Sunday night being off time for both me and Big Man, we decided to make it a busman's holiday by going out to hear music after the parades last Sunday. (There were 2 daytime parades on Sunday, January 27th: Krewe of Carrollton and Krewe of King Arthur; the sun broke through and shone on both parades, and a good time was had by all.) After checking the copious listings for live music in the city (on a Sunday night!), we settled on the Maple Leaf Bar Uptown on Oak Street, where blues guitarist Walter "Wolfman" Washington was playing in a trio with drummer Russell Batiste and keyboardist Joe Krown.
Other than plans to hear great local music, we had an ulterior motive for the choice -- Big Man is acquainted with a saxophonist who played for years and years with Wolfman, and the sax man has been trying to introduce the two to each other but the timing never worked out. Big Man thought he could introduce himself at the gig, mentioning the sax man's name. Seemed like a plan.
Getting ready to go, I found to my chagrin that I'm not as young as I like to think. The accumulated physical pressure of all the walking at 7 (count 'em, *7*!) parades since the first (rainy) one Friday night had blown my weak ankle (broken in a bad fall in 2001). Whether I liked it or not, and believe me, I didn't, the only way I was going to the Leaf that night was with a cane like an old lady. Geez.
The first set was advertised as starting at 10 pm, which we didn't believe, so we drove around looking at houses, trying to kill time, and finally parked across the street from the Leaf at about 10:10 pm. Entering, we were told the cover was $5 each, that the music would start in about a half-hour (so much for the listing in the paper!), and that the crawfish were out back. We looked at each other -- crawfish? We don't know nothin' 'bout no crawfish!
Parenthetical aside: Where else in America, or anywhere for that matter, can you go out, dressed casually, to hear really good live music on a Sunday night? And if you could, would it be a mere $5 a person? And even if, improbably, both of the first two were true, where else in heaven's good name could you get free boiled crawfish too? Only one place in the whole wide wonderful world, this place, this beloved old girl, this dear old wounded city. What a gift it is to live here.
Big Man bought me an Abita and himself a diet Coke, and we walked through to the patio bar in the back, where the pool table had been covered with a sheet of plywood which was topped with the detritus of a crawfish boil: small boiled crawfish, chunks of corn, small new potatoes, a few mushrooms, heads of garlic, halves of lemons (and oranges! never saw oranges in a crawfish before; take note for future reference), and lots and lots of picked-over crawfish shells. A few folks were standing around, peeling crawfish, sucking heads, picking through the debris looking for something, like the few pieces of hot sausage that were left. Seeing us arrive, someone said that another pot was boiling now and should be out soon, and noticing my cane, brought me a chair. (Maybe this old disabled lady routine is not all that bad.)
We picked and ate crawfish for a while, and then wandered back out to the main room, where the trio was slowly arriving and even more slowly setting up. Then an overwhelming aroma of fresh hot crawfish assailed our nostrils. Even though we had eaten a perfectly good dinner before arriving at the Maple Leaf, we hustled back to the crawfish pool table (another chair being provided for me by a young man calling me "sweetheart"), and ate some more. Everyone at the table agreed that the crawfish were early and way too small, almost too much trouble to eat, as we ate and ate.
Finally, in the general neighborhood of 10:45 pm or so, the band began to strike up a tune, and we went back to the tin-ceilinged main room, which was much more crowded than it had been earlier. I got a seat on one of the benches that line both sides of the room (again, the old disabled lady routine). The crowd was the usual Maple Leaf bunch: college kids, Baby Boomers, a few older folks, a few looking like their IDs hadn't been properly checked (but maybe that's just me -- 21 year-olds look so darn babyish!). The trio did not react much with the crowd; there were few announcements of song titles and such. They just stood up there on that little little-bitty stage and played their hearts out, tight and hot and New Orleans-inflected.
The first hour fly by, and the set ended before we knew it. Big Man followed the musicians outside to Oak Street to introduce himself and pass a few words, see if he could sit in. I stayed inside -- no point in me limping out there. Big Man popped back in to say that the sax man's name had been the right entree and he was going back to the car to get his horn, since they had invited him to sit in for a tune or two. He came back in with the small gig bag and began to discreetly warm up against the side wall with the mouthpiece and trumpet.
