s health plan is this: Don’t Get Sick! (or get sick and die).
Where are we going with this? I want to let you know what some folks are doing to help the homeless.
1802 Tulane Avenue. Saint Joseph’s Church. Beautiful Building. Go around in back, past the parking lot and there is a wooden compound that opens it’s doors to the people who have been thrown away by society. Designed by volunteers, staffed by volunteers and powered by donations from common folks and non political organizations; this haven offers laundry facilities, showers, phone calls and food for anyone who can make it there. Sanctuary.
No one asked them to do it. Some people just do what they can for those that cannot.

From a recent church bulletin: “ Neighborhood concert with Washboard Chaz Trio at the Rebuild Center”, and “The Lantern reminds us that they are still collecting travel sized toiletries for the homeless and cell phones which are turned in for cash.” And “The Kiwanis Club of Jefferson provided and served a spaghetti dinner”, and further “St Dominic sponsored a canned good drive”,
You should visit them, they will welcome you. They can always use a hand and they are rightfully proud of what they are doing and have done. Make no mistake, this is a hand up and not a handout.
At our shop we are collecting coin and can to help out, it’s still the season for giving and being in need has no cut off time period. It’s a cold world and we’re all in it together …. or else we’re in it by ourselves.
When we went there, we were amazed at the size and construction and workmanship that is available to those in need. There are numerous organizations that are doing whatever they can to help the helpless; do yourself a good turn and find who they are, where they are and what you can do. There’s a real need here and a chance that everyone that can help should not pass up.
The next time someone asks for that spare change, remember 1802 Tulane… send them there.
Tell you what. If everyone living in New Orleans would give twenty five cents a week, that’s one dollar a month, twelve dollars a year…. times what? Two Hundred thousand people back? Once again, do the math. Or how about a can of food for the bags of groceries that they give to people that have a roof and not much else.
A quarter a week. Sister Beth Driscoll: Lantern Light / St Josephs Rebuild Center 1802 Tulane Ave. NOLA 70112 or even at our shop, we’ll be glad to pass it on.
As someone once sang, back in the day: “There’s a chance peace will come in our time--- please buy one.”

Saving the planet in New Orleans

2008-05-11T13:06:00.000-07:00

News from the front: no progress has been made and the wind, my friend, is whistling at your doorstep, down your chimney and up your ego like the Dire Wolf, all six hundred pounds of sin. It’s hotter than July (go figger) and that storm is forming in your aura, if nowhere else. I’m at a category three myself.
I know what you’re thinking: what else can happen? Well, this: we got a bunch of yahoos wanting us to believe that their temporary agendas, with outcomes that we can or cannot predict, alter or effect are dialogue that we should consider considering. Go ahead, they seem to say, use what few brain cells that you have left to store useless information about the inhumanity (on all fronts) of our lives and conditions. But, you know what? All of our challenges will not amount to a hill of beans if we don’t take care of the hill itself. The rest is, after all, just mental masturbation, Capeesh?
Shot at and missed, shit at and hit. The war, the economy and gas prices, sure, are important; but, do you really concentrate on socks and shoes if you aint got no feet? Do you lock the doors when the walls cave in? Or… if you ain’t got a planet left to wage war on…what’s the point of having peace talks?
The big ‘E’ word. The environment. And how would you like to come see the poster child for environmental dysfunction? Well, ‘c’mon down!’ Come on down to New Orleans and The French Quarter!
As residents and workers here, we can’t help but chuckle when we see a tourist, inebriated or not, trip over what should be a smooth walking surface. The city says the sidewalk maintenance is the responsibility of the landlords, the VCC says it has a say on what goes on there and not to fool with blockage or adornment. Landlords and residents shoot the bird at any responsibility and say that if they are city streets, let the city take care of them. It’s the big ‘not my problem’ all the way around and then someone busts their butt.
Oh, and watch out for fallen light posts (or non existent ones). The city says to report a missing or broken light post just submit it’s identification number (?) The story of our lives here – take a number. By the way, THE LIGHTING DEPARTMENT ONLY INSPECTS DURING THE DAY!!!
Demolition by neglect? Where would you like to start?
Add to that, the dark corners where disrespect and crime flourish and there’s no better example of environmental disaster than the vomit and blood and urine and condoms and used hypos on our streets; unless it’s the frigging trash, like the drunk passed out in your doorway.
I know what you’re thinking: “why Phil, it’s a hell of a lot cleaner now that we have a trash company looking out for us”. Nooooo, Fool… we’ve got ten times the number of cleanup elves sweeping up after us… so fast that we can’t let a hint drop without someone being there from SDT to catch it before it hits the ground. We are NOT better citizens about cleanliness, we just have more baby sitters. With your eyes open you can still see trash being tossed everywhere; cigarette butts, chewing gum, chicken bones, go cups and a zip code of spit being left on our streets to be hosed down and picked up by our bazillion dollar trash service.
Paint, kitchen grease and construction mediums being flushed down our storm drains and ultimately to the lake? Let me count the ways.
Recycling? In your dreams, Sucker. One of the other things we have not come to grips with is that you can’t just throw something away… there is no away! It has to go somewhere, and if something that can be recycled is not recycled, you wind up wasting one resource and exploiting another to replace it.
Glass, cardboard, plastic, paper and even compost are parts of reclamation in any civilized community. Simple stuff like a deposit on a bottle, money for cans and cardboard or at the least, an environmental Nazi to fine the shit out of people that don’t take the life of the planet seriously are ideas that haven’t even occurred yet.
Yes, we’ve got trouble, right here in River City. We’ve got an epidemic of complacency that IS stuck on stupid. We have people that know the difference in right speech, right thought and right action with their ears in an iPod and their pants around their asses. We have parenting with no skills, models with no roles and lots of work with no pay.
We’ve been hung out to dry on every level and now the long slow hurricane season of the soul sets in with flash flood watches covering the southern portion of my disposition and a line of thunderstorms developing in the western region of my mental health and the northern regions of my ability to deal rationally with my precarious emotional situation. Severe weather well into the afternoon except for a lone gust of wind in my bedroom in a high pressure zone with a 103 and millibar high pressure zone and weak pressure ridge extending from my eyes down to my cheeks.
We know what needs to be done, what needs to happen and yet with daily life and every indiscretion that we allow to happen, another nail is driven into the coffin of the planet. It is said that an impotent person, an oppressed person, a beaten person does not make waves, and the ignorant get away with crimes against nature. Not one of us is truly enfettered and alive until we complain about the stuff that bothers us… the things around us that insult us.
Our sensibilities have left us for dead and put vice grips on our hearts and minds. Well, the forecast for the extended period of time until we wake up and take it all back is high tonight, low tomorrow and---
precipitation--------is-------expected.
(Excerpts of this piece lifted from Tom Waits and others… but, of course, you knew that.)

Aliens in the Big Easy?

