work the problem December 31, 2008
Since I’ve been subscribing to Netflix, I’ve developed a new year-end ritual. I google up all the various “Best Movie of the Year” lists and I add them all to my Netflix “Save” list, so they’ll automatically be added to my queue when they are released on DVD. Sometimes I add movies from the “Worst of the Year” lists as well. Sometimes I totally disagree with critics, and the movies everyone hates become the ones that I love.
“Cloverfield” is an example. Most of the reviews I read for “Cloverfield” were pans. I happen to love monster movies, so I watched it anyway. Loved it. Scared the crap out of me. I understand why many critics hated it, but I don’t care.
Recently, on John Swift’s year-end list of the best blog posts, I ran across this sublime post from a blog called “Making Light.” The author uses the events in “Cloverfield” as a lesson in emergency preparedness. Hilarious!
christmas with the boys December 30, 2008
I had a wonderful Christmas, my best in years. My sons, Laurence and Leicester, were here, and my grandson, Jackson. I got to be Santa for Jackson, and what a blast that was. He is four-and-a-half, and a true believer in Santa Claus. He usually puts up a fight before going to bed because he hates to miss anything. On Christmas Eve, however, when his dad said, “time to go to bed, Jackson,” he said, “Okay,” and headed into the bedroom.
Just then, his mother phoned. I called him back to talk to his mom. He talked with her for about a minute and then said, “well, goodbye, mom. I gotta go to bed.”
On Christmas morning, I woke up to his little wide-eyed face saying, “Grandma, you wanna see all the stuff Santa left me?” The delight in his face was infectious.
He loves anything that involves swords, so I decided on a medieval theme for his gifts. Santa brought him a suit of “armor,” complete with sword, cape and feathered helmet. There was an extra sword and shield so he could have someone to sword-fight with. He also got a Playmobil castle with dungeon, drawbridge and shootable cannon. I rounded out the display with some educational toys, to which he paid no attention. I also got him a little percussion set with a drum, tambourine, etc. Laurence said, “that’s going to your mom’s house, son.”
On another note, Leicester has died his hair black. He’s working some sort of Lord Byron vibe right now. He’s on a peregrination around the South at the moment, visiting relatives and friends. I am expecting him back for New Year’s Eve. In the past year, he has worked in an ad agency, acted in theater and written a play, “The Space Between Us.” The highlight of his year was meeting and talking with Edward Albee about play-writing.
Leicester is really a chip off the old block. I used to play around with my hair all the time, back in the day. I remember when I was in the play, “Biloxi Blues,” at Le Petit Theater. There were two women in the cast and we were both blond. The director sheepishly asked me if I would mind dying my hair red. I said, “are you kidding? Love to.” I also had red hair in “Dancing at Lughnasa.” When I played the Evil Queen in “Snow White,” I got tired of washing out the sticky spray-on black hair color after every performance, so I dyed my hair black. Not my best color move, everyone agrees, but I thought I looked just like Maria Callas.
christmas in the sub-tropics December 24, 2008
It feels so wrong to be running the air conditioner on Christmas Eve. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, everyone!
laissez le bon fire brulez December 23, 2008
Good news about the Mid City bonfire. It looks like the New Year’s Eve tradition will continue. I don’t think the city had much choice but to cooperate because the people who live in Mid City are determined to have that bonfire, come hell, high water or the NOPD. It was very squirrely for the city to wait until two weeks before New Year’s Eve to make their announcement. Dealing heavy-handedly with the citizenry has characterized the city’s approach since Katrina. They have busted up a jazz funeral and the Mardi Gras Indians, they up and declared that it was too dangerous for Endymion to take its traditional route and then had to back down, and now they have unilaterally cancelled the Mid City bonfire and had to back down.
Does it occur to the Police Chief, Fire Chief or Mayor that you can pick up the phone and call the people who create these events and negotiate with them? It’s not hard to find out who they are. They are not going to refuse to cooperate with the NOPD or NOFD. Then you wouldn’t have to go through these spasms of periodically issuing decrees that piss off thousands of people, followed by meetings where people tell you off to your face, followed by you changing your mind and working with the people to improve public safety at our traditional events, like you should have done in the first place. It’s just a suggestion.
