I have written in previous posts that I never got into the sport of football. Never played it, never followed it and never even watched a game until I moved to Who Dat turf. I kind of appreciated the sense of community and how it brings this city into harmony. Recent events have made me reconsider that perhaps my first disdain for the sport was correct.
I can't get the whole college football fanatisism unless you ACTUALLY attended the college. I was talking about LSU fans with the security guard down at the Pontalba building. I mentioned being originally from New Jersey, I never imagined that an entire state of non-alumni would give two shits about the college team. Back in Jersey no one but a Rutgers graduate would even watch a Crimson Knights game. I don't even know the name of Princeton's team, as many times as have been in Princeton NJ. The guard chuckled about how big college football is in the south. "We're big on all football down here. Mississip, Bama, Texans are the worst. Your Ivy leages don't turn out football players, they turn out millionaires."
For those of you outside of the Big Easy, you may or may not have heard about an incident that took place here in the French Quarter the night of a rival game between Alabama and LSU. Alabama fans flooded into the Quarter to watch the game, I listened all night to cheers and hoots from Bourbon Street fifty feet away from my balcony. Alabama won the game, so the LSU fans who out numbered the rivals 10 to 1 in the Quarter drank themselves stupid. I sincerely expected some form of violence that night. LSU fans down here take their team more seriously than careers or families., I believe a small percentage of the team's fans couldn't spell L-S-U. I could drive you around New Orleans and point out houses painted the purple and gold team colors. During the day of the game, several vintage cars painted LSU colors cruised through the Quarter.
So following the LSU loss, Alabama (I was surprised to hear that they had a college) rejoiced and celebrated through out the Quarter as Tiger fans drank themselves unconscious. This is the story of one of them. Synopsis of what happened: A LSU fan passed out at the Krystal Burger in the 100 block of Bourbon. That block is by far the most notorious and usually the most dangerous. Most of the high profile shootings took place in front of the Krystal Burger joint. The chalk outlines of the fallen are washed away by urine with in hours. The Krystal is like a 24 hour White Castle style place with counters at the windows that overlook Hustler Hollywood's storefront. As you dine on sliders, you can gaze upon mannequins dressed in S&M garb with each other on leashes. I'm not exaggerating any of this.
The LSU fan passed out at the window counter after one too many Handgrenades. First of all, he was an idiot with lousy friends. To get passed out drunk on Bourbon with no one trustworthy enough to watch your back is asking for trouble. He's lucky that he didn't wander down to Burgundy to pass out. If he had, he may not have woken up, or if he did wake up he probably would have been naked and covered with excrement of the homeless. Instead, he was discovered by Alabama fans exiting the Krystal. Garbage was left on him, water dumped on him, what you might expect from individuals who follow the careers of football players more than their own career advances.
One of the Alabama fans, Brian Downing, 32, evidently the closet homosexual of the group decides to whip out his junk and start to simulate sex with the unconscious LSU fan's ear by climbing up on a nearby chair. Yea, when I'm out drinking with my buddies, we are always trying to see who's penis is small enough to fit in another man's ear. Due to the lack of motor skills and judgment, the ear rapist Mr Downing slips making full facial contact with the man in the purple and gold. After he finished rubbing his male genitals on the face of an unwilling victim, Downing stood in the middle of the restaurant with penis still exposed as his friends cheered.
Mr. Downing, understandably growing up in Alabama has forced you to feel the need to remain in the closet about your homosexuality. There were better ways to out yourself. If you were so drunk that you felt able to express yourself in front of your friends, then you should have gone down a few blocks to St Ann Street. There you could have found dozens of WILLING partners who would have been more than happy to allow you to rub your penis all over them, and they would have precipitated to teabagging on your face. Perhaps your future cellmate will be a LSU fan who will help you discover yourself in a healthier fashion.
Ironically, in High School I was bullied by the jocks who called me a fagot because I never played sports and liked art. I never tried to penetrate the ear of a rival artist with my penis.
Here is some background art to the animation that I am working on. Originally I was just going to do just a minute or so of very rough animation to demonstrate the look of the show. Of course it soon evolved into a four minute cartoon of continuous sight gags. Since we are still somewhat up in the air as far as the voice actors and sound production, we had to deliver on the visuals. The cartoon kind of plays out like the Old "Pink Panther" cartoons. Our protangonist just trying to walk from one end of Bourbon Street to the other.
I have a greater appreciation for the labor involved in animation. One scene Otis and I included needed a galloping police horse complete with a mounted cop firing his weapon. Just the horse and gallop took me about 6 - 8 hours to complete. If that wasn't enough we added a swinging brass band, a running Baron Somalia, SWAT teams, gun battles and a huge chaotic finale. John Landis would find this final scene a challenge to direct. 
Here is one of the locations in the story line, a Bourbon Street strip club named "Barely Sane." The romantic interest of the lead character works there. Athena DeCruelle, B-movie actress turn fetish model, turned dancer and dominatrix. Don't expect a dumb bimbo type of lady. Athena is a shrewd, manipulative and brilliant woman of Bourbon Street. Granted, she's sleeping around with about half of the men in the French Quarter, but only one man truly loves her, this is his story. I won't make any promises on a delivery date for the finished product, I won't debut it until it's ready. Someday I may have to face deadlines, hopefully by then we'll have a budget and a staff to yell at. 
