Flat Tuesday, Continued
Fat Tuesday was forecast, by a random woman whom I passed along a parade route Monday night, to be "cold and wet."
The rain started falling not long after she had said that and continued to fall into Fat Tuesday morning, and then Fat Tuesday afternoon.
The "good news" was that the temperature was predicted to (actually) rise overnight.
The bad news was that it would only rise into the low 40's.
I was under the dock for most of the day, wrapped up and reading and writing and otherwise killing time.
I knew that I should check out Fat Tuesday evening, just out of the general principle that it is the culmination of the carnival, and that something good has a good chance of happening.
36 Dollars For Almost Nothing
I came out at 6 p.m., during a lull in the light rainfall.
I first walked to Sydneys, feeling my fingers stinging slightly and my feet a bit cold along the way.
I bought a Heineken Dark for $2.25, splurging for Fat Tuesday and because I had woken up with about 66 bucks on me.
I doubted that I would be able to busk any, unless the "warming up over night" had been grossly understated.
A walk to the Lilly spot, featuring a gust of frigid air which hit me as I rounded the corner to it, sealed the deal:
"I'm postponed tonight, due to weather," I said to Barnaby.
He and his lady friend were sitting on his stoop, drinking gin and having a cigarette.
He went inside and produced a bottle of beer. "Here you go, happy Mardi Gras. Here's a better beer than the one you're drinking!"
I apprised him of the fact that I was actually drinking Heineken dark.
He handed me a bottle of Brooklyn Lager, which, close on the heels of the Heineken, failed to wow me, but which was in the same ilk.
"I grew up right down the street from the brewery," said Barnabys lady friend, who is from Brooklyn.
I walked along, a man of distinction drinking Brooklyn Lager and was soon at the corner of Bourbon and Saint Phillip streets when a young man with a crew cut, seeing my guitar out of its case, asked "Are you going to play?"
This lead to a discussion about playing guitars in cold weather, followed by a demonstration by myself of how limited my picking was, having to hold the pick in my fist instead of fingers, etc.
They (as his buddy was there) wound up giving me 33 dollars...out of time
Laundry Quandry
Yesterday was Wednesday, Ash Wednesday; and the day the Mardi Gras ended abruptly at midnight.
I woke up to the sounds of the Natchez crew, who seemed very busy; though the boat was not to launch that rainy and foggy morning.
The rain started falling not long after she had said that and continued to fall into Fat Tuesday morning, and then Fat Tuesday afternoon.
The "good news" was that the temperature was predicted to (actually) rise overnight.
The bad news was that it would only rise into the low 40's.
I was under the dock for most of the day, wrapped up and reading and writing and otherwise killing time.
I knew that I should check out Fat Tuesday evening, just out of the general principle that it is the culmination of the carnival, and that something good has a good chance of happening.
36 Dollars For Almost Nothing
I came out at 6 p.m., during a lull in the light rainfall.
I first walked to Sydneys, feeling my fingers stinging slightly and my feet a bit cold along the way.
I bought a Heineken Dark for $2.25, splurging for Fat Tuesday and because I had woken up with about 66 bucks on me.
I doubted that I would be able to busk any, unless the "warming up over night" had been grossly understated.
A walk to the Lilly spot, featuring a gust of frigid air which hit me as I rounded the corner to it, sealed the deal:
"I'm postponed tonight, due to weather," I said to Barnaby.
He and his lady friend were sitting on his stoop, drinking gin and having a cigarette.
He went inside and produced a bottle of beer. "Here you go, happy Mardi Gras. Here's a better beer than the one you're drinking!"
I apprised him of the fact that I was actually drinking Heineken dark.
He handed me a bottle of Brooklyn Lager, which, close on the heels of the Heineken, failed to wow me, but which was in the same ilk.
"I grew up right down the street from the brewery," said Barnabys lady friend, who is from Brooklyn.
I walked along, a man of distinction drinking Brooklyn Lager and was soon at the corner of Bourbon and Saint Phillip streets when a young man with a crew cut, seeing my guitar out of its case, asked "Are you going to play?"
This lead to a discussion about playing guitars in cold weather, followed by a demonstration by myself of how limited my picking was, having to hold the pick in my fist instead of fingers, etc.
They (as his buddy was there) wound up giving me 33 dollars...out of time
Laundry Quandry
Yesterday was Wednesday, Ash Wednesday; and the day the Mardi Gras ended abruptly at midnight.
I woke up to the sounds of the Natchez crew, who seemed very busy; though the boat was not to launch that rainy and foggy morning.
Man, you're doing really well, honestly. It's your determination to live as a skeezer, (from the sound of it) smelling like hobo sweat and weeks-old meals, frowning, nappy-haired, that keeps you on the street. You could easily find a place to live, even an "industrial" space to (low key) live in like I do, and do music studio stuff.
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