A couple of days ago, jane_doe_ posted the following in neworleans:

I know this lady whose church goes on a mission trip to Guatemala every year, and she's looking for plush toys from Mardi Gras parades that anyone might not want. So, before you give that technicolor teddy bear to your dog to destroy in 15 seconds flat, think about giving it to me so I can get it to her. I've been to Guatemala, and I've seen the orphanages there. It's really sad--the kids in orphanages are there sometimes because their parents didn't have enough money/resources to support their children, or because both parents died of a simple illness or as a result of the violent crime problem, or because some people down there still believe that deformed or disabled children are a curse or a punishment from god. Something that small can be really special to a kid who really has nothing else. You can either get them to me or I'll come pick them up from you. Thanks!

She's specifically looking for the kind of tiny (usually no more than 4") stuffed animals and toys that get tossed from parade floats, since it will be easy for her friend to cram a bunch of these in her suitcase. If you have some, drop her a line at jane doe 1224 at gmail dot com (take out the spaces and do the usual things you do to fix an anti-spamulated e-mail address).

Since marquisdd called my Mardi Gras summary on his journal "minimal and stark ... pure Hemingway" (and since I'm a tired old fart despite only having had one Bloody Mary yesterday), I shall repost it:

We went out. We had fun. Here are a couple of lame pictures we took before leaving the house because we were too lazy to carry the camera around. Saw Rex. Saw Indians. Came home, watched the Rex Ball and the Meeting of the Courts on WYES while Chris fell asleep in front of the TV.

I did manage to do slightly better than the couple of lame pictures -- a whole set of them (with maybe even a couple of pretty good ones)!

This Mardi Gras was also a day of loss. Anyone who follows New Orleans music has probably already heard about the death of Antoinette K-Doe. I had the honor of meeting Ms. Antoinette once, at a 2007 Twelfth Night party at the House of Blues. She kindly invited me to be a Baby Doll, which in fact I was already going to be that year, but I didn't feel I could swear to be 100 percent "proper" and I strongly suspected she would not go for the Nixon head.

This morning, a bunch of us from Our Lady of Good Counsel met up at the church and caravaned over to St. Francis of Assisi on State Street to get ashes. Not long before we left the house, I received the news that my godfather, Warren Donald Henry, Sr., had also passed away yesterday. He had been very sick with cancer for months, so while this was terrible news, it was not a surprise. I only had the privilege of knowing Mr. Warren (as I called him) for a few years, but he and Rosary, his wife of 40 years, have been wonderful godparents who became the big Italian family I always fantasized about -- sort of a real-life Stubbs family without quite so many kids. I loved him dearly and am bereft.

[ETA: A couple of people have asked what I am giving up for Lent. Since I have already given up not only my church, but the certainty that my Church will not treat me like a criminal, the answer is nothing. But I am really going to try to get back on a regular weightlifting program, since it helps my back so much that it is foolish not to.]

I have assembled these over the course of an intense and strenuous parade season. There needs to be an equivalent set for paradegoers -- beginning with "Thou shalt not judge a parade solely by how much stuff they throw" -- but I cannot do everything at once.

1. Thou shalt forsake thy cell phone except to briefly ascertain locations of family members/close friends thou wisheth to bead-bomb.

2. Thou shalt put away thy digital camera. Thou art putting on a show for us, not documenting it for thine own self, and if thou art so drunk that thou cannot recall thy ride, snapshots of random screaming faces art unlikely to jog thy memory.

3. Thou shalt not be so drunk less than halfway through the parade that thou lookest as if thou art ready to fall (or puke) on our heads. This seemest to be a particular problem this year.

4. If thou danglest a prime throw, thou may taunt the crowd with it for not more than three minutes, and then thou must throw it.

5. Thou shalt not encourage girls along St. Charles to show their tits. That shit belongeth in the French Quarter.

6. If thou art rude to any paradegoer who hast not first been rude to thee, thou shalt be put to death.

7. Thou must at least look as if thou art having fun. If thou art spending thousands of dollars on something that makest thou look as bored and pissed-off as some of thou hath looked this Carnival season, thou art a dumbass.

Thank you, pro bono publico, and Hail Rex!

(On a more commercial note, please have a look at the latest round of eBay auctions if you can. I know the economy sucks, but damn, those are still some hot bargains if I do say so myself.)

At least once during the final week of madness leading to every Mardi Gras, I need a day where I ignore it and catch up on relaxing/solitary activities. Today was my "ignore day." I hated to miss Tucks (even though Chris went as my envoy), but I worked in the garden, read, and managed to finish and photograph a couple of blank books I'd been procrastinating on.

