my own drum

Place: New Orleans
Time: February 2007

Mardi Gras is underway in the city that was New Orleans. If you want to skip through all the rest of this, I found a slide show of some of this years events including Satyricon, Krewe of Cork, Barkus and Shangri-LA. The link is at the end of this article.

Mardi Gras isn't what has drawn me to New Orleans, however. What has drawn my attention is the general tone of the mainstream media, where good news is still rare in the ongoing tragedy that is New Orleans. Today I read a New York Times article about one young couple who had decided to pack up and move, this after returning from their Katrina evacuation. The young husband said that he bought his first house in November, and his first gun in December. Crime is very much a serious problem in the city, and the police department still has more than a few wrinkles to iron out. Add that on top of the devastation, from Katrina and again from a recent round of tornado strikes. Add that on top of high rents, soaring insurance premiums, and what is perceived by many a lack of leadership ability, money and progress.

Poppy Z. Brite, a New Orleans novelist, wrote: "This isn’t an easy place to be right now..."

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