that picture - of the final float in the krewe of muses parade - says it all for me in terms of why we, the people of new orleans, continue to observe mardi gras even now.

here are some more images from my past week, which has been, aside from the regular work of, you know, work, pretty carnival-centric: going to parades and getting ready, gathering my costume gear, etc., in preparation for these next few days of revelry. conscious revelry.

spinderella's not a fella, but a girl dj

worms

last saturday, the kids and I went out to the sun done garden in gentilly to learn about bioremediation with starhawk and the pagan cluster & common ground folks. the worm bins were wonderful, but what the kids really dug was the fire pit.






and then we rode the bus, streetcar & ferry home...


so that we could walk our dogs and get ourselves ready to enjoy krewe du vieux in the cold. which is when my camera battery gave out. but there are beautiful krewe du vieux photos all over the web, just search.

happy birthday to alice

this is why I get the writer's almanac in my email every day. because I get a lot out of being reminded of people like alice walker:

It's the birthday of the novelist Alice Walker, born in Eatonton, Georgia (1944). She grew up the youngest of eight children. She went to Sarah Lawrence College and then took a trip to Africa. When she got back to college she was pregnant and seriously considering suicide. She began writing dozens of poems over the course of a week, barely eating or sleeping, and she shoved all the poems under the door of her poetry teacher, Muriel Rukeyser. Rukeyser showed the poems to her agent and they were eventually published as Alice Walker's first book, Once (1968).

Her first big success was The Color Purple (1982), which spent more than twenty-five weeks on The New York Times best-seller list and went on to win both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Walker was the first black woman ever to receive the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

and folks criticize Ms. magazine, and rightly so, I mean, everything is deserving of criticism, right, but there will always be a special place in my heart for that publication. when I was a kid I always grabbed it first out of the mail stack to read the latest of the Stories for Free Children (and my all time favorite is the one about the mom trying to quit smoking while the daughter is trying to quit thumbsucking); and teenage me always grabbed it first out of the mail stack to read short fiction, by the likes of alice walker and margaret atwood.

anyway.

good morning.

the streets are paved with diamonds and there's just so much to see...

I've been away. and then back, but very busy getting caught up with work on account of being away, and now I'm about to be away again.

I went to western massachusetts:








and then new york city:







I'm sorry, how much is the chili cheese dog again? three signs are not enough for me!

calendars now



that's the cover image.

here's how to order: send $12 a piece plus $2 for mailing costs to
coleen murphy
PO box 741655
new orleans, LA
70174
or via paypal to coleen at bust dot com

here's when to order: now. the calendars will hit the postal system on thursday, december 29.

happy winter solstice

festivus

we went to "the holiday sale for the rest of us" over a week ago. this is roughly what our experience there looked like.

sunday morning blues

you know, it heals a little and then it gets ripped open and is raw and it hurts and I get angry at everyone, I want everyone to drop whatever they had planned and change their lives because that's what we've had to do. and when I say I want that I'm talking about an emotional response, I'm just emoting all over the place.

nash has this sore throat, his voice is gone right now, but no fever. 40% chance of strep the clinic doctor said. and to me, the herbalist wanted to know, do you have a tendency to swallow a lot of your feelings? and I feel like saying, ask someone else. I don't seem to know myself in that regard. I think I'm putting it all out there, all the time, but then folks often end up mystified.

I just ate some udon noodles in peanut sauce made from the grit recipe except for the ingredients I was missing (sesame oil, green onions) and with the addition of broccoli and I really like it. the kids hate it. this evening I'm going to try to make african peanut stew a la rowe camp. and cookies, loads of cookies. it's time.

words aren't working for me

my weekend in pictures, thursday morning to sunday night.

evil now, scary now

the only bad thing about being deluged with packages from all of y'all well wishers while we were waiting things out in Natchitoches is that the volume of stuff was so huge that I wasn't able to keep track of who sent what. I think it was either cheryl or ivy who sent a copy of jonathon richman's action packed cd, and today I got to listen to it all the way through for the very first time. dude, I hadn't heard little vampire girl in YEARS. a thousand times thank you.

to see what is beautiful

or, a mold-free photo post.


okay, this includes the very sad destruction of my neighbor's house, but it is also beautiful. my Liam, our backyard, that mighty tree that lost a large part of itself and took a fine house (and my back fence) down in the process.


we now take Brenna out for a walk on the levee every morning. and it's beautiful, every time.


Nash, even huddled up and feverish, is so damned beautiful.


what, you find no beauty in the dirty dishes? well, I do. see how they shine.