We ended part 1 with the following exerpt of our run in with the carhart brothers in Stinking Creek TN
I proceed to inquire of the 3 large men dressed in Carhart insulated coveralls if they could perhaps change a tire and replace 2 studs on our wheel. They look at each other, then back at me, then at Pete and the girls, the 6 seconds of silence were seriously starting to un-nerve me, then one of them says “Yea, I think we can do that.
Part 2:
Two of the three Carhart brothers proceeded to jack up the car and began to do whatever work needed to be done. Jen, Lee, Pete and myself decided to see if indeed we would become puppy chow for the Rottweilers. It was then that I noticed a smell that had escaped my notice till just then. The smell of frying meat. As I assessed the possible source of said meat frying smell, sniffing in each direction, my attention finally came back to the wood stove. On the wood stove sat a frying pan, and in that frying pan was rather thick cut Deer bologna being fried. The third Carhart brother was manning the frying pan. A realization slowly filtered down into my brain and eventually to my consciousness, the dogs were standing there waiting for some bologna from the brothers Carhart. This was considerably better than them eating us.
The brothers Carhart finished up the job in about ½ an hour. We paid them, I honestly don’t remember how much but it wasn’t ridiculous though. One severely bent rim and 2 broken studs later we were back on the road. The remainder of the trip was fortunately uneventful. We arrived in the Big Easy late, around 4am. Our NOLA destination was a place known by the acronym CAN. CAN would be the Cannabis Action Network, a group of Cannabis activists located in New Orleans. All of us at one time or another had been, too one level or another a Hemp activist so we all know most of the people that lived at the CAN house and had been invited to come stay there for Mardi Gras. It’s around 4:30 A.M. We get out of the car and can immediately hear the music inside the house and see 10 or 12 people through the kitchen window. Pete and I and the girls walk through the back door to find our Kiwi friend Kevin Aplin with two Schlitz malt liquor tall boys. “Welcome to New Orleans boys, the party has begun!” Kevin hands the two tall boys to Pete and I as I think to myself “it Appears to me the party has been going for quite some time, everyone I see and meet is well into a rather prodigious state of inebriation. Not much in the way of sleep that night.
The next day we spent admiring the various parades around NOLA. That evening I made my way to Bourbon St. Never want to do that again at Mardi Gras. The smell of vomit was strong on the air and the crowds were virtually un navigable. The party again lasted till sunrise and beyond.
The next day was the Zulu parade. The Zulu parade is an amazing parade, but it runs through some pretty income challenged areas of New Orleans. We parked on the outskirts of a sketchy neighborhood and began our mile or so walk to the parade route. I remember lots of people along the walk on the stoops of their shotgun dwellings dressed in huge native head dresses and other amazing ceremonial costumes. That was the cool part, the uncool part happened next.
As we are walking down the sidewalk we notice in the distance someone lying in the middle of the sidewalk. He was white and he was definingly passed out in the wrong hood… He was not wearing a shirt or shoes. As we neared the poor soul who had ingested entirely too much alcohol I noticed two black dudes making their way toward him. They started yelling at him “get the fuck up, you don’t belong here motherfucker”. We just calmly walk past them, no problem right… No cause I’m stupid. I am the one with the camera hanging around my neck so of course I turn around to see if it has escalated. Of course, it has escalated. Each of the black dudes had one of Mr. sauced legs and were dragging him down the sidewalk. As I said before I am rather stupid so I shot a couple of pics of Mr. sauced back being ground into hamburger by the cheese grader sidewalk, with the two lovely human beings dragging him. I made eye contact with one of them and at that moment I was pretty sure I was going to have to buy a new camera shortly, because the one I was holding was going to smash in someone’s skull to defend myself when they come at me.
Too be continued…
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