July 2006 Archives

In a word: tacos.

The taco trucks that are ubiquitous all over Texas have arrived in New Orleans to feed the new Latino labor force here, and since it's been a few weeks since we've had any Mexican food at all, we needed to try one out, so Liam and I headed up to the Walfuckingreens parking lot at Carrollton & Claiborne, where the smell of refried beans wafting across the lot instantly tweaked a little pang of Texas homesick feeling in my stomach.

We were the only gringos in line. There was only one other English-speaker, an elderly black man who was clearly confused by the whole thing. I managed enough Spanglish to order six tacos and a bag of sodas and we headed off home. (Need to remember: "Coke" means nothing outside English, but "Coca Cola" is universal.)

I got two al pastor tacos, plus four beef for the kids. The al pastor was awesome, grilled pork with lots of onion and cilantro and pineapple just like they do in Texas. The beef was shredded beef (and maybe tongue?) with onion and cilantro. The corn tortillas were spectacular, the kind that make you never want another flour tortilla ever again.

I meant for this to be a picture blog post, but, uh, well, we were hungry and, uh, well....

My friend Kristi from Austin sent me a link to this NPR story about Hansen's Sno-Bliz.

I took the family for their first Hansen's last week. Score another point in the "Dad, New Orleans is the best city ever" category. I told Ashley Hansen that the last time I was in here was in 1982 and she said "it hasn't changed much, has it". No, not at all.

And I have to say, Ashley (or do we call her Mrs. Ashley yet) is the most smiley person I have ever met. She's awesome.

The dates and locations for the two critical public meetings in the Unified New Orleans Plan have been announced. Both meetings will take place at the Pavilion of Two Sisters at City Park.

First meeting is this Sunday, July 30, noon to 4:00.

Second meeting is Tuesday, August 1, 4:00 til 9:00.

For more information and a detailed schedule, and to register for the events, go to the UNOP web site (which is quite well done and has been evolving quickly over the past couple of days).

And if you have a web page, you can pick up a banner icon from Humid Haney and link to UNOP in a bold and stylish manner like I have up there on the right.

Thanks to Dangerblond and Maitri, the Rising Tide conference now has a wiki!

I know all the New Orleans bloggers are already all over this, but I'm gonna say again: we want visitors from out of town.

I have half a mind to add a few people out of my blogroll just to shame you into coming. (Karl, Syl, Robin, Hiromi, Fredlet, Jette, you listening? Word on the street, Karl, is that there are a few kilt fans on the list already.)

All hail Schroeder, who just destroyed what was left of my Friday afternoon productivity with this:

The Unholy Army of Catholic Schoolgirls

I could do this for hours.

Salvation Army seemed to wind up in the hole
They all went to heaven in a little row boat
Clap hands, clap hands, clap hands, clap hands...

One of the big differences between now and my last visit in April is that most of the flooded cars that were collected under the freeway on Claiborne are now gone. Good riddance.

One of the things that hasn't been cleaned up, though, is the scattered assortment of boats which were pressed into rescue service and then abandoned at the waters edge, back when there was still water. There's one on I-610 near City Park. There's one on Earhart not far from the Superdome (snapped here by Chris Martel).

My favorite so far though is this one Uptown next to the cemetery at Valence and Danneel.

I know we'd all like to see the debris cleaned up and get the city looking good again, but part of me wants the boats to stay. They're like little statues, memorials of the flood and of the neighbors who rescued neighbors. Every one of these boats could tell amazing stories.

From the T-P:

In an unusually bald-faced declaration, New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board members acknowledged Wednesday that the city will not recover from Hurricane Katrina if the agency cannot quickly repair its underground pipes to stave off frequent losses in water pressure.

While calling for administrators to better prioritize infrastructure projects, members also lambasted the Federal Emergency Management Agency for paying through July 12 only about 9 percent of the estimated $447 million in damage to water, sewerage and drainage systems. FEMA has pledged to reimburse the Sewerage & Water Board and other local government agencies for the cost of repairing storm- damaged infrastructure, but the payments have been slow in coming. Board officials said the payment delays have stymied repairs and that the tedious application process has unfairly forced S&WB personnel to haggle with federal officials over the necessity and urgency of basic work.

The water pressure thing worries me more than the crime thing, and not just because some days it's hard to get all the shampoo out of my hair. Fire just freaks me the fuck out. We've got fire extinguishers stashed all over the place in here. The other day I was coming home and I could see through the window that the downstairs tenant was burning a candle, unattended. I wanted to break the window and climb in to put it out. "Dude! Don't you know we don't have renters insurance yet?"

Mark your calendars: August 25-27, the New Orleans blogging community is hosting the Rising Tide Conference "for all who wish to learn more and do more to assist New Orleans' recovery from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (and Rita)".