The trio came back on and played about 2 or 3 tunes, and then invited Eric to the stage. The remaining mike was behind Russell's drum kit, so Big Man stood back there, and played like he had been rehearsing with them. He blew sweet and pretty, and hot and high, and he added a little somethin' behind Wolfman's vocals. Wolfman and Joe Krown exchanged looks while Big Man blew, and the crowd responded to him with claps and cheers. He was a hit!
When the song finished, Big Man took a little bow and started to leave the stage. But Russell Batiste told him to stay (his actual words, I believe, were, "Don't go, man!") and Big Man ended by playing the rest of the set with them. Modestly, after every song, he made to go, but each time was prevented by a member of the trio.
At the end of the set, Russell Batiste asked Big Man, "Do you know 'Secondline'?" Big Man pointed down to where I was sitting, and said, "My wife's a native -- she MADE me learn it!" And then he proceeded to blow that old familiar start to "Secondline" -- BADA BAAAH-DA! And I and a few other people hollered back HEY! But Russell didn't think it got a big enough response, so he made Big Man blow again -- and again. But each time, it was only a few of us giving the response -- the crowd was obviously mostly out-of-towners who didn't know any better. So Russell gave Big Man the go-ahead and they went on to play the whole song, which the crowd danced to wildly and cheered and clapped when it was done. Joe Krown made a point of thanking Big Man and introducing him by name to the crowd, almost as if he had been a real member of the group.
As they began packing up to leave, the members of the trio made sure to get Big Man's contact info, so it's not impossible that he could, sometime soon, play the Leaf for real, and not just sitting in. But even so, it was a great time and it felt so good to see my Big Man on the stage of the Maple Leaf!
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Monday, January 28, 2008
Parading and Raining
Last Friday evening, January 25th, was supposed to be the first night of "real" parades in Orleans Parish. ("Real" in terms of full-size floats, marching bands, an array of throws, and so on; Krewe du Vieux may be the official first parade of Carnival, but it's not "real" in the sense above.) Unfortunately, it was a rainy day and got no better as darkness fell. The weather pros on TV tried to make the best of it -- "the front may quickly move through," "it may not rain all night," and the like -- but the fact of the matter is, it was raining all day, and it was planning on raining all night.
Two parades were scheduled, Oshun and Pygmalion. I knew Oshun from 16-18 years ago, when the African-themed krewe paraded through Mid-City and had marvelous Barth Brothers designed floats that were self-propelled, and not dragged by tractors, as almost all Carnival floats are, but I was not familiar with Pygmalion, which is apparently a krewe from another area of the city that at some point in the past gotten permission to parade the Uptown route. (Those fancy floats from Barth turned out to be gorgeous in theory but duds in practice -- the enclosed area for the driver in front tended to accumulate carbon monoxide. As far as I know, those floats were only used once and then scrapped forever.)
I had previously made plans with my sister L, who lives just off Napoleon near St. Charles, to see the parade together. (I had originally thought Big Man could join us and then head to work on Bourbon Street, but it turned out that he got an earlier gig and had to miss these parades.) So in the steady drizzle, I was driving from my house in the lower Lower Garden District to my sister's, and I was concerned that I had not left my house early enough to make the start of the parade, so I dialed my sister on my cell. She answered her phone by saying bluntly, "Are you bailing?"
I was outraged. "Bailing? Bailing? How can you ask me that! I'm on my way now to your house -- don't leave without me." She apologized for jumping to unwarranted conclusions, and said she'd wait for me. She also said it was raining pretty hard by her house. I moved my radio dial to a news channel, to check if the parades had been cancelled, but apparently not. I made it to L's house, using back routes to avoid the traffic and barricades on St. Charles Avenue, and the rain had settled to a light but steady drizzle.
Carrying my new purple folding umbrella, purchased just for rainy parade-watching, I entered L's house, where she and her friend R were doing parade preparations -- fixing alcoholic drinks in go-cups. Thus fortified, the 3 of us (L's husband had bailed) walked down Napoleon to the corner of St. Charles -- not our usual parade spot, but with the weather, we did not want to walk as far as our normal parade-viewing place in front of Sophie Gumbel Guild on the corner of Napoleon and Perrier. The parade had just started rolling as we arrived, with the big police van in front making the corner. If you were not from here, you would be surprised to learn that we were not the only ones there -- there was a large less-prepared group under the awning of the still-closed-since-the-Storm Copeland's, other folks with umbrellas, still others with zipped-up hooded parkas. There was also a clump of glum-looking NOPD with rain ponchos over their uniforms.