2008-05-03T15:46:00.000-07:00

“There are five nameless people that own the entire planet and move everyone around to suit themselves and their purposes”. This statement from a female life form (not unpleasant to look at) that had placed two imitation precious metal discs on a rim surface to indicate her challenge to a contest involving fifteen striped and solid colored spheres being hit with a non colored sphere by way of a long slender rod of wood. The intent of which is to propel those spheres, intentionally, into any of six cavities evenly spaced in a three foot by six feet flat green felt covered horizontal playing surface. I qestioned myself whether or not this was going to be just another game of pool.
A hot August evening, a quiet, non-competitive game (against myself), my local pub (Molly’s on Toulouse) and sleeping late the next day had had me lulled into a sense of psychic rest and relaxation. Obviously, this was not meant to be.
In our native vernacular, I responded “So, where y’all from?” She replied that she was from a “planet so far away that I could string toilet paper from my front yard to Uranus (was there a pun intended?), multiply that length by a qua-zillion and not even come close to imagining the distance.” Or, “so fucking far away, it would make your head spin.”
Good answer, I thought, scratched the eight and invited her to rack ‘em.
“So what”, I said, “you’re here to take the planet away from us, free us from destruction, save us from ourselves…what?”
“Nah” she said, “we gave up on y’all, you’d be more of a pain in the ass than we’d care to deal with. I’m just the mop up team; we’re outa here. “Plus,” she added, “most of you’re ugly as hammered shit, and just about as dumb.”
I invited her home. She racked. I broke. Sank nothing. She ran the table, sank the eight in a three bank shot and said: ”sure”: and we were off.
I have a nice house, a clean house, a big house, and a safe house and here I am discussing my world with a brunette who appears to have the mental stability of a spanner wrench. Or not. In either case why would I invite a nut case or an alien into my home? Perhaps the moon was full. Perhaps the planets were mis-alligned. Maybe I thought that I’d get lucky. That’s probably the answer; and while I’ve been laid by a lot of loonies, getting in the sack with an alien would be a new one. Yep, that’s what it was.
Out on the street, I asked about that three-rail bank that she did on the eight ball. She looked at me sweetly and said: “It ain’t rocket surgery, Cap”. Then she touched me behind my ear and something she did shut down my horny honey hornet system. It was like a cold shower, but more effective. I decided that I’d best be polite, that system is usually on red alert twenty four seven, ask anyone that thinks that they know me.
Seated on my porch with the air as still as a tomb and the clouds playing hide and seek with another electrical storm, I asked her what she had found out about us as a race.
“First and foremost: your collective will to exert superiority over each other. Those who find themselves on the lower stratum react with hatred, jealousy and violence while those above keep an illusionary and precarious control by placing value systems and unreachable futile goals that they paint as the pot of gold at the end of the ass kicking.
Those in power wage wars based on greed and oppression using mortality, valor and the joke of an afterlife to brainwash the ignorant into fighting for them.
The very thing that you call ‘sport’ consists, in general, either in abnormal body exertion or the ability to hit, kick, throw, capture or club little balls and then run like hell!
You take finely shredded plants, wrap them in thin paper, put them in your mouth, set fire to them, and then inhale a smoke that you know will shorten your pointless lives.
You drink fermented beverages, aware of their destructive addictive-ness and call it ‘fun’; you injure each other physically, mentally, and emotionally in your homes, your streets and in neighboring countries. Are you catching this or should I go slower for your pitiful ineptness to grasp complex concepts?”
I opened my mouth to answer but she didn’t miss a beat
“You empty your ghettos to provide fodder for rich men’s wars, the last ‘Prince of Peace’ you had got nailed to a tree over two thousand years ago and no one has since been able to muster up enough people to say ‘STOP!’ Got it so far, Dummy, or do I have to draw you a diagram?”
“Uh” I said but as you might suspect, she was on a roll.
“You climbed down from the trees ‘Psycho Monkey’ and took over the planet; since then you have done your best to lay it to waste. You pollute your bodies, your air, and your land, which incidentally doesn’t belong to you but to your future. Are you gonna say to your grandchildren: “Whoops, sorry kids; I forgot to take care of the planet that I’m leaving you?” You have got to have the intelligence of a tree stump to think that we want any part of this. Shit, we’d have to knock all Y’all off and start from scratch and basically, Buddy, that’s not our M. O.”
I asked her where she learned to talk like that. She once again turned on the charm and said: “tapes”.
She unfolded her tightly knit form from my Barco-lounger and said: “Well, hasta la vista, baby” and I begged her to stay, give us another chance; tell us anything that would help us.
She again gave me that certain smile and said “ believe seven impossible things before breakfast”.

Tenants rights in New Orleans

2008-05-03T14:52:00.000-07:00

True story, A neighbor of mine is lamenting a leaking roof, I call City Hall to inquiry about her rights as a tenant. The woman on the other end says, “I didn’t know they had any”.
Well she was wrong of course. Although tenants rights haven’t changed much in Louisiana since the early eighteen hundreds (that’s right!) you do have one overwhelmingly simple and basic right. You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to suck it up. And if you’re reading the right to ‘shut up and pay your rent’ here, you’re reading right.
Here’s how it works. You find a place that you can afford and maybe it even suits your needs. The landlord hands you a years lease and you sign it, most of the time not bothering to read it. Face it, most people are on the verge of desperation when they finally get to that point. You spend a year making it as livable as you can and what happens? Your lease is up and there is no new lease, you now join the ranks of the month to month renters, which means you have only the above right.
In the first year, if you’ve registered (and only if you’ve registered) your lease at City Hall, you are pretty much guaranteed a place to live with repairs and maintenance supplied by the landlord at a specific price: your rent. After that all bets are off. This is the state that most of us are in. It only takes five to ten days to get you out after that. You’re now at the mercy of the landlord. The kindness of strangers, so to speak.
During World War Two, renters in the USA were given a right called rent control, which assured them of a definite place to live at a specific price for as long as they could afford to live there. Any rent increases were carefully monitored and minimized. After the war only ten states kept it. Louisiana did not keep it.
Do you want rent control? It’s not easy to get. In 1987 the folks in Milwaukee voted for and passed a referendum in favor of rent control. The state legislature annulled it.
Then again it is easy to get rent control. All a city has to do is have its mayor put it into effect. Simple, huh? Don’t hold your breath.
In response to the Civil Rights movement of the sixties, The Federal Government funded a legal service to craft a model renter-landlord code. It was drafted in 1972 and approved by the American Bar Association in 1974. Today most states use the Uniform Residential Landlord Tenant Act (URLTA) as a guideline when writing their own laws regarding landlords and tenants. Louisiana has not.

However, the URLTA does not cover security of tenure, control over rent increases, reduced rent for reduced services, freedom of speech in relationship with the landlord, condominium conversion protection for tenants, appointment of a receiver to manage the building if the landlord fails to or the payment of interest and separate handling of security deposits. All things that we already don’t have.
It does limit the landlord’s free access, hold a standard of a warranty of habitability, and protects against landlord’s retaliation.
Do you think that your landlord’s got you by the cajones? I’m sure as heck that he does.
Here’s what the New Orleans Legal Assistance office recommends: read your lease carefully to learn what the landlord is responsible for and what your responsibilities are. Look carefully around your new place and make sure everything works and is in good order. Have someone as a witness and take photos. Get everything in writing and get and keep all receipts.
The law does state that if you do not get your deposit back in thirty days from moving you have to be told why not, and if you’re not to get all of it back, why that also. However, it’s still you word against the landlord’s, and guess who gets the benefit if the doubt? Right.
You have the right to make necessary repairs that the landlord won’t (given sufficient notice) and take it off your rent and the landlord has the right to evict you with no reason. Simple.
Remember, it’s the landlords that write leases and your rights depend on what the lease says. In the past it has been the landlords who wrote the laws governing renters and property, and those laws are still in effect, by the landlord-for the landlord. It’s landlords that can afford to attend political fundraisers to keep those laws in place.
And without someone with a little more authority than me, choosing to change things the renter will always take it in the shorts. And no, Virginia, not all landlords are mean, evil, money grubbing monsters that take their families to Europe, on your dime, as your bathroom ceiling caves in, but there’s nothing stopping them from becoming exactly that.