I was thinking about the first time I went to the bonfire, almost 20 years ago. Some friends took me over there, I hadn’t known anything about it before. We parked behind Dibert School. When we walked around the corner at a little past midnight, I could not believe what I was seeing. The fire was huge. People were walking up and throwing in boxes of fireworks. Bottle rockets were shooting out in all directions and people were laughingly dodging them.
My friend said, “it’s like fuckin’ Vietnam!”
I don’t remember anyone being naked, but I didn’t get very close because I didn’t want to wander into the path of a bottle rocket. Also, it was a very cold New Year’s Eve that year, so I don’t think many people were loaded enough to take their clothes off in that kind of weather.
There was a fire truck parked beside Dibert School and, after about 20 minutes, the firemen put out the fire.
I thought it was one of the coolest things I’d ever seen in New Orleans, and I had a great time. I’ve been back since then, but that first time was the best. I haven’t been back since the hurricane.
I have to say, as much as I enjoyed it, those uncontrolled bottle rockets were shockingly dangerous. I would never have brought my kids.
Apparently, they are not going to allow fireworks this year, which I think is a good idea. If you’ve ever torched a Christmas tree, you know that a pile of them will make plenty of fire. Mark Folse is one of the leaders of the Save the Bonfire movement and he says everyone should keep their clothes on. I think that’s a good idea. Naked people don’t bother me as much as bottle rockets, but there will be children there. If the fireworks and the nudity are brought under control, I can’t see any logical reason to cancel the bonfire unless there are high winds that night.
There is no sense in insisting that everything be 100% safe 100% of the time. It’s ludicrous to cancel the bonfire altogether when, every day, we have train-loads of dangerous toxic chemicals that rumble through the middle of town on the way to the port. If one of those cars ruptured, it could kill hundreds of people downwind. That is much more likely than any harm that could come from a bonfire that’s lit up once a year for 20 minutes.
Speaking of bonfires, there is another tradition that I think is a treat. On Christmas Eve, around Lutcher on the River Road, there are dozens of bonfires lit on the top of the levee. You can drive down River Road and see them, or you can park the car and walk up to them. The families that build them every year are very friendly. One year, a family invited us in for gumbo and beer.
the war on women
This is the weirdest thing. The Bush administration has gone out of its way to pass a “midnight regulation” called the “right of conscience.” It “protects” doctors, pharmacists and employees of health care providers who refuse to provide services or medications to people if those services or medications conflict with the provider’s moral, ethical or religious beliefs.
Of course, the rule is meant to protect providers and workers who object to abortion and morning-after pills, but it is so sweeping that it opens the door to all kinds of refusals. For instance, a Catholic pharmacist can take it upon himself to decline to fill a woman’s prescription for birth control pills without fear of being fired.
I haven’t read the whole 127-page rule, but how much do you want to bet there is no provision requiring the provider to warn patients that the provider’s conscience will guide their health care rather than the patient’s needs? It’s a bit unfair that the patient has to be undressed on the examining table, or waiting in line with other people at the pharmacy, before they find out that they are morally unacceptable to the nurse or pharmacist. I would much rather know ahead of time and avoid that doctor or pharmacist before being embarrassed and demoralized.
This rule has the worst possible consequences for women, as it’s intended to do, but men could be affected by it too. A clerk in a drug store could refuse to sell a man a box of condoms. A pharmacist could refuse to fill a prescription for Viagra and inform the customer that “it’s morally objectionable to me for an old man like you to be tom-catting around town,” or “if God had wanted you to have a hard-on, He would have given you one.”
When the government does things like this, I always imagine how it might affect me. At my age, a pregnancy would be disastrous on many levels. I would have a much greater chance of having a miscarriage, having a baby with birth defects, and/or not living until the child reaches adulthood. I would almost certainly want an abortion. How would it be if my doctor told me that everything would be fine and I should continue the pregnancy? Is a painful, life threatening, more-than-likely miscarriage better than an abortion under controlled circumstances? Don’t women have enough to worry about without having to worry that their doctor isn’t being straight with them?
I am counting the days until these dangerous hypocrites are out of office.
enough with the poop already
Yesterday I finally went Christmas shopping. I encountered very mild crowds and it wasn’t as horrible as I thought it would be.
