Another Magical New Orleans Day

Sometimes art imitates life and at other times it's the other way around.  You never know what you'll find when you turn a corner on another magical New Orleans day.

I run into one pleasant surprise after another, after ten years' of previous ones, every single day.  Naturally, I would.  I live here.  Every day is magical.  Be a New Orleanian, wherever you are.

HERE IS WHAT HAPPENED ON ANOTHER MAGICAL NEW ORLEANS DAY:

The other day some kids were putting on a puppet show on the front lawn of Sojourner Truth Elementary School, on Dumaine Street.  It's about five blocks uptown behind my house.  

School's not in session, yet.  They were just some neighborhood kids putting on a puppet show and the school has a small lawn in front where they set up their theater.  Plus, it was shady.  They drew quite a crowd.

I hadn't seen the press releases on Nextdoor.com so I just happened upon it while walking by.  There were people all over the lawn, some with blankets, some with folding chairs, some just sitting on the grass.  I paid my admission and joined them.  

After I got my ticket, Julie saw me and she motioned for me to join her on her blanket.  She was with Abe and Kermit.  They all made room for me.

What a show.  These kids are really good.  What do you expect, though?  This is New Orleans.  

The story was no Heloise and Abelard, and it wasn't Romeo and Juliet, either.  It was a love story but not like those.

It was the story of Venerable Henriette DeLille, a local hero around this neighborhood.  She is really a hero for the whole city, especially in the downtown parts, but, certainly she is venerated Uptown, too.  She got her start in Tremé, which is where we live, so she is especially venerated around these parts.

At the puppet show's end, the whole crowd gave a standing ovation.  The puppeteers came out from behind the painted refrigerator box which was their stage, and they took a bow.  A few people, probably family members, had brought flowers and they were tossing them at the actors.  

A guy with a wagon full of ice and cans of beer showed up and we all bought a can for $2.00 apiece and enjoyed good conversation about the show.  He had Big Shot for the kids.

It was better than a night at the Orpheum.  It was another magical New Orleans day.  There is no such thing as too many of such a thing.

THIS BLOG IS SPONSORED BY LA BELLE ESPLANDE.

La Belle Esplanade is a five-suite B&B Hotel located on Esplanade Avenue in New Orleans.  If you want to experience New Orleans like you live here, you can do a lot worse than the place that has been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans since April 2014.  

Go to our website, see what we have to offer, and make a reservation today.  We look forward to sharing our part of New Orleans with you.

You Can't Be Bored in New Orleans.

They say that only boring people are bored.  If you find yourself bored in New Orleans, you must have a hole in your imagination.  You can't be bored in New Orleans.  If you are, you are dead from the heart up.

I once knew a man who had a hole in his soul.  He tried to fill it up with adrenaline, with booze, with dice, with gunplay, with pornography, with MSNBC, and with expensive prostitutes.  That's no way to live.

Be your best self.  New Orleans is here for you.  You cannot be bored in New Orleans.

I live here.  I'm not bored.  I never have been and I never will be ---- as long as I am in New Orleans.  Home is where the heart is.

FIRST, SOME TRIVIA ABOUT LOUISIANA:

We don't have counties in Louisiana.  We have parishes.  What you call a county, we call a parish.  A lot about Louisiana is similar to where you live, but it's different here, too.  Sometimes it can be very, very different.  

New Orleans is not the only city in Lousiana, but it's the only one you've heard of.  There are reasons for that.

New Orleans is not the oldest city in Louisiana.  That one has a population of 17,500 people.  It doesn't take long to see what's worth seeing there.  New Orleans is 302 years old, and counting. You never run out of things to be a part of in New Orleans.

YOU CAN'T BE BORED IN NEW ORLEANS.

Open your ears.  Open your nose.  Whet your tastebuds.  Are you ready for a real New Orleans adventure?  Hang on.

A brass band wedding goes past our house on Esplanade Avenue just about every weekend in season, sometimes twice in a weekend, sometimes three times.  

Sometimes, for no reason that is apparent to people who don't live here, a half-mile long marching parade will go up our street, full of music and people dancing and having a good time.  The police stop traffic so the parade can pass.  Anyone can join in if they want to.

On St. Josesph's night, I'll sit in the back garden and listen to the drums and the tambourines and the songs of the Mardi Gras Indians making their way through our neighborhood.

