This past weekend, Clint had the opportunity to attend an American Medical Association convention in New Orleans, Louisiana. Because he is the best husband in the land (and because I cook the dinners 'round here), he was kind enough to ask me to go along for the ride. The following is an attempt to recreate the happenings of our 3 and 1/4 days in NOLA... (Bear with me, this post is sort of a dump of pictures and words. I wasn't sure how else to go about giving ya'll the full picture of our weekend adventuring.) Disclaimer: there may or may not (may is the right answer) be some pictures of transvestites and ghosts in this post. They are not explicit in any way, but you may want to read through the post before going through the pictures with the jovenes. Kthanks.
-----------------------
I got to leave work at lunchtime on Thursday, and we were in NOLA by 6:30 pm--just in time for Clint's first official AMA meeting. All of his meetings were downtown, but our Ramada was not. So we had to plan things carefully to make sure we did all downtown things during the same segment of the day to avoid paying multiple times for parking. I dropped Clint off and picked him back up again a few hours later. Since we were both tired, hungry, and not in the mood to deal with traffic, we opted to eat closer to the hotel the first night. GREAT choice. We ended up stopping at ACME Oyster House. The fried monstrosity to the left is a whole fried soft-shell crab. The shell is
still in there! I was so confused when it came out all whole and alive-looking, but the waiter assured us it was tasty--shell and all! And it was, of course. (Plus it came with hush puppies, so I was a happy camper!) Clint's gumbo on the right was deeeeelicious. He loaded it up with hot sauce, because he's a man. But I was still able to take some small bites. Very small. Perfect dinner.
Friday I was on my own most of the day, because Clint is a good guy and doesn't play hookie (like I probably would have...). But he did get a break to come play with me in the French Quarter for a couple of hours. So we found ourselves the best po-boys in the district and waited in line for them for about 30 minutes. They were worth it.
This next group of pictures is of weird or cool things we saw while venturing around the French Quarter on Friday:
 |
| Man with top hat casually visiting with man with normal hat. |
 |
| Gorgeous architecture! |
 |
| Painted people who hold perfectly still for money. |
 |
| Really creepy masked man standing on a trash can serenading the passersby in minor chords. I looked at him for a little too long right in the face, and I could swear he saw inside my soul. So creepy! |
 |
| Transvestite(s). They were everywhere. Don't worry... more to come. |
|
|
 |
| There was a very interesting costume party going on in Muriel's bistro (which is supposedly haunted by it's first owner and the spirits of African slaves who died there while it was a "holding cell", by the way). All of our favorite Wonderland characters were there (except Alice) along with a member of the Iraqi government. Curious and curiouser... |
 |
| This was my favorite artist in the French Market. He was the only one painting while displaying his art. What a beautiful setting for it, too! It was interesting to see these men and women who looked positively destitute, were missing teeth, clean clothes, and in some cases a few hundred brain cells but could create such incredible art. It was a very eye-opening experience. |
 |
| While waiting for Clint in the hotel his meetings were at that night, I was able to witness a literally traffic-stopping New Orleans tradition. These newly weds and their wedding party were allowed to parade down the middle of Canal Street, headed by 2 cops on huge cop-bikes. They completely blocked off that area of the street. Tough luck for the cars trying to get somewhere important that night. |
 |
| (Photo from here) After I picked up the medical diplomat from his business duties, we headed back to the French Quarter for dinner at the highly touted Arnaud's, a French restaurant and Jazz bistro. This was our official-unofficial anniversary dinner, and it was lovely. Between us we enjoyed Alligator Sausage, Cornish Game Hen, and baby crawfish. When in Cajun country..., right? |
 |
| And since our tummies still had a little room, we hopped on over to Cafe du Monde for hot beignets (French donuts) covered in heaps of powdered sugar. Mmmmm! I will be dreaming of these for weeks. |
 |
| Saturday Clintykin's meetings were done by lunch time. So we grabbed some McD's downtown (which was an ordeal in itself, surprisingly enough) and headed to the Garden District for some mansion-hopping. We didn't get to go inside any of them, but the range of architecture was really amazing. |
 |
| At the end of our Garden District wanderings we came upon a New Orleans-style cemetery. We wanted to go in so badly, but they'd closed the gates earlier that afternoon. We did contemplate hopping the fence, but decided that two little white kids in the middle of a cemetery in broad daylight wasn't quite inconspicuous enough to afford us a guaranteed escape. So we settled for a few pictures and went on our way before we let our fence-hopping temptations get the best of us. |
After our walk-about we hopped in the car and looked at even BIGGER, OLDER mansions on St. Charles Street. The houses of trust fund babies. Seriously gorgeous stuff.