I'm ready for my Ya Ka Mein, Mr. DeMille

2008-05-03T14:33:00.000-07:00

Notes on possible topics for this month:
1.Tenants rights in New Orleans: Forget it, there are none.
2. Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters: Patronizing the local economy
3. Lucky Dogs and Englishmen: Wagon the Dog
4. The four families that own the French Quarter: Better not.
5. Concierges and kickbacks: Whoops, did I say that?
6. Controversial stoop sitting: The last Black family in the Quarter.
7. Holding up the cab drivers: Who owns all the Taxi licenses?
8. Big Business Behemoths: The death of the small shops.
9. Trading paradise for a prophylactic: Trashing our treasures.
10. Would you buy a used car from this man? Big Brother is Alive and Well:
Forget it! Let’s discuss something serious, this is, after all, the Restaurant Guide. Let’s talk about Ya-Ka Mein.
Ya-ka Mein is not a restaurant, at least, not that I’m aware of. Ya-ka Mein is a something to eat that very well may be of local origin. I’ve never seen it anywhere else, so, who knows?
It’s not a snobs dish, it’s not for the ‘Upper Crust’ or the Hoy Polloy. It’s a working person’s affair, a culinary adventurer’s adventure, a true foodie’s food. Tom Fitzmorris disses it. Sara Roahen adores it. Mathew at the N.O. J&H Foundation calls it a ‘heritage thing’. Dudley at Zatarain’s described working on the river at Elysian Fields and ‘going in to the neighborhood’ for it at lunchtime. Brett Anderson was unavailable for comment at this time. Linda Green demonstrated it at Jazz Fest last year, bless her heart. Ya-ka Mein.
There are probably hundreds of places in New Orleans to get Ya-ka Mein, (spelled Yet-ka mein, Jakemein, Yakamay, Yatka-mein, Yet Gaw Mein, yakameat, Ya-ka Mein, Yakama or ‘Old Sober’) and, I haven’t been to them all…yet.
Legend has it that a hundred years ago New Orleans had a viable Chinatown around South Rampart St. near Tulane Ave. It butted up against a thriving African American living, shopping and entertainment district. Allegedly this is where a street kid, later known as Sachmo, cut his chops running errands for prostitutes, crossing the borders of these ‘hoods for little packages of…………. could it have been………….opium?
I like to think not. I like to think, though I’ve been wrong before, that he was getting take out, possibly Yakamay. {and to think, that nowadays, all that the musically gifted children have to look forward to is NOCCA— how the mighty have fallen} J
With the disolution of our neighborhoods (we also had Jewish, Irish, German, Italian and Greek ones that likewise evaporated) the dish was dispursed like the lost tribes, and only kept alive by the poor, the hung over, the corner markets run by Asians serving Blacks.
When I have guests in from out of town, you know, my peeps, I take them on eating tours (what else?) of our city. No, not to places that the average bo-hunk gets ripped at. I take them on street level tours. Items like Muffalettas at Louigi’s, meatloaf at the Café Reconcile, pickled pig lip ogling at Robert’s ($12.71 a gallon!), alligator sandwiches at Royal Street Gro, gumbo at the corner of Broad and Banks, Lucky Dogs, and Busch in a brown bag with a pack of Zapp’s. They’re all here for the taking, but not the breaking (of your pocketbook).
Ya-ka Mein is different. I kinda keep it to myself. Why? Because if word gets out, those hot shot Chefs with their high falutin’ ways are gonna ruin a good thing. I just know it. And to my way of thinking, we have enough variations as it is. Do I want to see “Duck confit and lobster Ya-Ka Mein with poached quail egg, foix gras and beluga caviar pasta….$24.95 I certainly do not!
But wait! What’s that you say? What is Ya-ka Mein? Listen Woddie, if you don’t know, you better ass somebody!
Oh, you’re assin’ me. Okay, here goes: Ya-ka Mein, whatever way you spell it is a noodle soup of oriental extraction containing a variety of dead animals (pork, chicken, beef , shrimp, etc.) seasoned according to the deviation tendencies of the perpetrator behind the stove, and invariably compoundly fractured (garnished) with a whole hard boiled egg. Y’erd me?
Sometimes it’s reeeeal garlicy, sometimes it’s reeeeal vegetably, the noodle may vary, the animals may change with the season. The prices are generally between three and four bucks for a one quart cup. Most times you get it at a place that caters to low income folks. You may come across it in a joint with a few, or many, tables; invariably you will be served a very hot broth with noodles, a hard cooked egg, spring onions and packets of soy sauce. Variations beyond these point are infinite.
Where do you get it? Usually the sign outside will say something like ‘Plate Lunches-Po Boys-Chinese Food-Fried Seafood Platters’ etc. That’s the call to go ‘check out’ a new source. Don’t worry, it’s cool, you’re on a mission from….. me.
As I sit here, I’m having a quart from Manchu.
Not a place for the faint of heart, Manchu is located at the corner of Claiborne and Esplanade, their Yakamein is first rate, with a great kick of cayenne. While there, check out the wine selection to see what the other half drinks.
If you’re a stranger to danger, hop on up to Broadview, a smooth Yakama is made with asian pork and is redolent with green onions. While there check out other menu items: gumbo, boiled crabs, crawfish, shrimp, turkey necks, corn,and pigs feet (eat in or take out).
Uptown try Mama’s Famous Foods, truly a garlic lovers version
John’s Grocery on Touro and N. Rampart has it in two sizes as does Danny’s on Valence at Magazine (although theirs is alittle salty for my taste).
D&D between Desire and Piety & St. Claude has a kick of black pepper. Monica’s on Milan is sold by a man named ‘Pops’, who keeps a bottle of Sriracha handy.
Chinatown on Canal and Kimmy’s in the CBD both have plethoras of fresh veggies but no egg (go figure) I just saw that the the Moon Wok in the Quarter has it, expensive ($5.95) but I gotta try it. Someone recently mentioned that there was one place in Chicago…………that one may take me awhile to check out.
What I’m saying is that Ya-ka Mein is like a cullinary mugging, waiting around the corner, not frequent in better parts of town, almost brutal in its honesty and straightforwardness. You may get it at a secondline from the back of a pick up, or whipped up at a poker game by a recent Angola graduate, it’s a little thing, a small pleasure.
But, hey, when this Clark Kent gets home (provided there’s no eviction notice on the door) after working (provided the friggin’ Daily Planet doesn’t lay anyone else off) plus fighting for truth and justice (compared to what?) and looks in the mirror (as long as I remembered to pay my light bill) a lot of times all I see on my chest is a capital A (for Adequate-man) or an E (for Every-man); I long for a little thing, a small pleasure. Yat-ka Mein is that.
The Prophet once wrote: “Now go.”

Lafayette, we are here

2008-05-03T10:51:00.000-07:00

The train pulls in like a tired, wet mule; breathing slow and hard, unable to shake the same wet and heat off that any junkyard cur has the inherent gift and liberty of doing, and sitting patiently achuffing as a group of passengers get off ahuddling under yesterday’s newspapers and dime store umbrellas to take a cigarette smoke break under the lone oak that plays depot to the town that is on the verge of realizing its own potential pure yet dormant, The year is 2002 but it could be a scene from a hundred years ago, rain is falling steadily, unaffected by, and not affecting, the heat. The precipitation feels like humidity personified. (Forgive the first paragraph-I is reading Faulkner)
We pick around the mud and start walking toward what appears to be ‘town’. We share three canvas bags and no umbrella. The rain is slowing and it’s four blocks before we find someone to ask directions from. We're headed the right way, but for sure, we’re not in the French Quarter any more.
Five blocks further and we reach The Blue Moon Hostel. As described, it IS right across from the Borden’s Ice Cream Parlor. Three kids (read: any adult at least half our ages) stand, beaming at us as if we were the village idiots who had finally found their way home. Two are male and that’s as much as I notice about them except that they are apparently unarmed (there’s the New Orleans coming out in me), the third is a charming woman, worthy of every positive adjective I can think of.
Anyway, with a smile that could charm puppets, paupers, pirates, poets, pawns and Kings (that’s life!) she says “looking for a room?” she’s actually grinning and on her it’s the grin of a window being raised in a stuffy room. The very air became lighter and fresher.
“No, I think we already have one” Debbie starts, “We’re looking for…”
and in unison three of us say “…Catherine!” and share a laugh. Sounds stupid, felt great.
“Welcome and welcome howareya jahavagoodtrip and I’ll show you in and we’ll be back in twenty minutes we’re goin’ for ice cream make yourselves at home”. Yes we were really not in the French Quarter, ice cream indeed!
It’s been like going to Grammy’s house. Living room, dining room, big kitchen, bedrooms, bunk rooms, back yard, front yard. Cozy, spacious, hospitable and definitely ‘Home’ (with a capital ‘H’) and more about this later.
To make a long story longer: we dropped off our bags and went to find ‘town’. After all it was only mid day Monday and we were anxious to see the sights.
Armed with a McDonald’s map of the downtown we found Jefferson St. and walked its length, about twelve of their blocks. We passed about four people. We found some businesses. They were all closed. We found some bars. They were closed except for the one (Chips) that we had a drink at that was closing in an hour. The most action we found was at Circle K.
Naturally delighted (not), we returned to the warmth of Blue Moon, made our dinner in the communal kitchen, opened our bottle of wine (word: never travel to unexplored territory without at least two bottles of a familiar wine, corkscrew and enough snacks for a family of four per person), sat in the back yard for a spell and then went inside, cuddled up on the couch and read our respective books (never go anywhere without a book. Never. Anywhere.) Miles Davis was playing softly and the City Rats (us) finally started to chill. I think that’s when we got it.
Believe it or not, what we consider our fair city; our Big Easy, to be: laid back; can only be true when we compare ourselves to other cities much larger than ourselves, like New York or Chicago. It seems, from even my limited perspective, that even a blind person could see that we’re all running around like lunatics here. We (in New Orleans) don’t take a walk on the wild side, we go at it like we’re keepin’ score on how much we can get accomplished, and you know what? Other people don’t do that! Not even other people a hundred or so miles from here that say that they live in a city called Lafayette, Louisiana.
Listen, we were on the Amtrak, snackin’ down, curlin’ up, happy as clams, watching the world go by, and two women whom we couldn’t help but notice came through the car, jouncing around, and as they pass us one says to the other “I’m gonna go slam back some Jack, this is soooo boring!” Huh? Well, it seems like this particular train didn’t have a designated smoking area and, have you ever seen a smoker going through a nicotine jones? Of course not. A smoker here can smoke pretty much wherever and whenever they want. Same with drinkers, gamblers and any other kind of stimulus junky. We don’t have to, but the point is we can.
Heads up! What did you do on your day off? Answer: you did too much!
The next morning, we looked at Lafayette through different eyes. The place is sweet. They have an Arcadiana Fest each September, they’re building a Planetarium, have a Children’s Craft Center, buildings 150-200 years old, antique shops and was the capitol of French Louisiana. Bring your car, there’s a lot to see outside of it as well. The place is et up with culture. They give tours fer Chrissakes!
We went to Don’s Seafood Restaurant; it was like a dinner from a time capsule, circa 1965. Lost in space and time and free of the !@#$%^&*( pretensions that we seek here.
Upon reading the brochure, at the Greyhound Bus terminal (the train was running eight hours behind, but they are building a terminal for it to stop at. I’ll miss that tree), I found out that the full name of our lodgings is The Blue Moon Guest House and Saloon. They have music on the weekends, guests from around the world, the most affordable prices and co-op type atmosphere. Except for the convenience of computers (they have a website too), you would think that you just stepped back in time, and, yes; I did go out for ice cream!