Every city is a city of neighborhoods but New Orleans is a city of neighborhoods on steroids.  Every neighborhood really is unique, with its own history, its own traditions, its own social aid and pleasure clubs, its own bars, its own holidays, its own sense of community.  

Most people in New Orleans rarely leave their neighborhoods unless they have to work.  Most people in New Orleans rarely leave Orleans Parish unless they need to go to Target or Best Buy.

The City of New Orleans and Orleans Parish are co-terminus.  They are one and the same.  To get to Target or Best Buy or Bed Bath & Beyond you have to go over the line into Jefferson Parish.

Here is, approximately, how you say New Orleans: Noo-OR-lenz.  Here is how you say Orleans Parish: Or-LEENZ.  I hope that clears that up.

For myself, I rarely leave Orleans Parish.  I have very few suburban errands.  Everything I need I find here, with the neighborhoods that make up beautiful New Orleans, Louisiana.

You can't get bored in New Orleans.  If you do, I don't know what to tell you.  There is always Jefferson Parish or Natchitcoches.  

TODAY'S BLOG IS SPONSORED BY LA BELLE ESPLANADE.

When you are ready to visit New Orleans, we hope you'll treat yourself right and stay at the #1-ranked place to stay in New Orleans, and in all of Louisiana, for that matter.  

We only have five suites so if you want to experience New Orleans like you live here, with two New Orleans goodwill ambassadors to help you find your way, La Belle Esplanade will be here for you.

Make a reservation today.

Good memories are made on our street every day.  The best New Orleans memories begin at La Belle Esplanade.

One Thing About New Orleans

I'm only going to tell you one thing about New Orleans and then I'm done for today.

I may be back tomorrow to tell you more.  Maybe I'll show up next week with another tidbit of New Orleans lore but, well, you never know.  I may be dead by then.  

I may be dead an hour from now.  Fate hangs heavy in the New Orleans air tonight.  I feel like I have a brick on my chest and I'm not laying down.  How's that for suspense?

New Orleans is a cornucopia of surprises.  It overflows.  There is more to New Orleans than hookers and getting sloppily drunk in public.  If that were all New Orleans is about, nothing would get done.  Who would make the gumbo?

That said, everything in New Orleans moves at a snail's pace compared to other big cities.  LA is not L.A.  New Orleans has a lot in common with New York City, but being fast-paced isn't one of them.  Far from it.  

People from NYC say, "I'm a New Yorker."  People from Chicago never say they are a Chicagoan; they say, "I'm from Chicago."  I've never heard someone from Los Angeles call themselves and Angeleno; instead, they say, "I live in Los Angeles."

Ask someone who lives in New Orleans and they'll tell you we are all New Orleanians, in it together.  When you Visit New Orleans you should be an Orleaneaut.

BACK TO THE ONE THING ABOUT NEW ORLEANS THAT I'M GOING TO TELL YOU:

Last year, I was walking in the back of City Park and an alligator was lying on tree trunk that had fallen in the water.  The next day, he was there.  The next day, he was there.  The next day he was there.  He was in the exact same position every day.  It must have been comfortable.  New Orleans is like that.

It's hard to tell how New Orleans moves.  Maybe it never moves at all, or, maybe, it dances most of the time and only resumes its position when you are there.  It's hard to tell.

The explanation is too long and complicated to get into it here.  I'm only going to tell you one thing about New Orleans today.

Everything you know is wrong.   

Even the Mayor of New Orleans doesn't have a good handle on what is going on in this wonderful city we call home.  She knows as much as the next schlub.  New Orleans is a kaleidoscope of a city.  New Orleans can make you dizzy.

Here is what you need to know-----  Ready?

It's going to seem anticlimactic, but here it is-----Are you ready?

THIS IS THE ONE THING ABOUT NEW ORLEANS THAT I'M FINALLY GOING TO TELL YOU:

The one thing about New Orleans that you need to know is that it is different from anywhere else in the world.

"So what?" you say.  "Every city is unique.  I could say the same thing about Wewoka, Oklahoma or Arkalyk, Kostanay."  You're right, of course.

The difference between Wewoka and Arkalyk, and any other city, town or hamlet and New Orleans is that New Orleans has a certain penumbra about it.  When you walk around in New Orleans you'll have sparkles in your eyes.  You'll see.

