A parade of picture books

So I'm on Day 10 of COVID protocols today.  According to the medical science practitioners I've consulted this means that I'm basically, pretty much, almost, okay-ish.  I know I'm among the last people on Earth to have encountered it at this point but it's been an experience. Even when you have all the shots and stuff, this is not a fun thing to get. There's a couple days of knock-you-on-your-ass fever followed by a lot of sniffling and coughing. Then you just don't have any energy for a few days. And finally, when you think it's almost through, there's a knock-you-on-your-ass migraine that sends you back to bed for a day.  In the meantime, also, your spouse tests positive and begins a similar cycle so you can sing this in a round if you like. 

The other thing that happens, inevitably, is Mardi Gras comes along right in the middle of all this. That's been disappointing for us. We were hoping this year would get us back into something like our pre-COVID pattern of cooking and hosting friends on (at least some) parade nights.  But we're not going to be able to do that now.  In a way, though, this is what Carnival is about; understanding we are all subjects to an impenetrable chaos and adjusting accordingly.  And that's what I've been doing.  Stepping out when and where I can to catch whatever vibe is there and then begging off to recover for the coming marathon.  I feel like that is paying off.  I'm definitely better now than I was. And medical science says by this point I'm probably not contagious anymore either so I'm trying to trust that as well.  Cautiously, though. 

Last night I went out by myself with the chair, the camera, and a couple of diet cokes.  They pull a sign at the front of this parade that says, "Carnival Begins When Babylon Rolls" so, really, it's as if I hadn't missed anything. 

Babylon's floats always look amazing. Their theme this year was Wonders of the World or some such. I think this float was the Hanging Gardens. 

People don't like to hear this but the Chaos floats also always look good. Sure, their content can go in some unpleasant directions. This year there was a Hunter Biden laptop float, a float that depicted Paul Pelosi drunk driving, and a particularly racist float about Ron DeSantis sending immigrants to New York.  On the other hand, when they come off the right wing cable news schtick and do something local, they can nail it. 

This one, for example, was about local developer Joe Jaeger and the various troubled properties he currently holds, including the Jung Hotel, the defunct Poland Ave Naval Station, and, of course the crumbling Plaza Tower. 

The linked article above says the Plaza Tower is now up for sale. 

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) - Developer Joe Jaeger has decided to give up efforts to bring one of New Orleans’ tallest buildings back into commerce, opting instead to try selling the deteriorating Plaza Tower, a City of New Orleans spokesman confirmed Tuesday night (Feb. 14).

Jaeger told the New Orleans Advocate he was “disappointed” to be giving up on the 44-story tower at 1001 Howard Ave. But Jaeger has owned the vacant skyscraper since 2014 with little progress and come under fire as it has fallen into a hazardous state of disrepair.

Jaeger has enlisted the real estate advisory and brokerage firm HREC (Hospitality Real Estate Counselors) to help find a buyer for the property, though no asking price has yet been listed.

A spokesman for Mayor LaToya Cantrell said City Hall hailed Jaeger’s decision and was eager to find a new steward for the property.

“The city is eager to be a co-investor with any development team that can bring this potentially catalytic project back into commerce, including Mr. Jaeger,” city spokesman John Lawson told Fox 8. “What the city has made clear is that we will not continue to let the property languish.”

The city still can't wait to "co-invest."  I'm sure we're all very confident in that prospect. It's sad to see the city use that language, though. Because it is true that whatever transaction takes place will involve a lot of public money.  In a better world, that would mean the public should have a real stake in how that property is used and for whose benefit. What the Cantrell spokespeople actually mean, though, is they are happy to just give our money away to help their rich friends do land deals. 

With the protective netting shored up, Jaeger’s real estate agent Lenny Wormser says he’s confident of a sale soon.

“If you take advantage of the tax credit, you could almost buy the building for free because of tax credits of up to $25 or $30 million,” said Lenny Wormser, with HREC Investments.

You could get it for free! What are you waiting for?  Okay well, what would you do with it? Let's ask the "experts."  Or maybe let's not ask them because, Jesus! 

Real estate experts say the building could be a natural for Air BnBs, especially since the city has been encountering resistance from residential areas that don’t want them in their neighborhoods.

“It’s got the best views in the city of New Orleans because there’s a five-story height limit in the warehouse district. No one will ever block those views and you have the Superdome,” said Wormser.

The Downtown Development District is eager to see a new buyer come in and restore this long-vacant property and rejuvenate a section of the CBD that needs a lift by utilizing new incentives which are now before congress.

“We’re working with legislators in hopes of Congress passing a ‘revitalizing downtown bill,’ which would provide tax credits for these developments,” said DDD Public Policy Director Alexis Kyman.

Downtown real estate is hot, with several new buildings recently constructed and rapidly filling up.

