This week in Carnival stuff

• The Royal Sonesta Hotel engages in a famous ritual each year where they prepare for the final weekend of Carnival by greasing the poles supporting their Bourbon Steet balcony. The idea.. or really the joke.. behind the ceremony is that this prevents drunken revelers from shimmying up onto the balcony should the spirit direct them to attempt such a thing. But really, the whole thing is done for laughs.
  
  Meanwhile, our tradition of applying fresh signage each year to the library bookdrop just before the first parade crowds gather may be more practical in its purpose, but it has become a similar ritual by which we welcome the season ourselves.
  
  



• Spent Sunday afternoon at the Thoth den party. Thoth's theme this year is "Streets of New Orleans" Expect to see a lot of this logo next weekend.
  
  



• Meanwhile, Menckles had an opportunity to help decorate a few of this year's Zulu coconuts. This one, she says, is an homage to Varg's work.
  
  



• If you're looking for an alternative to Saturday night's Uptown parades, you might check out the shoebox Krewe of 'tit Rex because, if you're pissing off the Rex organization, you're obviously doing something right.
  
  

  In fall 2011, members of the Rex organization contacted the microkrewe about the use of its registered trade name.
  
    "I was shocked and bemused," Yuslum says. "I almost thought I was being punked."
  
    Some of the 'tit Rex founders met with a lawyer from the Rex organization.
  
    "We tried to amicably resolve our concerns with regards to the copyright issue and their use of the name Rex," says King Logan, a spokesman for Rex.
  
    Both sides describe the meetings and correspondence as friendly, and both say they want to find a mutually agreeable solution, but it is unlikely one will be reached before the tiny krewe parades Saturday. Rex offered to license the use of its name to 'tit Rex, but the krewe rejected the offer. Yaslum says the proposal included an admission of copyright infringement and went on to define the small krewe in ways members deemed restrictive. Logan says the offer proposed various points but a legal agreement was not drafted. The group altered its name by replacing the e with a schwa and offered that to Rex officers as a solution.
  
    "We tried to honor what they wanted and maintain the identity of our parade," Schrenk says.
  
    The proposal has not yet been considered by Rex and won't be until after Mardi Gras, Logan says.
  
    In the meantime, the issue has spilled over into the parade. The 2012 theme is "Napoleon Avenue Complex."
  




• Earlier in the week, NOPD met with representatives of Mardi Gras Indian gangs in an effort to reach a better understanding about how the tribes will be treated on Fat Tuesday.

  Chiefs from both sides left the meeting hopeful but circumspect.
  
  “A seed was dropped. And hopefully we can cultivate that seed and watch it grow,” said Big Chief Tyrone Casby of the Mohawk Hunters tribe. Big Chief Darryl Montana from the Yellow Pocahontas nodded. “I feel like we’re getting there. But only time will tell,” he said.
  
  “I think this awareness will pay dividends,” said NOPD 1st District Commander Bobby Norton. “The task is to get every officer to understand the Indian tradition.”
  
  Norton — whose district includes Indian hubs such as St. Bernard, Claiborne and Orleans avenues — is convinced this year will be a good one for Indians, who travel the streets chanting and drumming while visiting places of honor and engaging in elaborate games of hide-and-seek.
  
  Indians have for years complained that police squad cars often vex them by blaring sirens without reason. “We’ve totally said no to that,” Norton said. “No to lights and sirens. No to pushing Indians off the street.”
  
  And if there’s an issue with a tribe, it won’t be resolved by an officer yelling over his intercom. “Officers will get out of the car and go directly to the chief,” Norton said.

  All of this, we've heard before, of course.



• If you're going to the parades this week, keep an eye out for the O.P. Walker Marching Band. Odds are, they're in whatever parade you're watching.
  
  

  O. Perry Walker is taking on a demanding schedule this year. Six of their nine parades will be back to back, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. In spite of all the physical stress inherent in the activity, one student dreads a decidedly different aspect of marching. “It’s tough not stepping in horsepoop because you can’t really see at night. Then your whole night’s messed up until you find some grass.”




• I'm still not in a... um... festive enough mood to blow $27 on a bottle of novelty flavored vodka. But I'm working on ways to make my own in the meantime.
  
  



• Finally, it's starting to look like the weather is clearing up before Oshun gets set to roll. Driving around today, though, I noticed several trucks and scattered equipment which I am told is the Treme crew filming in front of The Columns hotel on St. Charles. If it's not gone by 5:00, I'm calling Parks and Parkways to see if they'll come haul all that shit to the landfill.

