Long Distance Priscillas' Lament

Being long-distance (350 mi) Priscillas means we miss out on a lot of opportunities to help out with planning, prepping and other philanthropic goings on.  All we can do from here right now is offer ideas, volunteer for the post-parade ride back Uptown to unload gas cans, scooters, scooter bits, and any other equipment worth stealing, and plan what ice creams we're going to try at the Creole Creamery (Salted caramel? Satsuma and black current sorbets?  King cake dough or Steen's molasses oatmeal cookie?)


Today was the scooter tune-up and prep event at the riverfront portion of Audubon Park, known colloquially as The Fly.  Missed that.


Friday was the Camel Toe Lady Steppers' Best Little Toe-Down in Nola at Tipitina's, benefitting the Roots of Music program, one of the bands featured in The Whole Gritty City. RoM is a non-profit program designed to fill the void left when the public schools cut their music programs post-Katrina.  Missed that.


Yesterday was the Pussyfooters' annual Blush Ball benefiting the Metro Center for Women and Children.  Missed that, too!


I wonder what sort of fete the Bearded Oysters Parade Club, "the most shuckingly fabulous menagerie of slick chick tricks ever disorganized," puts on.

New Orleans...where it's cool to be in the band!

The 2012 Mardi Gras parade season kicks off in earnest this coming weekend with Krewe de Vieux's wild (and usually somewhat raunchy) march through the Vieux Carre and Marigny.  The local high school bands, the music engines of the Mardi Gras parades, are getting ready for showtime.  I love watching/listening to the kids in these bands.  They work so hard to prepare for Mardi Gras and even harder during parade season, some bands, like the St. Augustine Marching 100, marching in multiple parades (~5 miles each) in one day. Music is an enduring part of New Orleans cultural fabric, and these kids "bring it" with pride and showmanship parade after parade.  They make you smile, make you dance, and melt your heart a little.

The Whole Gritty City is documentary about these bands that has been in the works for a couple of years.  I've been patiently waiting for its release which is currently scheduled for early 2012.  Check out the trailer and the story!

New Orleans...where it's cool to be in the band!

Saving Soles One Shoe at a Time

"Voodoo Gumbo"

I got way behind this year!  We had hoped to get this year's Blue Suede Glitter shoes completed during the Christmas holidays, so Tom could chauffeur them back to New Orleans, but that didn't even come close to happening!

"Gator-tator"

We did have some extra help this year: my mother helped shop for silly stuff at the local Dollar Tree and made a couple of shoes ("Lampshade Wannabe" and "Peek-a-shoe").  Since we've gone to all the trouble to give our creations fittingly fabulous names, we titled and signed the barren blue soles of our shoes this year.  Thanks to a gold metallic Sharpie paint marker, the soles are pretty, too!


This glittering business makes a gosh-awful mess!  It gets on everything, including the dogs, and appears to have a very long half-life.  I think I'm still finding bits from last year! Even after letting the adhesive set on the shoes, bits would continue to crumble off while decorating.  We definitely needed to refine our glittering process.  Hello, Mod Podge (glossy)!  I love that stuff!  Mod Podge, glitter, then more Mod Podge works like a charm.

"Crawtator"

I just couldn't stay out of the Mod Podge.  I sat there, munching on Zapp's Crawtators and pondering how to use some crawfish beads we had, when it occurred to me we could put the chip bag on a shoe!  Hell, yeah!  Okay, I tried my damnedest with the less-than-cooperative foil chip bag before throwing in the towel and printing a picture of the Crawtator bag on more pliable paper.  The results were awesome: a 3-shoe Zapp's series!  "Cajun made with a kettle crunch" and perfectly outrageous!




Ooh!  Look what I just found!  A Mod Podge rocks blog!  Indeed, it does!

Lights, Camera, Action!

MobileMe's iWeb-hosting will be discontinued as of the end of June, so I thought I'd look for an alternative home for our annual Krewe of the Rolling Elvi  parade blog.  We'll see if this looks and feels as suitably silly and outrageous as the old site and parade blog