We took our place at the barricade next to an African-American family, two adult women, several kids. We all congratulated each other on being "real New Orleanians," the kind who come out in the rain for a parade. "It's our duty," L seriously told the group around us, "these krewes can't have a real parade unless we're here. We owe it to them." We all agreed with this -- we were being responsible, accountable New Orleanians, supporting our fellow New Orleanians in the parading krewe, and not crazy, obsessed nutballs standing in the pouring rain to no good purpose.
And it was pouring down rain. Make no mistake -- this was not a mist or a drizzle or intermittent rain, this was a full-fledged downpour. Our hearts went out to King Shango and Queen Oshun in their velvet and taffeta and rhinestone finery; we fervently hoped there were tumble dryers and lots of warm beverages waiting for them at the end of the parade route. As the king rolled by, I remembered the traditional cry of the followers of Shango in the African Yoruba faith, and I hollered, "Shango does not hang!" I do not know if the king heard all of what I said, but he heard his name, and turned towards me and waved his scepter over me in true Carnival style. I waved back.
We felt so sorry for the school marching bands in the parade. They were all wearing rain ponchos or capes, but the rain streaked down their faces. I'm sure they felt miserable, and the $1200 or so that the krewe gave their schools for their participation was surely not enough for how they felt. Oshun's bands were from some of the city's Creole neighborhood schools, and we saw St, Mary's Academy and Xavier Prep, both all girls, both very good and very wet. We shouted encouragement to them as they splashed past us, "Y'all look great! You're so brave! Thanks so much for being here!" Then L, who walked in parades as chaperone in her days as school counselor, began calling kudos to the parents and teachers marching with the bands. "Yay chaperones! Y'all are so fabulous!" earning grateful and appreciative smiles from the sodden grown-ups as they passed by.
Around the middle of the parade, another friend showed up, who we almost didn't recognize, since he was covered head to foot in hunting gear, waterproof overalls and boots, and a camouflage parka with the hood drawn tight. "How much did I miss?" he hollered over the marching band going by, "I couldn't leave my house, because my wife didn't want me to go!" We scoffed at such caution, and explained it, as we do everything we don't like in New Orleans, by saying his wife was not from here.
A band whose bus had gotten caught in traffic finally arrived, and the police in front of us stopped the parade, moved us to the side, and opened the barricades for the young people running from the buses in full uniform, instruments in hand. We hollered to them, "Be careful! Don't run, they're holding the parade for you! So glad you're here!" and the kids flashed grins to us as they rushed by. It was interesting to see how they must have entered the bus in formations, because as they ran, they just formed up perfectly, in the order they exited the bus. As the police moved the barricade back, we thanked them for their service during Carnival, and one officer said bitterly, "Don't thank me -- I wouldn't be here if I didn't have to." (Usually NOPD officers are a little more gracious when thanked at Carnival, but we cut the guy some slack, seeing how wet and miserable he was.)
When the last Oshun float rolled by, we learned that Pygmalion had been cancelled because of the rain, and we went slogged home, where L's spouse cranked up the gas fire logs in their living room. We gathered around with glasses of wine and told Carnival stories til the rain stopped.
We caught a lot of (wet) beads at Oshun, and we believe it was because the krewe members were so glad to have any kind of crowd at all. My sister is right: It was our duty to be there. Carnival is a kind of covenant between the folks on the floats and the folks on the ground. We need each other to be there for Carnival to happen. And last Friday night, in the pouring rain, we both held our end up.
Two parades were scheduled, Oshun and Pygmalion. I knew Oshun from 16-18 years ago, when the African-themed krewe paraded through Mid-City and had marvelous Barth Brothers designed floats that were self-propelled, and not dragged by tractors, as almost all Carnival floats are, but I was not familiar with Pygmalion, which is apparently a krewe from another area of the city that at some point in the past gotten permission to parade the Uptown route. (Those fancy floats from Barth turned out to be gorgeous in theory but duds in practice -- the enclosed area for the driver in front tended to accumulate carbon monoxide. As far as I know, those floats were only used once and then scrapped forever.)