What else you don't know

2008-05-03T10:26:00.000-07:00

“Hollywood created an era where prostitutes were made national heroines simply because they bedded well with some studio owners. Marriage was treated as a farce and divorce became a ticket for a whore to move from one house to another.”
Don’t take my word for it, that quote is taken verbatim from a book by a man (and his wife) named George Leonard Herter of Waseca, Minnesota.
The book; Bull Cook and Authentic Historical Recipes and Practices was first published in 1960 and had a number of successful reprints.
Other truisms that Mr. Herter propounds in his book are that menstruating women cannot and should not make mayonnaise (for it simply will not work).
Charemagne, who died in A. D. 814, invented sauerbraten.
Catherine De Medici who married Henry, King of France, “had three sons, two of whom were not all there mentally”. And furthermore, “Her face was not very good looking but she had beautiful legs(!!!). She invented women’s panties so that she could ride a horse with her skirts up high showing off her legs. Up until this time women wore no panties of any kind.”
Chow Mien and Chop Suey were “invented in San Francisco by a Greek named John Metaxa.”
‘Caesar Salad was invented by an Italian in Chicago, not a Mexican in Tijuana’.
You see? That’s how rumors get started!
At this point you will probably be asking yourself, ‘why is he telling me all this?’ (I know I would be). At which point I would answer you: ‘As a vehicle to your awareness, mon frere; you see, Mr. Herter, in his ground breaking tome, waxes profound on our fair city.’ And, as I know, Essence Festival is coming up (July 5-7) and there are going to be a lot of guests in town that you will be able to astonish and amaze with your inside information about our fair NOLA.
Be that as it may; before we explore new untohitherfore information about our city, let’s go back to the well for more examples of things Mr. Herter knew and we didn’t. This is straight up skinny, so, read on and learn.
*”In case of an atomic attack it would be important to know how to make jerky…”
*”Bat (Masterson) created a wiener sandwich…Everyone called it a Prairie Dog.” (think about it.)
*”If a human eats raw carp flesh for a week he will also die.”
*”Bull fighting is actually one of the safest ways to make a living in the world if you can stay sober.”
*…original onion soup contains no onions at all.”
*”The Indians of Mexico and Central America were the first to make spaghetti and tomato sauce.”
*All of the ones (gunfighters) of any note had blue eyes.”
*”A great many words used to describe recipes in French cooking mean nothing at all.”
*”The Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ was very fond of spinach.”
*”…I am sure that I am the first man who ever made a hamburger in Africa.”
*”One morning Oliver was eating a dish if cooked vegetables and fish. His pet cat had been drinking heavily. It jumped up on the table, lost its balance and knocked over a bottle of oil and vinegar, spilling both on Oliver’s plate. Oliver put the cat outside to sober up.” (On the birth of a dish called ‘Anti-Pasto”)
There’s plenty more but I need to get to ‘The New Orleans’ parts before I run out of room. Ready? Here we go!
**************************************
*”You have to go a long ways to find Italian food like they serve in New Orleans. It is the worst I’ve ever eaten…”
*”Drunkenness is not a crime in New Orleans unless you get disorderly.”
*”If the Bourbon St. crowd, go into a bar and look up from their drinks and do not see, among other things, a couple of well formed breasts flopping around, the drink doesn’t taste just right and they move to another bar.”
*”…but his jailers released (Pierre Lafitte) him and he walked out into the alley… This alley has ever since been called Pirates Alley.”
*”… the word Nouvelle (used in Nouvelle Orleans) is a feminine word and …made him (the Duke) out as a complete fairy.”
*”One of the first and best foods Bienville taught the colonists to make was oyster loafs.”
*John McDonogh (whose $ built N.O. public schools) invented ‘Shut Your Mouth’ sandwich.
*”Probably the two most important things that were invented in New Orleans are the poor boy sandwich and the expression O.K.”
* J.E.B. STUART (General of Confederate Army) invented ‘Dirty rice’
*“In New Orleans a drink is served today called Café Brulot. It is of fairly recent origin and is simply a drink dreamed up to look fancy and clip the tourist for a fancy price.”
*”Dominique You (top lieutenant for Jean Lafitte)… is probably better known for the phrase he coined…’Les bonbons acceuillis, produisent leur effet, mais la liqueur travaille plus vita cet effet’ …(Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker).”
I could go on and on, but now it’s time for some real info to pass on to our Essence Festers..
*The City of New Orleans makes a lot of money ticketing and towing cars, there are also residents that make money breaking into them. Watch where you park.
*Everyone in New Orleans is working a hustle. A ‘hustle’ is here defined as a way to make money to support a habit, and habits can range from eating regularly to anything else imaginable. Peep the hustle before you cop to it.
*The City of New Orleans wants you here and wants you safe, so don’t do anything stupid like walk down dark streets to visit Armstrong Park after dark, wearing Mardi Gras beads and carrying your camera with your new best friend that you just met on Bourbon Street.
*The annual Essence Festival zeroes in on African-American-oriented forms of music while also providing highly attended “empowerment Seminars” that help educate and inform the African-American community. It’s something we all could use a dose of on a regular basis. Pass it on.
*Check out local attractions and buy local products from local purveyors, including local restaurants, bookshops, grocery stores and galleries.
*Have fun and we’ll see you at the Dome!!!

There's a fly in your soup: waitering in the French Quarter

2008-05-03T10:14:00.000-07:00

I’m embarking up a new tree. That is to say, that I’ve taken another job outside the realm of hithertofore, common to myself, acceptable employment behavorable pattern structured lunacy. I am applying for, and will get, a full time, permanent, lucrative job as a………waiter!!
Hey, I’ve got experience! And what’s more, I’m already doin’ it part time! AND, I’m pretty darn good at it!
So, question: why do I want to do it full time? Answer: the ‘Get A Clue Phone’.
Sometimes it doesn’t take an epiphany to change your life. Sometimes all it takes is: “Ring, ring! It’s the Get A Clue Phone! Wanna take this call?”
‘Hello, yes. Uh huh. Yeah, good point. Okay, sure…………..’
(rough translation: I’m makin’ more money workin’ two shifts at my ‘part time job’ than I am in the five day a week ‘day job’ I have).
As I said: “Ring, Ring!”
Besides; the work is relatively fun, positively challenging, monetarily rewarding, mentally aerobic and calls for a dexterity of wit (which I only have half of).
Here I am in the dining room:
“Well Sir, the building was built in 1840, we’re on a foundation of cypress logs and cotton bales. We’re called ‘a floater’. A common misconception is that the Mississippi River has always just stopped at those hills that we call levees. Not so, where you are sitting was probably marsh or bogs, or just plain…swamp!”
“Yes Ma’am, most restaurants serve ‘Pasta Prima Vera’ as their vegetarian offering. Why? Oh, it’s our State Vegetarian Dish. Are y’all from California?”
“We have three specials today; well actually, two specials and one not so special. Here they are……”
“We were, by legend, first a slave exchange and then a brothel. Yes Sir, I understand that you’ve been told that about every restaurant that you’ve been to here. Actually, before restaurants were invented, all of New Orleans was first a slave exchange and then a brothel.”
“Foie Gras? That’s the Friday before Mardi Gras.”
“Bourbon Street? Two blocks that way, No Sir, you are in The French Quarter.”
“No Sir, the chef does not mind suggestions. You think that we should not use iceberg lettuce in our salads? Sir, iceberg lettuce is our State Flower! Are you, by any chance, from California?”
“No Ma’am, Gumbo is not a soup. No, not a stew. Gumbo is Gumbo; it comes from the Swahili word for okra. No Ma’am, our Gumbo doesn’t have okra in it. Yes Ma’am, our ‘Seafood Gumbo’ has sausage in it. That’s a crab claw, Ma’am. Ma’am? May I recommend the Onion Soup? Yes Ma’am, it has onions in it………”
“Sweet tea?”
“Non-smoking section? It’s right here, let me just get that ashtray out of your way. You’re from California, right?”
Here I am in the kitchen:
“Comin’ through! Right behind you! On your back!
Leroy, that’s four salads: one house, two blue cheese and one just olive oil and lemon. Olive oil? It’s that green stuff in a bottle, put it on the side, yeah.
“Who cut lemons today and where the hell are they?”
“Chef, I need table six. That’s no garlic, light spice and steamed veggies. I think they’re from California.”
“Table four thinks that their steak is over cooked. Yes Sir, that looks ‘medium” to me, lets just cook it a little more. Yes Sir, they’re idiots.”
“Is it hot in here or is it just me?”
“Who stocked wines, and where the hell is the ‘House White’?”
Here’s me with the busboy:
“ Yo bro, I need more water to eight, coffee at four, reset table twelve for a deuce, and that kid on sixteen just spilled his coke. Oh, and more bread to seven. Got it? Good.”
Me at the waiter station:
“Comin’ in!”
“Would you believe sixteen bucks on a hundred and fifty? Where are these people from?”
“What the hell is ‘sweet tea’?”.
“Yeah, I told him that the Merlot was a brutish wine with overtones of black cherry, chocolate, licorice, cinnamon, needed to come to terms with its tannins but wouldn’t screw up the taste of his cheeseburger. What did he do? What else, white Zin!”
“Who cut lemons today?”
“Where did you get those ear rings? They’re so damn cute!”
Petit Moi at the bar:
“I need a Fog Cutter, a Leg Spreader. Two Chocolate Margaritas, a Sloe Gin Fizz, a Fast Gin Fizz, a pair of Heinies, a Dancing Pony, a Dead Dog, Cherry Coke, Obituary Cocktail, two shots of Marti’s Crotch and Wet Sex On The Beach.
Just joking, make that two rum and cokes and a Bud Lite. Oh, you’re no fun.”
Back at the tables:
“What an engaging child. Is it yours? Yes Sir, of course it’s a boy. Cute as the dickens, too. May I clean up that spill? My pleasure.”
“ Sorry to interrupt you love birds, you do look, er, ‘comfortable’. Honeymooners, eh? May I suggest wet sex on the beach? No Sir, that’s one of our drink specialties.”
“Well Sir, Jambalaya is ‘jumbled’, Gumbo is ‘gumbled’: same thing, only gumbling requires more liquid. They’re local culinary terms, I think the words originally come from the Swahili language.”
“Yes Ma’am, Creole and Cajun are words from the Choctaw Indians. Creoles were here first, hence, the word ‘Cree-Old’, The Cajuns are the younger immigrants, that’s right Ma’am, ‘Cay-youngs’! Glad to help.”
“No Sir, that only appears to be trash on our streets; actually, it’s land fill on its way to expanding our landmass, also, it’s a gauge to show how much fun we’re having. No problem.”
“Hey guys, can I get you something from the bar? What are Hurricanes? Well, besides being a force of nature, they are a local drink with twelve kinds of alcohol, four natural fruit juices and a Voodoo spell by the bartender. They’re sole intention is to f--- you up. Two each? Comin’ right up!”
Back at the waiter station:
“Eight separate checks! All at one table! This is gonna be a ‘check out’ from HELL!”
“Did you see what she was wearing at table six? What is she thinking, Moulon Rouge? And the beads! Do they want to get mugged?”
“My dogs are barkin’! There must be a better way……”
At the end of the shift:
“Man, am I ready for a cocktail! Okay, but if you see me headed for the video poker machine, slap me; I need to make rent this week!”
Author’s Note: See? I fit right in! Wish me luck.

