I woke up at the sign spot with $14.13 in my pocket. I must have made about 20 bucks last night, at the Barnaby spot, but half of that came from one pair of guys from Illinois.
One of them was a luthier and gave me his card.
He was initially drawn to my guitar, understandably, and admired the repair-work which is evident from looking at the back of the neck. I could disguise it by staining the wood and varnishing it; but it is on the back of the neck; and plus, cosmetics aren't that important to me and plus, I'm lazy...
Another guy sat and listened to me rip through "I Feel Fine," by The Beatles; threw me a couple dollars and set a glass of whiskey beside me which was only diluted by a couple wedges of lime.
I found so much food sitting atop a trash can in a white plastic bag that I left a couple of the Styrofoam containers (the ones with the fried food) for some other person; probably a skeezer or other ne'er do well...
The $14.13 in my pocket is a reflection of the fact that I didn't have to buy hardly any alcohol nor food, but only splurged on a pack of cigarettes. I will sell as many as I can for 25 cents each (a 33% markup) and then busk as much as possible through the weekend.
Monday In Motion
I have targeted Monday as the day to hop out of here on the train.
This will be after having washed whatever clothes I will be taking, charging my phones (for photography and communications purposes), checking to see if my laptop is still under the dock and hiding it better if it still is; and then...
 |
| A skeezer similar to the one I fought; fighting |
| in the same alley while another skeezer fights off |
| a skeezer who is trying to jump in to help |
| the second skeezer, while skeezers and a pigeon watch... |
Off to Oliver Yard to talk to conductors about which trains are going where...
Monday, my food stamp card will be injected with 200 dollars, making starvation less likely, and hopefully I will have new strings on the guitar...
20 dollars was a decent take for last night (a Thursday) I realised after talking to other musicians and one who is a magician also (he will make his pick disappear and then find it in your hair; play a ditty; and then make it disappear and then open his case to reveal that the pick had gotten in there and was now inside an envelope...
Avoiding The Trap
The only thing that could sabotage me would be either having a dismal weekend and actually winding up with less than $14.13 by Monday; or falling prey to uncontrolled, alcohol fuelled spending...if people give me free drinks and I drink them and then make poor spending decisions.
It's sounding like it really IS hard to stay sober in NOLA. Frankly, I can see the lure of the free drinks. I mean, who's gonna leave 'em? Yuppie vacationing types who've had all their shots, use their Sonicare religeously, and probably have cleaner mouths than a dog. And besides, alcohol's supposed to kill germs.
ReplyDeleteI dunno what you do ... because in a certain bummy but carefree way, NOLA's pretty easy living. You can live off of hand-outs and leftovers, use your food stamp card to buy cold sodas and sell 'em for a buck or something, etc. In fact, it's a "thing" that a homeless person will get a place to live, paying rent by spending their EBT for food for their landlord, then begging, scrounging etc for their own food. I have mixed feelings about this, like, What kind of Dickensien hellhole is the US becoming? And, Hey that's pretty slick, there's plenty of food around, and thanks to the Dept. of Agrigulture, one more homeless person is off the street.