Memory Hole

Wow. Scary.

Where the knowledge at

Go read everything Oyster has today. That is all.

Election

Looks like municipal elections will be held in April.
Your local poling location has likely moved. T-P has printed a list of changes.

Oh no

You know I was kind of on the fence about this before but this pretty much settles it. Hurricanes suck.

Farmers, fishers and buyers say only about 20 percent of the state's crawfish crop survived the salty water brought inland by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and a drought in the Atchafalaya basin.

Crawfish lovers are unlikely to find the live Louisiana delicacy for less than $3 a pound wholesale in coming months. And processed crawfish meat, which is unlikely to show up at all, is likely to fetch $30 a pound.

Which means that boiled critters will be well above 3$ per pound this spring.

Internets Down

I've lost my pirated home access. Posting will be light until I can resolve this somehow.

Happy Birthday

To all the snake havin' Susie moms.

Civilization Has Returned

Walgreens on St Charles has resumed 24 hour operation! You may now satisfy your chocolate cravings whenever you wish.

More stuff I find

Looking for Indian stuff to put up in the library I found Katy Reckdahl's Gambit piece on Tootie Montana shortly after his death last year. Worth a look if you missed it during its original run.

Strange things I find

While searching for bulletin board fodder for a Mardi Gras display, I came upon the website of a consumer advocacy group dealing with the safety of carnival rides. I don't know why this strikes me as significant other than that I really like roller coasters.

Oh also the display.. will probably go with How Stuff Works.. usually pretty dependable stuff there.

Oh no!

Rose is back. Unfunny as ever.

The final word on the chocolate thing

Comes from da po'boy who says.

Yes, the Mayor said some stupid things. But don’t tell me you didn’t have fun with them.

Damn, since Nagin made his chocolate comments I haven’t stopped laughing. The chocolate jokes keep coming. Just re-reading his explanation of how to make chocolate, that delicious drink, made me tear up laughing.

I am glad Nagin made his chocolate comments. I needed that laugh.

Don’t worry about losing any federal funding over this. They are not giving us enough money anyway.

If anything, stupid comments by local politicians should be welcome. It’s a sign that New Orleans is coming back. It makes me almost miss the school board meetings.

Couldn't agree more.

Nagin and Bush

I've been knocking this comparison around in my head for a few years now. There are some striking similarities between the two men. Both came to politics from the "business world". Bush ran a series of cushy family connected oil exploration ventures into the ground before becoming a useful political puppet of arms dealers and energy companies. Nagin ran Cox cable in New Orleans (as Schroeder puts it in comments to this YRHT post, "How tough a "business executive" do you have to be to work for a massive monopoly that just collects checks for a ridiculously overpriced service?") before becoming a useful political puppet of the city's white aristocracy. Both men are prone to making bewilderingly stupid statements when allowed to speak extemporaneously. Both men can appear rather surly when challenged on these statements. (Nagin, admittedly, is a little better at damage control insofar as he actually makes the effort.) Nagin's recent statement that "God is angry at America" invokes the nutball religious rhetoric of Bush's constituency.

Luckily recent events have allowed a new mathematical relationship to emerge which I believe I can reveal to you here. In light of Nagin's bizarre "chocolate" word choice and given what we know from this equation discovered recently by Tom Tomorrow, I think we can now say the following with some confidence.

Well obviously

That's what he meant.

And now for something truly worthwhile

It's a great project. Here's how you can help.

King's legacy

Every now and then Lolis Eric Elie tells 'em what they need to hear.

King's message lost on politicians
Monday, January 16, 2006
Lolis Eric Elie

This is that day set aside each year so Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush or Ray Nagin can stand up and say, "If Martin Luther King were alive today, he would agree with me."

But no matter how many times they say this, my mind goes back to Memphis, 1968. My mind goes back to the actions King took in his final days, the ones that make liars out of each and every one of these people.

In April of that year, King had been working on a march that would bring thousands of poor Americans to Washington. But he put that work on hold to embrace some of the poorest, dirtiest, most disrespected workers in America: the sanitation workers in Memphis.

After several of their members were crushed to death in a garbage truck, these men called on King and others to bring their plight to the attention of the nation.

"You see, though it was not part of the Poor People's Campaign, it was consistent, because here were people, garbage workers, who were the worst-paid and had the lowest status of any group, demanding better wages and better working conditions," Coretta Scott King wrote in her 1969 book, "My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr."

"My husband felt he should be identified with them. He said, 'This is not a race war; it is now a class war.' "

Measuring up

How are we to measure the mayor of New Orleans in light of King's brave words?

Nagin deserves praise for the pay raises he budgeted for city workers in his first two years in office. But those raises are a distant memory. Not long after the hurricane, when it was clear the city had little money and few prospects for an infusion of capital, Nagin fired most city workers.

What about his top staff members, the ones he awarded substantial pay raises in better times? They kept their jobs and weren't even asked to accept symbolic pay cuts.

