I hate Bourbon Street. The very young and very ugly women seeking sexual legitimacy from wasted lechers and the lesser who crowd and gawk ballslessly. The shitheads call from balconies to show your tits and they throw things, not beads, which purchase the pavement like arsenal. No one tells you about that last part. Terrible music from bad cover bands and karaoke bars spill into the street in plastic cups. It's impossible to find anything real.

Some of the people here with me passed the evening on Bourbon Street. Some of them are 10 years younger than I am. Some of them, despite having drinking histories with more breadth than our age gap, still don't know how to manage their liquor. I can't relate, but you know, I never could.

I'm stealing time for myself today, bailing on the conference and so-called colleagues. I haven't had time alone in 7 days.

Only 1.5 to go.

Authenticity is well-guarded here. The woman renting us the condo is collecting the dough under the table and urged us to be silent about the deal. The owner of the entire building shushed us also about some other thing. We visited Preservation Hall for old jazz, but that felt staged too. (I enjoyed it though and enjoyed the musicians and the crowd, all with more depth than the fraternity and sorority kids outside.) The local music is elsewhere, which we know.

After Preservation Hall we searched for more music off Bourbon. We didn't find tha jazz, but I noticed, at least, the mostly empty bars comfortable with local people my age. The goth bar playing New Order, for example. Tonight maybe we'll go to Frenchman.