Photo lifted from Baller Alert

So it seems that Hollis Thomas has used his time off from the Saints to pursue his love of all things Spongebob Squarepants. I could paraphrase the report from Baller Alert, but that really doesn’t do it justice. The full description after the jump.

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The NBA uniform policy doesn’t leave much room to the imagination; like most pro sports, the most customizable part of a basketball uniform is the logo a player wears on his sneakers. That leaves players customization options to hair, varying types of sweat bands and tattoos.

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Julian Wright, meanwhile, wears high socks. He did so all of last season, all throughout college and even through high school. So adamant is Wright, that he’s been known to wear high socks even when they don’t match his uniform (see above). That, my friends, is dedication. Surely there’s some really cool story about why Ju-Ju started wearing the socks — maybe a vague NBA player Wright admired as a kid wore them and it inspired him to do the same? Read the rest of this entry »

 The countdown to the tenth annual Voodoo Music Experience has begun, and to rev up the excitement, they’ve opened up the vaults that contain a decade’s worth of performance footage. Selections from the creme de la creme of the over 700 acts that Voodoo has hosted over the years are available for viewing here. So relive your favorite show from last year (like the fan movie of Rage Against The Machine above - not an official Voodoo video), revisit the cathartic post-Katrina fest of ‘05 (footage of C. Ray riling up the crowd is available), or go waaay back and check out performances you probably completely forgot about, like a pre-diet Missy Elliott in ‘01 or Dr. John’s haunting rendition of “Indian Red,” from ‘99. Really, like you don’t already spend a bunch of time watching Internet videos at work.

They have nothing more to say.

 

When asked if members of the American Society of Civil of Engineers should have accepted medals from the Corps of Engineers while the same ASCE members were reviewing the Corps’ investigation (IPET report) into the levee failures, ASCE declined comment.

 

Following up on this week’s print story, “Post-Katrina Cleansing?“ — regarding the civilian medals the Corps of Engineers presented to members of the American Society of Civil Engineers’ External Review Panel in February 2007, more than three months before the ERP issued its main report on the IPET — Gambit Weekly again asked (ASCE was contacted for the print article, but failed to respond) if it was a mistake for the ERP members to accept the awards?

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When it rains it pours. And when it dries up…it’s a drought.. The US is in a recession. Something big is happening, or is NOT happening and Congress just voted down a bill that no one understands but that felt a lot like the rich stayed rich and the taxpayer suffered the burden. The Fed is, quite literally, printing money to get us out of this mess and is throwing hundreds of billions of dollars into emergency lending programs and foreign central banks. Whew. What a mess.

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Handy, then, that on Wednesday I picked up a book in the wine department of Whole Foods on Magazine Street called The Wine Trials by Robin Goldstein. It is an interesting book before you even get into the 100 wines under $15 that, in blind tastings of over 500 people, outscored $50 to $150 bottles.

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On Thursday the New York Times Dining Section wine writer, Eric Asimov’s weekly article was entitled “Modest Luxuries for Lean Times” in which he recommended 10 French wines available for under $20.

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Friday morning, Wine Spectator Magazine arrived with the word “VALUES” splayed across the front of the magazine and inside showcased more than 200 recommended European wines available for $15 or less.

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Now if two is a coincidence and three is a trend, I am pretty sure I have spotted something here. A $5,000 bottle of Screaming Eagle and ordering wine by the right side of the menu is passé. To be really hip – you need to be drinking good, solid inexpensive wines.   What follows are four of those wines. These wines are generally easy to find and  if your local wine store does not carry them, ask them to order them for you.   I have added food-pairing advice…because even in the leanest of times, this IS New Orleans!

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Obligatory Tipper Gore Warning: this video contains artistic PG-13 nudity!
Quite possibly — catching Okkervil River, Crooked Fingers and Black Joe Lewis at Republic New Orleans tonight for little more than the price of three Verti Marte side dishes is, at the very least, the year’s best concert value. As Alison Fensterstock notes in the current issue of Gambit Weekly, Okkervil’s The Stage Names vaulted the group from regional darling to bona fide buzz band in 2007. But I suspect 2008 will belong to tourmate Crooked Fingers. The Appalachian folk/rock outfit fronted by former Archer of Loaf Eric Bachmann is no unknown quantity; its latest offering, Forfeit/Fortune (CAI/Red Pig), due next week in an unusual, strategic rollout, will be its fifth this decade. The 11-track record is a new benchmark for the band, however — definitely its best since 2003’s Red Devil Dawn, and potentially its best, period. Bachmann continues his exploration of exotic international sounds — most notably on the flamenco dance “Phony Revolutions” (above), mariachi march “No Me Lo Des” and feedback-draped “Sinisteria” — but it’s on two hard-charging anthems that close the album where the singer really takes control. “Modern Dislocation” packs a pulsing, hair-raising hook, and “Your Control” pairs Bachmann’s clay-pot vocals with the gilded pipes of Neko Case (enough said). It’s a remarkably strong finish to one of the year’s strongest LPs.  

After repeatedly being misinformed by the Corps of Engineers about new low-rise pump technology, Sharon Duplessis says she and other concerned residents decided to go directly to the source. The result is tonight’s meeting hosted by the Lakeview Civic Improvement Association (and co-sponsored by another 11 neighborhood groups) being held at 6:30 p.m. at St. Dominic’s Gymnasium, 6300 block of Vicksburg Street behind St. Dominic’s Church on Harrison Avenue.  

 

Representatives from KSB, which is the third largest pump manufacturer in the world, and engineers from the Netherlands and Germany who have used the technology will explain how the low-rise pumps operate. High-level officials from the Corps of Engineers, including the new head of the Hurricane Protection Office, Colonel McCormick, a representative from Sen. Landrieu’s office and other public officials will be at the presentation. 

 

“Really it’s unprecedented in this country — 12 neighborhood organizations getting together and saying to the Corps that we don’t want your pumps,” Duplessis says.

 

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New Orleans has lost one of its most talented visual artists and a dedicated archivist of the city’s culture with the death of photographer Michael P. Smith. He died at his home last Friday of diseases of his nervous system. He was 71.

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On CNN; not online yet. It’s dead, at least for the time being.

Stocks in free fall.

So now what?

  Gov. Bobby Jindal continues to garner praise for his handling of Hurricanes Gustav and Ike, and the key to his success may have been some strategic hires the governor made earlier this year. Few would have suggested then that Jindal was building a Category 5 administrative team, but some say the analogy is warranted. 

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