With state and federal tax credits amounting to nearly 40% of construction costs, Wormser is confident that a new buyer can put together a package that would help restore this long-blighted property and make it an asset in a section of the CBD that they believe is ripe for redevelopment.

Trapolin says Air BnB development could be a big part of the Plaza Tower’s future. He says the return on investment for such properties is nearly double what you can get if you rebuild as apartments.

Terrific, more public subsidies for these guys.  Also the specific thing we are putting our money in to help them do is make "nearly double" what they would make building housing while turning downtown New Orleans into a tourist sacrifice zone. 

The huge impact of the so-called sharing economy on the tourism sector is currently a well-recognized reality [29,30,31,32]. Beyond the effect on other activities (such as automobile transport or tourist guide services), the phenomenon with the highest economic, social, and spatial impact doubtless corresponds to the rapid and massive expansion of housing rentals for use by tourists supplied via online platforms (Airbnb, HomeAway, Housetrip, etc). Indeed, it can be stated that it has become the decisive phenomenon in the functional transformation of central zones of the world’s major cities, which have shifted from being residential and commercial to becoming spaces devoted to tourist lodgings with higher intensity depending on the tourist attractions present in each city. 

The fundamental moral issue here, as always, is a city belongs to its people. There is no section of it that we are obligated to sacrifice to rent seeking leeches just so that they can turn it into a theme park. This is especially germane when public money is subsidizing the development.  There has to be public benefit.  Downtown is a neighborhood. The French Quarter is a neighborhood.  Residents come first in neighborhoods.  If you want Disneyworld, go to Disneyworld.

There's a clear line of division happening here between people who want to live in a healthy community and the monsters who want to suck the profits out of the land.  After Mardi Gras is over, the people  who style themselves our "representatives" on the City Council will, once again, consider the city's regulatory regime around these issues.  Let's all watch which side of that division they choose to place themselves on. Sounds exciting. 

Anyway, where were we?  Oh yeah, it's Mardi Gras and we're trying to watch some parades. When I planted my chair and sat my pathetic COVID ridden grandpa self down last night, I wasn't sure how long I'd be there. It's chaos weather season now and the temperature just dropped 30 degrees overnight. When that happens they always called for rain.  I was afraid Irma Thomas might be forced to sing the hits while riding in the Muses shoe.  Turns out, though, she wasn't. 

The rain did come, though.  But it was polite enough to wait until after we found out who this year's Dead Rock Star was.  (It was Jam Master Jay) After that I figured I could go on in and rest. 

Before that, though, I was delighted to watch a parade about picture books. 

This is something of an area of expertise for me. Would you like to see a thread of favorite picture books of 2021 curated by me?  What about one from 2022 that is even longer?  The point is, I read a lot of these. Some of the classic titles riffed on by Muses are among my favorites as well. Here's Mo Willems's famous Pigeon, for example. 

The Very Hungry Councilpillar, here, is supposed to be the City Council "eating into" the mayor's authority over city budget and staffing matters. Pretty clever.

I don't care for the way Muses lets its business class MSNBC brain get in the way of having an actual thought sometimes. This take on 'The Day The Crayons Quit' (really good book, by the way) got into some embarrassing "Third Way" can't we all be purple nonsense. 

But, it's the little things that you still have to appreciate. I like the "#LookAtThisFuckingFloat" touch on this roadwork float. 

All in all, pretty neat.  And even though I'm not going at it hard, it's still possible to catch a bit of a vibe out there. Tonight I'm going to try and approximate the normal rituals and make a pot of jambalaya before walking out.  We'll see how it goes.

Careful what you catch out there

Hope everyone is staying safe out there.  Happy to see that the COVID numbers are at their lowest point since the start of the Omicron wave.  Hopefully the closest you will come to catching COVID out there is if you get it in bead form like the above photo.  We've been doing our best to stay safe but we have been gathering in large crowds because how can you not.  That's still relatively low risk, or so we are given to understand. But just in case, maybe someone will throw us a few rapid tests in order to be sure. 

NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) - We all know that Carnival is known for catching unique throws and trinkets, but one crew has decided to make this year even more unique.

The New Orleans Health Department plans to hand out at-home rapid COVID-19 this Thursday at the Krewe of Muses parade. The at-home test will give you results in 15 minutes.

“We are excited to be part of the Krewe of Muses because we knew this would allow us to put more tests in the hands of our community,” said Dr. Jennifer Avegno, Director of NOHD. “If we want to participate in the activities we love at Carnival, we can’t let our guard down. COVID is not over yet, and we need to use every tool at our disposal to prevent a repeat of the tragedies of Mardi Gras 2020. Masking slows the spread, testing identifies cases and pandemic trends, and vaccines with boosters prevent hospitalizations and deaths.”

