So.

Three years ago today, I lost my home, my job, my salary, my workplace, and everything I owned.

Though I was luckier than some...like the ones I knew who died.

Anyway, let's just hope this go round is better.

Overheard, 7:30 a.m.

"Hey, you know Tanisha* up in the hospital, right? She got hit last night at the party by that bullet."
"Oh yeah, I heard about that."
"Yeah, and Denise**, she got grazed in the top of her right leg."
"Yeah, I know."

"And did you see that dress Alicia had on? I mean, what was with that bow!?"
"Girl I don't even know."


(** former student
*fellow student)

The path of true love is never smooth...

From today's Craigslist's Missed Connections:

Corner Pocket - 25 (French Quarter)

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Reply to: pers-814327822@craigslist.org [m4m]
Date: 2008-08-26, 4:53PM CDT

A few weeks ago you were dancing on the bar and I tipped you $20. Had a call on my cell had to leave in a hurry came back late you were gone not many people there. They called you Josh from what I understand. Be back in two weeks and hope to stop in. Please email me if you can.

Location: French Quarter

I just woke up...

from a dream in which I found myself with hair like this:



All I could do was to stroke it, much as she seemed wont to do in photos.
Not much else I remember about the dream, but really would anything else matter?
Then I woke up.
Sucks.

"get confused"

Fischerspooner.



I found this tonight on Fabulon.
I like this better than most of their recent work. I love the flutes.

Trivia: I once touched Casey Spooner's (very nice, actually) ass.
It was encased in spandex. The concert was, I think, one of the best I've ever been to.

Trivia: I heard Fischerspooner earlier today at UAL (a high end TJ Maxx). I was trying on European sizes after having eaten a Chik-Fil-a sandwich, waffle fries and a chocolate milkshake.
I was insane.

The two hipster sales girls were debating whose song was playing.
They couldn't place it. I let them know. They were cute.

"I'm going to go to Subway, to get something," says hipster girl #1.

"To eat?" asks hipster girl # 2.

"Yeah"
"You're going to eat!?" hipster girl # 2 asks, incredulously.
"Yeah, I know." hipster girl #1 says with resignation.

does this count as incest?

I guess now that those communist spoil sports have outlawed cockfighting, people around here have to find something to do.
Read it here

Three details:
1.not once, but twice
2.Avondale.
3.Sissy?

"Holiday"

Tonight, in honor of her 50th, Dennis and I made a walk down to one of the several Madonna birthday parties at the bars. We didn't stay long once someone interrupted the groove with Britney. The best part was the 6'4" or so cross between Gene Anthony Ray and Magic Johnson in cootchie cutters. Dennis thought he was in costume, a la "Truth or Dare," but I see him dressed like that all the time. The glimpse of my seventy something ex-landlord escorting his twenty-something boyfriend back to the car was the most excitement of the night, sadly. I guess it could have looked almost like something from the "Deeper and Deeper" video...if you squinted hard enough.
Anyway, after that, we ended up at the Camellia Grill and had bacon and grilled cheese sandwiches and chocolate cream pie at midnight, just like Madonna did I'm sure.

more unsolicited reviews of movies I've recently seen

I saw "Brideshead Revisted" a few weeks ago, and was surprised that it was not as awful as I expected it to be. I'd read the reviews. Of course the miniseries was formative to my adolescence. How else do you think a 15 year old begins a love affair with regency furniture and gets a subscription to Connoisseur for Christmas? If only I could have gotten my hair to be half as floppy as theirs my life would have been totally different.

Anyway, the Brideshead snobs have poo poo-ed the film, but it really wasn't that bad. I know they've "butchered" the book and all that, but Matthew Goode is perfectly beautiful to look at.
That ought to count for something, right?

In fact that was worth the ticket right there, for two hours getting to look at him and his puppy dog eyes.
But, well, I don't know that he's very good as an actor. I've admired Ben Whishaw since "Perfume," a movie which I am probably the only person at least in this state to have seen. He is, even the detractors would agree, the best part of the film. He's even better than Anthony Andrews was in the miniseries, I think. And, despite what I've read, I thought Emma Thompson was good. I liked that they used Castle Howard for Brideshead too. All in all, I enjoyed it.

