What? Westbank, what?

I'm doing my part to make up for the local media's shitty coverage of the massive flooding that occurred on the Westbank yesterday. Terrytown*** seems to have gotten whacked hardest. These are shots taken on my parents' street in Terrytown.***





(Above) From my parents' front door. Moms really stepped up to fill the void left by all the news crews "on location" at the Jazz Fest (beer tent).






umm, NO, I'm not cheating and re-posting from an old blog. You're probably just thinking of this.


***(To answer thousands of eastbankers: Terrytown is basically Gretna, but legally part of unincorporated Jeffersion Parish. It borders Algiers and is closer to the CBD than most of eastbank. Please, take as much time as you need to for the shock to subside, especially the ones who've ever waited until the cheaper night long distance rates kicked in before calling someone on the Westbank).

TPMtv: McCain Can't Quit John Hagee

For some strange reason, Sean Hannity didn't tell me about this whole McCain-Hagee scandal! I came across it on other blogs. The number of comparisons and contrasts that could be made to the Obama-Wright affair could very well blow a thinking person's brain circuitry.

Unless of course, you are able to exercise white privilege and deem all this race and unfair treatment hoopla irrelevant or just another Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton race-card-playing production. You could even go the extra mile like this self-proclaimed conservative blogger and come up with all kinds of creative "facts" for why McCain's association with Rev. Hagee is TOOOOOOOOOTALLY and fundamentally different than Obama's association with his pastor Rev. Wright.

I'm Baaaaack???

I hope this is the re-beginning of some sort of more regular posting behavior. There's no fantastical story behind my hiatus. The end of 2007 introduced personal and professional upheaval and blogging fell by the wayside. I don't know about you, but for me, it's really easy to fall into a pattern of not doing something once I stop doing it, especially when the not doing is accompanied by major depressive episodes and other various neuro-chemical imbalances -- oh, and by living somewhere where legions of both the powerful (i.e., politicians) and the common-folk (i.e., the seemingly omnipresent segment of local folks hell bent on showing their ass and lauding their ignorance) make me just want to say: "fuck it. Whatever it is; just fuck it."

I know I'm about 3 weeks behind the curve in terms of acknowledging the sudden, heartwrenching passing of local blogger Dr. Ashley Morris. What can I say that hasn't been said already? I talked to him twice in person and many times via email or blog comments, but it only took those couple of personal encounters -- and our shared trauma of living in Chicago immediately post-K -- to endear me to the guy to such a point that hearing the news sent me into a state of grief stricken shock. New Orleans has truly lost one of our strongest links in the chain keeping this battered boat anchored and afloat. In some strange way, I feel that jumpstarting this operation back up would honor Ashley in some small way. I almost feel as if I owe it to him.

Now, Ashley might rightly assert that I don't owe him shit, which is also true; but this tragedy was a bitter reminder that I may not have much time for spinning my wheels or sitting on the sideline thinking I can put whatever off just a couple of more days; or that it's no big deal to pass on staying involved in my community.