This is open to anybody who wants to participate, not just New Orleanians, so it's a great time to come down and see the city and catch all the sexy NOLA bloggers in one room.

Flights are cheap if you book ahead, and if I kinda sorta know you, I've got lots of room. (Karl, that means you.)

To keep current on details as they develop, check out the Rising Tide site.

Spike Lee will be present at the world premier of his HBO documentary When the Levees Broke, at the New Orleans Arena, Wednesday, August 16, at 07:30 PM.

Free tickets are available from Ticketmaster.

The show premiers on HBO on August 30.

I rolled into New Orleans on Thursday night with the dog (the wife and kids and movers having preceded me by a day). Windows up, AC cranked, in a car full of recycled air from the Atchafalaya.

I pulled into the driveway, opened the door, and the first thing that hit me was the smell.

Mold. The Katrina ick smell. I was surprised that the city could still be thick with it, and I looked around for a debris pile that might be the culprit. Nope, it was just the same old background smell of the city that's been there these last eleven months.

By later that night, I couldn't smell it any more, and I haven't smelled it since. Once something becomes natural to you, it fades into the background and you aren't really conscious of it any more.

Which got me thinking about perception versus reality for those of you who have been here all along compared to those of us who are arriving with fresh sight and unsullied noses. Over the past few weeks, as the summer doldrums have set in and the mayor's race has receded past the horizon of yesterday's news, I've noticed a steady drumbeat of frustration from the NOLA blogging community. "Nothing's happening! No progress! The rebuilding is stalled!"

I haven't walked in your shoes, but if you could see New Orleans the way I've seen it...in November, twice in February, in April, and now July, like a stop-motion animation that jumps ahead two months on every frame, you'd see the progress. It's everywhere. The difference in Broadmoor between April and now is striking. Similarly for South Claiborne and Fontainebleau. Everywhere are signs that people are coming back, that they're fighting the good fight, that they're not giving up.

I haven't had a chance to see the other parts of the city yet. Too much unpacking to do and I started back at my job today, and I know there are parts of the city like the Lower Nine and Gentilly that are probably more disheartening. I know the politics of the situation are maddening, that the frustrations of daily life are exhausting, the uncertainty terrifying, that y'all have been through hell and are still going through it. But from my outside vantage point, I see hope. Real hope that we are gonna be OK.

Thanks to Alan for hosting what felt to me like a spectacular welcome home party, where I got to meet fine folks like Sophmom and Lisa and b. rox and Schroeder and Oyster and Morwen and Karen and Loki and Dangerblond, and re-hook up with Ashley and Mark and Maitri. It was a blast, and we need to do it again soon. For those of you who missed it, the whole sultry mess is captured in flickr here and here and here and here.

(I confess to being a little embarrassed about bringing the brie after seeing what it did, until I saw Maitri and Lisa put down their cameras and start tearing into it with chunks of bread.)

AA hasn't really been in my life much during the past year. Just a few meetings, really, to pick up a chip or say hi to friends. I've been fine on my own. I haven't needed meetings, and honestly, when you don't really need them, sometimes those meetings can be real bloody boring. Annoying, even. The slogans, the cliches, the same old drunkalogue stories you've heard a hundred times before.

But self-centered thinking led me away from a tenet of AA that I forgot. Step Twelve. To take the message to other suffering alcoholics and addicts, in the hope that they too can find a way to live. And in doing so, to reaffirm your own sobriety.

Basically, I had gotten what I needed, and then I said "see ya" and never looked back.

That is until recently, when a good friend, somebody who I have grown to care about a lot over the past few months, who I had watched slip from unhappiness to despair to insanity under a barrage of pills and booze, finally hit the basement. Hard.

I've had long email conversations with this person, talking about suicide and emotional trauma and substance abuse. Sometimes I've been scared, stuck in that middle ground between needing to tell somebody and not wanting to betray confidences. Wondering if speaking out would be meddling, or if silence would equal death.

Interventions are always so easy on TV. Real life is more complicated.

The bottom came last week. And I've walked back into AA meetings, with my friend now a temporary sponsee (until a more appropriate sponsor can be found). And in trying to explain the program to a newbie, I've been able to re-examine my own complacency towards my sobriety. I've had to put into words certain thoughts I've been having that, if I'd shared them with my own sponsor, would have him calling bullshit on me.

I've become another AA cliche. Practicing the Twelfth Step has led me full circle to re-examing my attitudes towards Step One.

And if I'm totally honest with myself, I'd probably have to say "just in time".

P.S. I'd appreciate any leads on where the cool kids go to meetings in post-Katrina NOLA AA. Email is fine (ragicali at yahoo dot com). Anonymity preserved, obviously.

