In a place where the collective experience of parades, boomer musician curtain calls, and Cape Verdean storm systems already occupy a huge portion of private life, the events of the past year caused all New Orleanians to speak with a single guttural noise. From Causeway to Gulf, there rang out a booming “Who Dat” as the little football team that a few people pay attention to gave us deliverance.

In the wake of the Big Oozy, running a close second to BP's "We'll fix this" push was the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board's "The seafood's safe...really" campaign. Well, turns out there's still some questions floating around about that. Environmental dragon slayer Stuart Smith is gathering info to mount a challenge to the feds' assertion that the seafood is safe to eat, MSNBC reports. Smith's team used independent testing, and said the analyses that were used did not probe for several important particles that make up crude oil.

Not often does a story from the Gray Lady veer into Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay territory, but such is the horrifying series of events that led to up to the evisceration of the Deepwater Horizon. The paper of record laces the facts with high drama in a story about the final hours aboard the infamous drilling rig from the perspective of the people who were there. Turns out, there was an actual red button (that nobody pushed), and someone actually said "We're all gonna die!" But difficulties with lifeboats, and the peculiar nature of safety handbooks offer a chance to lean off the swelling strings, and ponder in detail how the forsaken disaster actually happened.

BP gave the feds serious cash to give to Gulf Coast residents affected by the Big Oozy. But like a deepsea robot trying to hit the right fuse on the blowout preventer, the plan didn't stanch complaints that people weren't being properly compensated for losses. Then again, has anyone ever looked into who was getting the money? Escrow-verlord Ken Feinberg said yesterday there's probably thousands of cases of fraud that he's turning over to the Justice Department. In one case, a woman in Gretna was compensated for losses at a restaurant that closed a year before the Horizon was marred. So what's next in the claims process?

One of the funny things about experiencing a massive oil catastrophe is that we get jumpy when we hear about rig explosions in our 'hood. So, after the Big Oozy, we report 'em all. The latest hit took place in Bayou Perot where three workers were injured (hospitalized in West Jef Med) after an oil rig explosion. Apparently, they were welding at the time of the blast. More details (See, details, totally different than Deepwater) here.

Ah, good. Finally, the Big Oozy is in the national news again. Well, maybe. It all seems to be about regulations and Beltway stuff. Could it have any real consequences? Follow the rainbow sheen with us, now. In a gaggle-coveted backpedal, the Obama administration ruled there would be no new oil drilling off the coast of Florida for at least 7 years, setting off another round about drilling safety/need/greed, etc. Even as the move appeared to be designed to give lawmakers time to figure out stiffer offshore drilling regulations,the Senate was pronouncing a BP-spawned regulatory bill all but drowned in the muck. But that's not all...

We know that the oil is not gone. However, our friends in Washington seemed to have caught some amnesia... That's the Big Easy's best medical professional is heading North. That's right Dr. John is taking our cause to the Big Chiefs in Washington.

With the Big Oozy still a key cog in this environmental terror we've constructed, BP is hard at work insuring that nothing about the disaster looks as bad as it is. To put a lasting artistic statement on a trove of hard-hitting docu-ads, the glass-half-full behemoth recently commissioned a production company they have on speed dial to make a feature length film about the oil.

Do y'all remember when we had that oil spill in the Gulf? You know the reason, they're handing out those checks? And, then remember when everything was magically alright?

Surprise! Apparently, everything is not alright!

We watch some quality footage in which a Cajun fishermen demonstrates the oil's staying power with only outboard motor. [VIA] And then we take a look at some folks a lot smarter than us at MIT usin' science to make us even more concerned about the seafood. [VIA]

Watch for yourself after the break...

Despite the lingering fear that they might be a little slick, oysters taste so good you'd think they were plucked from Eden. But, they're, well...they're just not. The much-opined fertile estuaries on the Louisiana coast are actually seeded like a bed of crops. In the wake of the Big Oozy, other tactics are being called upon.