NewOrleans Fun Quest

Last night I did some empirical science. Traditionally I rely on deduction from indubitable presmises to deny the worth of social entertainment. I figure:
a) Most conversations irritate me
b) People; when out drinking and looking for booty, have conversations
c) NBA basketball is FANtastic.
d) I should avoid going out unless it is to witness a NBA game

I take this argument to be true in this world. I am a happy camper attending Hornets games. In fact, next month I will watch Kobe rape the Hornets. Basketball rape, like sex rape, is not an act of sex but an act of power.

But I digress. I rarely go “out” and instead stay “in”. Last night I went “out”. I empirically tested my most cherished beliefs.

Mission Equipment:

Hat.
Gloves.
Super Shirt
Wool Sweater
Thermos full of “Sweet Whiskey” (aka (Whiskey and Simple Syrup)
Backpack
Two Beers
Knife
13 dollars

I traveled deep into the French quarter to watch the first parade of Mardi Gras season.
I drank all of my whiskey, my beers, and a bullshit mini-pint of Guinness. I stood in the cold with a group of grad students and their friends. I also ate tator-tots. The gang I was with had many conversations. These conversations irritated me. Overheard conversations:

1) An exposition on the movie “this movie is not yet rated”. Did you know that movie ratings are often based on bad reasons? Did you know that filmed boobies are more restricted than filmed violence? Guess what? The people who rate movies are a bunch of inconsistent prudes! No really! Some of them may have a conservative pro-family, pro-country, anti-gay, bias. [I believe when several people in unanimous agreement continue to state the obvious to each other, the discussion is not a discussion about a topic but an attempt by the speakers to affirm the significance and reality of their ability to exercise judgment. Seriously. Why are they talking?]

2) A discussion of left libertarianism/ Rawlesian redistribution. People began to disagree as to which of these theories gave the correct account of economic justice. The saying, “It depends on how you define the terms”, resolved these disagreements. Everyone agreed that, yes, this ambiguity of definition, and not an error on anyone’s part, was the explanation as to why it appeared that some of them did not know what they were talking about. Of course, after this breakthrough in insight, no one bothered to define “the terms”. The new found agreement amongst the disputants must not have been as superficial as it appeared because all parties of this dispute reacted to a hobo’s request for money in the same way: They ignored him.

3) The parade was pretty neat. The marching drums and horns (along with my sweet whiskey) made me want to dance; the costumes were fun and the floats risqué. Phalluses and fake nut sacks adorned many of the parade people, and some guy threw peanuts while shouting “I’m tossing my nuts around”. [This was the best overheard conversation]

I made it home by 10:30 pm. I had left my house at 4:30pm. Two hours were spent on the bus. It wasn’t a bad use of my time. I took the bus home with a logician in my department (the rest of the gang were going to share a taxi home at 3:00 am. Fuck that noise) and the logician and I had a good conversation. He pointed out an inconsistency in my preferred account for causation. This was very helpful for me. I like to think I showed him some problems with his atomism. We both walked away thinking about how much more work we have to do.