On today's episode of something strange in the bookdrop

It's Emily the Strange which, as best as I can tell, is a marketing icon designed to sell crap to young girls who like to believe that buying specifically themed crap makes them "different" from everybody else who buys crap. Anyway now we have this doll for some reason.

Monday

• We first noted the sinkhole on the corner of Carondelet and Third streets back in July. At the time, I jokingly told Menckles that it will make a fine parade trash and bead receptacle when it's still there come Carnival time. And so here we are less than a month away from parade season and the hole is still waiting a ready.
  
  
  
  It's even got a little starter trash going which will doubtlessly make it a more inviting refuse bin for passers by.
  
  
  
  Right now I'd say it's even money that somebody pees in it.



• On Saturday Night we attended the Pussyfooters' Blush Ball at the Howlin Wolf. The space there much smaller than the old Mardi Gras World location and this definitely makes the room feel more cramped. At one point I was standing about three feet away from Steve Zahn, and yet, somehow didn't jab a plastic fork in his neck. Must have been in a good mood.
  
  
  
  The good news, though, is that the crowd can spill out into the side bar and also the street. All in all it makes for better milling about and socializing than the old set up. At the same time, this also enables one of the worst hazards of events like this. It's gotten to where I can't go out to anything anymore without having to fight through four or five volleys of "Hey you're our librarian". It's only marginally an exaggeration to say that, next to the show Treme, the frequency of these assaults is slowly stifling what remains of my ability to enjoy New Orleans the way I used to.
  
  To begin with, I'm technically not a librarian. There was a time when I, my family, and my co-workers expected that I would eventually go ahead and get the degree but I'm not so sure that's in the cards anymore. As jobs go, this has been by far the most tolerable I've ever had. But after several starts and stops, I'm starting to see that I'm never really going to be able to suffer through the belittling tedium of grad school. Besides that the idea of belonging to a particular club or profession always seems so... I don't know... limiting, in a way that makes me too sad to contemplate. I don't mind doing my job. It's the idea of being my job that implies failed personhood, I think. Plus whenever someone accuses me of being a librarian, it's an implicit insult to the actual degreed librarians I work with or near and who take the title very seriously. This always makes me uncomfortable. It's not fair that people's perception of me should reflect badly on others.
  
  But what I really hate about being recognized at parties by Uptown Mommies is I know what they're doing. They're meticulously counting the "respectable" people and professions they encounter at such events. Sure they're there to wear silly costumes and drink and all, but they're going to make damn sure they're doing these things with the right sort of crowd. From time to time you'll hear such persons remarking to one another about how it was their family's doctor or their neighbor's boss they saw drunk off his ass and dressed as a penis and that's what makes it okay.
  
  Myself, I'm not very big on costumes and not much in need of the pretense of an organized pseudo sorority party to facilitate or validate my idle drinking. But there was a time when I didn't mind showing up at these things anonymously if only to bear further witness to their odiousness. But now, as "our librarian" I'm feeling a little too much like a prop. In a few more months the weekly festivals will start popping up all over town. I get to fewer and fewer of these each year for pretty much the same reason.



• This weekend, there were two second line parades in the neighborhood. I was feeling pretty cranky already (see above) so I didn't see either one of them. I did hear what sounded like six gunshots go off a few short blocks away from the parade, however, and went outside to investigate. According to neighbors and passers by, there was indeed a shooting on Baronne Street. The police came and blocked off the corner of Baronne and Fourth for a while.
  
  
  
  I couldn't find anything about this in the news anywhere. Anyone else see or hear it?
  
  On Sunday, the mayhem continued as a man crashed his motorcycle just outside the apartment on a slick Carondelet Street. He walked... limped away okay but the bike didn't look like it took things so well. At least nobody fell in the sinkhole.



• Finally, this morning's episode of Beer in the Bookdrop was brought to us by Abita Strawberry Harvest Lager. Much to everyone's chagrin, I'm sure, I didn't get a photo. Instead, enjoy this photo of several cases of Abita Strawberry I spotted recently at Breaux Mart.
  
  
  
  By the way, isn't January a bit early for "Stawberry Harvest" lager? I thought strawberries were harvested during the springtime.

Weekend digest

• This morning I emptied the bookdrop and found two diet books, one book on how to pray yourself rich, one success-in-life type biography of a well-known business person, and one book about how "effective people" communicate. I should probably start paying attention to the circulation rates of these sorts of items. If there's a reliable method to gauge the general "unhappiness" of the population during a recession, this would be it.
  
  Also, I'm not sure what this means, but this title was stolen almost as soon as it arrived.
  
  



• On Wednesday, James Gill's column speculated about Gov. PBJ's next career move.

