Please sir, can I have some more?

"All his patients want a second dose of the drug." No shit. This lady even started wearing Keith Richards' eye liner. I believe that the Psychedelic Experience is the perfect thing for terminal patients. I'm also a big fan of the LSD Hangover Cure, but only a couple of times a week. Please watch this:

Please wake me up before I start screaming…

I voted for Mitch Landrieu. My belief was that he would be a fairly straight shooter, perhaps a little clerkish, but a guy we could trust. His record of bringing entertainment dollars and tourism to Louisiana spoke to the artist & musician in me, I admit. I had high hopes, Mitch. High hopes, indeed. Above all, I really wanted to believe that he would take serious steps towards cleaning up our mired NOPD. The T-P reports today that Ronal Serpas is one of the finalists for Police Superintendent of the City of New Orleans. Please, somebody, pinch me and wake me up, before I start screaming uncontrollably. Not only does Serpas’ family have alleged ties to the Landrieus (both families are New Orleanian for generations, so it stands to reason), but Ronal Serpas is Ex-NOPD. He also has been seriously accused of maintaining the ‘blue line’ in his tenure as Chief of Police in Nashville, going so far as claims that he hid or altered evidence and coached officers to perjure themselves, in a case where white officers are accused of mistreating minority children at a 2007 Fraternal Order of Police Youth Camp for Less Fortunate Children. Maybe the Landrieu & Serpas families only met at a Bar-B-Q once or twice. Maybe Mitch isn’t just reaching out to the Good Ole Boy Network of People He Knows Will Do As They’re Told. Maybe the accusations are entirely false and an entire family spent everything they had on nonsense, just to make Ronal Serpas look bad. As the First Big Thing that Mitch does, and possibly The Most Important Thing that happens as he takes office, the mere cloud of such obvious impropriety is enough to make me gag. Even Ray Nagin didn’t make such obvious gaffs in public trust for the first few months. So I haven’t woken up yet. And I feel a scream coming on. And even if this guy isn’t our next police chief, I’m done. I voted for you once, Mitch. You won’t get another chance from me. You’ve already lost my confidence, and it’s too dear to trust to this kind of bullshit anymore. The ride is broken, and no matter how far your hands are inside the roller coaster car, it’s going the wrong way already. I want my money back. And the Federal Government taking over our crooked fucking NOPD.

We're a HIT!

Due to the success of last night’s premiere of ‘Treme‘ on HBO, Tour buses have been scheduled for regular routing. The first one to arrive in the Marigny, however, was stopped in the first block by a rapidly forming brass, drum & fiddle corps, breaking into song as the Tour Bus ground to a halt. A pair of two story bicyclists then snatched the driver out of the bus and dragged the driver into a nearby bar. He was last seen naked, asleep on the pool table. The passengers all left by United Cab, (only five passengers per cab, please) paying the full airport fare in cash up front. The Tour Bus remains, and may now be home to as many as three families, but it’s impossible to tell. The entire bus is covered in glitter and feather boas. More on this as the story breaks….

Living in the Moment

I was floored by Loki’s last post. Like being lacquered to to a dark, dank floor, from which nothing good will ever come. It felt like the bottom. Of everything. But sometimes the view from there gives us perspective. The only way to look is up. The only way to go is out, into another direction, in search of something true and real, something that one can clasp ones hands around and feel strength, a solid ground upon which to step from the rolling sea of bad news that has plagued New Orleans in recent times, more than ever. It’s a Beautiful Sunday Afternoon today. Following directly on the heels of A Beautiful Saturday & Friday Afternoon. It’s French Quarter Festival in full swing. I’ve just come from Cap’n Sal’s on St Claude with too many pounds of crawfish, not too small to eat or too hard to peel, perfect in every way. John Boutte is singing live on the radio. The windows are open and voices murmur from the street, thick with excitement on their way to the Music On The Levee, or languid with fulfillment on their way back. My brushes and tools seem to float around in my hands like some Disney Cartoon, magically knowing my secret desires and bringing them to life out of the flotsam of street scores. My heart, however blind to the horrors that jump from news papers and computer screens, is full of life today. Forgive me that, if you can. Just this once. I am acutely aware, in this very moment, that I live in The Best Place In The World. Because rabid conversation will soon turn to the vast nuances of What’s To Eat Next. Because the Music On The Levee today will continuously waft through from The Local Radio Station. Because art will be made from nothing. And because tonight, a National Premier on HBO will attempt to show the world our perspective on Life. Of course, no matter how close they get, nothing compares to living here. Nothing. Josh Cohen, of Morning 40 Federation, once announced with great pride that he’d fallen madly in love with a drunken old whore, the City of New Orleans. Whatever you call her or think of her, she’s seen better days, and worse. Beaten, robbed, exploited, held at ransom and very nearly drowned, she’s been through quite a bit these last three hundred or so years. But here she stays. And so do we. And behind the wounds and scars, under the tawdry costumes and torn bits of last nights finery, she has often made that walk of shame, heading home in the broad day light, no excuse for living too large, too fast, too hungry. Nor should their be one. There is Glory here. There is the Moment. There is the music coming from the river, the smell of something wonderful cooking, the cloying air and the soft sound of paint spreading from brush to surface. There are people talking, laughing and walking hand in hand, or riding ancient bicycles, to and from The Festival. It’s a beautiful Sunday Afternoon in that City by the River, another one in a line of them going back almost three centuries. Things are changing here. I hope for the better. They’ve can’t be much worse. They always change, however, as much as they always stay the same. We dance and sing, we raise glasses to the fallen and the lost, we share our tastes in art, music, & food. We live. And we go on. We are, all of us here, part of her now. Not forever, as she is, but only for a short time. Our lives are like The Moment to her. And in the Moment, we find ourselves. Individual, strong, resourceful and sometimes quite mad. But we know the Truth she knows. This will pass, like the water of the Mississippi does our city, everyday. What comes next is up to us. Whatever it is, it’s gonna be better. And we’ll go on. Like the endless story of the City of New Orleans, the Best Place in the World. Love you, girl. Yes I do. Lord David Skull Club New Orleans