What about the mayor's Bring New Orleans Back Commission? How many members of that august group can be said to represent the interests and aspirations of those low-income people who make up a majority of our citizens?

Put another way, can anybody imagine Ray Nagin making it a city priority to improve the lives of sanitation workers?

Hypocrisy on parade

Today, as our city leaders engage in their annual Martin Luther King Day march, there are a few things I can say about it with little fear that the facts will later prove me wrong.

King's dream will be tirelessly evoked and cited as inspiration for the direction the city is taking.

There will be few white people in attendance because, despite what King said in his most famous speech, the event has been allowed to become a virtually all-black affair.

There will be little talk of poverty or class. Hypocrisy will be on parade.

Must Read

This Observer piece on New Orleans and Katrina (linked by Greg Peters) explains more clearly than I have tried to on occasion the kind of damage done to this city by the tourist-plantation industry.

The French Quarter isn't feeling much pain. At the height of the storm, it shipped less than a foot of water. A couple of bars on Bourbon Street never closed. All that's missing are the tourists. There's bitter irony in this, because tourism is the primary reason that New Orleans sold its soul. Before the 1980s, visitors were expected to adjust to native customs. Then the local economy ran aground. The oil boom of the Seventies collapsed, and big business, driven off by Louisiana's punitive taxes, left town. Even the port, the city's primary source of income, was diminished. That left the tourist dollar. The French Quarter, previously ramshackle, was transformed into a creole Disneyland. Shopping malls, convention centres, casinos and theme parks sprang up, enriching a power elite. Old white money and new black money thrived. The populace at large was left to rot.

In recent decades, the mayors and the majority of the city council have been African-Americans, which merely proves that black rip-off artists can be as voracious as white. Pre-Katrina, tourism generated $1 million a day but not a dime ever seemed to reach the streets. And this was deliberate. Tourists need service - menial labour to clean their tables and make their beds, hose away their vomit on Bourbon Street. To provide it, the city adopted a policy of malign neglect. The old black neighbourhoods, rich in history and culture, were allowed to sink into ruin and the school system to founder. Without education, there was no way out. Many who refused to submit to grunt work in the Quarter became criminals, most often drug dealers. The public-housing projects that ringed the city's centre became armed camps, where killing was seen as proof of manhood. By 2000, New Orleans was America's murder capital, eight times as deadly as New York.

For tourists, this was an invisible world. If they ventured beyond the Quarter at all, they took the streetcar past the mansions on St Charles Avenue or joined a walking tour of the Garden District, and few troubled to inquire what paid for such luxury. The only white faces seen in the projects belonged to social workers and drug-trawlers. The city was more deeply segregated than at any time in its history. Almost every project family lost someone to violence or jail. A culture of hopelessness took hold.

The piece also makes a few points about Nagin that I think are largely missed.. or purposely obscured by the elitist New Orleans media.

Nagin is a contentious figure. After the flood, when it became obvious that the city's disaster plan had been hopelessly inadequate and he might be held accountable, he posed as a firebrand, accusing the powers in Washington. He had a point: the performance of those in power was a crime. Government at every level failed utterly to help its own citizens in need, and it continues to do so. But Nagin's efforts have been nothing to brag about and his posturing fools few. 'Ray Nagin was never black until Katrina' is a popular line among his constituents. Formerly owner of the local cable-TV franchise, his loyalty has always been to business. He has made a show of organising televised forums on New Orleans' future, at which community leaders can berate each other to their hearts' content. The serious brainstorming, though, goes on at private luncheons beforehand, reserved for Nagin and the developers and demolishers who are the true powers behind his throne.

Just a reminder of who is drawing up the plans, folks. Keep watching.

Under the Bridge

I spent a little time on the bicycle this afternoon chasing the All Star Second Line Parade through parts of Treme and Downtown. After cruising the neighborhood and people watching for a while, I planted myself under the Claiborne overpass at Esplanade Avenue where I got a few pictures. For the first half of the 20th century, the Claiborne Avenue neutral ground between roughly Canal Street and Elysian Fields was a wide parkway shaded by a quadruple row of oak trees. The green space was a central staging area for Downtown Carnival events. It was the stomping ground of Indians, Bone Gangs, and Baby Dolls. It was the heart of the downtown black community. In the mid sixties, the heart was ripped out of this neighborhood when the downtown stretch of Claiborne Avenue was overlain with the elevated portion of Interstate 10. Today the trees are gone but there are still mementos of the culture that flourished on this strip. In fact, while the neighborhood has suffered, it has clung tightly to its traditions. Many of the cement columns which support the overpass have been decorated with murals depicting aspects of local culture and even the long lost oaks themselves.





These murals depict a defiance of sorts; a triumph of the soul over the most vicious ravages of "progress". This kind of defiance is called for once again as New Orleans struggles to right itself after the storm. The sight of the murals next to the many abandoned and flooded vehicles the city is currently depositing under the overpass brings this challenge into sharper focus.







