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.