On the almost-empty streetcar at 2:30 a.m.

My, but I have a big nose.

I should be outgrowing it, but I still like going out at night. I like it more than ever. I don't like to drink a lot, I don't have much interest in any drug other than some occasional weed, and I'm now content to keep my lust for bad-boy musicians as completely theoretical as my desire for Johnny Depp.

But I like what happens, or at least some of what happens, when the rules of social engagement ease up after dark, when you can't see so much and the other senses become stronger. Also, during the summer in New Orleans, the late night is really the only time its bearable to go outside. It makes sense to doze the day away, shuttered up in the house, and go out into the world at night.

I like to go out alone, though I get bummed out if people don't talk to me when I'm out. Sometimes going out in Memphis, I was the only white person in the room. Now I have to get used to sometimes being the oldest person in the room.

I found the new club King Bolden. It's a half a block past Donna's (coming from uptown) on Rampart. Ryan Scully, one of the singers from Morning 40, was playing with a piano player. He was really good, though he joked he was not usually so. He's got that great wreck of a voice and a just-so sense of timing. He's cute, too, though please note my previous comment about the abstract nature of my admiration of musicians as sex objects. He put out a record on his own, which I will have to find.

Most of the rest of Morning 40 were there and about a half dozen other people. Slow night, small place. This big bald suburbo-tough guy stumbled in, really fucked up, sat next to me and asked the bartender to call him a cab. He sat there and made faces and seemed about to cry. He took out his credit card and put in on the bar. He tried to make eye contact with me but he seemed like a bad scene in progress, one I didn't want to partake of. The cab pulled up but he didn't see it. He gave the bartender the credit card and insisted that he wanted to pay his tab. The bartender explained that he hadn't ordered anything to pay for. He didn't understand, thought the bartender was messing with him, caught me smirking at him, and went off about how funny it was that he got pepper-sprayed and how the band sucked. But somehow he found his way out the door during this tirade.

After Scully finished his set, I went by Lounge Lizards to find the Stumpknockers still playing. AD says they are cheesy but I like them. I ordered a gin & tonic and the young man sitting next to me explained that I should specify a brand or the bartender would give me a well drink (gasp!). I explained that I like cheap gin.

Michael Dominici sent me an email thanking me for covering his shows while he was gone. He said I am his favorite substitute host. I wonder what he looks like--I have a crush on his record collection.