Noteworthy in Nola

Okay, so Gustav and Ike have both moved on, and while we keep our eye on the tropics and Texas in our minds, I want to pass something along that Charlie wrote in the 24 hours following Gustav.

Link: St. Louis Beacon

I forgot to post what happened when I returned to the French Quarter Friday afternoon. It was miserable, raining. A perfect sort of day for a mysterious adventure with a Voodoo Priest.

Sure enough, John was there, and still snuffling, although from bronchitis, not mourning.

So he showed me where the new voodoo dolls were, and I picked through to find the colors we’d sold out of, waiting for whatever special thing he had prepared for me.

But he didn’t say anything, and I was trying to decide whether or not to mention it when he said, “I told you I’d do something special for you…”

And he gave me a discount.

A little practical voodoo, if you will.

courtesy of John T.

Eugene the recently-deceased-happens to be one of the reasons John’s still in one piece after Katrina. He’d stayed behind to watch over the museum and his exotic pets, but when it became obvious things were going to hell he and a neighbor got in the car to get out of town.

The flood waters were just subsiding. There was no order, no food, no water. It was hot as hell. People were desperate to get the hell out of there.

The Quarter rats know about Doctor John and steer clear, but apparently other neighborhoods didn’t get the memo.

When they started to their way toward the bridge a big group of armed guys tried to carjack them… and then they saw 20 feet, 200lbs of snake in the back seat.

It turns out a large snake trumps a gun. Good to know.

…Voodoo Museum, that is.

I had to go down to the Quarter this morning to replenish stock from the Museum. Much to my surprise, Voodoo Priest John T was personally in residence.

He’s an older man, quiet until he takes your measure, but happy to share after he’s decided you’re okay. Intense. He’s that rare sort of person that you know is really looking at you. Slightly unsettling in a kindly way…I can’t imagine they have many shoplifters.

So I’m picking out the gris-gris bags we’re low on and he says, “You know I just lost my baby too.”

Oh…no. I knew he was talking about Eugene, his Burmese python- 20+ feet long, better than 200 lbs and John’s friend and security system (Eugene roamed the upstairs free and unfettered), although I don’t think he was used in rituals.

But it was the ‘too’ part I was curious about. (see here & here)I haven’t seen John in at least 6 months since he’s usually too busy to be tending the shop, but I guess one must accept these things when talking to a Voodoo Priest and psychic.

So we talked about our poor lost pets and got the sniffles. As I was getting ready to go, he told me to take one of the items inside a lined bowl on the shelf. “It’s the strongest juju there is,” he said. “I guarantee you put that on your dashboard and you won’t have anybody else touch your car or you, either.”

Need I say I didn’t mention our car theft? Coincidence? Likely…but then again…

At any rate, I’d have to say I agree that it would tend to deter thieves:

Yes, that would be a dried chicken foot, tied with yarn and a skull bead, blessed and whatall by John. “You come back here on Friday,” he said, cocking an eyebrow my way. “You’ve been having a hard time. I’m gonna have something for you on Friday.”

Here’s the thing- I don’t really believe in this stuff…but I’m superstitious enough that I’m not throwing it out.

And, obviously, I’m going to be there on Friday, too.

[EDIT- All further inappropriate beads will be on the other blog: Life in the Land of Dreamy Dreams ]

This is a question I got from a customer a few weeks ago… and a few weeks before that, and before that ad nauseum.

We made a conscious choice way back when to be ‘tit and toke free’- no nakedy type beads, no drug beads.

Not ’cause we’re prudish, ya’ll understand, but because:

• a) I hate the sterotype that you’ve gotta whip off yer shirt down here and
• b) I’m not interested in policing the ages on the site, especially since so much of our stuff is kidbait.

Plus, we sell lots of bead packs of random stuff, and I’d hate to have some 6 year old open the box and say, “Mommy, what’s this??”

But people do ask, and when we’re sourcing, we often find the most wretched things. We’ve started a little collection of these things and decided to share ‘em. So here’s the first in a series we’re calling Inappropriate products. We’re starting off going easy on you- I suppose you could almost say these are marginal, but…classy, classy, classy.

