New Toulouse

Dear Editor,

I normally disregard what passes for news in this rag, but I must respond to the fearful, calumnious, and cowardly dreck recently printed under the name of a “concerned neighbor.” Calling folks who have eyes to see and ears to hear “bad” is probably normal and polite talk in the pearl-polishing parlors of the New Toulouse elite, but it’s attitudes as such that have the average citizen pining for change.

Please explain to me how it’s bad to want to raise your children in the bayou without fearing zombies (many of whom I suspect ain’t even native to Louisiana) sucking their brains clean out? Please explain to me why bayou dwellers and lower class citizens in the city are the last to see any municipal assistance when the waters rise? I guess all of that vaunted “calm guidance” is for folks who can afford to be guided.

To address the personal slander against Mr. Mains, as my Daddy (and his Daddy before him) used to say: that dog won’t hunt. Mr. Mains is honest to a fault; his only mistake was to get himself involved in that devil-black insurance business in the first place. Now, of course Mr. Mains’ valiant attempt to clean up a dirty company would disturb the likes of Mr. Godenot and his boot-licking cronies—discouraging honest behavior is the only consistent party plank of the Regular Alliance.

In sum, all this hogwash about the current mayor being good people from a “fine family” makes me wonder if “concerned neighbor” might not be the mayor’s mamma. To be fair, if I was kin to a man this inept and crooked I’d be concerned too.

It seems plain as day that “Monsieur” Godenot ain’t good enough and that’s why we need a fellow like Richard Mains to make what’s crooked straight. I’d appeal to the plain folks of New Toulouse to vote their conscience and true interests. It’s the only way to assure we purge ourselves of the zombies in the Bayou and City Hall.

Sincerely,

Diogenes F. Teufelsdröckh
La Vie Bayou #4
New Toulouse, USA

Dear Friends and Neighbors—

A letter recently published announced the candidacy of a bad man and a bad party for the Mayoral race of New Toulouse. This man, Mains, you recognize as your insurance agent. Except he isn’t your insurance agent anymore, his company has fired him for his unprofessional behavior. And now this man wants to run for Mayor, so he can get his hands on your taxes.

Resist the urge to vote for the new shiny candidate, remain faithful to the wise leader we have enjoyed for all these many years. Keep Henri Godenot in office.

Monsieur Godenot is a good man, from a fine family. He knows and understands New Toulouse as few others do. His wise leadership and calm guidance have seen us through many storms and travails, and will continue to do so. Please vote for Henri Godenot and the Regular Alliance Organization for Mayor.

Your Concerned Neighbor

New Toulouse has entered its ninth year in existence, and as is the custom, the mayor today gave a speech honoring the founders. In attendance this year was New Toulouse founder Miss Carricre Wind (also known as “Mama Cree”), whom Mayor Godenot asked to say a few words.

“Enri mentioned that there is a founder here with us today, and that is really really true,” said Miss Wind. “In fact, there is more than one! When Taloo was built, the grid was full of cities where everything was perfect and rigid … and stuck up! That was terrible, though, so we build a place where everyone can be whatever they are—cannons on roofs, flying cars, whatever—be as dirty or clean as you need or want to! So it’s always been that everyone here helps found the place, by adding to what was there and growing the weirdness more and more every year! Keep it up, you glorious people!”

Amid cheers, Mayor Godenot performed the ritual Founder’s Day “Leap of Faith” and landed squarely in the bucket, traditionally ensuring the city good luck for the year ahead. A performance by Mr. Zachh Cale, pianist and singer, near the No. 23 Firehouse was the highlight of the street party that followed, with lovely stage decoration and refreshments provided by Miz Kristine Jinx-Kristan.

Photo credit: Liza Veliz

Gigi Lapin lives in New Toulouse Bayou with her pet crawfish, Jimbo.

The Samedi Gras Parade Association is proud to parade under the rule of this year’s Queen, Miss Maggie Hawksby!

The oldest and most traditional of the New Toulouse parades, the floats of the Samedi Gras Parade wind their way through the streets of New Toulouse this Saturday, the 6th of February. Carter Denja, our emcee and DJ, will start the show at Laveau Square (heard throughout the city streets) at 11:30 AM, and the parade itself kicks off at noon.

The Samedi Gras Parade has been a part of the New Toulouse Carnival season since the founding of New Toulouse. Wild costumes, bawdy shenanigans, and general misrule are the rule as the citizens of New Toulouse cut loose before the somber Lenten season.

Avoid that uncomfortable feeling of kneeling in the confessional with nothing to confess! Join your neighbors and friends in Laveau Square this Saturday, and try to come up with something that will make them blush!

Henri Godenot is the mayor of New Toulouse and the Capitan of Capitans of this year’s Samedi Gras parade.

January 5
New Toulouse City Hall

Happy New Year, and happy Carnival season!

Today, Twelfth Night, is the start of the Carnival season. Expect fun, frivolity, and a little government-authorized naughtiness.

I encourage you to dive into this Carnival season with both feet, and participate to the fullest.

Join a krewe, or form your own, and decorate a float for the Samedi Gras parade.

March, ride, or dance in the Krewe Bayou parade.

Paddle, sail, or motor a gaudily decorated boat in the Krewe du Canard boat parade.

Have a Mardi Gras ball, debut and fete your secret officers, share your secret handshake, and make outlandish promises that are automatically null and void on Ash Wednesday.

