The notes below are from my watching the WDSU cam.
My first glimpse of the WDSU cam was of a lady in a red dress with cone tits that had cans of whipped cream inside them which she could dispense! I forget what she called herself. What a great concept!
The WDSU feed looked good! (Quicktime) A little mottled but not bad and a good strong stream, good internet speed.
(What I saw in the order it came in ) The cameraman yelled at people to get out of the way. A menora. Lots of pirates. The cult of landscaping. Lots of Egyptian outfits. People covered w/ cash. A good brass band by the record player float. Single sperm cells on sticks. A smoking gun float. A devil float w/ ex-Mayor Morial's (and other's) pics on the side. A float as Senator Vitter's family values meal (Wendy's parody). A woman who was going as a shit-head said "When life gives you poo, make mushrooms!" Lots of mushrooms. Skeletons. We all live in a Jello-shot machine float (a parody of the Beatles Yellow Submarine). A paper-mache' guy getting an enema on one float. A girl gave the camera some beads and kissed it. (Love is in the air!) A kaos sign. A woman is interviewed. Her group are the LRA (Louisiana Recovery Authority). The theme - "You never give us the money" (spoof of the Beatles song) the theme of the parade this year being the Magical Misery Tour. She said "People are miserable but it is still a great place to be." (God bless her and those trying to make NO come back.). The parade had passed by at this point. They then interviewed a kid. His favorite part of the parade? The penis tank! They interview a couple. They interview a guy named Greg, "The parade was fast cuz it was cold." His favorite part: Spermes, a spoof of Hermes. The WDSU techies talked for awhile.
So, not quite like the Bourbocam but not bad. No constant yakking like the Boubo/Paradecam hosts but they did do some properly journalistic interviews. I am looking forward to the rest!
From a comment he made on another Flickr pic, the photographer, The Voice of Eye says:
"Can't think of any other place I'd rather be... Though I'm sure the playful and provokative adolescence of Krewe du Vieux might put some people off... that's part of what I love about this place. Pushing the boundaries of free speech and having a great time without trying to be something we're not..."
Getting ready for the first parade tonight at 7:30 NY time, The Krewe du Vieux (Doo?), (which apparently will be streamed live on WDSU probably here: http://www.wdsu.com/mardigras/index.html ), I ran across the Krewe Dy Vieux's guide on how to prepare for the parade. A good guide to the behind the scenes of how a Mardi Gras parade is done. How would you corral 900 drunks?
Check out the Brass Bands in this parade!
* Kirk Joseph * Trombone Shorty * Treme Brass Band * Paulin Brothers Brass Band * Stooges Brass Band * Free Agents Brass Band * Hot 8 Brass Band * James "12" Andrews * Da Truth Brass Band * Rebirth Brass Band * Panorama Brass Band * The Jazzmen * Charles Joseph * Down N Dirty Jazz Band * The Soul Rebels * New Birth Brass Band * Bone Tone Brass Band
Most of the best brass bands in NO!
The ball afterwards features: Late Night Trip by Quintron and Miss Pussycat!!
I thought I would document a day in the life of my cat. See the slideshow on YouTube above.
She usually sleeps with me so when I wake up in the morning, she'll be there on the bed. When I wake she'll come over and lie down so that she is connected to me somehow, her back, her butt, whatever. I pet her and she'll purr. She purrs alot.
I get up eventually. Today, like many, she stayed on the bed sleeping. After my shower, she likes to drink some bathtub water. I guess it is fresher than what I have in her water bowl.
I get dressed and shave, then have breakfast. After breakfast I give her her shot of insulin. Lately, the routine is for me to round her up from wherever she is and herd her to the kitchen. Hopefully she will jump up on the table which is amazing and today she did that. I assume she knows it is time for the shot but I don't know if she wants it by jumping up on the table. I am just glad she does it.
She certainly doesn't enjoy the shots. Today, despite "assuming the position" which is the first time I've seen that, she hissed and was mad at me for injecting her. Sometimes she'll lash out and scratch me. I don't enjoy giving her her shot.
