A Street Dog Named Desire

We marched in our first Barkus yesterday. Perfect weather, and a fun time was had by all. The prisoner motif was dictated by Beezus, who couldn't find anything else that fit her. And we ran out of throws in the first 20 minutes, when we got to the bottom of the bag and realized that a lot of the beads we brought were those crappy retro ones from the 70s with the plastic clasp on them. Nobody wants that stuff any more. People these days are spoiled, they're all about the long beads, the frosted king cakes...

This year's theme was "A Street Dog Named Desire" so there were all sorts of flowsy Stella dogs and dogs that bore absolutely no resemblance to Marlon Brando except for their sleeveless undershirts that his character, Stanley Kowalski, wore in the Tennessee Williams play set in the Big Easy. There were dogs dressed as New Orleans Saints — quarterback "Drool" Brees for one — and dogs dressed as alligators from the Louisiana swamps. And, this being the French Quarter, there were big, burly cross-dressing dogs outfitted in pink chiffon.

The Barkus parade brings out dog-lovers of all sorts and the narrow streets were packed.