Fri Dec 4 930pm
Ruby fruit Jungle 1135 Decatur Street

Hosted by
Spackle McCrackle

Music by...
The Kitty Lynn Band
The Bruisers
The Missing Links
The Swaggers
The Sophisticats
Clockwork Elvis

Burlesque By...
Reverend Spooky LeStrange
Dorian Faust
Kitty Twist
Foxy Flambeaux
Sparrow D'Luxe
Madame Chartreuse

Auction items by
Black Sail Photography
Tattoo-a-gogo
and more!

Six Bands and Six Burlesque Performers plus the comedy of Spackle Mc Crackle for $10 cover! Begins promptly at 930pm.
All proceeds benefit Joannie's medical fund! (last infusion and brain scan before finally being released to go back to work - so the event doubles as a remission celebration!)

The most interesting thing about nicotine withdrawl, with any anxiety based reaction in my experience is the rivers under my arms situation. This is what I tend to think of when I start feeling the adrenaline running down under my arms. Sitting as still as possible at my desk and typing while my body runs a continues fight or fly mechanism, and after enough time, it just sort of builds up in my triceps and I starts to feel this hot white energy coursing through me. And it's the best feeling of all, like being just a second away from an orgasm. of course the worst part is that there's no way to release all that energy without a smoke. So I'm just sittting right here at my desk. And I'm shaking just a little bit. And it's fine.

Humanity disappointes me more every fucking day.

Another day. Angry from the second I arrive. Last night I watched Turtles Forever with Nick and Erin. You should watch is too. Just to let you know.
After that I went to Uptown with Jacquie and the Rocky kids.

About the Uptown and I. Those of you in the know about have heard about "the Night that is not to be spoken of" the one night the Proletariate and I just refuse to speak of around each other. Bar fight, running out on a tab, assualt on an old man, telling cowboy he looked like the kind of guy who'd crawl through a whorehouse to get to a fat boys ass, getting banned, falling in a river. It wasn't a good night. Uptown is the new restaurant that it's that location. Just so you know there is history there.

I've been going there more often now. Under new management and some of the staff from Bridges is there while they're under repairs. Anyway, uptown is really a younger person bar. Twenty-five and under. The drinks are much too expensive, 15 bucks for two gin and tonics; the bar is small and crowded, and the karaoke stage occupies most of the west wall. Really cramping the room and keeping anyone from hearing anyone that's talking near them.

In it's defense, it's one of the few bars, that is totally cut off from the restaurant it's in allowing it to bypass the new anti-smoking law. And while expensive, they are well poured drinks, but this could just be the skill of Drew a very able bartender from Bridges.

Uptown has all the ambience of a sports bar while keeping it loud enough to be a singles bar. The clientel seems to be the hip younger crowd. I'm not sure how much I actually like it, but so far the company is good. Anyway, it's nice to know I once got banned and outlasted the old owners.

Nothing else to report.

So, we ended up in the U.P. longer than we meant to. The trip started off well-- good weather on the way up, enjoyed J.'s family. He gave one of our old digital cameras to the 5-year-old niece and we enjoyed seeing what she took photos of. Had a good time at my mother's place later in the weekend, good food, got to see my brother A. and his wife again, which was nice.

However, on the way home on Sunday, I was driving and hit a deer, just a few miles away from my mom's. We're OK, but the car wasn't driveable as is. The tow company thought they could bang out the metal and get us on the road so we could at least get home and start on insurance and collision repair and everything at home. We were thrilled to be on the road with the car by early Monday afternoon, but...

... then it started overheating and we had no heat in the car about an hour and a half out. We ended up stranded in the middle of BFE and had to call for roadside service. Thank goodness I actually had signal on my cell phone, because that's not guaranteed up there.

We were told it'd be 40 minutes for the tow truck and that the repair place they were towing it to had rental cars (another thing you can't be guaranteed of with these small towns up there!). Well, apparently the tow driver was wrangling with our insurance, and it was more than 2 hours before they showed up, and this is in a car with no heat on a 35-degree day. Finally got a tow, but Jeff had to sit in my lap in the cab of the tow truck for a 20-ish minute drive. Got to the dealership just 10 minutes before they closed, got the paperwork signed with the tow truck and got the rental car agreement signed. As soon as we had a key in hand, it started snowing.