I had previously made plans with my sister L, who lives just off Napoleon near St. Charles, to see the parade together. (I had originally thought Big Man could join us and then head to work on Bourbon Street, but it turned out that he got an earlier gig and had to miss these parades.) So in the steady drizzle, I was driving from my house in the lower Lower Garden District to my sister's, and I was concerned that I had not left my house early enough to make the start of the parade, so I dialed my sister on my cell. She answered her phone by saying bluntly, "Are you bailing?"
I was outraged. "Bailing? Bailing? How can you ask me that! I'm on my way now to your house -- don't leave without me." She apologized for jumping to unwarranted conclusions, and said she'd wait for me. She also said it was raining pretty hard by her house. I moved my radio dial to a news channel, to check if the parades had been cancelled, but apparently not. I made it to L's house, using back routes to avoid the traffic and barricades on St. Charles Avenue, and the rain had settled to a light but steady drizzle.
Carrying my new purple folding umbrella, purchased just for rainy parade-watching, I entered L's house, where she and her friend R were doing parade preparations -- fixing alcoholic drinks in go-cups. Thus fortified, the 3 of us (L's husband had bailed) walked down Napoleon to the corner of St. Charles -- not our usual parade spot, but with the weather, we did not want to walk as far as our normal parade-viewing place in front of Sophie Gumbel Guild on the corner of Napoleon and Perrier. The parade had just started rolling as we arrived, with the big police van in front making the corner. If you were not from here, you would be surprised to learn that we were not the only ones there -- there was a large less-prepared group under the awning of the still-closed-since-the-Storm Copeland's, other folks with umbrellas, still others with zipped-up hooded parkas. There was also a clump of glum-looking NOPD with rain ponchos over their uniforms.
We took our place at the barricade next to an African-American family, two adult women, several kids. We all congratulated each other on being "real New Orleanians," the kind who come out in the rain for a parade. "It's our duty," L seriously told the group around us, "these krewes can't have a real parade unless we're here. We owe it to them." We all agreed with this -- we were being responsible, accountable New Orleanians, supporting our fellow New Orleanians in the parading krewe, and not crazy, obsessed nutballs standing in the pouring rain to no good purpose.
And it was pouring down rain. Make no mistake -- this was not a mist or a drizzle or intermittent rain, this was a full-fledged downpour. Our hearts went out to King Shango and Queen Oshun in their velvet and taffeta and rhinestone finery; we fervently hoped there were tumble dryers and lots of warm beverages waiting for them at the end of the parade route. As the king rolled by, I remembered the traditional cry of the followers of Shango in the African Yoruba faith, and I hollered, "Shango does not hang!" I do not know if the king heard all of what I said, but he heard his name, and turned towards me and waved his scepter over me in true Carnival style. I waved back.
We felt so sorry for the school marching bands in the parade. They were all wearing rain ponchos or capes, but the rain streaked down their faces. I'm sure they felt miserable, and the $1200 or so that the krewe gave their schools for their participation was surely not enough for how they felt. Oshun's bands were from some of the city's Creole neighborhood schools, and we saw St, Mary's Academy and Xavier Prep, both all girls, both very good and very wet. We shouted encouragement to them as they splashed past us, "Y'all look great! You're so brave! Thanks so much for being here!" Then L, who walked in parades as chaperone in her days as school counselor, began calling kudos to the parents and teachers marching with the bands. "Yay chaperones! Y'all are so fabulous!" earning grateful and appreciative smiles from the sodden grown-ups as they passed by.
Around the middle of the parade, another friend showed up, who we almost didn't recognize, since he was covered head to foot in hunting gear, waterproof overalls and boots, and a camouflage parka with the hood drawn tight. "How much did I miss?" he hollered over the marching band going by, "I couldn't leave my house, because my wife didn't want me to go!" We scoffed at such caution, and explained it, as we do everything we don't like in New Orleans, by saying his wife was not from here.
A band whose bus had gotten caught in traffic finally arrived, and the police in front of us stopped the parade, moved us to the side, and opened the barricades for the young people running from the buses in full uniform, instruments in hand. We hollered to them, "Be careful! Don't run, they're holding the parade for you! So glad you're here!" and the kids flashed grins to us as they rushed by. It was interesting to see how they must have entered the bus in formations, because as they ran, they just formed up perfectly, in the order they exited the bus. As the police moved the barricade back, we thanked them for their service during Carnival, and one officer said bitterly, "Don't thank me -- I wouldn't be here if I didn't have to." (Usually NOPD officers are a little more gracious when thanked at Carnival, but we cut the guy some slack, seeing how wet and miserable he was.)