After, I give her her pill, Marin, for her liver. That gets put in a Pill Pocket, a WONDERFUL thing that I can't recommend enough. Getting a cat to take a pill is a miracle so something like Pill Pockets which the cat usually likes, is a godsend.
I also fed her some dry food.
After that I go read the paper and check e-mail. She sat on the table, either looking out or asleep.
Later she sacked out on the floor in the main room. I think she is sleeping more than before. Either old age or a possible reaction to the insulin/blood sugar problem. We see the vet this Friday.
(about noon)
I try to interest the cat in trying out the leash since it is a nice day out and maybe she might like to go out. I wouldn't let her our on her own at this point. She complained, hovered by the ground so eventually I took it off. This is the second time I have tried using the leash. Maybe some day she won't mind and we can go outside. No pics of this.
I go outside. It's 70 or so in the sun. I see the cat in the upstairs window.
She returns to the stereo cabinet to look at the birds.
Then she goes to eat again. Then to the kitchen table to smell the fresh air.
3:53 pm
She eats some more then wanders by me in my chair. Then to the bathroom to sniff around. Eventually she ends up on my lap.
I go out. When I come back she is sleeping, curled up on my chair. When I sit down, she leaves and goes to sit in the bathtub, one of favorite places to sit these days. It used to be that that was where she went when she wasn't feeling good. I don't think that is the case now but it could be. (I haven't seen her go into the closet much lately but she has disappeared in this tiny house sometimes and either one of the two closets are where she is likely hiding in. As often as she's been hiding she has been finding a place nearby just to be near me too so that is nice.)
6 pm
Cat has disappeared. I guess she is in one of the closets. Last time I saw her, she was in the bathtub.
She appears around 7. I feed her. Then she moves into the bathroom, jumps up onto the toilet seat, which usually means she wants to look out the window there. I opened the window for her, leaving the storm window down, but she didn't want to jump up onto the windowsill. She has had trouble in the past few months jumping up onto things she used to do easily but this may have been just a case of not wanting to rather than not being able to.
7:40 pm
She's sleeping, Sphinx-like, on the chair now. This has been a favorite spot for awhile.
8:50 pm
Cat eat some more. Now she's sleeping by the corduroy chair.
8:57 pm
Cat leads me around the house. We go to the kitchen. She pokes her head into the cupboard and a closet. To the bathroom. To the front door. She ends up back in the kitchen, eating.
9:30 pm
Has been sleeping on my lap for awhile, snoring slightly. Very cute.
9:50 pm
She's wandering around, looking for something interesting in the same old house she's lived in for 5 years. Now she's resting by the bathroom door.
10:30 pm
She comes over to be petted, ends up sitting in my lap, facing me, purring. She loves to bury her head into my wrist as I pet her so I indulge her often. Her other most favorite thing is to have her tummy scratched. Loves it. She'll direct my hand to her belly and then stare at me as I scratch her. I have never seen a cat do either of these. She does it all the time.
10:56 pm
She gets up to eat again.
11:17 pm
Eating again.
11:23 pm
She poops then runs to the bathroom and elsewhere. She sometimes howls after going to the bathroom (her litterbox) and does so tonight. I don't know why she does this. Often she'll run around the house before she poops. I guess it helps things.
11:30 pm
She sniffs around the front door then sits there. Later, she moves up to the top of the stereo cabinet and goes to sleep.
I get sleepy around then too and end the picture taking.
Parades start on 1/19. I doubt any of them will be webcast by OZ but maybe they'll do a webcam like they have in the past. See the parade schedule at WWOZ or http://www.nola.com/mardigras/
Tom Morgan's Annual Mardi Gras Indian Extravaganza Jan. 29th 11 am - 2 pm New Orleans Time Three hours of Mardi Gras Indian music and history with John Sinclair joining in !
David Kunian's Indian Show Jan. 29th sometime between ten and midnight, New Orleans Time David Kunian will be doing 2 hours of Mardi Gras Indian music with special guests.
I guess OZ will have some live in studio shows/guests too so that should be fun.