Despite the altered setting, something very like the classic Black Carnival still does occur "under the bridge".. or at least did until Katrina. God knows what will happen in 2006. Today's event was partly about reclaiming that heritage come hell, high water, or Republicans.

Disclaimer

This is a personal website. What appears here are the inane, hastily tossed off, frequently misspelled ramblings of an exceedingly silly person. The opinions expressed here are those of that person alone and have no affiliation with any public or private institution such as the New Orleans Public Library or Major League Baseball.

Meet the new boss

Fox Sports just reported that the Saints are planning to announce their decision on a new coach by Tuesday and that the front runner is Dallas assistant Sean Payton. If true I think this is probably the right move. Of course.. we haven't heard from the City Council yet.

Notable

It's hard to keep a good geek down.

Tears welling up

For the billionth time since all of this began as Schroeder links to this Wapo editorial by Eugene Robinson which once again points out the obvious. The city is at the mercy of aristocrats and developers bent on forcing people off of their land.
I have trouble believing this fight is really over, however. The key is for people to get off of this nicey-nice "New Orleans needs to speak with one voice" bullshit and start realizing that there are real enemies here.
Today the mayor said in a radio soundbite that the Martin Luther King holiday is a good time for everyone to come together and get behind the BNOB bulldoze scheme; yet another manifestation of the establishment's sanitization and appropriation of King's legacy. The architect of the Poor People's Campaign would want us to fight. Wake up, New Orleans before it's too late.

Looking for something to do this weekend?

New Orleans Social and Pleasure Clubs All-star Parade
Sunday, January 15, 2006 @12 noon

Caption Contest

Just in case anyone feels like playing I'll leave it open. Hint: The word fool comes to mind.

"What's dressed?"

We Never Close is now... no longer closed.

Now here's a good place to start bulldozing

Gill's column today subtly points out something most of us know but the T-P does not customarily highlight. Tulane does what benefits Tulane. Tulane rarely, if ever, goes out of its way to do what benefits New Orleans.

How are we doing?

Not good apparently.

The latest Katrina Index is available now.

Not no but hell no

But thank you very much for playing.

The Mayor's Bulldoze Committee is set to release its latest monstrosity of a plan today. Only one comment: It's obvious that the people making the plans prefer a sleepy resort town to the vibrant but troubled city that once stood here.

Someday the people we entrust with our governance will act in the interest of the people they were elected to serve. But for now it is as always about money... money enabled by racism.

Update: "Over my dead body"

Sunday Sports

Eli goes down in flames. This pleases me as now I don't have to listen to Dad's constant blather about an all-Manning Superbowl.

Young is coming out. If the Saints take Leinart ahead of him they are making a huge mistake... which wouldn't be out of character.

The sides are lining up

It's Carnival season. Which side are you on? This attempt by the Quality Inn on St Charles to throw evacuees out on the street in order to prepare for the "city's season of special events" is only a taste of the coming atrocities the city's aristocratic and corporate classes intend to inflict upon the poor and the displaced in New Orleans as we get closer and closer to the Most Soulless Mardi Gras Ever. I've got some thoughts on this coming in a future post. The short version is I'm having difficulty getting excited about Mardi Gras this year. There are too many sinister side stories to justify supporting it. Anyone who is familiar with the annual fanatic Carnival blogging on this site will know that that is indeed saying something

Again with the sports predictions and recommendations and so forth

Super Bowl XL: Patriots vs Redskins

Draft: If Vince Young is available, the Saints should take him. If not, trade the pick. Leinart is a Wuerffel waiting to happen.

Ethnic Cleansing

Appears to be the cause celeb over at the Metblog this week. Unfortunately we're going to be dealing with more and more of this over the coming year. At the moment I have only the energy to refer the participants in this conversation to the T-P's James Gill

There is no question that the uprooted denizens of the Lower 9th Ward and eastern New Orleans, for instance, include some pretty rough customers. Murders are way down in New Orleans and way up in Houston since Katrina, and the population shift is the most obvious explanation.

There are plenty of respectable citizens in New Orleans, therefore, who hope the displaced will stay where they are.

But it turns out that the newcomers do not deserve all, or even most, of the blame for the recent surge in murders reported in Houston. Sure, our guys have contributed, but statistics indicate that they have toned it down since they left New Orleans.

When Katrina struck, New Orleans had recorded 205 murders in 2005 and was on pace to exceed the 2004 total of 265 by a comfortable margin.

Since then there have been only six murders in New Orleans on account of there is hardly anyone here to fire or stop a bullet. Murders in Houston, meanwhile, are up by 25 percent, and local officials are inclined to point the finger at evacuees from New Orleans.

But their own figures suggest this may be a case of post Katrina ergo propter Katrina, because only nine of the 122 murders reported since have involved evacuees. And, in some of them, it was as victim, conceivably even innocent victim.