People have started calling Venice the New Orleans of Italy, and Paris the New Orleans of France, and Bangkok the New Orleans of Thailand.  New Orleans compares well to any other place on the land or under the sea.

New Orleans has the home field advantage.  New Orleans is a smidge more closer to Heaven.

The biggest river in North America runs through New Orleans.  Our city is uniquely magical beyond description.  There is something ineffable about New Orleans.  It's not just the breeze off the Mississippi River.  It's everything.

You'll feel it as soon as you step off the plane, or, if you are driving, as soon as you enter New Orleans city limits.  

Get deep inside the border.  New Orleans is calling you.

When it's time for you to finally visit New Orleans, you should stay at this blog's sponsor:  La Belle Esplanade. 

Our five-suite B&B hotel has been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans on TripAdvisor since April 2014.  All those reviews can't be wrong.

Go to La Belle's website and see what New Orleans adventures are waiting for you.  If there is one thing you need to know, it's this:  New Orleans is different in all the best ways.  We look forward to sharing our part of New Orleans with you.

New Orleans Cat Fight.

 I will never forget that time Susan and Nelly got in a cat fight outside the Holy Ground on Canal Street.  I know I'm not supposed to describe two women fighting as a cat fight but they were screeching and hissing and scratching at each other.  That's what it was like.  These things happen.

I'm not going to bore you with the particulars.  I'll cut to the climax of the fight.

Susan ripped Nelly's wig off her head and threw it into the middle of Canal Street-----and, then----then, THE STREETCAR RAN OVER THE WIG! 

That really made Nelly mad and she took it out on Susan.  They were on the ground wrestling over the tree roots.  That couldn't have been comfortable.  

Some people off to the side were making bets.  There are a few of those types in every crowd.  Most of us were trying to talk them down.  A few tried to intervene and break it up but there was no getting between those two and their fists of fury.  It went on for about ten minutes after the wig episode until NOPD showed up.

The sirens and the lights calmed the combatants down.  It was about time.

Nobody wanted to press charges and, as it turned out, no real laws had been broken, so the police left without incident after determining the non-severity of the disturbance.  Susan and Nelly have known each other for a long time.  They went to school in Chalmette together.  Now, they are roommates on Cleveland Street.  They share half of a shotgun.

Susan and Nelly were at the Holy Ground that night because it was the semi-monthly meeting of the Black Cat Magic Club of New Orleans.  Susan and Nelly aren't full members.  They are supernumeraries.  After that fight, I doubt they'll be awarded full membership anytime soon.

I've never seen Susan and Nelly fight like that since then.  Who knows what set them off.  I wasn't there for the beginning.  I was playing darts in the back when the call went out that there was a Black Cat fight outside.  

You never know what's going to happen on any given day in this wonderful city we call home.  It's all good when it's all done.

THIS BLOG IS SPONSORED BY 

LA BELLE ESPLANADE.

When you are looking to visit New Orleans and get a real taste of what it's like to live here, there is no other personalized B&B hotel to consider than La Belle Esplanade.  

We've been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans on Trip Advisor every month since April 2014.  #1 in all of Louisiana, too.  #2 in the United States, too.  #16 in the world, too.   

Treat yourself right and visit New Orleans like you mean it.  There is spoon-fed, off-the-shelf, tourist New Orleans, and then there is the real New Orleans.  We love where we live, you will, too.  Read our blog there to learn more about what we're all about.  

Another New Orleans Character.

 

If you've never met a guy like Ozzy, you're lucky.  I know Ozzy and I wish I didn't.  Talk about a knucklehead----that's Ozzy, warts and all.  He's another New Orleans character.

His real name is Oswald, which shows that he came from a family that didn't love him.  Children can be so cruel in school.  Ozzy grew up with a chip on his shoulder.  His temper has got a hair trigger that's itchy.  I hate to spend any time with him because it usually turns into an argument and that argument usually turns into fisticuffs, which I don't enjoy.  Great.  What a great way to spend my afternoon, Ozzy, talking to NOPD.  Thanks.

Still, I like Ozzy well enough.  He's always got a story.

I met Ozzy at Liuzza's-by-the-Track for lunch.  He invited me.  I would never invite him to lunch.  I cherish my peace of mind.