I didn't catch any rapid tests at Muses. I did get a krewe branded neck gaiter so, you know, every little bit helps.  

Anyway we're getting into the part of the year where I fall behind on getting my camera photos uploaded. But I did get a few with the phone last night.

Babylon was gorgeous. They did a fairy tales type theme. Here is their Golidlocks float. Kind of creepy, this one, actually.

 

Chaos is back... in more ways than one.

 

And, of course, the sight of this lantern after two years (actually three if you recall that Muses had to roll in the daytime because of the 2020 postponement) elicited a few goosebumps. 

As for the vibe check, it was mostly very good.  I'm trying to get an app on my phone that can detect vibes but until that gets invented, I just have video.

 

Also bonus video. This is the L.B. Landry band. 

 

Unfortunately, it wasn't perfect. There was a shooting along the route a few blocks down from us.  That hasn't happened at Muses since 2014. Previously there have been shootings during the Thursday parades in 2012 and 2004. In 2009 there was a shooting on Fat Tuesday so near to our place that we had to stay inside on a police-imposed "lockdown" for about an hour.  When these things happen it's ugly and horrifying and a reminder that real life is still going on around us and violence is a part of that. 

Anyway, once I get more photos uploaded (and tagged and described because yes that is still a thing I care about) I will try to post more stuff in between all the parading and doomscrolling which the times do in fact require one to do simultaneously. 

"Wait, there's a camera"

Friday Carnival

It's late in the afternoon on a rainy Friday and I've just put a pot of sliced and seasoned shoulder steak into the oven. It's going to braise for an hour or so in a broth with onions and garlic until it, hopefully, comes out as filler for little roast beef sandwiches like these.



I made those mini po boys about a year and a half ago and they seemed like good parade food to me. We're about to find out.

We're also waiting to find out what Endymion is going to do.

The Krewe of Endymion will decide at 9 p.m. tonight whether it will attempt to roll along it's traditional Mid-City route Saturday or will reschedule to Sunday because of threatening weather, according to a local television report.

Thousands of parade-goers battle traffic and crowds each year to see the superkrewe -- known for it's massive floats, celebrity monarchs, and generous riders.

If weather conditions appear too unsafe, the krewe will roll Uptown behind Bacchus on Sunday night.

For all the bellyaching we've done about the obnoxious Endymion crowds... and they are obnoxious... the hatches around here at Yellow Blogging world headquarters are sufficiently battened down so as to survive the assault. I'm not sure all these folks are going to feel the same way, though.

Either way, things are about to get crazy busy around here. But, since I've got few seconds now, allow me to share a few photos from the last few nights.

Druids is usually known for being kind of a rinky-dink production. Their theme is lame. Their floats are recycled from other parades. One egregious example of this being the appearance of one of the Krewe of Pontchartrain's signature floats in the procession.



Those of us who were out last Saturday will have recognized Captain Sam.



But, for what it is, Druids put on one of its more enjoyable parades this year. I especially liked these fire twirlers.



The most unusual thing that happened Thursday night was the appearance of not one but two fire engines parked on the neutral ground right behind us.



It's worth noting that although the fire department brought what had to be the biggest ladders in all of Carnival with them to the parade, they managed to keep them well behind the crowd and so didn't subtract from anyone's enjoyment.



Chaos didn't present my favorite edition of their typically satirical parade. While most of the floats were topical and creative, they also tended to come from a more elitist and conservative point of view. One float lampooning the health care reform story might as well have been a Tea Party demonstration, while the immigration-themed float struck me as downright racist. I did enjoy this float titled "Unlucky Dogs" which featured the score of every Saints loss this past season.



Muses, meanwhile, was beautiful as always.







One quibble would be that I seem to remember them throwing a bit more heavily in years past. But never mind that since we did snag this year's most coveted and infamous throw.



Alright that's enough for now. Time to pull the steak out of the oven and get back outside.

Mid-Mardi Gras photo dump

It isn't hard to guess that while we're knee deep in Carnival season, you're not going to see much here other than occasional drunken exclamations and crappy photographs. Here's a bit of what's been going on the past few days.

Thursday's cancellations moved Muses to Friday meaning there would be four parades that night on what was still a cold and damp Uptown route.



Fortunately, I had time to prepare during the day so, Thursday night, I pulled another wild hog roast out of the freezer and brined it overnight. Here it is all dressed up with cumin, paprika, oregano, thyme, onions, garlic, potatoes, bacon... um... some other stuff.



Add a little beer and some lime and orange juice, throw it in the oven around 10 AM and come parade time, it should look like this.



That should keep the folks warmed and well fed as they trudge in and out from the cold and mud of a long evening of Carnival.



Hermes might be the prettiest parade of all. The floats are elaborately designed but not stuffy. They could pass as either a super-huge "old line" krewe or a super-artsy Superkrewe. I'm afraid my blurry night photography can be a little hit or miss. My best looks at Hermes were of the the signature float above, this blurry float,



And this blurry flambeaux carrier.