The Tennessee Willams Literary Conference

2008-05-03T10:09:00.000-07:00

Stella Shmella

Tennessee Williams was a local gay drunk and for that we will celebrate him with a literary festival this month; NOooo…, probably more so because he was a kick ass writer who was immune to being jerked off by the powers that profited from his angst. Don’t take my word for it, ask me.
It’s easy to be a local gay drunk, not so easy to be a kick ass writer. Writers are barely above liquor salesmen, who are just slightly above the homeless. I consider myself a writer…I should know. Like Marvin the paranoid android will tell you: “brain the size of a planet and they want me to make tea, open the door”… “pick up that scrap of paper, Marvin--- sheesh --- you call this a life?”
What’s my problem? I’ll tell you: It’s another literary conference and yet again I have not been invited to sit on a panel, host a workshop or give a speech!!
Once again I will sit in audiences and think ‘I was going to say that!’ or rack my brains for an intelligent question only to have one pop into my head hours later. Perhaps it’s author envy or some such sucky malaise; but, I see myself up on the podium with the big boys (and girls) speaking freely, wisely and off the cuff. “ Yes Rex, I remember telling Tennessee about my idea concerning my first novel about sex, drugs, depravity, danger, bloodshed, mystery and Rock and Roll and he turned to me, exhaling cigarette smoke, and said… “Oooo….a documentary!”
Noooo--- I have to sit in another audience, having begged press passes (again) from Ellen Johnson and listen to how hard it is to find a good editor publisher getaway place in order to spill my guts pounding out ten thousand words a day to exorcise my demons while drinking single malt scotch and reliving the wreckage of my misspent youth, when, after all was said and done, antidepressants were the only thing that eventually saved me. That and not (again) be invited to the kick off party because I’m just a slug, parasitic, wannabe journalist that doesn’t have two pennies to rub together and can’t keep a line of thought going for more than three hundred and seventy words at a time. Where was I?
Being a writer is really very simple. You put some words on paper and somebody gives you money. You use that money to buy you some time to put more words on more paper for more money, for more time, more words, more money, more time and finally the antidepressants.
What do you write about? Well, about drinking single malt scotch while your marriage crumbles, your kid that hates you, and the dog; one of which finally succumbs to some incurable virus that turns him into a blood sucking goat; the husband, the kid or the dog… take your pick, it’s all good copy. Or as Tennessee would say: “Oooooo, a documentary!”
I didn’t want to be a writer, I wanted to play the saxophone in Aretha Franklin’s backup band. I wanted to sell red balloons in Paris. I wanted to be an organ grinder with a monkey on Fisherman’s Wharf. I wanted to act, like Brando, and say “you’se my brudduh Charlie, you wuz ‘sposed to look out fuh me!”
What I got? A one way ticket to Faulkner-ville. A ringside seat at another STELLA!! shouting Contest. Marda Burton’s salon that I can’t go to because I work seven days a week.
I guess I just got lucky. I even get paid to write; no, not enough to do the money/time/words/antidepressant tango, but paid nonetheless. And there are some people that read my stuff; however, no one has approached me about my memoirs…yet. Hey, don’t laugh, Chris Rose is in his second printing already, he has a publisher…an editor, etc. etc. Of course he’s much older than I am.
I’m reading a book by Elizabeth Wurtzel titled ‘Bitch’ sub titled ‘in praise of difficult women’ (now there’s someone that I’d like to see on a panel). I’m also reading the Kama Sutra, The life of Saint Joan of Arc and The Gambling Secrets of Nick The Greek. Between that and my recent trip to Europe, wouldn’t you like to see me up there, discoursing on the foibles of fables. My workshop would be called “The well rounded reader as writer” or “Po-Boy Askew Views”.
Is Joni still a saint? I’m speaking of Ms. D’Arc, not Baez, Mitchell or Crawford. I can call her Joni if I want, ever since I overheard a buggy driver describe her statue as “Joni on the pony” which to me sounded a trifle obscene.
The story of her life portrays her as being a little dumpy thing, with short dark hair and a trifle homely; which goes against my grain, as such a woman should be pictured a little more flatteringly, I feel. So, I immediately skipped over that part and went on to the good stuff so that I could continue to picture her as a long legged, busty, beauty who rode a prancing stallion with long hair blowing in the wind, waving a four foot long saber, ready to eviscerate any and all comers.
Don’t you think that all heroes should be frightfully attractive? And, wouldn’t you like to hear me bore you with that subject, for hours (on a panel, of course). Or maybe tell you about being a Seventh Day Adventist (I’m not, but I could wing it). Or, what if I told you about being in London tracking down a place called Lee Ho Fook to get myself a dish of Beef Chow Mein.
Nah, not this year. I’m not invited. I’ll be among the folks with sensible shoes and bad hair with a yellow pad and pen ready to jot down any pearls of wisdom that drop. Anyway, it could be worse…it could be raining.
So, what do you think? March 26-30. Gonna come play with me at the writer’s conference? I think this year I’ll try a comb-over; Oooooo!
phil@whereyat.net

