Last week's show relied on internet video and interstitials to tell an imaginary Tale of Two Cities - New Orleans and a society from a Star Trek episode.  Both cities were lead by a guy named Landrieu and both had Mardi Gras festivals.  Last week's archived audio and visual components told the stories and your imagination filled in the parallels.  Tonight's show will rely on my narration to talk about New Orleanians' unique embrace of our imagination as a means of viewing the world including Mardi Gras, radio, Katrina and even cooking groceries.  

 

Mardi Gras uniquely happens in New Orleans.  Sure, other cities also celebrate this holiday but they do it so differently.  Some by degree and others completely miss the point.  

 

A unique facet of New Orleans' culture is our adoption of the imaginary world into our culture.  We blur the objective world with our fantasy world.  For instance, professional reporters were absolutely baffled by the many stories we told them after Katrina.  I'll never forget the late great journalist Tim Russert who could get any interviewee to drop their pretentiousness, could not pin down a crying Aaron Broussard about a fantasy story Aaron told.  

 

New Orleans culture accepts a "story-rich, fact-poor" explanations of the world.  We revel in the Mardi Gras ritual of becoming costumed someone-elses.  We don't inquire about stranger's career identities.  It's too objective.  The stories we tell are also lacking in objectivity.  The passionately told facts generally don't add up.  If there is a logical factual progression, it usually rest on a ridiculous assumption ("Here is all my evidence that my house is haunted.")  We rush to use our imagination to overcome objectivity.  

 

The New Orleans imagination - tonight's reflection on last week's Mardi Gras.

 

 

 

110 Selections for one selection every 1:20

  20 Seconds slower than the radio sound barrier of a selection a minute  

  54 Songs

  56 Sound clips almost all from classic movies although Natasha Fatale and some other 'Toons always slip in

    9 Narrations

    0 Prostitutes hanging around my house

    3 Mardi Gras house guests (this average growing while JazzFest is lowering)

    0 Drunken callers requesting songs, repeating conservative radio show cliches or overly-sensitive objections to sound bites.