Monthly Archives: March 2006

Day 214: Let’s Take The Whole Day Off

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Eight months after the last time, I watched a movie in a New Orleans theatre. Last night, I saw Capote at Canal Place Theatre … and my eyes were glued to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s lips the whole time as he pursed them in that characteristic sneer to perfect Truman’s haute-nasal voice. I loved Hoffman in The Fifteen Minute Hamlet and even as the obsequious Brandt in The Big Lebowski, but this was different. This was eerie. Not the premise of the movie (there is no doubt the suspects were guilty), but the seamless merger of Hoffman and Capote. In different eras, both of them pulled off scared-country-boy-turned-scared-literatus to the point where I didn’t care who was who and when any more. All that was left was a quiet understanding of one of Capote’s more famous quotes, “I am a homosexual, I use drugs, I am a wunderkind.”

At the least, it was something different to think about besides the reality of New Orleans. For one, I watched the movie in one of the city’s more ritzy malls, which burned and was looted two days after the hurricane hit. There I was seven months later walking out of the same place, cleaned and restored. What amazes me is the varying nature that one place can take on over time. This concept drives home quickly when I stand on an outcrop of thick limestone and realize that, millions of years ago, a reef thrived under my feet. Or when I put my hand on the wall of an Indian temple and feel what my ancestors did thousands of years ago. And there I was, last night, walking out of a place that was the scene of utter chaos and destruction just seven months ago.

Same place, different moment. What separates us is the space of time.

After dwelling on that thought and the ones that went into this morning’s Metroblogging post, I retreated to the comfort of a low-carb frozen mocha (with whipped cream and sugarless chocolate syrup) and my iPod. I believe it’s time to unleash a brimful-style music quiz on my loyal readers. Follow the game, most of the rules of which I have shamelessly cribbed from ms. b herself :

The idea is that you take your mp3 player or iTunes (or multi-CD player for those of you who haven’t entered the 21st century), set it on random and write down the first line of the next twenty songs that play, regardless of embarassment quotient. If the title of the song is the first line, it must be excluded. Songs from the same artists should also be excluded. Then, you ask your readers to give you the artist and title.

Rules:

* No Googling. We work on the honor code. Leave your guesses on which songs are represented below, and I cross them off as you get them right.
* I will annoy everyone by tagging them. You’re all tagged, all of you.
* D is disqualified from playing as he possesses an intimate knowledge of my music collection. Good thing this isn’t an electro-techno sound bites quiz or Julie would have to be kicked out of play as well.

So, here are the results:

Continue reading →

Day 212: ThinkNOLA Viral Linking Campaign

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The use of the term “New Orleans Blogger” twice in yesterday’s post is part of the Link Think New Orleans viral campaign, a variant of The Indie Virus campaign. “Virus” is a good thing in this instance because, like your mama said about chicken pox, it’s one a kid wants to catch. Chris Pearson, the mastermind behind the campaign, explains its two-fold rationale:

“All you’ve got to do is link to lesser known blogs from within a post (or two, or eleventeen), but you have to make sure that the anchor text of your link is The Indie Virus [or in the case of New Orleans, New Orleans Blogger]

“The experiment … has two goals:

* To bring exposure to lesser known blogs (especially those outside of Technorati’s top 100)
* To explore the metrics behind a viral linking campaign launched by the “little guys” (less popular blogs)”

So, if you’re an area blogger and/or would like to bring attention to blogging about the city of New Orleans, link to two New Orleans bloggers you consider relevant, with the anchor text of the link being New Orleans Blogger. e.g. New Orleans Blogger. Important note from Chris: “make sure that you link directly to a post WITH A TRACKBACK and not to the site itself – it speaks louder!”

You may thank Alan, tireless hamster of the New Orleans Blogger group, for applying yet another online concoction to our local cause.

Day 211: Something Is Arbitrary In The State Of New Orleans

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An election is coming. Universal peace is declared and the foxes have a sincere interest in prolonging the lives of the poultry. -T.S. Eliot

My sweet post about Charity Hospital was all written, ready to breathe in the sweet air of the electronic stage. And Alan, that buzzkill (*smile*), had to inform me about an impropriety in the way the two candidates are chosen for the Clerk of Criminal District Court debate. This New Orleans Blogger explains that the candidates are picked by WDSU, the local NBC affiliate, via an online poll in which anyone can vote and numerous times. Can you say “vote early, vote often?”