Ozzy was already there when I walked in.  He was sitting at the bar with a big, icy, cold schooner of Dixie in front of him.  He was taking a sip from the schooner, using both hands because it was heavy, when he saw me behind him in the mirror.  He took a swig and waved me over to the stool next to his.

"How have you been?"  Ozzy said.

I was noncommittal.  Nothing much has been going on in my life.  Nothing I hadn't already told Ozzy when I saw him two months ago.  "This and that," I said.

"I know what you mean, brother, I know what you mean," Ozzy said.

Ozzy took another swig from his schooner, again using both hands to hold it.  "I wanna buy my friend a drink," he said to the bartender.  

The bartender looked up and she smiled when she realized who I was.  It was Anaïs.  I hadn't seen her for a long while.  "What'll it be, Mr. King?" she said.

"I'll take a Dixie, too, but just in a pint glass," I said.

"Your pleasure is mine," Anaïs said with a wink.

"Do you two know each other?" Ozzy said.

"Ive seen Mr. King around town," Anaïs answered.

Ozzy took another drink from his schooner.  Here is the story he told me today:

Ozzy was at the bus stop on the corner of Dumaine and North Broad Streets, waiting to catch the 94 bus to Gentilly.  He had to go to the pawn shop.  

A lady wearing a blanket came up to the bus stop and stood next to him.

At first, he didn't realize she was wearing nothing but a blanket.  It covered all of her. He thought is was odd to wear a blanket on an August afternoon in New Orleans but, in New Orleans, people do all sorts of queer things.  We don't ask many questions.  Let the good times roll.

Anyhow, she dropped the blanket and there she was, naked as the day she was born right there on the corner of Dumaine and North Broad Streets, right in front of Magnolia Meat Market.  All she was wearing was this blanket.

She didn't drop the blanket intentionally.  She was embarrassed and she quickly picked up her blanket and rearranged it around her body, like a cloak, to hide her nudity.

Ozzy was embarrassed, too.

He offered her his shirt.  "It's the least I can do," he told her.  "I can't give you my pants because I'm not wearing boxers but I can give you my shirt so that at least people can't see your milk jugs."  Count on Ozzy to keep everything classy.

The lady accepted.  She put on his shirt while he held the blanket around her to block the view from oncoming traffic.

Now, in most cities no shirt and no shoes means no service, and that is usually true on the New Orleans RTA, too.  By the rulebook everyone is supposed to be fully clothed on city buses.

When the bus pulled up, the lady went first and paid her fare.  The driver looked at Ozzy and gave him a disapproving look.  Ozzy went up the steps and explained the situation to the bus driver.  The driver nodded him on, no charge for a deed well done.  Ozzy sat in the back where he was sure not to bother anyone.

He got off in Gentilly and went to the pawn shop.  Unfortunately, he didn't have any business there anymore.  His original plan was to pawn his shirt for five bucks until payday.

He bought a plain white tee shirt at the corner gas station for $1.99 and took the bus back to Liuzza's-by-the-Track where he'd been annoying Anaïs all afternoon after that. 

"Thank you for taking him off my hands, Mr. King," Anaïs said while Ozzy visited the men's room.

I eventually walked Ozzy home before I went home by myself.  It was a day of good deeds.  It was a typical New Orleans day.

We live in a wonderful city full of colorful characters getting by by doing right.  New Orleans is that kind of a place.  We love it here off the usual tourist radar.  You will, too.  You'll see.

THIS BLOG IS SPONSORED BY LA BELLE ESPLANDE, a five-suite boutique bed-and-breakfast hotel that is close enough to the typical tourist action that you won't miss out on anything that your friends who came here for a bachelorette party or a convention have told you about.  We are also far enough inside the real city, the part where people live year round, that you'll discover what it means to fall in love with the real New Orleans.

According to TripAdvisor, La Belle Esplanade has been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans, and in Louisiana, every month since April 2014.  We've also been ranked the #2 place to stay in the U.S.----and the #16 place to stay in the world.  We don't rest on our kudos here.  We are New Orleans goodwill ambassadors and we look forward to sharing our part of the authentic New Orleans state of mind with you while you are here.

No one ever says their visit to New Orleans is too long.  It is always too short.  The longer you are here, the more things you will discover to explore.  Good memories that will last a lifetime are made at La Belle Esplanade every day.  I know.  I live here.