I'll do my usual Mardi Gras Day celebration eat and drink-a-thon and be watching and listening as much as possible then as well as catching the parades beforehand on the Paradecam and checking out Bourbon St if it is worthwhile.
Listened to some great live Prince bootleg tunes on Morning Dew on WBAI tonight. Go to the archives at WBAI here: http://archive.wbai.org/ (Only for 2 weeks though) and look up Saturday, 9-11pm,1/5/08.
The sound isn't great, no high end but lots of bass and since it was recorded in the crowd, you hear people all around whoever was recording it. Some great grooves. I taped 90 minutes of the Prince stuff but there was more before and after that.
On the menu: a large shrimp cocktail, some leftover Boston cream pie, a Hormel "Compleats" roast beef and mashed potatos dinner (with "beef like flavor" as an ingredient, I swear to god!), the remains of some not Bailey's but McCormick's Irish Cream. ice tea and eggnog at other times. (Sometimes together. My version of Thai ice tea...) I also have some double-chocolate Milanos but I don't think I'm going to get to them.
Listening to: FMU in the afternoon and evening.
WNYC Listened to Paul Winter's solstice celebration at the Cathedral of St John the Divine. Nice to hear Wolf Eyes again after so long. I remember playing that in the early 80s when I first got that record. Hearing the cicadas sawing and the wolf's cries. Still moves me. And the crowd howls along en masse! Bravo! And then to hear Minuit. Heaven.
Prairie Home Companion is re-running last year's show at the Ryman in Nashville but are playing some good cuts from various shows before that. In particular, Joe Ely's I'm Gonna Live Forever.
WBAI Will listen to Peter Bochan's Short Cut through 2007 at 11. Best line so far: "Hi. I'm Art Buchwald and I just died." (His real obit!) Otherwise, I don't think I'll save any of it. I must be out of touch with things audio. I didn't recognize many of the soundbites.
Watching: Various channels. Later, CNN looking at various New Year's Eves around the world with the sound off, listening to Short Cuts.
And poking around the web.
The ball drops 8 seconds after my computer's clock says it is New Years. Who's right? timeanddate.com says I am...
Note: This show will be rebroadcast January 1st from 6PM - 7PM
An hour-long retrospective of the year--an explosive, emotional mix of the sounds, music and events of the past twelve months, "A Shortcut Through 2007" opens with an introduction by the late sonic pioneer, Karlheinz Stockhausen and ends with a coda from Pakistan's Benazir Bhutto. Blending the concerns over our fragile social and ecological state -- the clash between celebrity and fame at any cost, the perilous drive to succeed in politics, business and sports by any means necessary, with answers to the question-"What will you remember about 2007"
Featuring commentary from Art Buchwald, Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut, Marcel Marceau, Jerry Falwell, Gerald Ford, Woody Allen, Ricky Gervais, Alec Baldwin, Don Imus, Oprah Winfrey, Rev. Al Sharpton, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Brad Pitt, Tony Soprano and family, George W. Bush, Michael C. Hall, Baraka Obama, Joe Torre, George Mitchell, Barry Bonds, Larry King, Roger Clemens, Anna Nicole Smith and many others.
Music from Amy Winehouse, Radiohead, Arcade Fire, Dre Dog, Bruce Springsteen, The Real Tuesday Weld, Peter Bjorn and John, Forro In The Dark (featuring David Byrne), Iron and Wine, The Sandpipers (with Phil Rizzuto, Tommy Henrich, Roy Campanella & Tommy Henrich), Boots Randolph, Boris "Bobby Pickett, Freddie Scott, Oscar Peterson, Ike & Tina Turner, Max Roach, Joe Zawinul(Mercy, Mercy, Mercy), Robert Goulet, Luther Ingram, Dakota Staton
Tributes to Luciano Pavarotti, Lady Bird Johnson, Porter Wagoner, Lee Hazelwood, Hilly Kristal (CBGB), Evel Knievel, Grace Paley, Don Herbert (Mr. Wizard), Ingmar Bergman, Michelangelo Antonioni, Merv Griffin, Tom Snyder, Joey Bishop, Tom Poston, Calvert DeForest (Larry Bud), Charles Nelson Reily, Al Viola, Denny Doherty, Eric Von Schmidt, Teresa Brewer and many more.