… by using an entirely unscientific online web poll, WDSU will choose two candidates that [are] given valuable television time, and priceless exclusivity. Worst of all, you can vote in the poll every five minutes or so.

Already, two of the candidates have 800 votes apiece. Are [they] voting again and again? Why wouldn’t they? … Someone could write a script to vote every five minutes.

WDSU’s poll disclaimer reads: “Please keep in mind that our polls are for entertainment and are not conducted in a scientific fashion. We make no guarantees about the accuracy of the results other than that they reflect the choices of the users who participated.”

There is no such thing as a scientific poll. Period. That said, there are ways to safeguard against possible abuse. How hard would it be for WDSU to permanently block IPs that have already voted? More importantly, why does the window for voting open again after 5 minutes?

A phonecall to Alan helped me understand the poll’s mechanism better: “In memory, the poll has a list of the IPs of the last few votes that were clicked. And then the software forgets either because time passes or whatever buffer it uses fills up after a while. I can’t believe that my most viable candidate can be excluded from a debate because another candidate had his/her nephew clicking for hours on end.”

VatulBlog supports no candidate for Clerk of Criminal District Court. The point of this post regards the stupidity of this situation – it is ludicrous that two candidates will receive media exposure in a debate, i.e. political manna, through a completely arbitrary electronic process. Local politics constitute the most important and accessible arena for citizen participation. This is where we exert the strongest influence on who governs our immediate surroundings.

I’m certain this is an innocent oversight on the part of WDSU, but a troubling one, nonetheless. Technology is more easily abused by the foxes at the expense of the poultry. No American community, much less New Orleans, can afford a lapse in secure polling on the part of its media outlets if that’s how debate contestants are picked. A manufactured debate cannot bring about a serious discussion of the issues, especially with respect to an office recently vacated by Kimberly Williamson-Butler.

I wonder what another New Orleans Blogger has to say about this.

Day 209: I’ve Got A Library Thing

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After blogging, my favorite activity is reading. I’m aware that neither of these tasks involve much in the way of kinetic energy, which is underpinned by my third-favorite hobby – sleeping. One of my biggest peeves about being away from New Orleans for so long after Katrina was the separation from my cherished library. My dad loves his plants, my mother her writing … I tend to my books like they are my precious children, each one allotted a special place in the hierarchy of barrister bookcases that is my library. Each item is organized by genre, importance within genre and then height – a fractal system of management, if you will. And believe you me, I know when even one soldier is out of place.

My compulsive fate, in the form of Dave, introduced me to LibraryThing right after my last post. Ever since then, each of my 500 or so books were entered into this online interface and are in the process of being tagged, ending with my last three literary purchases. Of course, these are only the books that reside in my immediate possession and not every one I’ve read. That would be cheating.

Once all of the books are entered [Update: ISBN or Library of Congress Call No. is the best way to search], the interface offers features like how many other users share your library and by how much, and “clouds” of favorite interests and genres. For instance, my cloud emphasizes the tags funny, geology and science fiction. Go figure.

Check out my personal catalog and the new widget in VatulBlog’s sidebar. Cool, huh? [*readers roll eyes*]

Books are enthralling, their organization is a vortex. Seriously, if you ever want to keep me occupied (and stop the whining about how bored I am), hand me last week’s newspaper or even a Chilton’s manual and I will stay out of your hair for a while. Give me books, papers and music to sort through and the silence will last for weeks.

Which makes me wonder if there is a Library Thing for music. CD cataloging, here I come!

Day 206: Carbs, Indian Tokens Of Love

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March is a great month because its first day marks my arrival on this planet and the following thirty involve people giving me the coolest things. Like the year Julie presented me with a care package containing everything a good geologist could ask for including Madison, WI Dive Bars: The Game or D unsuccessfully, yet sweetly, tried to surprise me with an XM boombox (tech support included).

