The Blog That Has Been "Secretly Banned" By The Chinese Government

Well, it's a Tuesday morning and the time when the crews go through and spray down the whole French Quarter, seeing who is asleep and who is dead, type of thing.

I'll bet that if I was at the Lilly Pad, about 3 blocks ahead of these 3 guys, playing "FM," by Steely Dan, at least one of these guys would throw a couple bucks in my basket, perhaps sensing in me a desperation, that is driving me to play at 9:11 in the morning, as if I had squandered all my money the previous evening, and was unable to even start my day (i.e. buy my first beer) before making some more.

When I lived under the wharf, I was in a better position to do things like that, and can remember playing at such hours, and having five dollar bills thrown to me by one of the very few people out walking.

My theory was; they were out walking in the morning, even though they were on vacation and at liberty to sleep in, because they were working class people whose habit was to be at their job sites by 6:30 each weekday morning. 

They would become restless, sitting around the hotel room, and would decide to at least walk down to a store, or something, to expend some energy. They might see a kindred spirit in a guy who is busking so early. The busker would certainly stand out, in the morning light, on a street that is void of other people and trash, and is glistening from having just been sprayed down.

There are a lot of things they might think, with almost all of them favoring the busker. Maybe he just got into town and hopped off a train flat broke and doesn't want to wait until the crowds pick up in the afternoon, in order to eat or drink.

I really miss the busking adventures I used to go on, like the time I went to Baton Rouge on the 5 dollar Hotard bus -a special service that was started in order to bring more workers into New Orleans by making it a cinch to come here from the capital city, which was then only an hour and 5 dollars away.

When it got slow here in August of 2011, I took the 5 dollar bus up there and would play at certain spots where the LSU students, of which there were a good number, even though it was out of semester, would be at the various clubs on weekend nights, and then in the downtown area on weekends.

I explored different playing spots using cities I was familiar with as the model. There was a part of Baton Rouge which was like a sister to the Mandarin area of Jacksonville, a place where I was able to prosper as a busker. 

It was the "Bluebell" part of the city and was the same 25 minute bus ride out of the downtown area as Mandarin was, and it had a similar Barnes and Noble and a twin Starbucks along with other clones of businesses. The same types of cars were in the parking lots, and the same types of houses sat in the surrounding neighborhoods. There was a library a lot nicer than the one downtown, etc.

I was able to sleep behind the library in a lush grassy area, plug in my laptop and use the library's wi-fi, and then in the mornings sit in front of the Barnes and Noble just as I had done in Jacksonville. The acoustics were the same because the architecture was, and people wearing the same kind of clothing as the ones in Jacksonville would come and throw the same amounts of money in my basket.

There were places where the homeless could get a shower, and a meal (which I skipped in favor of stuff I bought from a health food store, one of which was never hard to find). Someone might conjecture that this lifestyle was merely one of survival and that there is no future in it; but if the busker does his homework, he could put together an agenda, revolving around things like festivals and concert tours, along with finding the best busking spots in any given city based upon what the good ones were in the previous city.

I've often considered following a band like Widespread Panic around the country, stopping in maybe 72 different cities and then busking nearby the venue, to play for people coming and going. Your band may vary, depending upon what style of music you play. But, sitting on the side of a sidewalk right down the street from the Amphitheater in St. Augustine and making a quick 128 bucks off of the people who had just gotten let out of a Widespread Panic show, is what gave me the idea that I might have been able to follow them from city to city and do the same thing. I could go by bus, and arrive a day early in order to scope out a sidewalk just like the one in St. Augustine.

Then, in the off days, before busing off to the next city, I could locate the equivalent of the Mandarin area of Jacksonville, and find the Barnes and Noble and might wind up being able to bank at least a couple hundred bucks a week, while living pretty well.

I can see myself in the middle of a rainstorm in Broken Arrow, Nebraska, warm and dry in a tent, with an extension cord running to the power outlet of the library in the Mandarin-like suburb of that city, blogging and watching Youtube off the libraries wi-fi.

Then, after the skies clear, going to busk in a spot that I know will be good based upon its twin spot in Mandarin having been good, and at night, finding a steakhouse/sports bar type place where the patrons have to step outside to smoke, and playing about 30 feet down the sidewalk of the place when they do so.

Perhaps next year, when I turn 60, I will be able to get whatever Social Security benefits that are set aside for people my age every month, and that would give me a safety net kind of thing. I could tour the country, returning to Sacred Heart at least once every six months, in order to keep the apartment.

These are the things I'm thinking about, now that I am 22 days sober, give or take a day -I'll have to check my records.

Now to practice "FM," by Steely Dan and then watch Jeopardy in 15 minutes...