As if we weren't miserable enough, we hit really awful, blowing snow on the Mackinac Bridge and just south of there. J. was completed frazzled and freaked out- it had pretty much been the worst couple of days of our lives, and we were tired and the visibility was terrible. We finally ended up getting a hotel room in Gaylord (about 4 hours north of home) and stayed there Monday night, and drove the rest of the way home yesterday. We spend Tuesday afternoon dealing with insurance, running errands, doing laundry, making calls to workplaces to let people know what was going on, and I actually had some assignments due, so I had to work from home for 5-6 hours as well.

Finally, I think we're pretty much back on track today, but we still have to find out what the adjuster says, what they'll pay for, and when we can (oh joy!) drive back to the UP to get the car when it's fixed.

Not exactly how I wanted to spend my four-day holiday, but at least nobody but the deer is dead.

How was yours?

Still playing catch-up on my LJ friends list. I'm about 200 posts behind, but I'll read and comment soon!

It's a burgeoning x-mas tradition in our household to listen to this:

Do you ever wish you could just step away from everything? That if you just took a few steps back from the concrete nature of reality you could see something true?

Tonight at the Howlin' Wolf , 6:00 - HIV Awarness Music Project
Advance Ticket $15, Door $20
Buy tickets online here.

Featuring:
Trombone Shorty
Kermit Ruffins
Dee-1
Soul Rebels
Rebirth Brass Band
5th Ward Weebie
Wisebird
LBENZ!

The Show will start at 7:00pm and feature a headlining band, top local New Orleans bands and performance groups as openers, short motivational speeches by HIV speakers, on-stage HIV testing (results kept confident), an eco-friendly fashion show featuring donated clothing and jewelry from New Orleans based eco-conscious companies worn by student models, a raffle with donated items including the clothing and jewelry from the fashion show, HIV non-profit organizations and student groups tabling/boothing, a high class VIP lounge fully catered with fine ordeurs and drinks, large festival style art sculptures in main venue area and on-stage, fine art and paintings in VIP lounge, several Elvis look alikes walking around, and roller derby girls selling raffle tickets

The Schedule:

Schedule:

Host - Two Cent

6:00-6:50 Wisebird
7:00-8:00 Kermit Ruffins
8:05-8:45 Jeff & Vida
8:55-10:00 Rebirth Brass Band
10:05-10:20 Fashion Show
10:20-11:20 Trombone Shorty
11:20-11:25 Raffle Drawings
11:25-11:40 Fleur De Tease
11:45-12:45 Soul Rebels
12:40-1:10 Dee-1
1:15-1:40 5th Ward Weebie
1:45-2:10 The Show

There are like no wifi areas in Sydney, I cannot rely on my laptop
I want to use my iPhone for email, text, LJ/FB posts, etc etc...
But I'm so confused about what I can and cannot use
It's so messed up and it's seriously hurting my head

Day 1: I am going to kill the chubby slow witty loud girl. I shall make a mask of her lungs and suck the sweet nicotine from them. Then I shall chew some gum. Gum really helps.

I slept well last night. Funny thing that, it's been a few months since I could say that. Well and more or less sober. I mean does three drinks count? Five if you count the ones with Allison for her birthday...
I felt sober. Wrote as well, which was nice.

My first call which was supposed to be at 11 moved to 1. This means I came in early ignoring my desire for water for no reason.

I'm going to put in my two weeks in a month. Just after my PTO resets. Fuck this place. I want a 150 hour vacation. What is that? Almost a month? I can deal with that.

Please keep in your thoughts and keep in your prayers my friends son Liam. He fell off a balcony and is in the ICU with a fractured skull. Pray for Liam. Pray for his family. Pray for a quick, speedy recovery.

...that a person who cooks is called a "chef-er". So, for instance, when he helped make pizza tonight he and I we both "chef-ers."

It's so cute that I haven't tried to correct him.

Tonight is the first day in weeks that Tenzin hasn't spent several hours in his Jedi costume.