Given that the holiday season always tends to bring a spike in homicides and suicides, it appears that Houstonians would be dropping like flies even if everyone from New Orleans had stayed home. Why our hoodlums should have remained relatively inactive in their exile is a bafflement, but it appears to be the case.

Please, people. If we're going to rebuild our city it is imperative that we try to be more careful before we introduce too much hateful poison into the environment.

Today's worst news

There was never and still is absolutely no call for this. Even if we tolerate it this year (which we should not) it must not be permitted in the future.

Today's best news

The mayor is starting to relent on his "more compact city" rhetoric and is opening New Orleans East to 24 hour traffic. The East is home to a large number of the city's black middle class homeowners many of whom have the means to rebuild should they choose to do so. If enough of these residents return and rebuild soon, the misguided ULI plan will become unworkable.

Wow

Image available on all sorts of merch at Tom Tomorrow's store

It's time to impeach, really.

NBC confirms it's investigating whether Bush spied on CNN's Christiane Amanpour

Late Night Debris Blogging

This overturned tree at the corner of Harmony and Prytania is getting to be quite the landmark. The holiday ribbons are, I think, a nice touch.

This really is a shame

He certainly made some mistakes but I really did like Jim Haslett... and that's saying something as I have a generally low tolerance for all football coaches. I still think he'll be successful in his next job.

Watching me watching you

A look at Big Brother on St Charles Ave

Good News/Bad News

Good: WYES is broadcasting over the air again

Bad: Fucking Antiques Roadshow is on.

Lib Chron 2005: So Much Loss

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

It looks like we will get to see Matt Leinart play after all

Saints to play 2006 schedule in Louisiana

I mean, you know...

TS Zeta

City Gates

Welcome to New Orleans. Don't expect much help. Don't get out of line. And for God's sake do not brandish any kitchenware in public.

Thursday Debris Blogging

Late December and this traffic light at the corner of Napoleon and St Charles is still down.

Hidden State

C'est Moi

With Bush's defense of his wiretapping, the hidden state has stepped into the open. The deeper challenge Bush has thrown down, therefore, is whether the country wants to embrace the new form of government he is creating by executive fiat or to continue with the old constitutional form. He is now in effect saying, "Yes, I am above the law--I am the law, which is nothing more than what I and my hired lawyers say it is--and if you don't like it, I dare you to do something about it."

Casting Call

Script in progress: Tom Benson's Christmas Carol

with:

Arnold Fielkow as Bob Cratchit

Michael Lewis as Tiny Tim

Paul Tagliabue as Marley

Buddy D as The Ghost of Christmas Past

Aaron Brooks as The Ghost of Christmas (almost) Present

Jim Haslett's Contract Extension as The Ghost of Christmas Future

Ok this can get really stupid if given any serious thought. Ideas anyone?

Curfew may be ending

Just in time for New Year's Eve. Boy did 2005 ever suck!

More Rebirth Pics

Crappily uploaded for your pixelated pleasure.

Make Way For the Reebirth

I dunno... maybe we ought to have a Mardi Gras this year if this keeps up. Sunday afternoon, during the fourth quarter of the latest Saints debacle I happened to stick my head out of my front door to find a second line a comming down my street. Not an unusual occurance in my Central City neighborhood but thoroughly unexpected given the state of things. I have no idea what the occasion or sponsoring organization were. Doesn't matter because they had the Rebirth Brass Band. I grabbed my camera phone and a couple of beers and tagged along for a while with a huge crowd as we made our way down Washington Avenue to Annunciation Street. The mood was joyful and somewhat purposeful (several times a fun if uncreative chant of "Fuck Bush" broke out in time to the music). People danced in the street, on porches, on top of paperboxes, even on the wall of the Lafayette Cemetery. (dancing on graves?) The procession stopped for a break at Laurel and Pleasant where I decided to separate and make my way back home. I didn't see any pictures of this in yesterday's paper. Here is what my crappy phone saw.
Note: Images obviously screwy. Sorry about that. I've tried numerous things but can't do any better than this for now. Or you can just click to enlarge.

Mayor backs scheme to bulldoze neighborhoods

In this case "letting the residents decide" means, we'll allow you to come back, but we won't support you, won't do anything to encourage services and investment in the area, and then after a year of neglecting you, come back and force you out on the grounds that your neighborhood didn't fully recover. It's like Tom Benson aruguing that he is justified in leaving New Orleans based on the Baton Rouge attendance numbers.

Encouraging rhetoric

Still not near enough money.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush will request $1.5 billion more to help rebuild the levee system in New Orleans, Donald Powell, the top federal official for reconstruction, announced Thursday.

Update: Here's why
And again:See here
Once more:And here

Rose is Wrong

I'm starting to come down on the "let's not have Mardi Gras" side of this argument... not because I'm worried about "sending the wrong message" or any such bullshit but because of reasons which I tried to outline in a comment to this metblog post but still don't have time to elaborate on until I get some actual time to write.

