The Great Catch Up

• Mama Cat Gives Me A Bike
• Mama Cat Takes The Bike Back
• Leslie Gives Me A Harmonica
• Mom Sends Money
• Micro Chip Replaced
• Crab Boil On Birthday
• My Favorite Mule
• Capo Replaced

 The sign spot, as seen in the morning (left).
Since I last posted, all of the things mentioned above happened.
I got a call from my mom on Friday, telling me that 100 dollars had been wired for my birthday, which was the following day.
I had $2.16 on me when the call came, having squandered money making opportunities Thursday night, by choosing to watch football and consume, rather than go out and gather.
I was at the Veaux Carre Baptist church, waiting for a shower.
"Wheelchair" Charlie and "wheelchair" Sue were there, along with heroin addict Bobby.
Bobby had stayed briefly at Leslies house along with the other two, long enough to urinate and vomit on the floor and leave beer cans on under the bed.
I was invited to become the fifth resident at that place last week, when we thought a tropical storm was coming, but I declined, opting for underneath the dock where the Natchez lands instead.
There has since been posted a note by Leslies landlord on his door admonishing him to have no guests at all.
I heard Charlie on Friday night, asking Leslie for the key to his place and telling him that he needed to keep his woman safe (that would be wheelchair Sue)..
Leslie refused to give them the key and I was proud of him.
He understands that he can lose his Section 8 benefits, or whatever they are, for any number of violations; and it is his opinion that Charlie and Sue don't care about that, but are only thinking of their own creature comforts.
Charlie told me that; every once in a while, one must "kick his (Leslies) ass," and that will make him "a good little boy," for a few days; a good little boy who will spend his whole paycheck on beer for everybody.

Knows The Drill...

 My Favorite Mule
Well, I have had this picture for a while in my phone, and can only now post it to this blog, after the purchase of a new USB micro sd adaptor; due to a generous birthday gift from my mom (see above or below).
The mule shown is the mule that I chose to be "my favorite mule," when I sing the song of the same title.
Often times when it pulls its carriage by, I break into the song: "...Did I just not see my favorite mule; my favorite mule...etc.."
I came upon the very same mule and learned from its driver, a middle aged lady, that it is her favorite mule also; she loves it.
The mules name is Sparticus, and the lady told me a story, which I will para phrase:
One night, Sparticus was being driven by a guy who liked to drink whiskey and drive a mule and carriage.
The guy was on pain medication of some kind, having visited the dentist or something that day.
He passed out.
The Japanese tourists in the carriage, who were busy taking pictures and hadn't been listening to the drivers foreign gibberish anyways; were unaware that he had checked out and was slumped over at the reigns. 
Sparticus did the entire route, according to witnesses, making all the right turns; stopping at the right spots, waiting for approximately 2 minutes in front of the Blacksmith Tavern and even for the traffic light to turn green on Decatur Street before pulling onto it.
He then got back in line behind all the other mules at Jackson Square.
The driver was woken up and fired.

What kind of parents would let their children play on Bourbon Street?

Crab Boil On Birthday
I was invited (begged) by Leslie to attend a crab boil, which happened to fall upon my birthday.

At 10:30 in the morning, he told me, they would arrive at the sign spot to pick me up.
By 11 a.m., they had not arrived, so I left to use the McDonalds restroom.
I had forgotten to dig up my money from where I bury it next to me; and so I had to return to the spot to get it.
It was then that the truck arrived, carrying Leslie in the bed and his boss and 2 co-workers in front.
We rode quite a ways to the huge lake north of NOLA, where we boiled "$240 worth" of blue crabs; threw a football around, listened to music and enjoyed my birthday.
Thanks to the money which my mother had wired to me; I was not stressed out over having to get back to the Quarter and back to work.
One of the co workers spoke very disparagingly of Leslie, saying that the boss, on occasion, would pick him up at a bar at 7 in the morning; and Leslie would emerge, stumbling drunk, and not having slept, and would go to work in that condition.
He would then have to be supervised closely and shown repeatedly how to do the simplest tasks.
The boss, Paul, is a general contractor and seems to have adopted Leslie as a charity case.
I tried to hint around that I wouldn't mind pushing a paint brush around for 8 bucks an hour every now and then...
Crab Grabbers
Another couple joined us shortly after the crabs began to boil; and there then became a schism between the bosses and the workers; with each group seated at separate picnic tables.
One of them had brought the football, which was an official NFL ball and might have been caught at a Saints game. The guy sure seemed proud of it.
The batches of crabs which were coming out of the boiler were set upon by the bosses, with the new arrivals grabbing greedily at the corn on the cob and the potatos. The crabs which made it to the "Leslie" table came minus their claws.
Instant Karma
So, it seemed like instant karma when I punted the football and it got stuck at the top of a queen palm tree; becoming an official NFL coconut, and its owner began to ponder bringing out some kind of construction equipment to retrieve it...

The dock spot (left) -needing a bit of stone masonry to smooth it out.

 When it rains; the drainpipe becomes a nice shower!

A blurry Leslie in his garden.