Dickless on Bourbon
by Jen Kuchta

NOLAFugees correspondent Jen Kuchta explores the deep pockets (and throats) of Southern Decadence.

As we New Orleanians held our collective breath and waited for August to go away, Mother Nature (not God, you dumb fuckers. Yah hear me, Reverend Storm?) sent her little son Ernesto our way. But he musta been a fag because he saw New Orleans preparing for Southern Decadence, screamed “no mas,” and headed for the East Coast.

I’ve lived here for well over eleven years, and in all that time I have never seen so much air time and newspaper space devoted to Southern Decadence. Granted, I’m not talking about full-color (or full-frontal) ads or anything more than a couple of breaths long, and the only article going on at any length about the annual homosexual festival – the Gay Mardi Gras, if you will – was tucked way back in the Money section of the Times-Picayune. Also, I don’t think I ever actually heard the words gay or lesbian come out of any reporter’s mouth, but the word was out. In times of dire circumstance – no dinero, tax base, or shrinks – the world is suddenly the formally feared-rejected-and-bashed homo’s best friend. New Orleans
et al was more than happy to be on the receiving end of the homosexual community’s allegedly deep pockets (and throats) during this year’s Southern Decadence.

Projected number of visitors: 75,000. Did it happen? Who the fuck knows? But while our very own homeboys were shooting each other up in Central City, Metairie, and Algiers, and adding a little domestic violence to the ass-capping Uptown, a whole bunch of Queens, Fags, and Bears, and a handful or two of Dykes, spent the long weekend living it up and dropping tons of bills down in the French Quarter. The defining moment: the 2:00 Sunday afternoon parade.

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As a member of the two handfuls’ worth, I was semi-excited. After all, Decadence is more for the boys, and in years past, I’ve had my unfortunate fair share of dick sightings and the like, but I was thinking and hoping that Decadence 2006 would be a blow out, a filled-to-the-high-water-mark, monster-crazy, bleeding-out-of-every-orifice party – a party I’d feel reverberating and beating in my eardrums long after I was safely tucked away back home in the Isle of Denial.

But, alas, the only things reverberating in my ears after I left the French Quarter that sunny Sunday afternoon were the cicadas and the house-sanding-on-the-Lord’s-Day Mexican workers across the street. Dios mio!

As we waited for the parade, for the Fags to realize it was time to saunter their aching, high-heeled foots up Royal Street, I sweated in anticipation, waiting for the roar of a four-stroke or V-8 anything. Hell, I would have settled for a single gimpy mule or a Miata (What is it with fags and Miatas?), but nothing doing.

The parade lasted all of fifteen minutes at the most, and legend holds that it broke up not long after it passed us, a mere block or two from its headwaters. Granted, it was fun. I, for one, love having black condoms and tubes of lube hurled at my head by limping Queens. And I am glad I went and supported my kinfolk ‘cause I haven’t done dick for anyone but myself since I came back nearly a year ago. And, mind you, I wouldn’t be caught dead in or even under a Miata, but, simply said, it was the most UnDecadent event I have ever witnessed. Pueblo, Colorado’s, four-block chili festival is far more risqué – complete with open container laws, Beer Gardens, and Latinas in wife-beaters commandeering air-brushed purple lowriders. Rowr!!!

Now don’t get me wrong, the event was well attended, and I am sure it provided some well-needed revenue in the city, but it was a fully clad and safe crowd. In years past, there was a wiener on every corner: the good, the bad, and the ugly. (You’ve seen hot dogs left in the microwave too long? All leathery and shriveled up? Sometimes blackened on the sides or one end?) Not this year. Nakedness tally: two bare (bear!) butts. No penile protrusions, and no boobs, of course. Dykes just don’t whip things out. Even the usual herds of harnessed and well-muscled and oiled boys were lacking. I asked my most oversexed and overtly gay friend to describe Decadence in a single sentence or less. His response: “mildly inappropriate.” The most Decadent thing I saw in the Fruit Loop was a T-shirt that read, “I am the Man from Nantucket.”

I wandered back home hot and sunburned with a belly full of cheap beer, wondering, what the fuck happened? Did Katrina wash something out of New Orleans after all? Did Reverend Storm get his wish? Did the Lord bitch-slap Mother Nature so hard that sin and debauchery were washed away, leaving what’s left of the Crescent City free of homosexual frivolity but steeping in its rising murder rate? Naw, He wouldn’t do that would He? And Big Mom Nature, she’s too big of a dyke to take that laying down, right? That Ernesto thing was just a joke, right? Anybody?

It wouldn't be Decadence without a cracker preacher.

Great relief enveloped me when I picked up the Times-Picayune in the days after the event and saw that some poor fuck had managed to waste thirty seconds of his and my precious time complaining about this year’s Southern “Decadence” fest. His letter to the editor was as short as his manhood. In a few sentences he pointed out that last year at this time New Orleans was praying for relief after the world’s biggest bitch of a straight girl stormed through, and this year, in comparison, after surviving a fucking year of this shit, we were in the wrong for celebrating Decadence. How fucking stupid. Did the son of a bitch actually leave his house to see said “debauchery” going down? Or was he too busy hitting his babysitter from behind? Why wasn’t he concerned about the eleven people shot in the Greater New Orleans Area that weekend? What, it’s more of a sin to bare your hairy bear ass in public than it is to shoot your ex-wife in the face and then go watch the Saints?

In-fucking-deed. Good ol’ New Orleans. Guess I best get myself a Glock and get with the flow of things. Think there’s some of them Latina bitches in what’s left of O.P.P.?

Jen Kuchta is property owner and regular correspondent for NOLAFugees.com.