Post-K Data

The Brookings Institute has released "the first in a series of monthly snapshots" of the rebuilding efforts in New Orleans which will track the progress of selected economic and social indicators as the city attempts to get back on its feet. The full report is available in PDF format from the site accessed by the above link. A summary and snazzy graphic were provided to the New York Times here. Note in the graphic that 58% of public libraries are open in the metro area. At NOPL, we are only operating Main and two branches with extremely limited hours and services. The report concludes that the city is still in a "state of emergency." At the library, we couldn't agree more.

"No shortcuts to quality"

As a child, I first learned to handle standing in a long line with grace by reading that slogan as well as the assorted news clippings and pieces of memorobilia on the walls at Hansen's Sno-Bliz. How many more of these pricesless pieces of New Orleans culture can we stand to lose? I am very relieved to see that they're keeping the shop open. Seeing this story this morning, reminded me that the final T-P Laigniappe section before the storm included an piece on where to find the best snoballs in New Orleans. I remember finding the very idea of a debate over this issue to be laughable at best. Nothing ever came close to Hansen's.

Shifting, weeding, collection development

Going on in the links here. Still no time to finish the project in one day.

Bell South Sucks

Hours after New Orleans officials announced Tuesday that they would deploy a city-owned, wireless Internet network in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, regional phone giant BellSouth Corp. withdrew an offer to donate one of its damaged buildings that would have housed new police headquarters, city officials said yesterday.

link


I don't know what they're upset about seeing as how 1) State law requires the city's connection speed to suck and 2) No one who has tried to connect from the library has any evidence that the thing even works.

Jump out boys

Reason number two hundred million not to stick around during a storm: You may be suddenly abducted by soldiers and forcibly shipped to Utah while your dog gives futile chase behind the truck.

Many, including Timmons, resent that they didn't have a say in where they were sent.

"I didn't choose this at all," said Timmons, 57, who lost everything when his home in eastern New Orleans flooded. "I was forced to evacuate."

A day after the storm, Timmons said, he waded to a friend's home on Prentiss Avenue near Old Spanish Trail, where it was dry.

He ventured out daily to make sure his mother's house was secure. Petey, the family dog, would follow. A week after the storm, he was on one of his walks, Timmons said, when an Army National Guard truck pulled alongside him.

Two soldiers jumped out and told him he would have to come with them. Timmons said he refused. The soldiers forced him onto the truck and made him leave Petey behind.

"It was almost to the point that I was in tears," Timmons said. "My dog ran for miles behind me and then stopped."

The truck didn't stop until it reached the airport, Timmons said.

Inside the terminal, Timmons said he and other evacuees were poked and prodded along like cattle, an experience that further clouded his mood. "You didn't feel like a person," he said.

News that they were being flown to Utah was the final blow.

Must have been a slow news day

But then what day isn't in De Kalb, Ill?

More on the Blackwater dudes

From Loki

Glad somebody said it

I was going to post a "shame on wwl for putting this bloviating crap bag back on the air" rant but Dave Walker's column handles the issue nicely.

The point of Limbaugh reading the story: To discredit the liberal media who would concoct such a horror story to discredit the swell job George Bush's FEMA did -- and is still doing -- to save the city.

All of which begs the question: After aggregating an enormous cache of goodwill among local listeners for the past three months, has WWL blown it by reinstalling a distant and obviously misinformed syndicated star?

And what of the national impact of such just-plain-wrongness, uttered by an icon whose fans consume his pronouncements as gospel?

link

Still no help from Cox

Won't be back to heavy posting until I get internets at home. By the way, is anyone able to connect to the city's downtown free wireless network? Library staff and patrons have been unsuccessful after a week's experimentation.

Blaming the victim

The feds continue to treat our people like utter garbage.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency pulled all its workers out of New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward yesterday after threats of violence and planned to request additional police or National Guard support, a FEMA spokeswoman said.

I don't have a lot of time to comment. But suffice to say any threats against FEMA staff be they real or percieved have been provoked by their treatment of disaster victims in New Orleans. I have seen this first hand. At the library, FEMA has set up a disaster recovery center where they process aid applications from the public. Now I've never been much of a customer service whiz but even I know that if you make people who have just lost their houses or their loved ones or more stand in a long line to be funneled through a metal detector and frisked by Blackwater Security and generally treated like criminals from the minute they enter the building then you might expect that they won't take it so graciously when you tell them that you can't help them because they neglected to rescue a birth certificate from their flooded attic. But here we are with our neighborhoods being more or less treated like Fallujah... except without the billions of dollars of federal rebuilding funds.

Plus he would have had to move the sausage and cheese cart off to the side

Mall manager just doesn't get it.

Responsive Government

To help boost its stalled economy, hurricane-ravaged New Orleans is offering the nation's first free wireless Internet network owned and run by a major city.

Hey great, check it out, the city is taking a groundbreaking step toward creating a more egalitarian information distribution system in a time when those among us who rely on what few free services remain available are almost completely shut out.