Chris Martel at New Orleans Metroblogging has noticed that the satellite images in Google maps are starting to be updated with post-Katrina pictures now. Mostly just the Ninth Ward, Chalmette, and a little N.O. East so far.

He's collected a bunch of interesting links and posted them here.

"And soon that ass will be mine!"

Go read the latest brilliance from Stone Cold Poetry Bitches, and give all thanks and praise to Robin.

I have recently learned that you received a letter from me that incorrectly identified your position on the Federal Marriage Amendment. I am deeply sorry for this mistake and wish to assure you that this is not a common occurrence, but it i s one that I strive to correct as soon as possible.

Thank you for contacting me in opposition to the Federal Marriage Amendment. As you may know, the Marriage Protection Amendment, states, "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any State ... shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than a man and a women." This legislation amending the U.S. Constitution would require passage by two-thirds of both the House of Representatives and Senate, and also ratification by three-quarters of the states.

I believe marriage to be a union between one man and one woman. The Marriage Protection Amendment removes the debate regarding the definition of marriage from the hands of the courts and judges and returns this decision to the American people, where I feel it belongs.

Once again, thank you for contacting me to share your thoughts on this issue. Please continue to contact me in the future about other issues important to you.

Sincerely,

Senator David Vitter
United States Senator

I hate myself when I do this.

You Are Oscar the Grouch

Grumpy and grouchy, you aren't just pessimistic. You revel in your pessimism. You are usually feeling: Unhappy. Unless it's rainy outside, and even then you know the foul weather won't last. You are famous for: Being mean yet loveable. And you hate the loveable part. How you life your life: As a slob. But it's not repelling as many people as you'd like!

The kids are up in Fort Worth at the grandparents' house, and like a lot of New Orleanians I wasn't feeling the love for the red white and blue today, so Gina and I spent half the day boxing up stuff in our storage units in preparation for the movers arriving next week.

Tonight she headed over to a friend's house for some wine and cooking out, but I was feeling pretty anti-social, so I spent the day watching the Axis powers duke it out in soccer and then the evening with Alton Brown and Dave Chapelle, and worked on trying to consolidate all our critical papers into one plastic file bin for easy evacuation toting.

And I had my own version of a patriotic meal. No grilling for me. We need to eat the frozen food before we move, so I dug the last pouch of gumbo out of the freezer, made some rice, scored some French bread from Central Market, and celebrated Gulf Coast Independence Day in style.

The gumbo is cajun-style, from the Soup Peddler, with chicken and andouille and duck fat roux. (Mmmm, duck fat.) Best gumbo I've ever had outside of Louisiana that I didn't make myself.

The bottle of Crystal sauce is my last bottle, of pre-Katrina vintage which means it's the last of the true bottled-in-New-Orleans hot sauce.

The beer is Busch NA, which is surprisingly good. My one nod to mainstream America on their holiday. Nobody makes fake beer as good as the brewers of American lite lager mega-swill . My theory on this is that beers like Busch NA and O'Doul's and Coors Cutter are not really that far off from the fucking-close-to-water alcoholic stuff that those brewers think is real beer. Whereas Guinness's non-alcoholic Kaliber is a wretched bottle of fizzy nine-grain bread that is miles away from a true Irish ale. The Irish just aren't capable of grokking the notion of beer without booze, and it shows.

Hope everybody had a good one.

I just saw a preview for A Scanner Darkly on Comedy Central, and one of the review tags said "Linklater's funniest film in years!"

I beg your pardon?

It's been years since I read the book, and yeah, all of Dick's stories have a sort of wry cynical humor to them, but they're more edgy than hyukster funny. Did Linklater or somebody else with the purse strings need to dumb this down and tart it up for a modern idiot audience? The original work explored complicated ideas about consciousness and awareness and reality vs. perception, and this was supposed to be the film that would finally faithfully represent Dick's vision on the screen. It'll really break my heart if we end up with Total Recall on rotoscope.

My books are packed, but I'm going to have to go buy another copy and reread it before I see the film, just to firmly replant the book in my brain like I did with War of the Worlds.

The book is always better. Always.

Two sites that I dig:

ThinkNOLA, which I've been reading for months and which contains not just a blog, but the fast-growing New Orleans Wiki and a detailed New Orleans Calendar.

NorthWest Carrollton, a new civic blog dedicated to the Carrollton neighborhood, which I just ran across last night. Since I graduated from Ben Franklin back when it was still at the old Carrollton courthouse, I've always felt like this neighborhood was my "second home" neighborhood. Most of my teen years were spent in either Algiers or Carrollton, and my kids will be going to school in the same neighborhood next year, so this is a blog I intend to watch.

Open source civic activism at its finest. Check 'em out.