And then, Saturday night back at the French Quarter...
 |
| We got to see lots of men in various costumes. The question we were left with was, what won't a person do to get some attention in New Orleans? And I don't even want to know the answer to that question. |
We scarfed down some NY style pizza and headed to Flannigan's Pub for our Haunted French Quarter tour. It was actually more historical than scary, but it still rocked. Let me show you all the "floating orbs" (=ghosts!) we found... (Click to enlarge.) If you want to hear any of the spooky stories, just let us know. We are now "phantom" experts!
We were pretty exhausted after this 2 hour walking tour, so we said our last good-bye to the French Quarter and headed back to the hotel. On Sunday morning we attended a very nice (very small) ward. It just so happened to be their primary program (which rocked). I'll tell you what, it's a good thing we love kids so much, because if we didn't we would never have kids after going to that ward. The poor mom in front of me was being constantly harassed and accosted by her two little boys. They just so happened to be super-cute little boys, so that made it less threatening as they were trying to climb on her head. But still...
We noticed a huge levy behind the church building and decided to check out the lake on the other side. Lake Pontchartrain is HUGE!
Other than the lake, there wasn't much up on that levy, so we amused ourselves by running back down it. Slightly underwhelming, to tell you the truth. But I'm pretty sure we scared the heck out of the dog-walker who happened to be strolling along just as we came bounding down the hill (I was screaming, of course). Poor lady.
Our next adventure Sunday morning was a Cajun Swamp Tour...
 |
| Clint Irwin... crikey! |
 |
| Our first 'gator sighting! |
 |
| Swamp friends. That middle one is a 5-footer. Big gator. Cap'n Tom (the tour guide) said he'd be a $1,000 gator if you skinned him. Cap'n Tom is a hunter of the Swamp People variety (that's a reality show, apparently). By the end of the tour we knew the market price of just about every swamp critter imaginable. And we learned there is no such thing as a "swamp deer" or "swamp rabbit." All very useful things to know. |
 |
| Kissin' cousins. |
 |
| Cap'n Tom kept telling us this was the creepiest swamp around. That was on account of three things: (1) several small grave sites of unnamed people killed in hurricanes and buried under 2 feet of dirt, (2) a creepy shack (pictured below) which was used as a permanent residence 20 years ago but has since been used as housing for fugitives of the law and thrill-seekers on camping trips, and (3) the "hanging tree" (not pictured) which was used for countless illegal hangings on the bayou. |
 |
| Peewee the alligator! |
 |
| Mean Martha the Alligator Snapping Turtle (not her real name). And there's Cap'n Tom--an authentic Cajun. Complete with a nifty accent, French proficiency, and a working knowledge of all hunting seasons. |
This was a major highlight of the trip for both of us. My favorite things we learned on the tour were (1) that a Snowy Egret (which are now illegal to kill) tastes similar to a Cornish Game Hen. And believe-you-me, those Cornish Game Hens are deeeelish! (But seriously, why would you eat a Snowy Egret?) And (2) that I have never seen a real dinosaur. While in Kindergarten, I spotted an older, larger version of one of these giant spikey turtles in a creek by our home in Raleigh and have thought since then that I had seen a dinosaur. So finding out what the "dinosaur" really was was both relieving and kind of saddening.
The next (and last) thing on our NOLA agenda was a tour of Oak Alley Plantation. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside the mansion, and we were getting pretty sloppy with our picture-taking by then. But here is a reference picture I found online:
We had lunch at their restaurant (more po-boys, of course) then proceeded with the mansion tour. Best house tour ever. There was this crazy cloth thing above their dining room table which would act as a fan when they had large dinner parties. This meant that a small slave boy would have to stand in the corner for the 3 hour dinner and continuously pull a cord to keep the air moving through the room. Apparently the average male in the area at that time was 5'4" and the average female was 4'9", so all of the furniture was in miniature.
There was even one haunting story just for me! It was a truly lovely tour.
We followed up the tour with a visit to the onsite ice cream parlor where we enjoyed some Blue Bell ice cream to kick off the ride home. Clint was a rock star and read 5 lectures on our way home. I only had to stop for 1 big drink, and it wasn't even a Diet Coke! Plus, we didn't die despite there being a bajillion crazy drivers who don't know how to use their cruise control. It's hard being the only good driver on the road, ya know? ;)
Bottom line..... NOLA trip = Success!