The system will provide download speeds of 512 kilobits per second as long as the city remains under a state of emergency. But the bandwidth will be slowed to 128 kbps in accordance with a limit set by Louisiana's law once the city's state of emergency is lifted at an unknown future date.

Wait... what?

Phone and cable TV companies have fiercely opposed attempts at creating new taxpayer-owned utilities. The companies contend competition from government-run Internet service stymies their incentive to invest in upgrading their networks and services.

In a time when New Orleans is learning just how indifferent government can be responding to the humanitarian needs of its average citizens, here is another example demonstrating how quickly and efficiently it responds to pre-emptive lobbying from corporate interest groups. By law, city wireless networks have to suck. Brilliant.

Also, during yesterday's news conference, the mayor made one of the more remarkable rhetorical gaffes of post-Katrina times when he described the network as something that will soon "flow throughout the city". I seriously doubt anyone is interested in hearing about anything flowing through the city at this point.

Wireless Network

City is expected to announce this today. Would be a nice alternative since I still can't get Cox out to my place. Of course, then I'll have to buy a laptop.

Still Around

Sorry, kids.. still don't have internet access at home and I'm far too busy at work to say anything meaningful here. It's a temporary situation. In the meantime, remember three of your libraries are open.. sort of. We're open primarily for internet access and are not able to lend any items yet. On the other hand we are giving away free candy. Also keep reading Oyster who actually is able to blog about the NOLA situation on a regualar schedule... and also because he points out all the new blogs who unearth true gems like this.

Should be an interesting day

FEMA is moving in to set up a disaster recovery center inside the library. They have brought with them a squad of employees of the famous Blackwater security firm. Let's hope we don't get any rowdy patrons this afternoon... for their sake.

Answering Rudolph

This is what makes me sad.

You may have noticed

A slight reduction in activity on this site in the past two weeks. Don't fret. This is only a temporary situation. I'm a bit frustrated because I'm back in NOLA and the library is open and this means I have a great deal of stuff to dump here in my little yellow forum. Unfortunately now that the power is back on at my place, I've moved out of Daisy's appartment and away from her super-fast internet connection. Things will get back up to speed as soon as I can get Cox out to my place.

In which I tacitly endorse looting and vandalism

If these store owners are to be believed, then typically apathetic New Orleanians are more class conscious than they are assumed to be. This can be a good sign.

Because they all asked

Audubon Zoo to reopen after Thanksgiving.

Ha ha

I can't decide what's funnier, the thing itself or Pope Horatio Tyrannosaurus Nixon Rex's commentary thereupon.

If you open they will come

Your library is open, folks. We're nothing near to normal but what is? We are running two branches and the main library with the most unbelievably meager staff. If a great city deserves a great library, then that library needs its librarians back. Part of restoring vitality to a community is restoring the kind of services that a vital community depends on. By that same token, it can be said that a community's vital signs are manifested in its demand for those services. Once that demand is established, the services can be expanded. The community benefits, the demand grows and the virtuous cycle begins. And so this morning as we prepared to open for the first time since the Second Grand Derangement, we hoped for the sake of our library, for the sake of our scores of laid-off staff, for the sake of our whole city, that we would hear something close to a heartbeat.

It appears that the patient does indeed have a pulse. A line at least 10 persons deep greeted us at the door of the main library this morning. At our current staff level, we are able to offer only computer access, in-house use of a limited part of the collection, and the most basic reference service. The first surprise this morning was a woman with her two-year-old in tow asking to use the children's room. At Main we're only allowing the public access to the first floor and the children's room is on the second floor. But, Christ, in a supposedly "childless city", one of our first patrons is a woman and her kid. It's a sign! Everything is going to be OK! I ran upstairs and picked out a stack of picture books (titles Daisy and I used regularly when we used to do storytime together.. you know back when we actually worked in a library) and found them a place to sit downstairs. It was the highlight of my month.

As we anticipated, most of our patrons wanted to use the computers but many also had books to return which we accepted. Most also asked to check books out; something we aren't staffed to handle yet. We are excited that the demand is there. Most of all we were encouraged by the warm greetings, the hugs, and in one case the cookies we received from our patrons throughout the day. It means they want us back which means, hopefully, that soon many of us can actually come back.

At closing time, I found myself unable to extricate myself from a conversation with an actual bona-fide crazy person. You see she's a musician from Georgia and she and her husband-type person have produced their own country music record. Only it's not country music per se because they're an interracial couple so they call it "funktry". And wouldn't I like to have a copy of their CD? Aw who cares! The point is the library is open, even the nutballs are back, and I couldn't be more pleased.

Yeah, what he said

Oyster links and reproduces the text of an op-ed piece by Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities director, Michael Sartisky. Um.. it's real good, y'all.. hits on just about every reason New Orleans is worth saving and why I came back. As a side note, Daisy and I attended an LEH function at Dr. Sartisky's house last year. I am certain he has no idea who we are.