Produced by Peter Bochan
Sunday, December 30, 2007
The Mysteries was a series of three plays put on by the National Theater of London which were based on mystery plays like mummers plays.
There is an excerpt of the first one, or perhaps the whole first one, The Nativity, here.
I love ice tea. Drink it all year long. I love egg nog. I wish it was available longer than it is (roughly Thanksgiving to New Year's). I love Thai Ice Tea. I have only had it in restaurants; haven't seen any mix in the stores.
I have discovered that if you pour ice tea into some eggnog, it sort of tastes and looks like Thai Ice Tea. Some eggnogs are spicy which ends up making it a spice tea which I don't like but so far it's been bearable.
My local PBS stations now have HD for the News Hour. I'm getting some bowing with standard definition pictures within the HD picture but a more noticeable effect is that a HD picture will make EVERYTHING look smaller when viewed on a standard definition set.
This will take some getting used to. I'll have to wear my glasses more until I get HD (at least a 16:9 screen set).
(I watch via DirecTV)
1/8/07 The bowing, it turns out, is only my set. My video capture device, an EyeTV 250 Plus, does not show that. That is good to know.
Ovation Network is having a Battle of the Nutcrackers on tv. Their promos are funny, done in the style of professional wrestling, Smackdown!
I've now seen all 4: Matthew Bourne's, George Balanchine's, Mark Morris's Hard Nut and finally the Bloshoi's. I enjoyed each one never having seen any version all the way through before. I thought it was time.
Matthew Bourne's is all kitsch and surreal gay design gone mad. I don't remember much of Balanchine's except that it was more traditional than Bourne's and starred a young (isn't he always young?) Macaulay Culkin. Mark Morris's had both beauty and humor and I think it gets my vote for the contest. The Bolshoi's was entirely traditional, had the music at slower tempos than what I've heard otherwise and had some wonderful dancing. I was impressed also at the crowd interrupting the performance with Bravos and applause whenever they liked what they saw.
Bush should be impeached for so many things. I have asked myself, can we impeach him yet?, so many times.Why isn't it happening?
The Democrats want to leave him in power so voters will have built up so much antipathy towards the Republican party that Democrats will get the votes that would go to Republicans by those who wouldn't vote Democrat unless Hell freezes over. By letting George continue to make the Republicans look so bad, Republicans will turn against the party; Democrats will look good.
Impeachment would cause a backlash against Democrats no matter how well deserved. This way, as long as the country can suffer through this president, voters will be eager to vote for a change, albeit not too big a change, by voting Democratic in '08. The fringe candidates who offer significant change like Ron Paul or Ralph Nader are still too scary for incurious, lazy middle America.
Of course, many will sour on the Democrats for not impeaching but I guess those numbers are lower than the voters the Democrats hope to gain with this strategy. Let's hope the country can survive this guy. It will be a challenge.
As I drove in the driveway today, I saw 16 wild turkey and the 3 deer I'd seen at breakfast! They walked towards my house so I stopped and waited for them. Then, I drove very slowly towards them and they barely moved out of the way. Eventually I parked, getting out right next to them. I'd never been so close before. They have beautiful golden feathers in parts.
I don't see people complaining that people shouldn't be living in Southern California with the fires they're having like they were about people living in New Orleans when Katrina hit.
They are the same thing. People living in an area that has natural threats aggravated by man's shortcomings.
CA - overbuilding in a natural firezone, that has fires EVERY YEAR. NO - flooding brought about by poorly designed and built levees (that has hurricanes every year)
I always wanted to ask when people brought up this argument, should people live in Holland? They live below sea level too. (Of course they should. Like it or not, there they are.)
I've climbed the Grossglockner, the highest mountain in Austria (and by no means hard to do). I have no desire to climb another mountain again, thank you.