Hence, new eBay auctions. I'm returning to signed books as promised, this time with an out-of-print copy of Guilty But Insane and a very rare Swamp Foetus ARC (aside from this copy, even I don't have one) from Penguin UK. Both of the blank books on offer are significant to my Carnival this year. One has a sort of "Nixon Gras" theme, featuring two of my past costumes amidst various Carnival gaiety. The other's theme is "Skull & Bones," which will be my costume this year. Early on Mardi Gras morning, Skull & Bones gangs from the poor black neighborhoods of New Orleans take to the streets with a mixture of menace, fun, and warning (their slogan "You Next" refers to mortality in general and to the effects of drugs and violent crime on their community in particular). I've gone as a Nixon Skull & Bones guy before, but it was years ago, before we had a digital camera, and I didn't get any good pictures, and anyway it just feels right this year somehow, what with the "You Next" business and all.

A cool thing happened when I was Googling images for the Skull & Bones journal: I found some wonderful photos of the North Side Skull & Bones Gang on Flickr, taken by one Charles Silver. I began composing an e-mail explaining my blank book project and asking if I might use a couple of his images in a book, but before I could send the e-mail, he sent me a Facebook friend request. Synchronicity! Anyway, I used the images with Charles' kind permission, and Charles takes all sorts of great photos of New Orleans and other subjects, and you should check him out.

There are few things more morally reprehensible than a float rider who dangles a gorgeous pair of beads to tantalize the crowd, then puts them away and flings a handful of crappy beads. I'm looking at YOU, Krewe d'Etat. (I do love the Archbishop Hughes' Papal Police Dance Team shirt my friend Greg Sonnier got me from d'Etat, and will post pictures of myself wearing it soon.)

Hermes, on the other hand, was both beautiful and far more generous with the throws than I expected. I got cold and achy and didn't stay for Morpheus.

I'm up early in an attempt to get some gardening done and still have energy for tonight's great parade lineup: Babylon, Muses, and Chaos. Although, honestly, I can't say I have felt quite the same about Muses since ... well, suppose I just tell the tale. Each year, Muses selects a woman from the New Orleans arts community to ride as an "honorary Muse." In late 2006, I got wind that I was being considered for the 2007 parade, and would I be willing to ride if chosen? I said I'd be honored as long as they were willing to accept me as an honorary woman. That didn't seem to be a problem, but a couple of months later I received word that I was out of the running because one of the more high-poppalorum Muses That Be had found my blog, in those sorrowful days of late 2006, too dark, weird, and/or scary.

It's just as well that I wasn't chosen. I spent much of Carnival '07 getting our new house fixed up to move into, and a strenuous night of bead-throwing and ball-going wouldn't have helped my strength any. Still, I do find it pretty hilarious that this year's honorary Muse is a former crack dealer.

(I will probably be dragged away in the night and have my throat slit with the heel of a stiletto for revealing this story, but fuck it.)

Ah, well. It's still a great parade and I will still be there, though I have to say the coveted Muses Shoe is one of the very few prized Carnival throws that completely circumvents my bead lust. Maybe it has to do with my general revulsion for feet. (I do, however, love the bracelet made out of little pink plastic shoes I caught last year.)

... at least so far. It's only 1:00 PM, the crack of dawn to me these days, so I suppose it has the potential to get better.

A) I made myself so sore working in the garden yesterday that I'm not sure I will be able to make it to the Druids parade tonight. The work -- digging out a new bed for elephant ear and stargazer lily bulbs, eating the weeds, putting up a new hanging basket so the neighborhood cats won't destroy my catnip plant -- needed doing and I enjoyed it, but I will purely hate missing that parade.

B) We awoke this morning to a newspaper story about Chris in which he is misquoted as calling me his "wife," even though he took the time to explain to the reporter that we don't use that word in our relationship and why (the short version). The story is well worth reading anyway for Chris' interesting food book selections, but for the reporter to put that word in Chris' mouth was careless and unprofessional, and I expected better from that particular writer, who has done some wonderful stories for the Times-Picayune. I can deal with it being used to describe me in text by writers who don't know any better, but to see the word supposedly coming right from Chris' mouth was hard and painful.

(Please note: I do not think there is anything wrong with being someone's wife ... if you identify as a woman. I am no one's wife and never will be. Chris usually refers to me as his "better half" -- a kind fib, but one that works for us -- and told the reporter so, but she apparently didn't listen or care.)

C) The coffee maker suddenly decided to be broken this morning. This is the same coffeemaker we bought about six months ago and actually spent decent money on because we were tired of buying cheap ones that kept breaking. Can I lay hands on the warranty? No, of course I cannot.

D) Deuce is loose.

I'm sure there are people out there who are having far, far worse mornings than this, but as a wise man once said to me: if you say you have a headache and someone tells you, "You think your head hurts? That guy over there just got hit in the head with a hammer!", it doesn't make your headache go away -- it just makes you start looking around for a hammer.