Arriving home for lunch today, what should I find propping open my storm door but a box from the rare and cultivated Ms. MP, more familiar in these here parts simply as brimful. She had mentioned mailing me something, but I figured it was a card at most. No, no, the darling woman sent me a collection of food, more explicitly her homemade baked goods expertly and lovingly wrapped, the cutest little bottles of Fudge Fatale dessert sauces and a bottle of Chandon. *does happy dance* How could I eat just one of those yummy chocolate-smothered flowers or crunchy globules of flour, sugar, cardamom and another ingredient whose identity eludes me, but with which my tummy is in love? Let’s say that I’ve just consumed enough dessert for four days. Brimful of comatose …

Like the rest of my family, I show my friends love by feeding them. When Machelle or Amanda come over, they eat whatever I’m eating, even if it’s berries, eggs or microwaved Lean Cuisine and I will go out of the way to reduce the hypoglycemia quotients of the ones I hold dear. This is something else I love about New Orleans – every party, every get-together, every shindig has enough food for a wedding. From gumbo to red beans & rice and bread pudding to olive salad, it is difficult to go hungry in this city.

Note that I said I feed my friends and don’t necessarily cook for them (ok, rarely, and only Indian food). MP, on the other hand, is the consummate baker; affectionate is the first word that springs to mind regarding her confectionary creations and the people for whom she makes them. *sigh* Thank you, MP, for the love you put into remembering me and for the thoughtful-funny card. You bet challenges will be met with my “characteristic resolve” as long as I know I’ll come out on the other side to your delectable carbs.

As someone who shuns simple carbohydrates (and lost 25 lbs. after moving to New Orleans by staying away from them), it’s hard to hail from an Indian family. Seriously, we have every form of starch, sugar and combination thereof cornered. Speaking of love and food, what about the birthday package I received a few days ago from my parents? Aside from a dozen or so of the most snazzy pieces of jewelry picked out by my tasteful mother, the box contained an assortment of South Indian desserts, murukku (a salty, crunchy snack), sambar powder and narthangai (a dried-citrus pickle/relish).

How many times have I asked my parents to send me just three laddus and to cease and desist with the murukku? “No, no, the poor child doesn’t get enough home cooking and we will have to stop referring to her as an eruma maddu for a while.”

They adore me and wish only for my happiness – what else can I ask for? But, these pounds don’t get taken away by elves, you know!

Some day we’ll win ‘em all. Until then, these culinary gifts go in a safe with a timer that shoots the door open for five minutes every other Saturday. After I tuck into one last piece of MP’s cardamomy goodness … teehee …

Day 206: I Believe In Intelligent Design

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Now that your jaw’s on the the floor and I have your attention, allow me to continue my assertion: I believe in the intelligent design of the new New Orleans. John By The Bayou correctly expresses disbelief at Nagin’s support of rebuilding in New Orleans’s flooded neighborhoods without a plan.

As he has often done before, [Nagin] rejected the call by the commission’s Urban Planning Committee for a moratorium on building permits in the city’s hardest-hit and most flood-prone neighborhoods … Nagin said he appreciated the committee’s desire to protect residents from spending money on houses or stores that could be vulnerable to flooding again and might not be eligible for flood insurance. But, he said, “I have confidence that our citizens can decide intelligently for themselves where they want to rebuild, once presented with the facts.”

Whether or not for a reason, we have been bestowed with brains that can think and, as Nagin says, make the right decisions for ourselves … and, in this city and era, ourselves within the framework of a large and intertwined community. We can intelligently decide given the facts and several stare us right in the face:

1. A number of this city’s hardest-hit and most flood-prone neighborhoods have flooded in the past.

2. This city has a history of leading its citizens down the wrong track by not presenting them with facts. (Lakeview – drained swamp – and the Ninth Ward – serious lowlands – being cases in point).

3. Even jarring pieces of data such as 1965′s Hurricane Betsy and 2005′s Katrina aren’t going to enhance the attention span of the local flummoxed parish-dweller.

4. What can flood will flood, our storm buffers aren’t growing and hurricanes will not disappear any time soon. The recurrence of a post-Katrina-type deluge may be unlikely, but nature’s plumbing is equally unlikely to work in our favor.