  The secret of Gov. Bobby Jindal's success may be that he can fast-talk his way into a fancy job before he has had quite enough time to be judged a flop in the last one.
  He has held so many prestigious posts in a relatively short career that he must get credit for knowing when to get out of Dodge.

  Gill goes on to suggest that Jindal may not be quite ready to run for President in 2012, but instead may be interested in replacing Michael Steele as RNC Chairman. This morning, NOLA.com points us to yet another possibility.
  
  Catholic bishops say more exorcists are needed
  
  

  Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Ill., who organized the conference, said only a tiny number of U.S. priests have enough training and knowledge to perform an exorcism. Dioceses nationwide have been relying solely on these clergy, who have been overwhelmed with requests to evaluate claims. The Rev. James LeBar, who was the official exorcist of the Archdiocese of New York under the late Cardinal John O'Connor, had faced a similar level of demand, traveling the country in response to the many requests for his expertise.
  
  The rite is performed only rarely. Neal Lozano, a Catholic writer and author of the book "Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance" about combatting evil spirits, said he knows an exorcist in the church who receives about 400 inquiries a year, but determines that out of that number, two or three of the cases require an exorcism.
  
  No one knows why more people seem to be seeking the rite. Paprocki said one reason could be the growing interest among Americans in exploring general spirituality, as opposed to participating in organized religion, which has led more people to dabble in the occult.

  
  
  Talk about your indicators of general unhappiness during a recession, right? More and more Americans are looking to magic for answers. And if that means more and more amateur witches and exorcists seeking office, then that's what it means. Whether or not it means we can still teach science to our children remains to be seen.



• Easy reference question of the day: "I can't get the internet on this computer" Answer: "Double click the blue 'E'"



• Oh and speaking of career opportunities, State Rep. Walker Hines has made quite a turnaround in seeking his.

  State Rep. Walker Hines of New Orleans announced today that he is switching his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican, making the GOP the majority party in a legislative chamber for the first time in modern Louisiana history.

  
  
  A few years ago, Hines invited several local New Orleans bloggers to meet over coffee where he made some statements about his "principles" that are interesting to reflect upon now.




• This one kid came in today chewing on a plastic pen cap. He spent the whole day here and out on the basketball court without discarding it. Just chewed the hell out of it all day long.



• William Jefferson's freezer cash eclipsed by bills in a bra In which T-P reporter Bruce Alpert actually writes, "They didn't explain how she had enough room for so much cash."



• Witness recounts 'pop' that felled Glover In which read the following testimony:

  Calloway also testified Friday about his experience at the police compound, where he said officers beat, insulted and threatened him and two other men as Glover lay dying in the backseat of a car.
  
  "They said this is gonna be the judge and jury right here," Calloway, 39, testified. "They were saying stuff like they were going to cut our tendons ... push us in the river ... they kept saying we were looters, pieces of s---."
  
  Glover's brother, Edward King, grew angry with the officers and said he would find and kill the person who killed his brother.
  
  That's when an officer choked and slapped King, said Calloway, who added that he saw the officer's name tag -- at least "all the way to the little 'm.'" He pronounced the name "Schumacher" in early interviews with the FBI, an apparent reference to defendant Scheuermann.
  
  Calloway recalled Friday seeing an officer with roadway flares in his pocket -- identified by another witness as officer Greg McRae -- drive off in the car containing Glover's body. McRae's attorney has admitted his client drove the car to the levee and set it afire.
  
  Sometime later, the officer who hit King gave them an update, telling them Glover had been shot for looting and that they could get the body from the coroner, Calloway testified. The officer then instructed colleagues to give the men a bottle of water and let them go.
  
  Calloway said he and King ran in a criss-cross pattern from the police compound "because we didn't want to get shot in the back ... I never ran that fast in my life."




• I'm so old I can remember reading Josh Marshall's TPM when it was one years old. And today it is ten. Ten years seems like a long time, especially in internet years, but sometimes even the old internets still seem sort of newish to me.



• Difficult reference question of the day: "When are they gonna fix that water fountain?" Answer: Who knows? A few days ago, I took this picture of the leaking water fountain on the basketball court at Laurence Square.
  
  
  
  About 8 months ago, I took this one.
  
  



• Right now Georgia is trying to give Auburn some trouble which could further screw with the BCS picture. More importantly, it can give LSU a real shot at an SEC title should Alabama, you know, find some motivation later in the schedule when they play Auburn. Les Miles will be grazing on ULM later this evening.



• And finally, speaking of grazing, last night we made chicken enchiladas with a salsa verde, which requires many many tomatillos.
  