From Angus Lind's story on the Chaos floats:

As we meandered through the den, it became very apparent that Chaos likes to keep things local, and being a Catholic city, it was inevitable that we would stumble onto one addressing the church situation.

"Oh my Gawd! The float's named 'Oh My Gawd!'" Float said. "Superb! It's about the churches Archbishop Hughes closed, and it seems he has a dollar sign wrapped around the cross on his archbishop's hat, as he smiles down benignly on the graves of St. Henry's, Blessed Sacrament and Our Lady of Good Counsel churches, all buried in St. Louis Cemetery No. 2 with 'For Sale' signs on them."

"He won't stop those congregations from making life miserable for him with lawsuits and appeals," I said. "Chaos is clearly saying, as the storm clouds gather: Hughes on first? What's on second? And I Don't Know is on third."

Chaos rolls on the Uptown route Thursday at 6:30.

Today's King Arthur parade featured a float about the New Orleans church closings. King Arthur isn't an especially satirical krewe, and this float was pretty obviously recycled from some other hot topic of some other year, but it was a nice gesture. (They were generous with the throws, too -- I caught a pair of King Arthur medallion beads with mini-medallions of Merlin and Guinevere, a pair of old-fashioned glass beads, a bracelet, a rubber shark, a Buffalo Soldiers doubloon, and regular beads aplenty.) Chaos and Krewe d'Etat are expected to provide somewhat more biting satire on the subject later this week, and I hope to get pictures of those too. For now, here are some shots of the King Arthur float (plus a few others).

The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. -- Matthew 26:41

I seriously doubt that Matthew was talking about Carnival parade overload, but if he had been, I would understand his problem all too well. Can I make it to Druids tonight? The Gods of Sciatica say "No way, beeyotch, you got a date with a heating pad tonight." But the Gods of Bead Lust whisper insidious and seductive whispers in my ear: "Beads ... doubloons ... footballs ... glass beads ... "

[ETA: I don't know how I thought Druids was tonight. In the world of reality, it rolls Wednesday night, so I can be tired without regret this evening.]

They actually did the right thing. I have to admit I thought they'd get defensive and mouth a lot of bullshit about showing Carlos Mencia what a valuable place we really are.

( Here's the pissy e-mail Chris and I sent the krewe's captain yesterday. I think he probably got about 100,000 others just like it. )

I don't really like Orpheus or the other superkrewes -- I'm more of an Henri Schindler-type parade fan -- but I just may have to go see them this year anyway.

It's appalling what some people will call a parade. What, two floats that looked like ass and didn't even throw anything? They could have had awesome long beads with flashing Bill of Rights medallions, Obama doubloons, plush Baracks, Michelles, Sashas and Malias ... big beautiful floats with Henri Schindler tropical-blossom fantasies or Blaine Kern glitz and glamour. Butterflies of winter. Such untapped potential, such fun the new First Family missed out on.

Desiree Glapion Rogers, native New Orleanian, two-time Zulu Queen, my adopted cousin Harry's cousin, and now White House Social Secretary was sighted in the royal box on MSNBC. She didn't look too thrilled with the parade either.

We don't have much here in the banana republic of New Orleans, so when we visit the mighty cities of Dallas or Florence and see the thin trickles of water that flow through them, we get a kick out of saying, "You call that a river?" We snicker at hardy northern peoples who think they are having a heat wave any time the mercury hits 80. We sneer at Pacific Northwestern "Mardi Gras" celebrations that destroy entire downtowns. And we turn up our noses, just a bit, at the bleak little inaugural parade. Don't get me wrong; a good military band is an important part of almost any parade, but you need variety and gorgeousness for a truly great one. We could have put on such a show for them. And not one of those bands was a patch on the St. Augustine Purple Knights.

Bumping up eBay auctions, because I think the two newly listed blank books got a little lost in the inaugural flurry. Even down here in the forgotten third-world protectorate, I have to admit it was pretty exciting.

I'm sorry I have been neglecting the blog. This bad bout of sciatica has kind of taken the heart out of me, and has destroyed any urge I have to sit at the computer. I will see my orthopedist on Tuesday. For now, here are pictures of me and Chris before going out on Mardi Gras morning:





Note kitten in each shot. They're omnipresent.

I got a wild hair and limped up to the Avenue to see Bacchus. I'm still sore as hell and I don't usually like the superkrewes, but I was damned if I was going to live three blocks from the Uptown route and never get my parade on. Chef Bob of Cuvee texted me his position, but I didn't get up to St. Charles in time to catch his float. ("Float 8b neutral ground side bottom level at the end of the whale's tail" is a perfectly normal text message to get from a friend at Carnival time.) The best throw I got was a stuffed crawfish wearing a little chef's hat. I usually give stuffed animals to little kids in the vicinity, but the rider caught my eye and aimed it right at me and that sucker was mine.