This blog has screamed itself hoarse about rebuilding New Orleans right. For once, we came up with a plan that befits citizens of a developed nation – grow out from the center, the known, the safe. People want their homes back, I empathize, but at what expense? In essence, what has to happen before the collective New Orleanian shift from maintenance to lasting? Makes you wonder about the nature of and respect for The Long-Term down here.

You know why Nagin disagrees with his own BNOBC on land use, don’t you? He doesn’t want to go down as the leader of New Orleans who turned away his own. He wants you to make that decision – you will leave your neighborhood or stay and the result will not denigrate his legacy or detract from his re-election.

Legacies and elections aside, the mayor is not the city. S/he does not provide garbage pickup, mail service, decent nearby schools, crime deterrents, police and fire protection and emergency services. As John says, “What commitment does the city have to delivering services to different parts of the city – and are there resources to back that commitment up?” And who has the final say as to the rebuild – the commission or Nagin?

Time to look at the reconstruction perspectives of the other candidates.

Day 205: Katrina’s Lessons Down Under

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Cyclone Larry March 2006 worldhum.com
Cyclone Larry Hits Queensland . Courtesy worldhum.com

At least some part of this planet learned what not to do in the case of a massive storm.

Within a few hours of the most powerful cyclone in decades hitting Australia’s northeastern coast Monday, state and federal governments had declared a state of emergency, prepared Black Hawk helicopters to run rescue missions and announced cash payouts for victims … Emergency relief officials said they had studied the response to Hurricane Katrina last year – and learned what not to do.

We still know how to evacuate for hurricanes better than anyone.

New Orleans undertook the largest evacuation in its history in a mostly orderly fashion … The problem for the Gulf Coast was the response did not match the unprecedented needs after flood walls and levees that defend New Orleans broke. With more than 70,000 people stranded in the city, resources were stretched to the breaking point and relief could not get in fast enough.

Category 5 Cyclone Larry hit northern Queensland with “up to $1 billion damage to homes, businesses and vital infrastructure and wiped out almost all of Australia’s banana crop … and no reported deaths or serious injuries.” Less than 24 hours later, President Bush called PM Howard with an offer of monetary help.

President Bush, who took a hammering in the United States over the slowness of his response when hurricane Katrina battered New Orleans last year, clearly wanted to get in early this time.

“You’re funny,” said Howard before he hung up on Bush and returned to his radio interview.

Six months later, the Katrina diaspora continues to reel from shock, guilt and the slow heal. As one of the 7000 rendered homeless by Cyclone Larry, can you imagine having to move from banana plantations to the desert of Western Australia or a big city? Relocating to Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, or anywhere in southeastern Australia doesn’t sound like such a bad thing, though. Can I go?

Australia will take care of its own. For one, they don’t have to contend with FEMA.

Day 201: Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

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Adrienne Cook once said, “St. Patrick’s Day is an enchanted time — a day to begin transforming winter’s dreams into summer’s magic.” And what winter reveries we’ve had. About a year ago today, cancer encroached on the life of D’s mother. Quietly, pragmatically, she went in for treatment and came out the winner towards the middle of the year. Shortly thereafter, everything seemed to go downhill with the arrival of Katrina, the resurgence of the cancer and everything you have read about on this blog for the past six months.

This year, we start again, ready for summer’s magic. The wonderful thing about life is that it gives us chance after chance – the challenge is for our tired eyes to seek out those opportunities and make good on them. So much more to find and understand. The more you know, the more you don’t know.

For instance, a scientist at Trinity College in Dublin has discovered that the name Patrick isn’t of Irish origin. In fact, many names considered proper Irish today are not Gaelic and are, in fact, English and/or Nordic in origin. Something tells me that I will receive more punches than kisses if I roll out this information at today’s various St. Patty’s Day parties.

Many popular male first names commonly thought of as being Irish, such as Patrick, Mick and Sean, actually originated with the English and the French-Danish-Norwegian Normans, who invaded Ireland in the 12th century and led to radical changes in the way Irish families named their children.

