come on, baby, let the river roll on

Waiting for a pizza from Fleur de Lis Friday night. I am not that guy at the window. I am the one wearing a damp towel wrapped around damper swim trunks behind the camera.


This red glowing sign says "TELEPHONE TAKEOUT." It differentiates this window from the one where golden era Baton Rogeans ordered their pizzas by telegraph.


The blue says "AIR CONDITIONED"; the red, "ROMAN."


Then on Saturday, a thing got moved in a house and a sweet, dumb dog was totally confused.


Church barbecue was acquired for lunch. I got the "meat plate."


Maya made a catfish and cheesy spaghetti sandwich and offered me a bite. Thank you, indeed.


Then onto the OA block party thing in the 9th Ward with Little Freddie King


and the ubiquitous Rebirth Brass Band. The fact that Rebirth is the band that shows up everywhere reminds me of what a special place this all is.


The light was gorgeous down there after the rain. The party was to celebrate the release of Dave Anderson's One Block, a photo essay about 5 years of this corner since Katrina. I saw a pit bull, lovingly featured in the book, knock a  little kid down to take his hot dog and then cavort in the mud. The most commonly uttered remark from among my crew and myself and those with whom I spoke was that five years and one week ago, we would have never stepped foot in this part of the 9th Ward, such was the neighborhood's reputation. We're awesome about things sometimes.


Like I said, the light was unreal.

Unpictured: The karaoke breakdown at the Kingpin. I will never hear "Purple Rain" or "Shout" from The Blues Brothers the same way again

Also unpictured: the amazing tacos from the Taceaux Loceaux truck (@TLNola)


Among the simpler pleasures of Sunday at home, there was a hummingbird


and then it was gone.

This was all done while Cotton Jones, Tall Hours in the Glowstream purred its slow jams from the prom of the Angels. It hasn't quite torn me apart like Paranoid Cocoon did last week, but it has a rip going. There's this one song whose chorus goes "come on, baby, let the river roll on" which is the general tack I'm talking with this Katrinavale Disasterversary. Here was my take at the time. Obama lost points on his NOLA (y'know, it was never widely called NOLA, written or spoken, before The Storm) visit by still kicking around the phrase "natural disaster" in regards to it, but gained points with a poboy stop at Parkway Bakery. If he wanted to do it right, he'd've made his feel-good speech to the brave people of NOLA with a conspicuous roast beef jus stain on his American tie.

I also read a lot of Gert Jonke's The Distant Sound this weekend, and I'm kinda ready to get through with it. It's good, and a third of the thing is pointlessly dogeared with "oh this part!"'s but man, Eastern Europeans sure are all bound up about trains and circus magic = escape from tyranny. After a girl walks a tightrope strung through a train car, takes it down and than walks the memory of a tightrope, this is observed:

But it is as if Daniele has been swallowed up by a suitcase again. The director is right, you think, one day she may climb up through the air on the rope ladder of her imagination, all the way to the trembling flashing weather intersections on the shores of the atmosphere.

Speaking of part, this morning I'm listening to the new Arvo Pärt, Cantique, via NPR Music, and his is a gorgeousness so simplified and serene and distilled that you figure it is probably there in the background of everything all the time if you'd just listen.

Twice I typed wondow instead of window and I like the sound of wondow (window + wonder) but it is really too corny to use.