[techtags: Mardi Gras, New Orleans, beads]

Doing some research today for the new Voodoo section of the store, I came across this description of a particular gris gris from www.themystica.com:

Another favorite gris-gris of gamblers was made of chamois, a piece of red flannel, a shark’s tooth, pine-tree sap, and dove’s blood. The dove’s blood and sap were mixed together, and this mixture was used to write the amount that the gambler wished to win on the chamois, which was wrapped in the red flannel with the shark’s tooth between the two layers, all of which was sewn together with cat’s hair.

You took this bit of lovely, sticky, smelly goop and stuck it in your left shoe, then hobbled off to your gambling venue of choice, where, I suppose, you won because everyone folded their cards just to get the hell away from you.

Gris gris (meaning grey/grey- neither black nor white magic) are small packets that have a combination of herbs, stones and suchlike to bring about the outcome you’d like- there can never be more than 13 items, and there must be an odd number. The ones we carry are a lot more pleasant to carry than the one described above:

So over the weekend, I somehow spent a lot of time organizing computer stuff. Thousands of photos, for instance, in random files. If I opened the “My Pictures” file, there was about a 50/50 chance the computer would just crash. Clearly, it was time to do something.

But this started a hunt. Although I had thousands of photos, not all of them were the right photos. Where, for instance, were the photos from the European vacation I took with my daughter in 2002? Can’t find ‘em. How about Rome? Totally absent. And, for someone who’s always taking shots as I go along, it just seems like I should have MORE.

Some of this is the print/digital divide, of course. Somewhere there’s a box, and I’ll have to ship the negatives off to have them scanned in. So, in attempting to stop hyperventalating, I decided to keep cleaning stuff in the computer, and moved on to the My Docs folder.

Mistake!* Read More…

So after promising to be a good girl, I naturally immediately fall off the wagon. Yep, me and Lindsey Lohan, birds of a feather, flocking…well, okay, not together. In similar flight patterns, how’s that?

But I feel like I haven’t gone anywhere- I’ve been staring at the same interface for days. I was tapped to redo the Irish Channel Neighborhood Association’s website, and after much time and (somewhat less) patience, decided that the WordPress platform would work. Spammers had infiltrated the last site, plus we had one lone member maintaining it, and while she did a great job, keeping up with content was impossible.

But- ug- no good deed goes unpunished. What I thought would be a quick migration has taken 70+ hours. Mailing lists, content, layout, photo taking/editing, blah de blah blah. I even went nuts and played with Flash, which I haven’t done in literally years.

Yeah, I’m a big dork. ANYway…if you’re interested in seeing why I haven’t been doing anything here, it’s cause I’ve been over here instead.

I love that phrase… it’s absolutely perfect for today. We’re finally wrapping up the new website(!), but now that all the high-level stuff’s been decided, it’s the really dull but important details that each have to be tracked down and pummeled into submission.

You know you’re really starting to go crosseyed when you sit and stare at a product photo for 10 minutes solid, mentally riffing on how it came to be. Really- consider: Somebody had to get these two gussied up. Had to decide that that…uh…tan (I guess?) looks good- or even worse, photoshop it in. They took the photos, somebody approved them, they were put on packaging, etc…HOURS of people’s lives went into this.

I really get this way when I see an advertisement with an obvious spelling/grammatical error. I guess it’s more of a judgement call with a photo, but see for yourself:

Granted, they do look like they’re genuinely having a good time, if slightly demented.

Maybe it’s time to knock off for the day…

Okay, we’re coming out of a bunch of craziness now, with Mardi Gras, St. Pat’s and Jazzfest coming to a close.

It’s a time to get caught up, clean up, and chill out. And I’ve been promising myself to write more, and the blog is one way to do that…so I’m gonna get focused and post more all the time.

To keep myself honest, I’m going to make a few changes. I’m gonna pull this out of its current home in a tiny corner of the costume shop and give it its own address- after all, if I’m paying for a domain, well the cheapie in me will make damn sure to make use of it.

Hopefully.

So I’ll also play around and get to know the system better so maybe people can actually find it, etc etc.

Then I’ll just have to go on a diet, start to do that yoga,& become independantly wealthy to have a good start on my New Year’s Resolutions…