Hot sauces in The Big Easy

2008-05-03T10:05:00.000-07:00

Scoville’s Horse
Okay, Tabasco sauce is hot, and when it comes to food, the word means hot. In fact since the first two ounce bottle was sold by Edmund McIlhenny in 1869, Tabasco brand pepper sauce has been the benchmark in hot sauces and is exported to over 110 countries. Talk about a success story. It is rated at about 3-5,000 SU (Scoville Units). Consider it a classic.
Recently though, hot sauces have taken a different turn with a ‘burn K-Doe burn’ emphasis, with criterias of higher Scovilles and catchier labels. The labels that have flooded the market are the likes of ‘Pleasure and Pain, Plastering Phiery Pneumatic Perambulators On Unsophisticated Pharynxes ’, ‘Ass On Fire In A Bucket Of Blazing Briquettes’ and ‘Bubba’s Butt Rectal Revenge/Satan Sphincter Shrinker Venom Masochistic Napalm’.
Scoville ratings have now gone out of the roof and into outer space. And next you’re gonna ask, “Phil, what the deuce is a Scoville?”
Ahem…in 1912 a man named Scoville heard his horse ask: “Wilburrrrr, how hot is hot?” And, viola, he set about investigating, formulating and recording the different heat levels of different peppers. Assembling a posse of gangster tasters and using a normal bell pepper as a zero Scoville Unit, he set about seeing exactly how much sugar water it would take to neutralize the heat of any given pepper. For example, he found that it would take 2,500-5,000 ounces of sugar water to neutralize one ounce of a Jalapeño pepper’s heat, so he gave it a rating of 2,500-5,000 Scoville Units, based on the Scoville Organdeptic Test. What he was measuring was the levels of capsiacinoids, the element that we call heat. Incidentally, nowadays the test is done using a microscope. By the way, that little orange pepper called a Habanera that you see in stores and in hot sauces? It’s 200,00-300,00 SU. There are sauces available that go up to 1,000,000 SU if you’d care to blow your brains and your bottom out. Compare classic Tabasco sauce at 3-5,000 SU to pure capaicin at 16,000,000 SU.
Where are we going with this? Just a little background information while we whet your appetite for real hot sauces with simple names from the New Orleans area that are used in our homes and restaurants to flavor our local foods with a minimum of fooling around.
But first, did you know that until very recently, most New Orleans restaurants made their own hot pepper sauce? It was usually kept in a big glass bottle in the dining room and vinegar and peppers were added as necessary to keep it going. Many residents still make their own (myself included). I recently met a man that is keeping up and using his grandfather’s sauce. His grandfather died over thirty years ago!
I contacted some local companies and did taste tests and here’s what I found. Hot sauces are either water distilled or vinegar distilled, naturally the type of pepper used and it’s proportion to the liquid effects the strength of the brew. Vinegar is added to most pepper sauces for bite, sugar or fruits will be added to tone the mixture down. Water distilled sauces will be milder, with less bite and more emphasis on flavor. Aging is also a factor, and like fine wine, aging develops complexity of taste, a balance of acidity and the heat and smoothness of flavor profile. But you already knew that.
Okay, this is the part where I ‘Goggled’ local hot sauces and only one answered out of a half a dozen. If I had been writing this about Tabasco, I’m so damn sure that they would have jumped on this wagon and sent me samples, some Tabasco bling, banners and maybe even a brass band, that I could spit. But nooooo… I’ve got to write about the little guys.
Anyway, rule numero uno: read the ingredients and if there is something other than stuff found in nature and your kitchen, put that puppy back on the shelf! I’m thinking “peppers, vinegar, salt”. You with me?
Here’s some local names: Cajun Chef, Panola, Crystal, Louisiana, Chachere’s, Ashanti and Bayou Red.
Rule two: choose your camp. Are you gonna be a Louisiana fan, a world fan or are you, like some hard core Pepperheads, gonna swear allegiance to one brand and go so far as to even carry a bottle with you? Or do you give a rat’s whisker at all? Personally I love Sriracha and will use it on everything wherever I find it served, but I don’t tote it with me. It’s got a lot of stuff in it and is contradictory to any Pepperhead rules; but, like love, I am blind to it’s faults and prey to it’s flavors. Other sauces I can take or leave; however, some of the chipotle (smoked jalapeño) sauces are rather appealing.
Rule three: snub your nose at gimmicky pepper sauce. If you’re going to be a serious Pepperhead use them for flavor and heat, not just for heat and a cartoon of a woman dressed in low cut leather, sporting a whip and black thigh-high boots.
Number four: check out Latin American, Caribbean, Asian, Indonesian and American regional sauces. Go to tastings (Austin has a great one) and talk it up with fellow Pepperheads.
Five: as the man said, “If you don’t like the news, make some of your own!” The same goes for hot sauces. You can and should make your own hot sauce. There are books out there like ‘Hot Licks’ by Jennifer Trainer Thompson and more; check ‘em out! To further exploit quotations, as an ex-con acquaintance once said to me “read a book, get a clue.
And Six: Use your computer to Further educate yourself. When last I checked there were 1629 books answering the key words ‘recipe hot sauces’. Rounding third and heading for home, heeeeeere’s Seven: go down to the Decatur Street Newsstand, 1133 Decatur, and pick up a chili lover’s magazine, or two. Call Bruce, 566-3000, to see which ones are in.
Until next month, here's this: In India they grow a pepper, Bhut Joloka or Ghost Pepper, 1,001,304 SU. It is said to be the equivalent of a sensory mugging or as one quote assured "like swigging a cocktail of battery acid and glass shards." Woof! Let me in on your thoughts, phil@whereyat.net.

If You Live Long Enough

2008-04-27T16:01:00.000-07:00

She’ll be going on thirteen in cat years, he’ll be a little over seventy in human terms. She’s in a convalescent home on the West Bank and he’s at home; they both appear to be circling the drain, failing slowly but surely, the treachery of physical forms giving out while the spirit of life fights to remain among us.
For the people that love them, it is a heartbreaking death-watch. It is a wearing down of deep emotions, like being one breath away from bursting into the tears in the face of loss unremitting. The heart remains a weight to carry. The next phone-call may bring news of the end.
This is a Valentine card to them: Verita Thompson and Phil the cat. Hello in there…and goodbye.
I met them both, separately, about eight years ago. They were both strong and alive, full of piss and vinegar, élan, and elegance, vitality and vigor.
Phil was a new rescue from Fairhope, Alabama; brought to New Orleans for a new lease on life. Personable and loving, mischievous and bold, honorable and agile; he soon became the king of the courtyard and a bane to small birds and rodents. Hell, I don’t need to tell you how a big gray lug of a boy tabby can win you over while he establishes his own kingdom (over you, your belongings and surroundings), stealing your heart with love full and pure.
He came to a whistle and a call of his name. He was equally at home in the neighbor’s apartments and often came home late, smelling of tobacco and a good time. The girls called him ‘Phil-boy’. The guys just called him ‘Buddy’. He was part of the pack of critters that stayed through the storm and evacuated to San Francisco and back. He’s been around, now he’s going down.
Two years ago he was diagnosed with FIV and separated from the other cats. Medication was prescribed and Phil was supervised a little more closely.
But wait. Before you might have the nerve to think that Phil was quarantined, let me again tell you how we treat our heroes. Phil still has free range of his kingdom. It was Bob and Pepper that made the adjustments. Pepper, who has been an inside feline…remains that way. Bob, who was Phil’s sidekick was promoted to shop cat and relocated to Toulouse St.
Things remained pretty much status quo until the beginning of November when Phil went into renal failure, after a week’s hospitalization, he was sent home, a shadow of his former shadow. The classic “til one day the old doctor looked at me and said: I can’t do no more for him, Jim” was applied and accepted. So it goes. Phil is now lying in the sun and fading.
Here’s the next part: what do you call a woman who was Humphrey Bogart’s mistress, had two restaurants in Los Angeles (at least one given to her by Howard Hughes), has Henry Mancini’s piano in her living room, wears Chanel suits and has the ability to use language that can make a sailor blush? You know, a little sassy broad, lunching at Galatoire’s in the day and tossing them back on her rounds in the evening? Who is it that can bring a crowd to Claire’s On Conti by the rumor of an appearance? Who is it that said that if Lauren Bacall couldn’t run her out of Hollywood, Katrina couldn’t run her out of New Orleans?
Who is it that you missed by not paying attention to legends living amongst you? Uh, that would be Ms. Verita Thompson.
Verita stands about five foot nothing (in heels); however, when she holds court, she is the center of the universe and the word HUGE doesn’t adequately suffice in application. She has a book that she authored named ‘Bogie And Me’ out of print for twenty five years and still sought after. She ran a saloon across from Antoine’s for a time and flitted between Santa Monica and here for years until…..
Question: what happens if you live long enough? Answer: you get old. The ‘O’ word. The curse of a long life is that your gears start to wear, your bearings get bushed, your oil needs changed more regularly and, although your spirit is still willing, the flesh simply cannot keep up. A mild stroke and a hard fall was enough to put a seal on Verita’s future. What had been a brave ‘fuck you’ life is now the time that the kindness of strangers becomes the reality of her existence. Confined to a wheelchair, fed through a tube and diapered, medicated, not listened to or even noticed in a facility that they mistakenly call a ‘Convalescent Home’. There is no convalescing from this one, Honey.
Last night a waitress that I know told me that she cannot stand waiting on the elderly because they break her heart and bring her to tears with how fragile that they are. Hey, listen up, we are all headed down that same road; if we live long enough.
So, I put it to you: what are you doing with these days of your life? If Verita were your age, she’d be knocking back a tequila with the likes of Gable and Gabor. If it were Phil, he’d be having you for lunch on his personal killing floor.
Well, tough guy, you can spend time on your cell phone, irons in the fire and all them business deals; but, you cannot put real value into a life if you place your dreams on call waiting. February the sixteenth is Verita’s ninetieth birthday. I’ll be at Claire’s On Conti hoisting a few and celebrating what time that we, collectively, have left on this planet. I’ll also be wishing Phil god-speed in whatever reality he may be residing in.
Question: how am I feeling? I’m blessed to be alive and awfully glad to be here. The longer that I live, the more precious my life has become, as I remind myself, often, that there are no ‘do over’ days. Here’s lookin’ at you, Kid.
phil@whereyat.net

