Krewe of the Fives

We're the float that doesn't move, the morning fête, the oi polloi. Six feet above the street, laughing and dancing and hassling the crowds. We want your beads, your candies, your boiled peanuts, and your pretty wenches. We're the Krewe of the Fives.

All year I live in a crickity crackety apartment that's slowly returning the soil, dealing with palmetto bugs and critters in the walls and an oven that doesn't work. Downtown noises and overflow parking from the hotel down the street. But one day a year, one spring morning when the dogwoods are blooming and folks pack the streets, mine is the best house in town. My friends show up happy, the beer goes down easy, and the marching bands step lively.

I simply can't express how I fall in love, each and every year, with the whole damned affair. If you can, come join us. Bring chips and a smile.

the throne room

Before:




The last three are "in progress" pictures. I did have a wall behind the tub and all - that was part of the problem. At some point, someone covered up the window that was already there.

After:

Yes, I lived like that for 6 years. I mean, it wasn't as bad when I moved in, but it got pretty grody toward the end. To have a bathroom window and a ceiling free of mildew seems to me to be the height of luxury right now.

To a man with a heart like a lion.

If the road hadn't been rainslick. If the young driver hadn't been fooling around. If he'd been buckled in. If this, that, and the other goddam thing, I'd be helping my friend Derek Biggs celebrate his 25th birthday today.

6 years gone, I can barely believe it.

"And for some of us, there's never gonna be any happy ever after."

My sink and toilet are sitting in my bedroom. My bathroom floor is in chunks on my yard. There's a hole in the wall over the tub, covered in plastic and awaiting a window.

If you have ever been in my bathroom, you'll know why all this is so exciting to me. They're destroying the mildew and painting my walls! In fact, they are actually giving me real walls instead of slowly rotting plaster over 80 year old lathe.

For a cinematic conception of what my bathroom has looked like for the past 6 years, see here and just remove the chick and the sofa. When you have no vent, nothing ever dries. Especially in Florida. Especially in my house, because I am a man who likes a long, hot shower.

I'm gonna buy a towel bar, by gum! And when they finish the renovations, I'll post before and after pictures.

coming events

If you're around, come on by that morning and join in the fun.

In which I teach my nephew Owen how to yell at cars.

Okay, Owen, now let's hassle that guy driving the yellow Hummer.


"Hey! Hey, buddy! What's with the car? Always dreamed of being a school bus driver but couldn't make the cut?"


"Ha! That always cracks me up."

On Top of the City

Every home has its own pleasures. Maybe you've got a cozy den, a kitchen window looking out on birds and palms, a tiled shower with perfect water pressure. Me, I've got brick steps, the perfect place to loll and sip beer and watch Tallahassee traffic roll past.

Remember when people would add neon light bars under the cars and trucks to give them a colored underglow? Yeah, some folks still do that. I know. I see them. I see it all on nights like tonight might pan out to be. Teenage boys singing show tunes. SUVs full of tiara-topped bachlelorettes (where do they go to make complete idiots of themselves in a town with no gay bars and no strip clubs?). Restaurant workers walking home, dreaming of taking off their shoes and polyester button down shirts. Hipsters on bikes. Old men on bikes. Once, a full sized Dodge van loaded into the back of a dump truck.

I intend to go home from work, put dinner in the fridge, clean out the cat box, change into my bdu britches, crack open a Pabst, and take up my post on the stoop. Hey, if you're out and about and haven't got anywhere to be, stop on by and say howdy. It's that kind of night.