Yup

They're hypocrites. A double standard in the code of conduct required of owners vs employees is demeaning and reprehensible... also probably racist. The players should strike over this.

Tonight's Tom Benson Follies

First, don't miss James Gill's column today for this nugget.

Far be it from me to knock anyone who buys a full-page ad in The Times-Picayune, especially a native son protesting his fondness for the city, but how come Tom Benson can't spell the name of his old high school, St. Aloysius?

The name was spelled out in the school cheer, but maybe Benson wasn't into football in those days and didn't get to hear it. The school is long gone, but one of its most successful alumni should never have written "Aloyisous" in the first paragraph of his lengthy apologia, right under the headline, "Tom Benson Wants to Return to New Orleans."

And then there's this. If the NFL doesn't fine Benson (as they would any player who behaves this way) they are little more than hypocritical scum. Oh wait a minute that's exactly what they are.

Question of the Day

Posed here by Richard.

New Orleans' citywide curfew starts at 2am, right? But this is the weekend that Daylight Savings Time comes to an end, meaning that at on Sunday at 2am, we wind our clocks back an hour. I wonder how many curfew-breakers are gonna try to use that one as an excuse.

Pictures From Happier Times

When babies acted like babies
And so did the grown-ups.

Today's Halloween rerun is last year's Halloween party! (may have to scroll down a bit..permalinks are funny) In an eerie Halloween coincidence, this post was also introduced by GBV lyrics.

More Book-Type Stuff

The 2005 New Orleans Book Fair will indeed happen. Back in happier times, I thought we would do well to open a neighborhood branch on Oretha Castle Haley Blvd. That part of town was just starting to come back from the dead.

NOLA Recovery @ Your Library

Since we got a blurb in today's T-P Metro section, I suppose it's not confidential info anymore. We're planing to open the Main library, the Algiers Point branch, and the Nix branch next week for internet access only. We're not quite ready to do circulation yet but people are welcome to return books. (No you won't have to pay overdue fines for books you had out during the hurricane... and yes I expect to get that question from now until the end of time) Getting back to public service in some form is a big step for us and we're very excited about it.

Strange Times

This also happened to me.

Tooker admitted that the lack of her own favorite comfort food has driven her to distraction: "There's no BUTTER," she said. "It's freaking me out. I'm all about butter. After five days of going to every (open) store and looking for butter and only finding squeeze margarine . . . . I finally stood in one store and started to cry last week because I couldn't buy butter."

Since then, of course, my power has been turned off so I can't really cook anything anyway. But New Orleans without butter... sheesh you might as well fill in the Mississippi River.

White House Reeling

Yesterday, Bush was forced to reinstate Davis-Bacon and now today there's this.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush on Thursday accepted the withdrawal of Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers, according to a statement from the White House.

Apart from what it says about the political stregnth of the White House, the Miers withdrawl may not be the greatest development. Bush has a few serious fire-eaters waiting in the bullpen.

Frogmarch coming

I can't wait. It's like Christmas Eve. Now what will Old St Fitz leave under our tree? A Scooter? A Rove? How about a Big Dick?

The news of the eleventh-hour moves came as Cheney himself was implicated in the chain of events that led to Plame's being exposed. In a report in the New York Times yesterday that the White House pointedly did not dispute, Fitzgerald was said to have notes taken by Libby showing that he learned about Plame from the vice president a month before she was identified by columnist Robert D. Novak.

FEMA

Yeah, pretty much a dirty word in these parts.

Kos

The Post K World

I am crawling through muck and mold looking for salvageable dvds and inflatable tigers. Meanwhile it appears that Rudolph is doing something close to what was once my job.

Yeah screw 'em

They sure aren't rushing to help us. BFOP points out a possible perfect storm scenario for the Americans who don't give a shit when us third-world dwellwers suffer and die.

Update: Hey sorry, America. I was a little loaded last night. I really don't hope you die. Not all of you anyway.

Turn it up

Drunk... using Daisy's appartment until they turn the power back on at my place... means I get to use her stereo...

don't be told what you want
don't be told what you need
there's no future no future
no future for you

Usufruct

Here's a creative proposal for dealing with the housing issue in New Orleans.

Authorities would locate scattered homeowners to determine if they have the means or the inclination to rebuild. There are believed to be at least 100,000 homes in New Orleans that are damaged to the point that they are not habitable. If the owner is not planning to return anytime soon, local officials would strike a deal.

The owner would sign over controlling rights of the property — but not the title — to the government. In most cases, that would likely be the city of New Orleans, but the program would apply statewide and could involve numerous municipal or parish governments.

Through contracts targeting hundreds of properties at once, the government would then pay to make the home habitable again, while assuming, in most cases, mortgage payments for the owner.

The home would then be rented out, first to displaced "essential workers" such as teachers, police officers and firefighters and their families, then to the public. Rents would likely be subsidized, and checks would be written to the government agency that signed the deal or to a company hired to manage the money.