Here is this year’s Carnival schedule:

• Twelfth Night: January 5
• Krewe Bayou parade: January 30
• Samedi Gras: February 6
• Lundi Gras: February 8
• Mardi Gras: February 9

The informal mania of the Krewe Bayou parade takes place on Saturday, the 30th of January. Anyone can join and march in the Krewe Bayou parade, because “Everyone is in Krewe Bayou.”

The Krewe du Canard boat parade is like the Samedi Gras parade, but the floats in the boat parade actually float. This parade is normally held on Lundi Gras.

The big formal parade in New Toulouse is the Samedi Gras parade, which will occur this year on Saturday, February 6.

Visit the Research Room at City Hall for krewe and parade information and free stuff!

Happy Carnival season!

Mayor Godenot

Henri Godenot is the mayor of New Toulouse and the captain of Krewe des Zombies.

The Mayor’s Office once again reminds the people of New Toulouse that kraken do not exist, especially not air-kraken. Neither does the mayor’s new special task force have anything to do with the accidental release of air-kraken hatchlings all over the parish.

“It certainly has nothing at all to do with kraken,” Mayor Godenot said with a chuckle. “We all know they don’t even exist.”

Civic-minded persons who would like to be part of the task force (which we have been assured is completely unrelated to any nonexistent creature) should apply at the upper floor of City Hall, just outside the back room that doesn’t contain the municipal False Memory Generator.

Gigi Lapin is a member of New Toulouse’s Tiny Social Aid & Pleasure Club, #1 Red Drum Place.

Mr. Jack Mondieu suggested that I explain the visit of Dr. Augustus Boffin and his crates, and address the unfounded and foolish concerns of some of our more gullible citizens.

Dr. Boffin is a well-known purveyor of scientific supplies to the collector and educational communities. His microscopes and slide sets and mineral samples can be found in nearly every school in the country.

Dr. Boffin contacted me some time ago, and I have invited him to visit our fair lands and collect new samples to his heart’s delight. His “mysterious” boxes contain parts to fix the ice plant, except for the empty ones intended to help him transport his collected samples back to his laboratories—certainly not to deliver parts for any nefarious machinery in the upstairs back room of the New Toulouse City Hall That Has Always Been There.

If you should see Dr. Boffin about town, please extend to him the courtesy for which our fair city is known. If he asks to collect samples from your homes and farms, please allow him to do so. And if you have any scientific curiosities, show them to him—he may be interested in purchasing them!

Henri Godenot
Mayor
City of New Toulouse

Being connected directly to the pulsing heart of New Toulouse by virtue of my many contacts, of various states of learnedness, at the myriad delightful watering-holes throughout our fair city (where there is never so much as a slight overcast to the sky, and where beautiful birds untainted by feather-rot warble sweetly from every branch), there have come to me wild rumors, gossip, and outright fabrications of the most upsetting sort.

Dr. Augustus Boffin, recently arrived in this town, is a current subject of such spurious speculation. Some say he is the mayor’s “mind man,” here to assist City Hall in its efforts to keep the locals happy and uninformed. That is, of course, pure poppycock. Dr. Boffin is the Boffin of Boffin Scientific Inc. (BSI), a perfectly benign concern mainly involved in outfitting the amateur science enthusiast. Any bright eight-year-old with a healthy interest in beetle collection or wireless technology knows this.

But some local scandalmongers have even been painting poor Boffin as a sort of mad-scientist figure out of the fevered imagination of H. G. Wells, darkly muttering about the shipment of crates from BSI to City Hall, as though they held parts for some evil mind-control device and not the insect vivaria and radio parts they probably contain in actuality.

Clearly these whisperers and ranters could use a dose of cold, hard reality with a side order of common sense. To this end, I call upon the mayor to stand up and tell the people of New Toulouse why exactly he has been conferring with Dr. Boffin. Mr. Mayor, please find the time to speak and allay our concerns! I will be waiting, pencil in hand, ready to record for the Tattler the substance of your address.

Jack Mondieu, Ace Reporter, exhibits a love of chemistry. His favorite molecule is CH₃CH₂OH.

The Mayor and all of City Hall want to thank everyone who took advantage of the beautifully mild weather last week to participate in the City’s Grand Ménage (Big Cleaning). The City has rarely looked so clean, the streets amazingly so, they look like they’ve been soaked and scrubbed and polished!

So a very special thanks to everyone who participated, and especially Captain Alcide LeBlanc, who delivered an entire shipload of free coffee and bananas to all who volunteered.

Miss Nikita Weymann, freshly returned from her vacation in St. Mary Parish, delivered a box of parts to the Mayor in the City Hall That Has Always Been There and stood outside looking in amazement at how sparklingly clean and fresh and dry the City had become in her absence.

So thank you! The Mayor and City Hall hope that when you drink a cup of free coffee as you sit outside in our beautiful city, admiring the freshly polished streets and enveloped in the fragrant smells of citrus and ligustrum, that you enjoy your beautiful city, and thank your neighbors for their help and hard work that went into this year’s Grand Ménage.

From City Hall,

Henri Godenot,

The Mayor

Henri Godenot is the mayor of New Toulouse.

Mayor Henri Godenot, sporting a snazzy hat at Saturday’s Surrealist Ball

Maggie Hawksby took plenty more photos of the event—see them here.