And that's all I got. No Saints game tomorrow so I've been scheduled for alternative activities which I sincerely hope are not rained upon.

On today's episode of beer/something untoward in the bookdrop

This morning's winner: A frozen margarita from Superior Grill. Spent most of the morning trying to clean the goo off of the books as best as we could. At the bottom of the bin, we found the lime.

Bingo in the Bookdrop

Last week The New Orleans Bingo Show played a gig at Tipitina's. One of their patrons must have deposited this with us on their way home from the show. Sorry about the crappy phone picture. I actually had my real camera with me but can only upload the phone pic right now.



Previous episodes of "Beer (or other things) in the Bookdrop": Here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and I'm sure elsewhere if you want to search around.

Random Book-related items

• A few years ago (back in the fading pre-flood times) a colleague of mine and I were enduring a particularly heavy day on the circulation desk. During one short moment of quiet where we tried to make up for lost time checking in a large pile of returned items, my partner stopped, took a breath, looked over at me and sighed, "I hate books." Still cracks me up to this day.


• It was also about that time that the daily bookdrop became fodder for a running blog item I used to call "Awful Book of the Morning" I am reminded of that feature due to my recent discovery of the "Awful Library Books" blog.


• Former Saints quarterback Aaron Brooks enjoyed a short career as a Literacy Advocate which he later parlayed into Children's Author. One year, Brooks held a press conference at the (now destroyed) East New Orleans library to announce the start of his "Read to Pass" program. After the event, a discarded page of notes was discovered which had been prepared for Brooks by one of his handlers. It was full of sympathetic words of encouragement along the lines of, "I know you hate this but it's good for your image," and so forth. Copies were made and distributed amongst the staff to keep as souvenirs. His book, Rise Above features a photograph of the back of the head of the colleague of mine who once claimed to "hate books."


• Ray Nagin once gave a short speech to a group of middle-school children whom he applauded for being in the library as opposed to "shooting each other in the head, neck and shoulders." It was interesting that the Mayor chose to specify areas of the body which were not being shot that day.


• Today, while reading the The Gambit blog, I discovered that popular entertainer, and now author, Kanye West is, himself, "not a fan of books."


• In a related matter, recovery expert Veronica White will be signing How to Maximize FEMA Funding After a Natural Disaster tomorrow at Dillard University. Click here for details.

Update: I completely missed this Len Paquarelli column on Brooks who, although out of football, is apparently still participating in his literacy program.

On today's episode of beer something unusual in the bookdrop

Boss came in an hour early today and took care of this herself so I, unfortunately, don't have any pictures. What she found in the bookdrop this morning was one large empty Crown Royal box plus one Crown Royal bottle. The bottle contained a suspicious liquid which I am told was clearly not Crown Royal.

The kicker is, it was just yesterday morning that I repaired the sign which reads, "Please do not throw trash in the bookdrop"

Previous episodes of "Beer in the Bookdrop" here, here, here, and here.

On today's episode of Beer in the Bookdrop

Woodchuck Cider. Red label Amber. Mmmmmm.



Previously on "Beer in the Bookdrop"

Beer in the bookdrop

This morning we were treated to cool Rocky Mountain refreshment with our book return.



Below is the obligatory accompanying photo of the sign begging people not to bestow such gifts upon us.



This has been yet another exciting episode of Beer in the Bookdrop.

Beer in the bookdrop

Over the past.. what.. year and a half or so we've discovered an annoying tendency among persons exiting Ms Mae's late at night to use our book drop as a waste receptacle. This morning, we opened the box to find the now familiar hot-beer aroma heralding the presence of a half-empty bottle of Carona resting between copies of Pizza Pat and Henry and Mudge and the Funny Lunch. This despite the fact that we have taken great pains to plaster signage all over the drop pleading in big black block lettering with passersby not to chuck their trash there. This also despite the fact that the book drop is located within 30 feet of several actual garbage bins. Luckily the books were undamaged but the smell is getting bad in there... although we're getting kind of used to it.

Note to public: In the future, when depositing alcoholic beverages into the library bookdrop, please see to it that these items are fresh and unopened. We can make far better use of these donations than half-empty bottles.. or many used books we get for that matter. We're not picky although we have a slight preference for Abita Wheat which is just coming into season and should be easy to find. Thank you.

Now excuse me while I go get my aura tuned.

Beer in the bookdrop

For the second time in ten days, passing happy revelers have left us a sample of their delights from the previous evening. Last week's incident was unsurprising what with the library being so near the Carnival festivities. But this (random Tuesday) morning, our newspaper once again bears the distinctive scent of Abita Turbodog. It is doubtful that this will improve Rose's column but we'll give it a chance.