Some Real New Orleans History

The mantle in our Clio Suite

Remember, in New Orleans, it's usually the rule that most things are pronounced differently than you think, especially if street names or Greek Muses are involved. 

Who are the Nine Muses?  In alphabetical order: Calliope, Clio, Euterpe, Erato, Melpomene, Polyhymnia, Terpsichore, Thalia, and Urania.

You think this is trivia, but everybody in New Orleans knows this and everyone in New Orleans pronounces those names differently than you probably just did if you are reading this blog aloud.

I recommend reading it aloud.  Rex Hollywood reads each installment aloud to his sweetheart.   I know this because Rex told me this himself and his sweetheart confirmed it.  It's no wonder people who know him (what, you don't know Rex Hollywood?) call him "The Last of the Red Hot Lovers" behind his back.  I know this because one of Rex's pals stayed with us and he told me that in confidence.

Anyhow, one of our suites is called the Clio Suite because there is a statue of Clio in the park across the street from this suite's balcony. You, and most of the world that speaks English, French, German, Latin or Greek, Spanish, Albanian, Polish, Magyar, or Arabic, would naturally pronounce the name "klee-OH."  You would be wrong.  In New Orleans, it's pronounced "kl-EYE-oh."

Now you know.

A float in the Rex Den

I know what you're thinking.  You're thinking, "Waitaminnit!  This is Mardi Gras season and you said you were going to post pictures of all the floats you saw in the krewe dens you visited two (2) weeks ago!"  

I did say that and I'm getting around to it, but I was looking through some old photos when I found something else that caught my fancy today.  Wanna see it?

A relic from another time

By the usual loopy narrative logic of this blog, let's travel back to one fateful night two years ago when I visited the men's room at The Steak Knife Restaurant on Harrison Avenue in New Orleans' Lakeview neighborhood.  It was strictly for professional reasons.  

Frau Schmitt and I have been to The Steak Knife twice.  We both like it, but with about 800 restaurants to choose from, we have to eat at as many as we can so that we can talk about them knowledgeably with our guests and make recommendations.  The Steak Knife is in a part of the city that few of our guests ever visit (though Alan and Shelly were there just the other day for ice cream --- to Harrison Avenue, not to The Steak Knife).  If you want to learn more about The Steak Knife, here's a link to their website, though, I have to admit, I don't think you're going to learn much there.  They apparently don't feel an urgent need to publicize.  After 40 years in business, they're probably right.   

Let me get to the point, already.  

This particular men's room is full of old pictures and magazine clippings and this one of the guy holding two fish caught my attention.  Here's the caption under the photo:

Big news about a big catch

In case you can't read the tiny print:

"TWO BLACK BASS, both slightly over two pounds, were caught the other day in a back lagoon at City Park by Jack Crowley, 2422 Laharpe.  The fish were taken on a plug casting rod.  City Park's fishing season closes for two months, beginning Monday."

Our inn is located at 2216 Esplanade Avenue.  2422 Laharpe Street is just four blocks away from where we live.  You can stroll over and take a picture of Mr. Crowley's house if you want to.  I just might do that later this week even though Jack doesn't live there anymore.

Coincidentally, I was walking our dog around a back lagoon this morning and two gentlemen were fishing there, in two different locations.  I asked one of them if he had had any luck.  He said he had just hooked a bass and he showed it to me.  He was a kindly looking, elderly gent.  It wasn't Jack.  I know Jack.

You never know what you'll find as you wander the byways and restrooms in New Orleans.

And, on that note, we must conclude.

Frau Schmitt's mother-in-law is coming to visit.  If installments don't come as regularly as we've recently become accustomed, you can't blame my mother.  Blame it on Mardi Gras.  The whole city shuts down during Mardi Gras.  Though Mardi Gras is next Tuesday, the real serious parading begins today and it's not going to stop until Lent.

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade
...where the rest comes easy.