Dear Doctor I'm Damaged

2008-04-27T15:57:00.000-07:00

“When sex, drugs or Rock and Roll are no longer the answer, my friend, clearly the question is bigger than both of us” my mentor was in the habit of saying. Of course, he was also in the habit of remarking that: “today was the first day of the rest of my miserable f_cking life!”
Speaking of my existence (miserable or not): the question now is: how do I change ennui to élan or, how to lift the mantle of blues that The New Year traditionally brings; and/or: what do you do when the gumbo of your life tastes flat? No pep in your step, no glide in your stride, no gut in your strut and no woogie in your boogie? Or, for Chrissakes, ALL OF THE ABOVE!!!
Qu’est-ce c’est when there’s no more shelter in you mother’s little helper?
I think that it’s time for a trip. You know me; there’s no problem so big that I can’t run away from, and if I don’t take a break….I’m going to have a problem. I’m going to have more than my usual challenges (that which I can overcome), I’m going to go into negative land, as a friend calls it, and become hard to live with and around.
So, what’s got me down? What am I rebelling against? Name it, I can’t. It’s just everything these days seems to conspire to piss me off and no sooner than I get my blood pressure back under control than, as the man says, “BAM!!”
Am I going to give you a hundred and twenty examples of stuff that happens? Shall I tell you about my nineteenth nervous breakdown? Noooo, I could… but I’m not going to.
Instead, I’m going to point you to the way out of this asylum that we call home. By the way, I truly believe that things would be better if the inmates were running the asylum. That aint happening, so the get-a-clue phone says: “make like a tree.…”
We’re going to London and Paris the first two weeks in January. This is not something that we can afford to do; but, it’s something that we can’t afford not to do. Why London and Paris, you may ask? Culcha dawlin’! And distraction. And it will be less expensive in January, and it’s between the busy Christmas season and the busy Mardi Gras season. And if you need to ask that question again---it might be time for you to consider therapy.
Consider this: they are both cities that are a lot like New Orleans is supposed to be; charming, quaint and with a fun mixture of visitors and working stiffs, where one street off the beaten path will put you into someone’s neighborhood. There’s good food to be found and shops, galleries and museums. The folks there are not overly gregarious nor are they rude; and the thing that strikes me most there is tha, pretty much, everybody is content with their station in life. And, add to that, they were both once great cities, like us, and they are both great walking towns (with rivers). Oh, they speak funny over there too… like we do.
There the similarities end. New Orleans has, from the beginning, been Europe’s bastard child; wild reckless and irreverent. Spoiled. We are the eternal adolescent, playing dress up and never cleaning up our rooms or doing our homework. Staying out late and coming home smelling of booze and sex. Greasy kid stuff in our hair and blood on the saddle. You can’t live here and not notice. If London and Paris are like that, I swear, I will not notice.
The Tate Modern has opened since last I was in London and I want to do some touristy things while I’m there this time; no phone, no pool, no pets. We’ll get to Paris via that speed-ball of a train that goes under the English Channel and emerges in the French countryside like a bat out of hell. Paris is so lovely that it makes me want to smoke cigarettes, keep my hands in the pockets of my unpressed trousers and slouch around. Guess where I would really like to live more than New Orleans?
Oh, I’m not through living in New Orleans for a while; but, that’s something that can change with the next mugging, murder or mayhem on my street. The next time that I step around body waste, litter, or the contents of someone’s drunken stomach might just put me over the edge. The next time that I read about someone’s child taking the life of someone’s child or the indictment of another elected official or the next reaming that we’re going to take because it’s our turn in the pork barrel, I just might be ready to kiss this third world country farewell.
I’m sure that in the future, in my own time I will be ready to miss New Orleans; however, not now. UNLESS----if somehow, someway an opportunity to relocate across the pond occurred, I’d be out of here like a shot. Watch my tail-lights gleam. Rollin’ like those tumbling dice; sixes, sevens and nines! Bon jour my honey, bon jour my baby, bon jour my rag-time gal; send me a kiss…by wire!
It’s that or medication. Or a glimmer of hope, a show of promise, a hint, an allegation, a rumor of impending recovery. So far, that’s not happening either, the homeless numbers are off the chart, our city services are pitiful at best and I’m not getting any younger or more tolerant of ignorance.
Last Saturday while strolling down Royal Street with a glass of champagne, going from one art gallery reception to another gallery opening on an unseasonably warm evening, everything was right with the world. What we need, in a perfect world, is that we get our city mobilized 24/7 until we’re up to snuff, wake up to what century we live in, stop sniveling and get the !@#$%^&* to work, do our jobs and stop taking advantage of each other. In other words, like the Joker said: “What this city needs… is an enema!”

April Fool

2008-04-27T15:55:00.000-07:00

People that want money from me come at me from all different directions and are all on different schedules. My bills arrive in my mailbox all on different days. Also, they are all due on different days, which has me at my checkbook three or four times a week, at the post box three or four times a week and at my mail box every day. I’m thinking ‘some kind of conspiracy’. I’m thinking that they’re trying to drive me nuts…well, it’s too late.
Do you know what happens if you check your mail, say, once a week? When you look at how much the postman has managed to cram in there you just know that there’s a late fee lurking. And forget about waiting until the last possible day to post a bill. Of course, that’s the very day that you get the next bill from the very same people. You just cannot catch a break.
The fact of the matter is, that, if all my bills came at once, my life would be easier but my brain would probably go into the ‘deer in the headlight’ zone. I shudder to think of how much money I put out every month, I really don’t want to know, not all at once at least. I do know that it is all the money I make and then some.
Talk about not catching a break; I saw a mouse that had gotten that snap across the neck in one of those ‘look! Here’s some plastic cheese!’ affairs. His little hand was still outstretched wanting and wishing for that piece of orange plastic. The perfect picture of the April Fool.
You, or rather we, April Fools know who we are. We’re the ones waiting to inhale and exhale; waiting for our agent to call; the winning daily double; our lucky day; Hell to freeze over. We’re already aware that the concepts of winning or losing are nebulous at best and we’re pretty much happy if we can cop a draw.
Are you looking for an even playing field? Do you really believe that the check is in the mail? Good times are just around the corner? There is no recession? This year will be better than last year? That there is really a Department Of Happy Endings? April Fool.
Okay, the April Fool is a little naive, the April Fool still believes in love no matter how many times they have gotten their heart broken. The April Fool believes that there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and every cloud does have a silver lining. That’s why we set aside the first day of April to celebrate them (us, you, me).
All Fools Day is celebrated (if you can call it celebrating) around the world. In France they’re called Poisson d’Avril, in Scotland they’re referred to as April-gowks (cuckoos). At one time, the last week in March into the first couple of days of April was when the New Year was celebrated, the time of the vernal equinox. A lot of people were slow at hearing about the change (1582, go figure), so, those in the know decided to play tricks on them, pretending it was the New Year and generally pulling wool over they’re eyes and confusing them and stuff like that; until the day has generally degenerated into what we have now: a day dedicated to embarrassing the gullible. That’s me…the gullible.
Let’s see, who else could be called an April Fool? Let’s go down a list: do you, or have you ever, believed in organized government, The Road Home, the Army Corps of Engineers, FEMA, or the ability of someone up for election who will take the stars from the sky and put them back into your eyes?
‘See a pin and pick it up…that means all day you’ll have good luck’. “I’m looking over a four-leaf clover that I overlooked before”. “I’m siiiiiiiiiiiingin’ in the rain!!!!!!!!!!!” Etc. etc. etc. Sound familiar?
How many times have you played that game where you’ve bought your lottery ticket and before the numbers are even drawn, you have already decided where you will spend your winnings?
Hollywood has made a lot of money on movies for and about April Fools. Boy meets girl, they fall in love, girl finds out something and they break up.
The boy goes into the Army and is shipped off to fight in an unjust war. The girl stays at home and cries. The boy gets a bullet, which stays lodged in some obscure part of his body. The girl is in an automobile crash (not her fault). The little dog gets stolen by terrorists and is being set up to be a suicide bomber. The father (did we mention the father…a retired firefighter, blind since birth) and the mother (who makes the best gol-durn tuna casserole in the world!) are worried sick and the mortgage is overdue.
The girl is forced to work on the first floor of a honky tonk saloon (she just can’t make it up the stairs) and the boy’s buddies check him out of the hospital where the male nurse has a crush on him (and him and him and him).
The boys go to the honky tonk saloon and the boy sees the girl and naturally thinks the worst and flees. The girl sees this and rushes after him (not easy with her crutches, but he’s in a wheelchair--- and here comes Fido!!!) Meanwhile….you see where this is going? Not a dry eye in the house.
Well I say that the April Fool is being maligned and castigated unjustly. Think of it this way; were it not for us there would be no other holidays! Who else would celebrate Valentines Day, Mother’s Day, Christmas…. Easter?
So, here’s your assignment: think of some cool (non aggressive) tricks for All Fool’s Day, like asking someone if they knew that the word ‘gullible’ was being taken out of dictionaries, and get ready to be fooled yourself. When a prank is pulled on you, even when you know it, fall for it and laugh like you don’t have a lick of sense. Did you know that it’s April Fool’s Day today?
Comments, questions, gossip? phil@whereyat.com