When the last Oshun float rolled by, we learned that Pygmalion had been cancelled because of the rain, and we went slogged home, where L's spouse cranked up the gas fire logs in their living room. We gathered around with glasses of wine and told Carnival stories til the rain stopped.
We caught a lot of (wet) beads at Oshun, and we believe it was because the krewe members were so glad to have any kind of crowd at all. My sister is right: It was our duty to be there. Carnival is a kind of covenant between the folks on the floats and the folks on the ground. We need each other to be there for Carnival to happen. And last Friday night, in the pouring rain, we both held our end up.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Krewe du Vieux's "Magical Misery Tour"
Last Saturday night was the first parade of Carnival, the raucous and rowdy Krewe du Vieux. (They're bawdy too -- local TV promoted the parade while warning the unwary of the nature of the satire and costuming. Channel 6 went so far as to advise viewers that the parade was not suitable for children. Didn't matter -- there were New Orleanians in attendance with kids in tow. My dad would have done the same.)
In what was both a tremendous coup and a fantastic honor, my spouse Big Man, in town for his first Krewe du Vieux, was asked by a historic brass band (formerly headed by the man who until recently was the city's oldest jazz musician) to march with them. We dutifully headed off Saturday afternoon to the justly-renowned Meyer the Hatter shop (where we were extravagantly greeted by one of the scions of the Meyer hat dynasty) to purchase a traditional white jazz hat for this very purpose.
(I am amazed and thrilled that the very first year we come home to belle NOLA, it turns out that Big Man gets a gig playing 5 nights a week when many musicians are finding it hard to get work, and on top of that, to walk into town and hook up with one of the oldest and most respected brass bands. It must mean that we are both supposed to be here. Just recently, a new musician friend asked Big Man if it had been difficult to get his wife -- meaning ME! -- to move to New Orleans. Big Man didn't get into all our details, he just said drily, "No, not really.")
I attended the parade with two old friends, one of whom was still celebrating his 60th birthday -- which had officially occurred the day before, but this being New Orleans, we had to keep on going with the festivities. This was my first time seeing Krewe du Vieux in 15 years -- since the year I moved away from New Orleans to begin my ministry in Tennessee. In the manner of New Orleans Carnival, some things had changed a lot and some things had not changed at all.
What had not changed was the Krewe's biting and often hilarious satire of current events (usually but not always local in origin), almost always expressed in sexual and/or scatological terms. As I had remembered, there were a lot of heaving bosoms in tight bustiers or corsets (despite the biting wind!), and lots of flailing phallic symbols and stand-ins, as parts of costumes and decorating the floats.
A couple of things had changed -- floats were MUCH more elaborate than I remembered from the past, and many had animation of some kind (moving parts, twirling wheels, blowing bubbles, etc.). Also, the marchers (members and hangers-on of the various subkrewes that make up Krewe du Vieux) had many more throws than in years past. A lot of the throws were themed, and others referenced old-time (long-lost) "classic Carnival." For example, I got 4 pairs of lovely GLASS beads, which, believe you me, I'll be wearing, and not just during Carnival.
The theme throws were well thought out and very funny. The members of Krewe du Jieux (pronounced "jew" of course) were carefully handing out to favored parade-goers handsomely decorated and painted bagels. These were much sought-after, and I managed to get one. On close examination, the trinket turned out to be an actual, real bagel, painted, sequined, jeweled, and glittered. I think I'll have to spray it good with polyurethane or something to preserve it, and keep it from molding. (I remember a Zulu coconut I got one year that not been properly drilled and dried out and after a while it developed a memorable Smell that required me to do something almost unheard-of for a coveted Zulu coconut -- I actually had to THROW IT AWAY!) By the way, Krewe du Jieux is not the only Jewish group in the parade -- there's also Krewe du Mishigas (which means craziness in Yiddish, although it is alternate/bad? spelling), whose theme this year was warding off the evil eye. Their costumes with giant evil eyes on their heads reminded me of our family group costumes (created by my mother) way back in the day with big eyes on our heads to represent One-Eyed, One-Horned, Flying Purple People Eaters.
