April 2009 – NOLAmotion Blog

This is a rather primitive path in a park out west:

This is what the N.O. City Park Improvement Association, park directors and contracted designers consider a modern path:

Don’t you feel better knowing that people on the public payroll showed their wisdom in the management of one of the world’s great municipal parks by designing, reviewing and approving nearly a mile of polluting, impermeable, heat-inducing asphalt eight feet wide? This really brings New Orleans into the 21st Century! Heck, now you can even drive a car in places you couldn’t before. We sure are in good hands.

I want to thank all the wonderful people around the world who continue to contribute to our renewal. I know you will be impressed when you see how we’ve become such good stewards of our landscape in the aftermath of Katrina. Come to think of it, we might even make a few more bucks showing the world how we do this.

I don’t know about you, but I’m so proud right now I could cry.

Permeable Pavement Workshop Link

I’ve decided on a new career that I know will make me rich. I’m going to be a chicken plucking, film making, sports team owning, wood pulping for export, drug testing entrepreneur! Yes, that’s the key.

Since it’s increasingly obvious the state doesn’t care for its arts, music, environment, mental health or safety, I figured I’d put my thinking cap on and ponder: What does the state really support? And, voila, I got the answer!

We’re spending $114 million buying the friendship of the movie industry, we’re putting up $50 million for a chicken plant near the Arkansas border and $20 million for a chicken freezer next to the French Quarter, we’re annually handing professional sports teams dozens of millions, we’re giving tens of millions to speed up the cutting of our mixed hardwood forests for things like wood pellets to be burned for fuel in Europe and landscape mulch, and we might put our money where the piss is by drug testing 20,000 welfare recipients.

Those are the businesses in Louisiana’s future!

On the other hand, we’re doing nothing to support music, cutting the arts, still don’t fully understand how to restore our environment, are closing and cutting mental health facilities and even have a bill ready for the upcoming session that allows guns on campuses… Hey wait, I just thought of something: bulletproof vests for teachers and students!

Hell, I almost missed a big one that could pay for my second Hummer. Yeah, it’s a great time to be in Louisiana, no foolin’…IF you know what you’re doing.