If you're gonna do it, do it today. Lent starts tomorrow, when "some people give up something they enjoy doing a lot, and often give the time or money spent doing that thing to charitable purposes or organizations." In other words, tomorrow you're going to have to stop fucking around and pledge to WFMU. But today is Mardi Gras.
Pet Parades are a Mardi Gras thing. There's the Mystic Krewe of Barkus, and the Mystic Krewe of Mardi Paws, and I think the only limit on starting your own pet krewe is how many pet puns you can put up with. At first I thought the pet krewes were only a little gay (I have a policy about dogs and clothes). And the pictures of the royal court were kind of gay (left, H.R.H. Queen Lucille). But then I found out that this year's Mardi Paws theme was "The Wizzard of Pawz...There's No Place Like Home," and I didn't have to wonder how gay it was any more.
New Orleans has it together enough to have Rivercam, Bridgecam, Beadcam, Paradecam, and Quartercam up and running, but the truly compelling Bourbocam is all you need. Live Tuesday until midnight.
Penis Police. I was trying to find out more about the legendary New Orleans Penis Police, and instead I found a story about how a frightened convenience store clerk in Pittsburgh thought she had microwaved a severed penis. So I decided I didn't really want to know more about the Penis Police. Maybe they police penises, or maybe they are police with penises, or maybe they police police penises, but once you've got the image in your mind of a severed penis coming out of the quickie mart microwave, you can't think about anything else.
"For some the shady side of the street beckoned with money, glamour and fame." The New Orleans burlesque scene of the late 1940s through the 1960s, and shady B-movies of the 60s.
Mardi Bras are available in two sizes: less than a handful and more than a handful.
If you like round, colored things, check out the Smart Balls in the Bucket of Smut. You put them in your vagina to get it ready for the SAT's. They are part of a whole box of stuff from Good Vibrations, which is part of the $700+ worth of prizes available to anyone who pledges $65 or more to any WFMU show and also emails amanda (at) wfmu (dot) org to get in the running. Details here.
Thanks to John L for the Mardi Gras stuff.
This is a special daily marathon fundraising edition of This Week in Sex, which usually appears every Friday on WFMU's Beware of the Blog.
Happy Mardi Gras y'all.
Here's the corrected link for the Mardi Bras:
http://misskarinas.com/mbgallery.html
Also, some links that didn't make the cut:
The Bearded Oysters
all-female parading dance troupe
http://misskarinas.com/beardedoysters.html
The PussyFooters!
another all-female dance/marching group
http://www.pussyfooters.net/
Beadwhores (of both sexes)
http://beadwhore.com/
(A commercial site. They sell beads but they have fun too.)
There's also a New Orleans tradition that is being revived where adult women dress up as "baby dolls". I can't find much info on that but the late Ernie K-Doe helped with that and they are mentioned on his site (http://www.k-doe.com/) and a few other places but nothing is too informative or accessible. There's a picture here: http://www.tulane.edu/%7Evmayer/Service.htm (That's a Mardi Gras Indian to the left.)
Cheers,
Lipwak
Posted by: John L | February 28, 2006 at 01:48 PM