I also took myself to see "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" today, and also kind of liked it.

I'd heard Penelope Cruz was good in it, and I guess she is.
But actually I liked Rebecca Hall (Vicky) even more, or maybe I just related to her character more.

Scarlett Johanson seems to be channelling Woody Allen again, like she did in "Scoop." There is was almost cute, almost...here it's just irritating. In fact, the dialogue is really stilted. Only when it's in Spanish does any of the dialogue sound remotely natural. Another good thing about the film is that fellow westbanker Patricia Clarkson makes an appearance, but she's not given much to do. And of course, Javier Bardem is hot. No need to explain that. Oh, and in looking for nude pictures of him online doing research, I noticed that he was born in the Canary Islands, just like my maternal ancestors! Something to chat about before we have sex.
Anyway, the main thing the film does is makes me want to go to Spain. Good God, it's beautiful there.

cherchez...

I don't remember much of my tenth year of life. I don't remember most of my classmates' names. I barely remember my teachers.

I do, however, remember about five minutes of an early evening in the fall.

I was walking down the darkened hall, hurrying to the safety of my bedroom.
The radio in the room next to mine was turned on. Passing the doorway, I heard a peculiar, tinny voice. I stopped.
It was this song:



I was hypnotized. I sat down in front of the radio, and drifted off to some other world for those few minutes. I got up and didn't know what to do. No one announced the name of the song. It was gone. No matter how often I listened to the radio, I never heard it again. There was no one to tell about this discovery. I wouldn't have known what to say even if there had been.

The song was stuck in the back of my head, however.

Sometime, about eight years ago, I found out the artist's name (Dr. Buzzards Original Savannah Band), and in the intervening years I've found out more about them. I've found a couple of interesting articles about them, like this one. I learned how some of the members eventually split off to become Kid Creole. I've listened to some of Cory Daye's own music. I've discovered that a number of artists, like M.I.A. Ghostface Killah, Miss Kittin, Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, were somehow or another influenced.

When, thanks to the internet, I found the song again, I remember being surprised. It was not nearly as "different" as I remembered it being.

If I'm honest, I didn't really even like it any more.

The other night, however, I found this video and bookmarked it. Since then I've kept replaying it.
It's a glimpse of a lost world, maybe several lost worlds...nostalgia built upon nostalgia built on more nostalgia.
I think I've finally grown to love the song for real now, where I once just had a childish infatuation.

This afternoon, while browsing the stacks

of new books at our local public library, I saw this:



Somehow I think a bad idea, all the way around.

where to put the candle?

Just a bit more art from Cake Wrecks

Louisiana olympics

Oh no! I see we have only one day left to enjoy part of my fair state's cultural heritage.

Maybe I should host an event here.

I'll bring the Popeyes.

where is my beautiful wife?

I found this rather disturbing article here.
I will give these ladies one thing. They are more stylish than those Texan polygamist wives.

-----------------------------------------

Most of us just grumble, but some women have taken radical action to escape what they see as the soulless grind of modern life. Meet the 'Time Warp Wives', who believe that life, especially marriage, was far more straightforward in the Thirties, Forties and Fifties.


"Debbie Cleulow, 34. Debbie says: When I see a girl walking down the street wearing next to nothing, I think: 'Why don't you have more respect for yourself?' Other women may laugh at my determination to make my home perfect for my husband, Martin, but I enjoy spending my leisure time baking cakes and sewing
I really believe that women today have lost their way, with bingedrinking ladettes and children as young as 11 going out in tiny tops. The age of innocence has been lost and it is such a shame. My idol is Ava Gardner and when I watch her films - as I do all the time - I think that so much has been lost from today's society. I've made my home a shrine to the Forties, and I only ever wear clothes from that decade. Other people may laugh at me, but I really don't care. I think I have a far happier marriage than many other people I meet, because we have strict demarcations in our roles. I do all the cleaning, ironing, washing and cooking, and Martin puts up shelves and looks after the car. He's the breadwinner and I create a lovely - and loving - environment for him. "




