<![CDATA[I may not be as artsy as some of my neighbors, but I’m not averse to snapping a few phonecam pics now and then. Here’s a few shots of New Orleans quietly getting her groove back:

 

One of the worst things about living in New Orleans these days is that our usually green city is now various shades of brown: brown from the water-level lines that stretch across distinctly un-level house fronts; brown from dust and caked-on mud; and brown from dead/dying plants that couldn’t handle the flood’s standing water or that perished in the subsequent drought with no one around to water them.

The upside of that last part is that all those needy, whiny, pansy-ass plants I’ve spent years struggling to keep alive: they’re all dead now. The only stuff that’s still around is the hardy crap you just can’t kill: ferns, philodendron, nandina, crape myrtle, buttloads of irises, and my personal favorite, sweet olive. In fact, some plants seems to have thrived: the angel’s trumpet pictured above has grown from a few spindly twigs to take over most of my patio. (Don’t worry, Jackie: I’m not makin’ any cocktails with it.) If I just dig up the dead stuff, I’ll be well on my way to a garden I can totally ignore.

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She’s been here for years, this lady. I don’t remember her name. She’s a performer on Royal Street, and she’s remarkably untalented. She’s got a gimmick, though: she dresses up like a 19th century floosie, sets up a Casio, and hammers out what sounds to be barrelhouse blues. She sings a little, too, in a growling kinda music hall way, but she only knows about every third word to any given song–not that they’re real songs she sings, mind you. She’s kinda mental, so she’s probably just playing what she hears in her head…. Anyway, the point is that she’s got the look and the sound down, even if she doesn’t really know what she’s doing. There’s a blind clarinettist on Royal who pulls the same schtick: he can’t play a real jazz tune to save his life, but he can squeal the high notes like Pete Fountain, so he gets a good sympathy tip from tourists. Anyway, I guess it’s working for the pianolady, ’cause she’s still here and still fat.

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On my way to grab some coffee the other day, I looked up and saw an almost completely intact One Shell Square–not too shabby for a building that’s rumored to be cased in highly unstable shalestone that allegedly erodes in heavy rain and is allegedly prone to come tumbling to earth during high winds….