Krewe du Vieux's theme this year was "Magical Misery Tour" and apparently all the subkrewes were asked to stick, more or less closely, to using Beatle songs. As always, puns were the order of the night and everything pointed back to goings-on in the city. The mostly-absent mayor was lampooned as "Nowhere Man." The Krewe poked the Road Home program with "You Never Give Me My Money" and contractors dumping piles of debris everywhere got "Why Don't We Put It in the Road." The U.S. Congress -- being of so little help to the region after Katrina -- were deemed "Fools on the Hill" (of course). Everyone trying to rebuild their homes and lives got "All We Need Is Cash" as their appropriate theme song. And so on and on, ad hysterium. (Go to http://www.kreweduvieux.org to read all about it yourself. I'd create a link, but I can't seem to get that darn function working right now!)
Senator David Vitter came in for some unrelenting and well-deserved drubbing for his escapades with prostitutes, and there was, almost predictably, a whole group of marchers dressed as the hamburger-chain mascot Wendy, in honor of the local professional gal with Vitter in her address book and speed-dial.
With all the secrecy that traditionally surrounds Carnival preparations and themes and costumes, even in Krewe du Vieux, it seems that at least 4 of the subkrewes had settled on some version of "Sergeant Pepper" as their theme. There was (naturally) "Senator Vitter's Lonely Whore's Club Band" and for former DA Eddie Jordan, who resigned under pressure for firing every single white employee of the DA's office, there was "Sergeant Eddie's Only Honkies Banned." There was also a "Sergeant Pecker's" -- and we all would have been disappointed if there hadn't.
One subkrewe, the Krewe of PAN, touched my heart with their unusual literary theme, an evocation of 19th century New Orleans writer Lafcadio Hearn, using the same quote that I have quoted in 2 recent sermons about recovery in New Orleans, the one that ends, "But it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes than to own the whole state of Ohio." The members wore "sacred seersucker" robes as costumes, and flaunted the "sacred fleur de lis." There were references to the peculiar and beloved New Orleans patois ("your mama an' 'em," ) and celebrations of our Creole and Cajun food, liberally seasoned with the "Holy Trinity" (to "allay'all" outsiders, that's onions, bell pepper, and celery -- vital necessities for our kind of cooking). There was more, lots more, but you get the picture. While PAN did not exactly hew to the Beatles-song theme, they were touching and emotional and true to our beloved, wounded-but-wonderful NOLA.
By moving around the Marigny just a little bit, I managed to see the parade 3 times (two of those times, I broke in to kiss Big Man!), and each time it went by, it got a little crazier, a little more chaotic, a little more, shall we say, enhanced by various substances. Despite the cold weather, a good time was had by all. It was a fitting start to the Carnival season.
In what was both a tremendous coup and a fantastic honor, my spouse Big Man, in town for his first Krewe du Vieux, was asked by a historic brass band (formerly headed by the man who until recently was the city's oldest jazz musician) to march with them. We dutifully headed off Saturday afternoon to the justly-renowned Meyer the Hatter shop (where we were extravagantly greeted by one of the scions of the Meyer hat dynasty) to purchase a traditional white jazz hat for this very purpose.
(I am amazed and thrilled that the very first year we come home to belle NOLA, it turns out that Big Man gets a gig playing 5 nights a week when many musicians are finding it hard to get work, and on top of that, to walk into town and hook up with one of the oldest and most respected brass bands. It must mean that we are both supposed to be here. Just recently, a new musician friend asked Big Man if it had been difficult to get his wife -- meaning ME! -- to move to New Orleans. Big Man didn't get into all our details, he just said drily, "No, not really.")
I attended the parade with two old friends, one of whom was still celebrating his 60th birthday -- which had officially occurred the day before, but this being New Orleans, we had to keep on going with the festivities. This was my first time seeing Krewe du Vieux in 15 years -- since the year I moved away from New Orleans to begin my ministry in Tennessee. In the manner of New Orleans Carnival, some things had changed a lot and some things had not changed at all.
What had not changed was the Krewe's biting and often hilarious satire of current events (usually but not always local in origin), almost always expressed in sexual and/or scatological terms. As I had remembered, there were a lot of heaving bosoms in tight bustiers or corsets (despite the biting wind!), and lots of flailing phallic symbols and stand-ins, as parts of costumes and decorating the floats.