In addition to the usual stocks of seasonal merchandise, I noticed something that I find peculiar and a little disturbing. In the candy sections of various stores that I visited, they are selling little plastic animals that are “pooping” brown jelly beans. A lot of little plastic animals pooping brown jelly beans. Apparently they are very popular.
If someone gave me that for Christmas, I would assume the person hated me and was trying to drive me crazy. If I gave someone a plastic animal pooping brown jelly beans for Christmas, it would only be because I hated them and was trying to drive them crazy.
What kind of sick mind would come up with something like that?
For the first time this year, I have also become unfortunately aware of a Catalonian Christmas tradition known as a “caganer.” Caganer means “pooper.” The caganer is a figure that is added to the traditional nativity scene, tucked behind the usual Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus, and who is depicted as squatting with his pants down and, you guessed it, pooping. Yuck!
I believe that some Christmas traditions, like the giving of fruitcakes, deserve to die. The caganer is one of those traditions. The plastic animal pooping brown jelly beans should be stamped out before it catches on. It may be too late already.
i would like it noted that these people are not from the south. December 16, 2008
Idiots in New Jersey name their child after Hitler, then get all shocked when it upsets people. Thanks, mom and dad.
Via Shakesville.
best comment ever on nola.com December 14, 2008
“So long Vince Murdernello. Now you’ll have hell toupee.”
clASS act December 11, 2008
What on earth possessed David Vitter, of all people, to get up on the floor of the United States Senate and bring up the subject of “ass?“
the wily ways of the liberal media
It seems that a lot of people got the same queasy feeling I did upon reading this piece in the New York Times. At first, I thought it was just a particularly tortured piece of journalism. I was struck by this quote:
Beyond the irony of its outcome, Mr. Obama’s unusual decision to inject himself into a statewide issue during the height of his presidential campaign was a reminder that despite his historic ascendancy to the White House, he has never quite escaped the murky and insular world of Illinois politics. It is a world he has long navigated, to the consternation of his critics, by engaging in a kind of realpolitik, Chicago-style, which allowed him to draw strength from his relationships with important players without becoming compromised by their many weaknesses.
The one fact around which this story swirls is that Barack Obama made a telephone call in August to the president of the Illinois state senate urging the legislature to over-ride Blagojevich’s veto of an ethics bill. The bill was passed and it goes into effect January 1. Facing tighter regulations, Blagojevich apparently stepped up his corruption efforts in order to beat the deadline.
Using the word “irony” here only makes sense if Blagojevich and Obama were buddies, and Obama inadvertently laid a trap for his good friend. That does not seem to be the situation, however.
From what is in the complaint, it appears that Blagojevich hated Obama. Obama has been in a position to help Blagojevich advance himself, but he hasn’t done it. I have not seen anything that would lead anyone to believe that Obama and Blagojevich were political allies at all. I suppose we are meant to believe that, because they are both Illinois Democrats, they are necessarily mutual supporters of each other. How long do you have to be a New York Times reporter before you figure out that, many times, people from the same party can’t stand each other?
Also, it was common knowledge that Blagojevich was being investigated. Obama and his people surely knew that the governor was radioactive. How stupid would it be to expose yourself to that? I don’t think Obama is so lofty that he has never horse-traded with another politician, but simple self-preservation would dictate that you don’t touch Rod Blagojevich with a ten-foot pole.
It’s looking now like this insinuating article was the first hint in the mainstream media of a right-wing attempt to connect Barack Obama with Rod Blagojevich. Today I read this in Think Progress. Fox News is now anticipating that Democrats will rush to Blagojevich’s defense. Huh? The latest I’ve heard is that Barack Obama, Harry Reid and every other Democratic lawmaker are calling on Blagojevich to resign. I can’t see any upside to any Democrat supporting this guy, unless he’s your brother-in-law and you want to keep peace in the family.
I think there is only one legitimate question raised here about Obama’s nexus with Rod Blagojevich - did anyone associated with Obama know of specific illegal acts by Blagojevich (like demanding bribes or pay-to-play) and fail to report it to the authorities? I’m not talking about hearing rumors or second-hand stories, only first-hand knowledge would matter. After all, to paraphrase Machiavelli, you don’t strike a governor unless you kill him.
older posts »