Archetypal Irish names in Irish America, such as Patty and Mick, really are more a product of the Roman Catholic Renaissance (which occurred well after the Anglo-Norman invasion in 1167 A.D.). The clergy tried to wipe out traditional Irish names by replacing them with Biblical names … Canonical laws in Ireland for many years prevented the baptism of children unless the chosen name was that of a saint. Girls often took on variations of the name Mary. At the same time, harsh penal laws from the 16th to the 19th century further weakened traditional Gaelic/Celtic culture.

Before the Irish fret about this loss to the English, the study suggests that “the earlier Anglo-Norman invasion had possibly a more profound impact on Irish names.” Phew.

Speaking of profound, Mark remembers “the great monument to the Irish in New Orleans, the New Basin Canal, which ran from about where Union Station stands today to Lake Pontchartrain.” In fact, Blake Pontchartrain wrote about the canal back in 2003 and even printed a picture of the beautiful cross to which Mark refers.

New Orleans Celtic Cross
Image courtesy Gambit Weekly . March 2003

Mark reminisces on:

“Today, all that stands in remembrance of the Irish who built the canal is a Celtic cross in Lakeview near West End Boulevard and Downs Street. I didn’t even think to check on it when I drove around Lakeview when I was home Mardi Gras week. It’s fitting there should be some remembrance, in a city famous for its cemeteries, for the jazz funerals, for the way we have come to very public terms with death.

“That the cross stands in Lakeview is a fitting reminder that The Flood was not the city’s first experience with mass death or with disaster. Our entire city is a monument to death and disater overcome. The area of cemeteries where St. Patrick’s and all the other cities of the dead stand was once the back of town, where the remains of the yellow fever victims were kept away from the living …

“So, as we celebrate the unique American holiday of St. Patrick’s Day, let me lift a glass to the forgotten thousands of the New Basin Canal, and to their cousins who never left the old country. You made this city what is is, and can teach us what it can become. You show us that we can embrace and celebrate our past and ourselves while we make a new future. And that there’s no need for the music or the drinking to stop to make it happen.”

Goodness grace everyone on this day with peace, happiness and safety. Slainte!

Day 200: Look Back, Look Forward

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The Internal Revenue Service, in a rare show of benevolence, has extended our tax filing deadline until August 28th of this year. So, on this day, if you are a taxpayer in Cameron, Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, and St. Tammany parishes, you have 165 days left to file. The genetic combination of a banker and a stickler, I will have my taxes done by the close of business tomorrow. Then again, I didn’t lose a family member, house, business, job and I sure don’t have to fight that losing battle with insurance adjusters, FEMA and the like. A silent prayer flies upwards for this.

We on the Gulf Coast are American taxpayers, meaning no taxation without representation. At the dawn of the 21st century, I would like to extend that caveat to good representation.

Exactly two weeks ago, I listened to an NPR interview with Governor Kathleen Blanco regarding the needs of post-Katrina Louisiana. Michele Norris of All Things Considered asked Blanco why the federal government should give our area the funds required for adequate protection, what is being done to prevent levee failure and resultant flooding in the short-term, and how the governor deals with this on a personal level.

“… there’s life that’s been stilled. And when you have that experience, the magnitude of it is what moves the heart and the mind. And then they understand the reason for the big ask, the big amount of money that it takes to make up the difference.

“… nobody can ensure anybody of their ultimate safety anywhere in this world because things happen and [wait for the contradiction] we have to count on the federal government to keep us safe.

“I think that God has erased our world, not all of it was beautiful, but he has given us another chance.”

Oh boy. With representation like that, who needs to travel to banana republics to get a handle on government ineptness? Can I be her speechwriter? Allow me to offer a sample to Frau Blanco:

We are Lousiana, the 18th state to be admitted into the Union, with a total gross state product of $153 billion in 2004. We are taxpayers, we are Americans, our young serve and die in American battles, and we provide this nation with natural resources. We don’t need the nation’s heart or charity, we want their support as fellow Americans, as members of this nation. If the government failed us over all of these decades, the rest of America has every way of being neglected as well.

Lastly, God cannot help those who have no idea how to help themselves. An engineering disaster and not a natural one, the current state of the Gulf Coast is all too earthly a matter. Just like death and taxes. Something to keep in mind as you peruse that EZ-File.