b.rox

Last night I stopped by the Parkway for a sandwich and a glass of wine, on my way to a meeting.
I sat at the bar near a woman who was celebrating her birthday with a cosmopolitan.
We got to talking — pleasant enough to start with. She asked me where I was from. Funny how some [...]

Eric and I are both letting our hair grow because our barbers haven’t come back since the storm.

But I don’t know how long this protest will last. I’m considering shaving my head bald– it’s getting hot. Eric is considering dreadlocks.

I read in the paper last weekend that B-Stupid copped a plea.

In exchange for pleading guilty in federal court Thursday to drug-trafficking and gun crimes and his agreement in state court that he was involved with a friend’s murder, a 22-year-old New Orleans man will face a possible sentence of 25 years instead of life, [...]

It was good to see a letter my neighbor on the editorial page of the Times-Picayune this weekend. (Note: The “Good Neighbor Program” started off as a city ordinance that dictated storm damaged homes must to be gutted and secured one year after Katrina. We are now approaching the two-year mark.)

Not such a Good Neighbor
Sunday, [...]

It seems Ralph Nader is contemplating another run for the White House. I remember when he sought the Green Party’s endorsement in 2004. (He didn’t get it, by the way. I should know, because I was there.) Anyway, back in 2004 his supporters pitched his candidacy as “one last run.” I guess it’s hard to [...]

Last night I had one of those intricate, mind-blowing dreams that seems to go on forever in vivid detail, complete with dreams within the dream. I couldn’t begin to recount the whole thing, which has faded from my memory anyhow, but there’s one compact vignette that was particularly striking. I was lying on our couch [...]

On Thursday, Xy and I went on down to Spanish Plaza, caught the tail end of Dennis Quaid and the Sharks and watched The Big Easy on the big screen. (I wrote about this event in advance, but remember, I am not a marketing tool.) It was fun in a cheesy way. As Chris Martel [...]

We’ll let the minor factual inaccuracies pass in this, the 21st article about our renovation, because Stephanie is such a nice person. But dang, Steph, this is what happens when you make up quotes!

I was interviewed this morning for Falling Together, which is a documentary film about the rebuilding of New Orleans. (At least I think that’s what it is. I can’t keep up with all that’s going on.) We sat on the porch of my neighbor’s abandoned house, and I talked for almost 90 minutes. I didn’t [...]

Hmmm… looks like a certain university is aiming to demolish a whole neighborhood. Well, not quite, but 21 houses.

Housing Conservation District Review Committee
Agenda
10 a.m. June 25, 2007
Room 7E07, 7th Floor, City Hall
NEW BUSINESS:
Gert Town
947 S. Cortez St. – Owner Xavier University has applied to demolish this workman’s cottage to be replaced with a vacant lot.
934 [...]

We just got a “survey” from State Senator Derrick Shepherd. Maybe he’s taking his cues from Senator Murray, who sent us a “survey” back in May. I’m a little surprised by this since we’re not actually in Sen. Shepherd’s district, but what the hell. The man who brought us the Saggy Pants bill is full [...]

Today is the longest day of the year in the Northern hemisphere. It’s also the shortest day on the other side of the equator. For this reason some people favor calling it the Northern Solstice or the June Solstice. After all, it’s not summer in the southern half of the world.
Every year I learn a [...]

I’m not sure why, but there seems to be a real uptick in activity in our area lately. People are renovating flooded properties or demolishing and building anew.

For a while there it seemed that progress had ground to a halt. But now it seems to be lurching forward again. Slowly, slowly to be sure. [...]

If you want to live just around the corner from yours truly, consider this freshly renovated shotgun double in the 3000 block of Bienville. Live on one side, rent out the other! I have no idea what it’s like inside, but the paint job is pretty nice.
It’s listed for $175,000. Call Luke Jones at 504-905-9101.

Or [...]

I like Netflix. They’ve got a nice service that I enjoy and they did right by their customers after Katrina, automatically suspending all subscriptions within the disaster zone.
But by God, I am not promoting this event on Thursday. Dennis Quaid rocks Spanish Plaza, followed by a screening of The Big Easy? I have no clue [...]

It’s been just over a year since Lucy disappeared. Somewhere along the way between then and now our hopes of ever seeing her gradually diminished until finally we have accepted that she is gone forever.
But I still miss her.

I find myself strangely unattached to the many cats in and around our house these days: [...]

On Friday Xy took some of the neighbor kids to the North Shore for a swim at Fontainbleau State Park. But the lake was closed for swimming, and the swimming pool was closed as well. Fortunately she found a water-based attraction, some sort of bizarre playground where the water squirts up from underneath. It might [...]

Did you know you can watch the space shuttle take off from Vero Beach?
We didn’t.
So we just missed it last Friday.

“Hey, I wonder why all those people are gathered on the beach?”
We sure felt stupid.
Speaking of stupid, how about this shuttle mission? The insulating blanket seems to have been improperly buckled down or strapped on [...]

Back in September of 2005, I wondered if Katrina would become an campaign issue in 2008. Now pollster John Zogby says it just might:
73 percent say the U.S is in a serious crisis, according to our recent polling.
This suggests a need to redefine the very nature and structure of U.S. federalism. In our post-Katrina polling, [...]

Upon our return to New Orleans, we had a bit of laundry to do, so I made my way to a nearby laundromat. This place was flooded, but it finally re-opened during our absence. The proprietor was hanging out in front, listening to Earth, Wind & Fire with his dog. I congratulated him on his [...]