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As my neighbor Sara put it, just when you completely give up on the city of New Orleans they go and do something cool.

I couldn’t believe it when they first began striping St. Claude Avenue for bike lanes. I still recall a conversation with the Department of Public Works when they said “We don’t want to put bike lanes on the streets because then if someone gets hit the city will get sued.” Never mind that the absence of action has rarely protected anyone from a frivolous law suit.

So when the paint when down and the lane was official, I decided to take a ride and return my overdue book to the Alvar branch of the library. It was a beautiful day and it turned out I was not the only one taking advantage of the new lanes.

If I’m not mistaken, that is Greg Schatz in front of me enjoying the ride down St. Claude.

So congratulations to the city, to the Metro Bike Coalition, to the Regional Planning Commission, and to anyone else who had a hand in making this happen! Great work everyone.

And if anyone wants to attend the Official Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, it will be tomorrow at 10:30 am outside the Universal Furniture building (view google map ). Below is the official announcement from the Metro Bike Coalition :

St. Claude Bike Lane Ribbon Cutting

Tuesday, May 20 - 10:30 a.m to 11:30 a.m.
You are cordially invited to attend a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony to open the first designated bike lane in New Orleans! It will be held outside the Healing Center/Universal Furniture Building, at the corner of St. Roch and St. Claude

We hope that MBC members and friends can attend with their bikes, to show our enthusiasm for bike lanes and to be available to ride the lanes for media coverage. The Regional Planning Commission strongly encourages that bicyclists wear helmets and have back reflectors, so that coverage of the lane openings can also share a safety message with the wider community.

I’ve had a Sherwood Lap Steel for a couple of years now. I got it from Amzie down in the Marigny. While I liked the idea of the lap steel, the sound out of this one was never very good and it wouldn’t hold a tuning.

So a couple weeks back I got a wild hair and decided to re-wire it. I picked up two 250 pots and set to work replacing the old ones.

I rarely work on the electronics of my guitars having successfully screwed up quite a few in my younger days. But given that this particular instrument has little monetary value and had almost no value to me in its barely-functioning state, I decided to dive in.

When I had the new pots in and plugged it in, I couldn’t believe the difference. The pick-up in that thing sounds fantastic!

So to complete the transformation I picked up a set of grover tuning pegs and replaced the mis-matched set that was on it when I bought it. I suspect that if there is a Sherwood lap steel purist out there in the world, they will be horrified by my desecration of this old war horse. Sorry about that.

The good news, however, is that I now have a kickin’ little lap steel with great tone that stays in tune!

I first became eligible to vote in 1984. That means that there has been a Bush or Clinton in the White House or the Vice-President’s mansion my entire voting life.

And its not like things have been getting better with each passing year: no need to rehash all the grim statistics related to the decimation of the middle class, the wealth transfer to the haves and the have mores, the War on Drugs morphing seamlessly into the War on Terror, etc. etc. etc.

I can’t take it anymore.

It is just a small voice of protest, but I teamed up with my friends at Dirty Coast to produce this shirt. If you like the message, you can purchase them at the Dirty Coast store on Magazine Street next to the Whole Foods. Or, they will be available on-line at dirtycoast.com very soon.

UPDATE: Here is the link to buy them online: http://dirtycoast.com/product_view.php?id=107

For years I have nurtured a secret love for the fiddle. I’ve often wished I could play it. Mostly, I rationalized that since I missed out on violin lessons as a child it was best to maintain the appreciation of a spectator. Hell, I’m still trying to figure out which end of the guitar is up and I’ve played that for years.

Enter Katrina (which smacked me back to a zen-like appreciation of living in the moment) and the Festivals Acadiens (which made me want to move to Mamou and raise my kids speaking French) and suddenly I’m playing the fiddle.

Well, not exactly playing . . . yet. But last night my friend Pat Flory brought me over one of his fiddles to borrow so I can see if I really want to do this. He graciously spent an hour or so showing me how to hold the bow and find a couple of notes. And a mere 24 hours later I can play the most god-awful version of ‘Happy Birthday’ you have ever heard.

Thats ok though. Because it has been a long time since I have approached something that made me feel so incredibly inept and made me laugh like a kid (surfing might have been the last one).

I think I am safely beyond the age where I have to worry about becoming a virtuoso player. Happily, I’m also finally past the age where I feel I have to be good at everything I do.

If I can learn a song or two and have some fun with friends, that’s plenty.

So after getting popped taking kickbacks and faux-repenting for a lapse in judgment, former Councilman Oliver Thomas this week revealed his true colors as just another petty self-serving thug who cares only for himself and his fellow thugs — the rest of the New Orleans community be damned.

When Thomas first admitted to using his public office to enrich himself and hook up his friends, he stated: “I fundamentally believe the ethics in this community and the culture in this community has to change.”

Apparently fundamental beliefs don’t run very deep in Thomas’ world because now we learn that Thomas met twice with authorities and, during the second meeting, “indicated he did not wish to ‘rat’ on anyone and that his father and aunt did not wish him to be a ‘rat.’”

So . . . the ethics in this community and the culture in this community absolutely have to change — but Thomas isn’t man enough to act on this “fundamental belief.”

When news of Thomas’ indictment first surfaced, we were flooded with stories about what a great person “Oliver” is and how this was such a sad moment and how a single lapse in judgment had brought down an otherwise good man. Where are those voices today?

At the time, I held my tongue; maybe I have old fashioned notions about not kicking a man when he is down. But anyone who still thinks Oliver Thomas hasn’t been an integral part of the problem in New Orleans for many years isn’t paying attention.

If anyone is interested in understanding the level of corruption and its history, here are some questions that might lead in fruitful directions:

Why did the developers of the never-built Albertson’s Grocery in Central City (Thomas’ district) give equity shares of the project to two ministers in the neighborhood without the ministers putting up any money?

Is it true that the developers were told by Oliver Thomas that without buy-in from the ministers the project would not move off square one?

Were city funds use to move houses from the proposed site of the grocery to land owned by the ministers churches? Were additional city funds used to then renovate the houses?

What is the relationship between Oliver Thomas (and Jim Singleton before him) to the Central City Economic Development Corp and what sort of accounting can be made of the city funds transfered to this organization over several decades?

What is the relationship between BOLD, the political machine that put Singleton and Thomas into power, and the Dryades YMCA?

Why did the Dryades YMCA mysteriously burn down the last time someone began inquiring about its funding?

Why has Brown’s Diary been allowed to purchase and demolish homes, purchase and close city streets, and expand industrial uses in a residential area?

I don’t have answers to all these questions but I have long thought that serious investigation into any one of them would lead to interesting interconnections. I tried in vain for several years to get Coleman Warner, Bruce Egler, or the editors at the Times-Picayune to ask these questions. Apparently when you have a monopoly market, there is little incentive for serious journalism.

So I’ll just stick these thoughts up here on the web. Post-Federal Flood I often run into motivated and enthusiastic bloggers and budding Woodward & Bernstein’s. Many have the smarts required to tease out the intricate web of connections in this kind of stuff — but it takes time and dedication. This isn’t the kind of thing a blog post can unravel. This will take research and feet on the street.

Who knows, maybe Jim Letten will stumble across this. He knows people who can figure this out.

Convicted felon Thomas was right about one thing, the ethics in this community and the culture in this community have to change. Unfortunately, by his actions Thomas merely provides one more example of the mentality of the playground prevailing over the norms of civil society.