The owners would be allowed to return after an agreed-upon period of time — perhaps three to five years — provided they could repay the government for repairs made. If, at that point, the owner did not want to return or could not pay for the fixes, the government would have the right to sell it. If the house were sold, the government and the owner could share in profits and losses.

Certainly seems like a program that can be abused in ugly ways. Also could be turned into a mechanism for wholesale bulldozing of neighborhoods. However, it does have potential.

Catching On

Unsurprisingly, I'm not the only one to think of this. It really ought to happen.

Stolen T-P Image of the Day

Also: http://tombensonisabum.blogspot.com/

In the dark

Yup, I'm one of these people. Particularly annoying when you're the only building on the block without power.

Salvage image of the day

The parking lot at East New Orleans is full of these.
Oh and yes, Virginia, Skookses do float. I managed to rescue the little guy myself.

Update: Skooks recovers from his ordeal by relaxing next to a T-shirt featuring this year's eerily prescient summer reading club theme.

No Doze

This Times piece paints a rather bleak picture. I don't think it has to come to that. There will not (or at least should not) be as much bulldozing as is currently expected. Many houses can still be saved.

Stealing a dead man's wallet

Quote is from Jim Henderson's commentary yesterday. Big Shot says all there is to say.

Salvage

Spent yesterday afternoon crawling through the muck and mold that has become the Keller branch looking for anything we could hope to save. Two points:

One: These photos like all photos of the damage simply do not convey anything near the experience of actually being in the midst of this continuing unreality. The heat, the smell, the palpable rot can only be truly understood in person. Nor does one truly feel the full weight of the devastation until one begins tourning the the flooded regions of the city marked by brown grass, piles of rubble, and the ever present tell-tale water line.

Two: No matter what you soak them in, no matter how meticulously you work to wipe away the mold, library cds by Celine Dion and John Tesh still suck.

Oh for crying the fuck out loud

Tropical storm warning; U.S. Gulf Coast likely threatened

It's a crime wave

The city is not safe. Tourists on Bourbon street are subject to random acts of violence. Citizens are harassed and bullied as they go about their daily routine. You can't call 911. The criminals have even become so bold as to steal our street signs in plain view of witnesses.
And who is responsible for the terror? We cannot look to the usual suspects. God and Richard Baker have "cleaned up" public housing. The "bad apples" erroneously reported to have run amuck in the Superdome are unable to return so long as the current housing market remains as it is. So how now do we rid ourselves of this scourge of crime and violence? Who will protect us from these out of control police hoodlums?

Quick Question

If it is okay to lift the midnight curfew, what exactly is the point of a 2-6AM curfew? Who is going to benefit from four hours of people forced off the streets? Why not just lift the whole thing?

Jeffrey's first post-Katrina big idea

New citywide art project in the spirit of the fish thing. Festival of abandoned fridges. I've noticed folks have been scrawling messages on the refrigerators they leave out on the curb. For chrissakes, people, get some paint some beads and a hot glue gun or something. I'm sure we can all do better than this.

Other news: Last night I supped on a hamburger at Igor's. While I was there I met an out of town contractor/carpetbagger type person who treated me to his theory about how New Orleans deserved what it got because it "got away from the lord." I very nearly punched him.

Quick post

I don't have a whole lot of time to detail my experience since returning to NO. There's a lot to say which I will get to... but not today. In the meantime, add me to the list of people severely pissed about this completely unnecessary curfew.

Vacation Ending

Baltimore is alright. Certain things here are very much like home. The nice parts of town exist in close quarter with the trashy parts. Bars and churches every other corner although I am still at a loss over the Northern obsession with prohibiting folks clearly in transit between bars from drinking on the street. The people here like to hang out on their porches. They say "hon" where we might expect to hear "dawlin". They also eat a lot of seafood, although I'm still not convinced they quite know how to do it properly. I grew up with boiled crabs. While I'll admit that steaming them is another great way to do them, I won't go so far as to say that it's better. I'm told that the Chesapeake oyster is the same species as what we get from the gulf. They run a bit smaller here.. but oysters on the half shell are oysters on the half shell anywhere which is to say a delight I'm not sure we mere mortals truly deserve access to. On the other hand, from what I can tell, these people are truly at a loss as to how to fry an oyster. Yesterday I had an opportunity to sample what passes for an oyster po boy up here. It made me sad. The day before, I had stupidly ordered barbecue shrimp. This made me feel bewildered and incredulous as well as very very sad.

Spent Sunday at the Fell's Point Festival Something very like FQF except minus the Wild Magnolias and plus a metal karaoke band. I had part of a pit beef sandwhich, a fried plantain, the aforementioned oyster po boy debacle, and some kind of grilled mozarella and cornbread sandwhich. Not quite like what you get here, but I guess it keeps the alcohol happy. Managed to find the Saints game on in a bar. Live from San Antonio. This also made me sad.

Hoping to be in New Orleans this weekend. Half-expecting to find an eviction notice on the door.