March 2005

   Had a hell of a time in New Orleans. I will post some photos in a while (probably later on in this post). We flew out of Atlanta at 9:30 Sunday morning, and got there around 10am Central, so that was weird in itself. As I get older I hate flying more and more. The last time was 12 or so years ago, and this sucked even worse. White-knuckled the whole way. I know it is even safer than driving, but that doesn’t make me feel any better. If I had had longer than 2 days, I would have taken the Southern Crescent (Amtrak). I had ridden then Atlanta-DC leg, but never gone to New Orleans on it. Always did like the train. Don’t see any reason to leave the perfectly good ground. Anyway, we got there pretty early in the day. Rode the bus from the Airport to just outside the French Quarter, and walked the rest of the way. We just had a couple of overnight bags, so that wasn’t too bad. Unfortunately check-in was not until 4pm, so we walked….and walked, and fucking walked. Walked so much the last three days that my legs are killing me, and I make my living on my feet all day. We stopped and had lunch at Pat O’Briens. That kicked ass. I had Crawfish Etoufee (sp?). Walked around a pretty good part of the Quarter, and down Bourbon Street, got about halfway down, and run right into one of my regular customers. Can’t get away from work even in fucking Nawlins.

   We checked in and immediately took a nap. Hell yea, that was nice. Got back up and wandered around for awhile. We ended up at Sammy’s Steak and Seafood for dinner, that fucking kicked ass. I may hunt down web links for some of these places later and add on to this message, or post another. Had the best goddam medium-rare rib-eye that I have had in awhile, and Voodoo something-or-other beer. Wandered down to some blues club and hung there for a couple of hours jamming out. We ended up finishing the day pretty early (old farts), around midnight.

   Didn’t post about the room yet. When I booked online, I got what I figured was a pretty good deal. $99 a night at the Bourbon Orleans. Checked in, and the had to upgrade us for some reason. We ended up with a fucking two-story suite, with a balcony overlooking Orleans St and Bourbon. Hell yeah. The only thing I didn’t like was that the bed had one of those squishy fucking foam things on the mattress, it ended up getting so hot I couldn’t sleep worth a shit.

   I was up at my normal time, around 5am or so. Wandered around for awhile to find some coffee. Stephanie finally got up and we roamed the Quarter for awhile. Checked out the French Market, and Cafe Du Monde. Had Beignets and coffee. Waked some more, and walked some fucking more. Had brunch at the Two Sisters. This kicked ass. Had about three mimosas each, wandered back to the hotel and took another nap. I think I got up at 3 or 4. We finally got out, walked some more. Went back to Sammy’s again for Dinner, and then headed out for the evening. We hit the Famous Door, then that same blues club, then back to the Famous Door again. Listened to several different bands, and got shit-faced. Being as how I am usually good for one beer (maybe two), I was about seven past my limit, not counting the weird fruity shooters. Goddam. Thought I was going to have to drag S out of the bar. She was having a pretty good time. I don’t dance (like a fucking ape in heat if I do), but she does, so she was having a pretty good time. I knew I had hit my puke limit (that space where you will keep on drinking if you stay, and get sick but do it anyway), so it was time to call it a night. Got to sleep about 2am this morning. Woke up at 5am, laid back down till about six or so, realized that I still felt like shit, packed up, got to the airport a couple hours early. The flight home fucking sucked shit. Lots of bad weather, so the turbulence was lousy. I had upgraded us to business class before the plane left so it was not as bad as it could be. Took a couple of hours to get over the damn flight though. I may never get on a fucking plane again.

I will upload some pictures to flickr and post them right after this.