A couple of things had changed -- floats were MUCH more elaborate than I remembered from the past, and many had animation of some kind (moving parts, twirling wheels, blowing bubbles, etc.). Also, the marchers (members and hangers-on of the various subkrewes that make up Krewe du Vieux) had many more throws than in years past. A lot of the throws were themed, and others referenced old-time (long-lost) "classic Carnival." For example, I got 4 pairs of lovely GLASS beads, which, believe you me, I'll be wearing, and not just during Carnival.
The theme throws were well thought out and very funny. The members of Krewe du Jieux (pronounced "jew" of course) were carefully handing out to favored parade-goers handsomely decorated and painted bagels. These were much sought-after, and I managed to get one. On close examination, the trinket turned out to be an actual, real bagel, painted, sequined, jeweled, and glittered. I think I'll have to spray it good with polyurethane or something to preserve it, and keep it from molding. (I remember a Zulu coconut I got one year that not been properly drilled and dried out and after a while it developed a memorable Smell that required me to do something almost unheard-of for a coveted Zulu coconut -- I actually had to THROW IT AWAY!) By the way, Krewe du Jieux is not the only Jewish group in the parade -- there's also Krewe du Mishigas (which means craziness in Yiddish, although it is alternate/bad? spelling), whose theme this year was warding off the evil eye. Their costumes with giant evil eyes on their heads reminded me of our family group costumes (created by my mother) way back in the day with big eyes on our heads to represent One-Eyed, One-Horned, Flying Purple People Eaters.
Krewe du Vieux's theme this year was "Magical Misery Tour" and apparently all the subkrewes were asked to stick, more or less closely, to using Beatle songs. As always, puns were the order of the night and everything pointed back to goings-on in the city. The mostly-absent mayor was lampooned as "Nowhere Man." The Krewe poked the Road Home program with "You Never Give Me My Money" and contractors dumping piles of debris everywhere got "Why Don't We Put It in the Road." The U.S. Congress -- being of so little help to the region after Katrina -- were deemed "Fools on the Hill" (of course). Everyone trying to rebuild their homes and lives got "All We Need Is Cash" as their appropriate theme song. And so on and on, ad hysterium. (Go to http://www.kreweduvieux.org to read all about it yourself. I'd create a link, but I can't seem to get that darn function working right now!)
Senator David Vitter came in for some unrelenting and well-deserved drubbing for his escapades with prostitutes, and there was, almost predictably, a whole group of marchers dressed as the hamburger-chain mascot Wendy, in honor of the local professional gal with Vitter in her address book and speed-dial.
With all the secrecy that traditionally surrounds Carnival preparations and themes and costumes, even in Krewe du Vieux, it seems that at least 4 of the subkrewes had settled on some version of "Sergeant Pepper" as their theme. There was (naturally) "Senator Vitter's Lonely Whore's Club Band" and for former DA Eddie Jordan, who resigned under pressure for firing every single white employee of the DA's office, there was "Sergeant Eddie's Only Honkies Banned." There was also a "Sergeant Pecker's" -- and we all would have been disappointed if there hadn't.
One subkrewe, the Krewe of PAN, touched my heart with their unusual literary theme, an evocation of 19th century New Orleans writer Lafcadio Hearn, using the same quote that I have quoted in 2 recent sermons about recovery in New Orleans, the one that ends, "But it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes than to own the whole state of Ohio." The members wore "sacred seersucker" robes as costumes, and flaunted the "sacred fleur de lis." There were references to the peculiar and beloved New Orleans patois ("your mama an' 'em," ) and celebrations of our Creole and Cajun food, liberally seasoned with the "Holy Trinity" (to "allay'all" outsiders, that's onions, bell pepper, and celery -- vital necessities for our kind of cooking). There was more, lots more, but you get the picture. While PAN did not exactly hew to the Beatles-song theme, they were touching and emotional and true to our beloved, wounded-but-wonderful NOLA.