"Joanne Massey, 35, lives in a recreation of a 1950s home in Stafford with her husband Kevin, 42, who works as a graphics application designer. Joanne is a housewife. She says:

'I love nothing better than fastening my pinny round my waist and baking a cake for Kevin in my 1950s kitchen. I put on some lovely Frank Sinatra music and am completely lost in my own little fantasy world. In our marriage, I am very much a lady and Kevin is the breadwinner and my protector. We've been married for 13 years and we're extremely happy because we both know our roles. There is none of the battling for equality that I see in so many marriages today. What's wrong with wanting to be adored and spoiled? If I see a hat I like, I say 'Oh, we can't afford that' and Kevin says: 'You have it, I'll treat you.' I don't even put petrol in our Ford Anglia car, which is 43 years old, because I think that is so unladylike. I ask Kevin to do it. I make sure our home is immaculate, there is dinner on the table, and I look pretty to welcome my husband home.'"


Be even more disturbed here.

wwjd

The other day at the library, I checked this book out.


It's all downhill after the title.

Really, I picked it up to see if there was a listing in the index for "staunch cousins"

or "racoons"

but no such luck.

I did ,however, glean these choice nuggets:

"Get a Brazilian? Certainly not. Although she was fastidious and understood the need to tend to things down there, she didn't believe that body rituals should be subject to trends."

"Get a hair weave? You bet she would!"

how not to date

So life is not all gay Iraqis.
(And quel dommage too.)


Here's the most recent responder to my ad.
(I know I'm going to hell for this, but I can't help it. I'm trying to make a point here, people)

Honestly, it isn't the wheelchair, or, well, those eyes.
It isn't even the (all too typical) lack of conversational skills.











No. It was this picture.



Posing on a bearskin rug after puberty is a disability I cannot deal with.
Sorry.

overheard

"Listen, does Margaret know where those briefs are? I have a deposition at 3."

Guy loudly on cellphone, loosening his tie, aggressively making a beeline to the Barnes and Noble men's room...
a heavy copy of Taschen's The New Erotic Photography
under his right arm.

From the frontlines

When I get depressed, I often find myself placing or answering personal ads.

Hey, some people cut themselves, I choose a more self destructive route.
What can I say.
Anyway, a few weeks ago, I put up an ad. (The men here in the entire state of LA were uniformly disgusting, by the way, no surprise.)
But internationally, well, more interesting.

A week ago, I saw that someone had left me a message. It read:

"Hey, handsome. You are very handsome man!"

I clicked on the link and here were his pictures:






His name is "Zosi" and he lives in Iraq. Because I'm intrigued, and because, well, he's cuter than anyone in this state, I wrote back. I asked (what I assumed) anyone would write. I thanked him and asked him about how things were over there, how was it to be gay in Iraq.

Here was his reply:


"oh man am so open minded baby - all is ok here and life is pretty good"

Whew, I'm glad that's settled. I mean it's good to know things are swinging out there.
"Mission accomplished" as W said.

fun with frosting

From one of my new favorite websites,Cake Wrecks

Seven things

I took myself today on a little trip downtown.
Here (in chronological and geographical order) are a few of the sights I saw:

1.An elderly Hare Krishna monk, in white robes walking under the oaks.
2.A dead middle aged male body on the sidewalk, surrounded by efficient and calm police and EMS.
3.A living middle aged hooker, chatting with her pimp outside of a motel. Even more surreally cliche, she was dressed much like Donna here (albeit in basic black, and sadly without those glasses):

More sadly still, she seemed to be about the same age as Donna.
4.A guy in a rumbled suit, stumbling out of a bar, a stream of orange vomit stumbling out of his mouth, nearly hitting my shoes.
5.Four separate groups of French tourists. Ironic, but the French quarter seems infested with the French. Why would they come here, I can't imagine.
6.The most beautiful 7 foot tall young man I've ever seen.
7.An AIDS patient being patiently wheeled into the bar by his nurse.

just a moment of beauty

from The Sartorialist

overheard

"Hey, wait, how you spell 'Los Angeles'?"

Our eighth grade English teacher (with a masters in Education, btw)
in the middle of the seminar.