The New Orleans Food Co-op is open (!!!) and selling great, healthful food every Sunday 12-6pm at the Healing Center (2372 St. Claude Avenue - the old Universal Furniture building st St. Roch). All items are bargain priced; many are organic. Foods for sale include fresh, locally grown greens and citrus fruits; bulk dry goods such as red beans, black beans, Louisiana grown brown rice, garbanzo beans, navy beans, TVP (textured vegetable protein, made from soy), split peas, almonds, walnuts, sunflower seeds, raisins, dried mangoes, cocoa, oats, cornmeal, and other items such as rice milk, soy milk, blueberry concentrate and more. Bring your own bags and containers for bulk foods if you can!

In addition to wanting people to come shop, of course, the food co-op also has a huge need for volunteers any time before, during, or after the market on Sundays. We need volunteers to help set-up, clean-up, greet customers, assist customers with weighing bulk foods, talk with customers about recipes and cooking ideas (some shoppers are a bit mystified by the TVP...), check customers out, bring a potluck dish, drink tea or coffee, have fun and so forth.

So, if you would like to volunteer to help out, please stop by the Healing Center at 2372 St. Claude, this Sunday or any Sunday between 12 p.m. and 6 p.m. for more information.

Please come over to shop and hang out awhile, to talk about the future of the food co-op with members, and find out how you can get involved.

Co-op website with current info and announcements:
http://www.nolafoodcoop.org/

New Orleans Food Co-Op Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=56587740141&ref=ts

Please forward this to everyone you know who may be interested.

I sometimes wonder what it is that makes us want to be with other people?

I've been in a good mood the last two days, after a dismal drunken proformance on Saturday. Thanks to Dave and Aimee for the lift home.

I spent yesterday in front of my PS3. Resting. Getting healthy, I guess. ONly smoked two and a half, only had two glasses of bourbon. That counts as healthy in my book.

Tonight, I'll swing in DC for Allison's birthday; tomorrow, drinks with Jaquie and the Rocky kids; Wednesday, I'd very much like it to be cold enough to justify sitting in the house, watching TV and resting. The rest of the week after that will play out however it wishes.

Book discussion:
Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston

Wednesday, Dec. 2, 2009
6:30 – 7:30 p.m.

New Orleans Public Library – Latter Branch, New Orleans, LA


Join Chris Smith of the Southern Food and Beverage Museum for a discussion of the classic novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. The book will be discussed in terms of racial identity, the role of women, the concept of love, and other issues. We'll also discuss the book in terms of its food. Food is important in this book; it sets a time and place, demonstrates how people lived, and we'll explore issues of hunger. This book features scenes in which food moves the plot, illustrates important concepts, and serves as metaphor.

Latter Library
5120 St. Charles Ave.
Uptown New Orleans
596-2625

Last day to smoke in bars... SHit.

The CRU email hack seems to be much ado about nothing except that scientists can be snarky in emails. There has been some ironically predictable display of global warming skeptics being unskeptical of emails cobbled together over several years, and a parameterisation in some IDL code which is attempting to make tree-ring data fit instrumental observation. There is this thing called the divergence problem in dendroclimatology and to make dendroclimatic modelling programs more accurate some 'fudging' is required to fit instrumental records. The CRU of East Anglia University have some additional pertinent comments.

The latest Isocracy Newsletter is now available. It includes a review of Dominique Moisi's "The Geopolitics of Emotion", a campaign against a proposed escalation of 40,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan costing $100 billion USD, a secret copyright treaty and user disconnection in the UK and US, and the development of Isocracy across different social networking sites. I am pleased with how this small group of politically-interested people is developing. Perhaps early next year it can be formalised as an incorporated association in Melbourne, and start it's own public campaign; I was thinking of raising the spectre of free public transport which has received some previous support

A number of my longstanding roleplaying campaigns are coming to an end. My eighteen month Powers & Perils game has reached a point where all needs to be written up is the denouement. My HeroQuest Glorantha game, which has been going for almost three years is in the last couple of months by my estimation, as is my sixteen month RuneQuest Prax game. The short stint I had for Rolemaster Cyradon playtesting is also complete. Hopefully all this will give me some extra time to do some more RPG writing (yes, rather than playing - swings and roundabouts).