I did not see Hulk Hogan, but I think I'll live. As far as I'm concerned, he is a better celebrity guest than Endymion's Kevin Costner, who should be barred from the city after starring in that ridiculous movie that further besmirched Clay Shaw's reputation.

Yay, Giants! Yay, Eli!

Jeez, I guess I kinda disappeared there. Did not mean to solicit worried e-mails, etc.; I just haven't been in much of a blogging mood. I woke up this morning with sciatica as bad as I can remember it ever being, which put a kibosh on my going to the parades tonight -- and I was looking forward to Muses in particular. Instead, I've spent the day and evening in bed with kittens, books, and heating pad. However, Nixon will NOT be kept under wraps on Fat Tuesday; I have painkillers and I'm not afraid to use them. The problem is managing to save them for four more days when I feel so crappy naaaaaaaaoooooow.

Overall, it's been kind of a crappy Carnival season. Far too early and too cold. I usually try to see as many parades as I possibly can. This year I've seen a pathetic two. We've been heroic in our king cake consumption, though; this afternoon I counted the babies and realized we were currently on our seventh.

greenwoman is selling five lovely "Liquorverse" sketches on eBay, and has very generously offered to donate the proceeds to the Cats Fund. I love these little drawings -- check 'em out!

Tomato and I walked up to St. Charles to see Sparta -- not an especially beautiful parade; generous with their throws, but pretty generic throws except for a pair of old-fashioned glass beads I got -- but became too cold to stay for Pegasus. Augie and Frank are currently playing in the booty pile, their first Carnival. Unfortunately, it's hard to get good pictures of them because whenever I point a camera at them, they both stop what they're doing and come swarming toward me. Tomato was happy to see a parade at all because he said he'd been in jail for the past several Carnival seasons. I do keep some odd company these days, but I suppose I am odd company for them too.

DAMMIT. I can hear the marching bands. I HATE not being up there. HATE IT. HATE IT.

Did I ever tell y'all about the time last year when I was in a lousy mood (surprise) and complaining about the city's "Mardi Gras mentality" (probably something to do with Nagin, the author of all our misery)? Chris said, "Dude, one of your three main criteria for buying a new house was that it be within walking distance of the Uptown parade route. You're disqualified from bitching about the 'Mardi Gras mentality.'"

He was right, of course.

Miserable, miserable, miserable weather for the first parades of the Carnival season: cold, rainy, even goddamn lightning. I want to see them, and you always get good throws when you go in the rain because the krewes are grateful you're there, but Chris brought me some kind of new coughing superflu that keeps almost going away and then coming back. If I go out in this, it will doubtlessly turn into double pneumonia.

marquisdd came by and visited last night, and today I drove way out Jefferson Highway to get a Haydel's king cake, so I've had a (comparatively) active couple of days. Haydel's only porcelain collectible this year seems to be the little Cafe du Monde waiter. We now have enough of them to start our own branch of Cafe du Monde. Oh, and I made a voodoo doll, one I've been wanting to make for a while. I'm not sure it's finished and I'm not sure I like it, but when it is and if I do, I'll probably put it on eBay.

Which reminds me, I think I had auctions end this afternoon. I better go send out invoices.

I got the first baby of the year from a Haydel's king cake. We devoured that entire cake yesterday morning, then stopped later and got a Randazzo's one from the PJ's Coffee on Metairie Road. (I was briefly but intensely diverted by a ring in the window of the Hyme Tyme Clock Shop -- a decent-sized diamond flanked by two dark, dark blue stones -- tanzanite, perhaps? That's all I need, to be tempted by bling when my checking account balance is $178.54.)

Chris got the Randazzo's baby this morning, so he has to buy the next king cake.

and beginning of the Carnival season! If I weren't sick, I'd be up by the streetcar tracks waiting for the Phorty Phunny Phellows (Chris' favorite krewe, because when he was a child he felt certain "fart" was spelled "phart" and felt a tremendous sense of injustice when he learned otherwise*). I did drag my infectious self out to Epiphany Mass, which I always love, though this verse of "We Three Kings" makes my eyes prickle:

Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume
Breathes of life of gathering gloom
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb

Even if you're only a little religious, it's hard to see Jesus as a newborn, golden baby and think about what's going to happen to him. I do like Brian's mother's ambivalence about myrrh in The Life of Brian, though.

Rouse's -- a Louisiana-owned grocery chain, I might add -- was OUT OF REGULAR KING CAKES. They only had the filled ones, which are a perversion. I was looking forward to it with coffee in the morning, but we'll get one from Haydel's tomorrow.


*He also threw a tremendous shit-fit last week when I happened to mention that British people call yellow traffic lights "amber." I see nothing wrong with that -- it's actually a more accurate description of the color than "yellow" -- but I do appreciate being with a man who feels deeply about words.