By moving around the Marigny just a little bit, I managed to see the parade 3 times (two of those times, I broke in to kiss Big Man!), and each time it went by, it got a little crazier, a little more chaotic, a little more, shall we say, enhanced by various substances. Despite the cold weather, a good time was had by all. It was a fitting start to the Carnival season.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
New Year Thoughts
It's January in the Crescent City, and many of the city's deciduous trees, having changed color only last month, are now dropping their orange and yellow leaves. The streets and sidewalks are clogged with leaf litter, swirling in today's brisk wind. (In some areas to the east, tornado warnings are in the forecast.) At the apartment complex being (re)built across the street from my house, workers are laying fresh sod. It is so muggy and warm, I am contemplating turning on the a/c at the house, and I'm sure using it in the car. My hair is frizzed out to the nth degree. Welcome to January in New Orleans.
Adding to my list of "things you only hear in New Orleans," I overheard two women talking at my sister's New Year's Eve Party. One said to the other, "I couldn't believe it! It was awful! I called my brother the day after Christmas and asked for his turkey carcass to make gumbo, and he said HE HAD THROWN IT OUT. Can you imagine?" The other woman sadly shook her head, "It's terrible. Same thing happened to me with my neighbor's carcass -- just threw it out. How are we supposed to make New Year's gumbo like that?" They tsked-tsked together over this complete lack of forethought and consideration for the traditional niceties. I don't know how they ended up making their gumbos, but, being New Orleanians, I know they found a way.
Later that night, I headed to Bourbon Street in order to be with Big Man at midnight -- a custom of ours no matter where his gig is for New Year's. The Quarter was packed, but the out-of-towners celebrating in the French Quarter apparently didn't realize they could have parked in the CBD, for my son's parain and I had no trouble finding a free parking space in all the madness. We made our way past the brand-new, elevated, mobile police station, deployed at the hotspot corner of Canal and Bourbon, and through the partying throngs of Hawaiians and Georgians in town for the Sugar Bowl football game (in terms of physical attractiveness, the former have it all over the latter) and pushed our way into the club where Big Man plays. I've never seen the place so crowded. There was some confusion over exactly when it turned midnight, and so the band played "Auld Lang Syne" twice, Big Man and I kissed, and somewhere in there, 2008 officially began.
We held a Jazz Funeral for 2007 at my church, and we laid to rest all the cares and stress of this past year. Fear, anger, worry, grief, pain, rage, despair, bitterness, alcohol and drugs as a way of coping -- everything was put into the casket and symbolically buried, and we second-lined around and through the ruined and not-yet rebuilt church complex. Let us start the new year with open hearts and clean slates. Let us deal with what we have to deal with, and leave the rest to God. What else can we do?
Cautious optimism is the order of the day, and it is how we start this year.
Adding to my list of "things you only hear in New Orleans," I overheard two women talking at my sister's New Year's Eve Party. One said to the other, "I couldn't believe it! It was awful! I called my brother the day after Christmas and asked for his turkey carcass to make gumbo, and he said HE HAD THROWN IT OUT. Can you imagine?" The other woman sadly shook her head, "It's terrible. Same thing happened to me with my neighbor's carcass -- just threw it out. How are we supposed to make New Year's gumbo like that?" They tsked-tsked together over this complete lack of forethought and consideration for the traditional niceties. I don't know how they ended up making their gumbos, but, being New Orleanians, I know they found a way.
Later that night, I headed to Bourbon Street in order to be with Big Man at midnight -- a custom of ours no matter where his gig is for New Year's. The Quarter was packed, but the out-of-towners celebrating in the French Quarter apparently didn't realize they could have parked in the CBD, for my son's parain and I had no trouble finding a free parking space in all the madness. We made our way past the brand-new, elevated, mobile police station, deployed at the hotspot corner of Canal and Bourbon, and through the partying throngs of Hawaiians and Georgians in town for the Sugar Bowl football game (in terms of physical attractiveness, the former have it all over the latter) and pushed our way into the club where Big Man plays. I've never seen the place so crowded. There was some confusion over exactly when it turned midnight, and so the band played "Auld Lang Syne" twice, Big Man and I kissed, and somewhere in there, 2008 officially began.
We held a Jazz Funeral for 2007 at my church, and we laid to rest all the cares and stress of this past year. Fear, anger, worry, grief, pain, rage, despair, bitterness, alcohol and drugs as a way of coping -- everything was put into the casket and symbolically buried, and we second-lined around and through the ruined and not-yet rebuilt church complex. Let us start the new year with open hearts and clean slates. Let us deal with what we have to deal with, and leave the rest to God. What else can we do?
Cautious optimism is the order of the day, and it is how we start this year.
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