June Juleps

2008-04-27T15:53:00.000-07:00

Boy, the Olympic torch didn’t stand a chance this year. It was a case of ‘Send in the next frothing self-incendiary activist!’ Talk about raining on somebody’s parade! Have you followed this? Harried all the way across Europe and then, get this, flown from Paris to San Francisco, put up in a major hotel with no less than six decoy/replacements and probably sent across the Pacific in a nuclear submarine, disguised as a pregnant geisha with garlic breath. If I was the torch I would have just said “drop me off in New Orleans, I’d rather sip a PBR at Parkway and shake my booty to Kermit!”
Paraskevidkatriaphobia is something you may have to deal with this month; however, Dr. Donald Dossey reports that when you can pronounce the word you will be cured. And I always thought the term was friggatriskaidekophia. Silly me, and by the way, those words are not describing exotic Greek pastries.
Well, optimism abounds (not!) here in the Quarter where the hurricane season kicks off with dire warnings added to an unreliable economic future. The convention arena participants will see their travel insurance double, gas prices will make it financially unreasonable for short trips in and out of the city, and the merchants will be jerked around by the city’s tourist agencies that promise pie in the sky and the next wave of free spending tourists that never show up.
In the face of all that, there are still new businesses that decide to buck the odds and stake a claim as a real French Quarter Shop owner.
As a bookshop co-owner in the thick of it, I can tell you about my neighbor shops that have hung in there, a lot of times working seven days a week for months on end. The Glorias and the Gingers and the Jasons who came back knowing how hard a row it’s been, is and by looks of it, will be to gain traction on the treadmill in the small merchant financial gymnasium.
Anybody looked around the Quarter lately? Shops that didn’t make it back from the storm still shuttered, old businesses that came back leaving for the promise of a better life on Magazine Street or just folding their tents, like the Arabs of old and slipping off in the night. Two small grocery stores gone, the only hardware store considering selling, the shoemaker that never came back, galleries having liquidation sales and restaurants still on partial operating schedules.
With rents either out of control or at least, unreasonable, it’s hard to find a small start up entrepreneur willing to risk their shorts to give it (business) a go. Unless you have a landlord like we do, most of them are unreasonable, illogical and/or immovable on their attitudes and concepts of what is best for the French Quarter. And I can tell you from firsthand knowledge, some are squarely immoral in their business philosophies. But that’s another story.
As far as living in the Quarter goes: the fact is that, with two thousand buildings sharing a mere square mile, it does seems a trifle weird that we have less than four thousand residents; that is, until you look up to see how little use there is being made of properties above shops and how many living spaces have been turned over to condominiums owned by out of state part timers. It’s all fun and games until you look for a real post office, a gas station, baby wipes, auto parts or anything second hand. You go up Magazine for that stuff (or out to the ‘burbs) where the placement of a plant, flag, sign or sandwich board is not taken as much of an issue, there’s adequate street lighting and the parking Nazis aren’t nearly so militant.
Well hope springs eternal, and here comes a newbie named Jen at the freshly opened Lost And Found who has decided to cast her fate, fortune and future to Chartres Street, the kindness of strangers and faith in the uniqueness of her inventory She is joining the ranks of us gamblers of commerce that have staked our claim to the successes of our enterprises. Welcome.
I am a believer in the value of neighborhoods and the worth of likeminded and like suited human enclaves. The areas that America, both corporate and political are trying to have us abandon. I feel warm when a person on the street is someone that I can hail, wave to…and/or hug. I’m a sucker for anyone who knows me by name, face or whatever little reputation that I have left. And so, I play my part as well… I’m real picky as to where I spend my money, where I purchase my gifts, where I eat my meals and who I deal with. Just like you, right?
Face it, the little guy in this country is taking a beating. Our economy is not geared for gifted starry eyed would be up and comers, and certainly not in the French Quarter if in New Orleans at all. Hell, us crusty hard nosers are being tested every day. We applaud newcomers for having faith and the willingness to keep it.
Economically the facts are: rents are through the roof, leases are generally short term, tenants rights are nil. You cannot afford to hire staff that lives locally because the working stiff needs to be able to pay rent (not easy for a ten dollar an hour guy to pay a thousand a month for rent) and with gas prices… well?
Say I was the most talented cook in the world, made my bones in some class joints and was ready to spread my wings and my message; what’s my next move? Not New Orleans. Back in the day it was affordable; I know because I did it--- not once but twice, because I could afford to do what I wanted to and not have to prostitute (yes I said that) my food because the landlord wanted a pound of flesh every month. How many businesses can say that today?
Your assignment this month is to pronounce paraskevidekatriaphobia three times and to pray for an infusion of sanity and a safe hurricane season. There’s no place like home. Comments? plamancusa@aol.com

Michael

2008-04-27T15:50:00.000-07:00

“Michael…come down and talk to me”. Up ahead a member of New Orleans finest is calling up to a second floor balcony, gun drawn and held behind his back. Quietly in the hood, the streets are blocked by flashing blue moonbeams, no sirens, as Michael pokes his head out and says something soft and incoherent. Michael has closely cropped hair, a gaunt composure and blood running down his arm. I’ve just picked up a sandwich and I’m headed back to work. I check to make sure my van isn’t in the line of fire and redirect my steps to avoid Michael, the cops and any drama that might be going down. Here comes Michael’s landlord rushing down the street waving the keys like he’s ringing a bell; I’m sure that he’s only trying to avoid his door being kicked in, it doesn’t appear that anyone really gives a shit about Michael but the man in blue with the gun.
But, you know, that’s the way it is in the city. Lovers walk connected at the hip, taxis prowl the Rue Dumaine looking for fares, a drunk stumbles into the glaring sunlight and Michael’s situation is unfolding around him like a urine stain on the fabric of his life.
One of the things that I don’t like about the nowadays of my life is the apparent necessity of making sure that I have one eye on the road and the other eye looking over my shoulder, almost sure that trouble will sneak up on me unless I stay alert. There was a time when I could be slow and stupid and breeze along immune to negative happenstance, blissfully ignorant and comfortably numb in a cloud of naiveté. Then again, at that time I rarely read newspapers, didn’t worry about a job, rent or where my next meal was coming from. All of that seemed to be taking care of itself; it seemed like all I had to do was ‘do my thing’ and the universe took care of the details. Cool, huh? I mean, I did work, I paid rent and was definitely not malnourished, the point is that at one time I didn’t think about those things being so strenuous.
Back… thirty- five years ago or so… I had a man come to me for a job and flat out told me that he wouldn’t work for less than $4.50 an hour. Of course we were paying that, four-fifty was the coin of the realm going rate for any reputable house of employment. Why do I mention this seemingly worthless piece of information? It’s not just another ‘when I was younger’ tale, it is a point of reference as to what is making life difficult here.
Back when I was paying cooks in my employ less than what minimum wage is now, a person could live on four frigging fifty an hour! AND my point is that three and a half decades later the cost of living has not kept in line with the average wage being paid. Even at three times the wages (which is lower than the norm) the cost of keeping my head above water (no pun intended) is tenfold what it was. And that, my friend bites the big one. In a manner of speaking, when someone tells you: “you’re doing a fine job, whatever they’re paying you is not enough” they couldn’t be closer to the truth than if they said: “ a snake’s belt slips because he has no hips” but that’s neither here nor there. Face it, Buddy: you’re sweating your cajones off while the fat cat still skims the cream from the top of the pitcher. And it is not that the cost of living has gone up, the fact is you’re not getting paid enough to cover that expense.
I think about that when I hit the ticket booth of the Jazz Fest. Usually with a “the price is WHAT???” And then I turn into my parents with the ‘I remember when blah blah blah and phone calls were only a nickel blah blah and who’s getting all that money and why can’t I bring my own sandwich etceteras’.
Yes, it is going to cost me at least a hundred dollars a day if I’m going to have my kind of fun at the Fair Grounds. No shit, I don’t come cheap and I intend to have big fun spending money I don’t make on the best time of year that anyone with warm blood in their veins could have in this city. And I know that there are lots of folks that the Fest is just not for ---and that’s good… for them.
But, you know what? I’m going to go out every day that I can! That’s right, cash in the chips, raid the piggy bank and to hell with the housework… I’m going to the Fest!!! And unlike most everything else in this crazy life of ours, it’s going to be worth every penny that I’m parting with!
I know that in years past that I’ve written about The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in terms of what to wear, who to hear, how to avoid the crowd and still find a reasonably clean rest room in my thousand word missives. Not so this season I’m not. So? This is this ‘what up’ for this year:
The Jazz Fest is probably the best time in your otherwise stressful life that you are going to have and still remain vertical. The food, the music, the people, and the atmosphere continues to rock me, every year, since I was paying line cooking dogs four-fifty an hour.
You know, you walk through those gates, the world outside goes away and you (at least I do) forget for eight hours all the other stuff that I have to do and not once look back over my shoulder unless it’s to catch another glimpse of some hot number who’s mama let her get out of the house wearing that outfit.
In what has become my personal tradition, this year I’ll raise my first beer and wish a good god bless to everyone that can’t quite make it, where ever they may be. And one for Michael.