Be a New Orleans character, yourself, while you are here.  You won't need to visit a pawn shop to afford it.  We'll be here for you when the coronavirus is nothing more than a bad memory.  Even a mediocre day in New Orleans is better than the best day the best day of fishing.

Have a great New Orleans day today, as best you can, no matter where you happen to be as you read this.

Cheers!

Sweet New Orleans

 Spend some time in New Orleans and the good memories will stay with you until death do you part.  New Orleans is a multi-layered wedding cake of surprises.  It is sweet and gooey on the inside.  New Orleans will stick with you through thick and thin.  There is a reason there is no such thing as a jelly beignet.  There isn't any need for it in sweet, sweet New Orleans.  You don't put red gravy on gumbo, do you?

Crab beignets are delicious, though.  So are crawfish beignets.  I've never been a fan of the plain beignet, and by plain I mean piled high with powdered sugar.  I tend to steer clear of beignet shops that purchase powdered sugar by the truckload.  I like a savory pastry.  Call me crazy but there is room for everyone of every inclination in New Orleans.

New Orleans is both savory and sweet, if you have the tooth for either. Even sweet New Orleans has bite.  What you think of as spicy, we call piquant.

Every day is effervescent.  A day in New Orleans is like spending time in Heaven on the installment plan.  Nobody ever says their visit is too long.  You know you want to move here.  Be careful what you wish for.  It has been the downfall of many a young man.

If the seductive city of New Orleans doesn't charm you, you could use a chuckle.  

Can I tell you what a day in the real New Orleans is like?  I can't.  You have to live New Orleans on your own terms to get to know it.  Firsthand is best.  You'll never forget your first full day in New Orleans.

There is tourist New Orleans and there is the rest of New Orleans.  Which is more real?  I have my New Orleans and you will have yours.  They will overlap but nobody experiences New Orleans the same as anyone else.  New Orleans tells you what you need to hear.  Buck up.

Be yourself.

Sweet, sweet New Orleans, Queen City of America.  The Big Easy.  The Wet Grave.  

We live in a kaleidoscope of a city, like Peter Fonda in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, like The Princess And the Frog.

The more you look, the more you'll see and the more you see, the more you'll get confused.  Crazy New Orleans.  Sweet New Orleans.  In a New Orleans state of mind, everything that might have been is as good as done and it will all be good as purple, green, and gold when everything is said and done.  How could it be otherwise?  You're in New Orleans.  Everything that should be good will be good.

If you've got something pressing on your mind, I know just the cure.  Come to New Orleans.  

No one has a headache in New Orleans, unless they wake up after spending their whole night on Bourbon Street.  Stay away from the jello shots.

If you have a song in your heart and you are ready for love, let the stormy clouds chase everyone else from the place but get your good self down here to New Orleans.  You belong here.

How do I know you belong here? I live here.  If you've read this far, you belong here.  Trust me.  You belong on Esplanade Avenue.

This blog is sponsored by La Belle Esplanade.

La Belle Esplanade a five-suite B&B hotel that has been ranked by TripAdvisor as the #1 place to stay in New Orleans (and all of Louisiana) every month since April 2014.  You deserve the best New Orleans you can get.  La Belle Esplanade will be here for you.  

The Meaning of New Orleans.

I know you think you know something about New Orleans but, unless you live here, you don't know nothing.  You know something, but what you know isn't worth a picayune.  Good luck with that.

What is the meaning of New Orleans?  You may as well ask what is the meaning of love?  It is what it is.  New Orleans, like true love, perseveres and lasts forever.  Get your New Orleans groove on and you'll never be tired.  Go with the flow.   This is a city like none other.

Even if you can only be here in spirit, be a New Orleanian, wherever you are.  That's what it means to fall in love with New Orleans.  It's what it means to miss New Orleans.  It's not just an old song.  It is a pain in one's heart.  How many people have died from being away from New Orleans for too long?  I shudder to think about it because I live in the cure.

The meaning of New Orleans is written in rats' footprints in the batture mud.  The meaning of New Orleans is in the crisscrossed power lines that are webbed over back-of-town streets.  You can read about someone's love for New Orleans by looking at the lines in their palm.

If New Orleans means anything, it means getting by by getting along and getting what you can by any way you can.  New Orleans loves the people who call this wonderful city home.  They can do no wrong.