If it helps, keep in mind that my actual vision is usually about this blurry during the parade anyway so these shots are fair approximations of my memories of the event. Some of those border on the nightmarish such as when the Skeleton Krewe arrives at the head of Le Krewe D'Etat.



I was disappointed in both the Krewe D'Etat and Muses parades this year. They are known as two of the most witty and satirical krewes but I thought the theming was a bit uninspired Friday. D'Etat's political commentary was mostly driven by parting shots at Ray Nagin which, already, seem a little passe. There were some base celebrity gossip items (Tiger Woods, John and Kate) which strike me as irrelevant material. Finally, a few of the floats such as one depicting ACORN appeared to be informed mostly by the FOX News side of things. The Saints float featured a prominent representation of Tom Benson. I really despise this business of glorifying the owner in a triumph that really belongs to the players and to the city. But a lot of these krewe people tend to identify with ownership for the most part so I guess this was to be expected. On the bright side, I really enjoyed the Dancing Buddy Ds.



Muses' theme was "The Muses' Guide to Love and Romance" The floats were a string of trite "women be different from men" cliches that put me in mind of this Athenae rant about a similarly stereotype-ridden Dodge commercial. It's a shame to see the creative talents of these two Krewes so badly misused. Typically I enjoy both parades. I especially like the numerous marching clubs Muses incorporates into the procession. Here are the Camel Toe Lady Steppers,



The Pussyfooters,



And the 610 Stompers trying to get crunk as the parade speeds up unexpectedly



These are all very creative people and I love that they take their creativity to the streets every year to help us celebrate. Some years, though, the parades serve to remind me how little I have in common with the Krewes' membership.

I think the Muses krewe members, like the Krewe D'Etat members are comfortable with this kind of banal humor because they're typically the sort of people who are comfortable with their station and are reassured by its associated humdrum. The very act of joining a club is, after all, a calculated attempt to improve or cement one's status and fortune through contrived interaction with a group of similarly desperate social climbers. It's the same as what I said about John Georges' decision to join the Tulane goat-fucking society. They're all aiming at the same phony idea of success through the act of joining a club. Some clubs have their members show off their worthiness by parading through the streets in silly costumes. Some have their members do funny things with goats. And some, it turns out, wear silly costumes while parading their goats through the streets on mule-drawn carts.



Either way it's all part of the same exercise.

So that's the bad news, I guess. The good news is, you don't have to be in the dumb club to be a part of Carnival. For that all you have to do is get out in the street and play. Which is what I'm about to do right now. But first a few techniques for optimizing your chances at catching stuff. One, just be generally awesome like I am. I got this cool sword at Endymion last night which I'd love to show you but there's no time to add a photo now. Two, wear an appropriate shirt. This one seems to be the winner this year.



Note: She's worn it to every event and hasn't washed it yet.

Three, wear an appropriate hair color and maybe someone will throw you a glittery shoe.



Failing all of that, just keep drinking. Seems to be the catch all solution anyway.

Going back outside. More later.

Uh oh

Gonna be one of those massive crowds tomorrow night. Nothing like Lombardi Gras, I'm sure, but still pretty big.

Krewe of Muses parade, pre-party postponed until Friday

Last night we stood out in the surprisingly-not-so-cold to catch the Krewe of Druids with about five or six other people.



As a parade, Druids is pretty much just filler. It exists as a sort of collaboration among members of other Krewes to add another "traditional" looking parade to the calendar. We're glad they do it. We tend to think the parade schedule is too compacted at the end of the week.

[Begin tangent] There are enough parades to hold one or two on each night of the week instead of what we have now. Things are a bit different this year because of the addition of the Saints parade on Tuesday but usually we get zero Monday, zero Tuesday, one Wednesday, three Thursday, and three Friday. Now some people may want to keep a short break on Monday, which is okay, but the rest of these parades could be spread out to better balance out the week. An ideal schedule of the current parades would move Morpheus to Tuesday and Muses to Wednesday. That way we get Monday off, one parade Tuesday, two Wednesday, two Thursday, and two Friday. Plus, extending the schedule opens more opportunities for make-up dates in the case of bad weather.[End of tangent]

Anyway, in parade aesthetics, there's a fine line between traditional and lame and Druids tends toward the latter category. The floats are not very elaborate. The theme is uninspired. Last night's theme was various puns on the word hole. Floats were things like "Man-hole" "Fire-in-the-hole" "Key Hole" etc. None was particularly witty or satirical or really worth looking at. Also they don't throw very much... except for this one guy but he was obviously kind of nuts.

Adding: Oh and now Babylon is also postponing until Sunday which means we'll have five parades that day.