I don't know about you but I live in New Orleans.  I have for a while now.  I'm not a native but it's often assumed I am.  I love it here.

Keep your eyes open in New Orleans and you'll learn a lot.  It will be a whole lot of nothing worth knowing unless you live here.  New Orleans is like no other city anywhere, anytime, anyplace.  

It is impossible to put your finger on New Orleans' pulse because the city is an organic collection of moving parts, not all of them synchronous, almost all of them improvising.  

Creativity is alive and well in New Orleans.  If you can't get yourself out of a jam, put on your thinking cap.  You'll figure something out.  That's how you'll know you belong here.

I ran into Nicholas the other day.  He's 17 years old.  He goes to college at University of New Orleans.  His parents think he's a smart kid.  He doesn't say so, himself.  He is pleasantly self-effacing. 

Nicholas is dating an older woman.  Age means nothing in New Orleans.  In this ancient city everything old seems new.  Decrepitude is an aesthetic.  Picturesque decay is a way of life.  Though no one lives forever, New Orleans will forever endure.  It always has.  Nothing's going to stop it now.

Nicholas was born in New Orleans and he has lived all his 17 years in this wonderful city we call home.  "What do your parents think about this older woman?" I asked.

Nicolas said, "The age of consent in Louisiana is 13, but with her I had to be 17.  Neither of us has done anything wrong."

Tina Turner came on the jukebox.  "What's Love Got To Do With It?"  People just put dollars in the jukebox and forget what they asked for.  Find me a jukebox that is quiet in New Orleans and I'll show you a place that is closed.

Nicholas said, "Look, man, if you want to hassle me over an older woman, we can take this conversation outside."  So much for the self-effacing part of his personality.  I had apparently struck a nerve.  I should have known.  I suspect he's been getting a lot of ribbing over this relationship.  Poor guy.  He's only 17, he doesn't know how to handle it, yet.

"Alright," I said.  I motioned toward the door.

Here we were, standing outdoors on Bourbon Street with all the drunk tourists, the buskers, the film-flam men, the con artists, the pickpockets, and the shot girls.  It was kind of awkward.

I held Nicholas's chin in my hand and I said, "Look, Nicholas.  Plant one on my jaw so that you keep your pride but remember this: Never be ashamed of the woman you love."

I took my hand off his chin and put my hands at my side, poised to take my comeuppance.  I said to Nicholas, "Do what you think you have to do but don't forget that I envy you.  You have a woman to love.  Make her your wife and live happily ever after.  That's my advice to you."

Nicholas wound up his fist like he was going to hit me.  He was pulling a Popeye with his windup.  I was braced.  Nicholas lost heart.

"I can't do it," he said.

Vincent came out of the bar.  "It's a good thing you didn't do it, Nicky," he said.  "If you had hit this guy after that wind up you'd be in jail for murder."  

You can always count of Vincent to put a positive spin on things.

Nicholas turned to me.  "No hard feelings," he said.

"Never here, either," I said.

We shook hands and Vincent took Nicholas back inside.  I followed and sat next to Nicholas and his fiancé the whole night.  She is a very interesting and beautiful woman, both on her outside and in what she says and how she acts.

The meaning of New Orleans is the freedom to be yourself.  

I have no reason to be envious of Nicholas.  I am married to the nicest person you will ever meet.  She is beautiful.  I wouldn't trade her for the world.  Maybe someday you'll meet her.

New Orleans is like that.

THIS BLOG IS SPONSORED BY LA BELLE ESPLANADE, a small boutique bed & breakfast hotel in New Orleans.  Visit New Orleans like you mean it.  Good memories are made on our street every day.

Free New Orleans.

Folks say that only the people who were born into the Carnival Class have been dealt a lucky hand in life.  The rest of us get by, feeling free.  Uptown or Downtown, living in New Orleans is a nice way to be.  Free New Orleans.

Most of us rather like it.  It's a living.  The whole year revolves around Mardi Gras.  Most people belong to some kind of a krewe.

Life is what you make it in New Orleans.  If you can't fall in love with New Orleans, you have a heart more shriveled than the Grinch's.  

Even a peg-legged hunchback with one eye and an ugly scar across his or her kisser can find love in New Orleans.  Every memory in New Orleans is priceless.  When you have a song in your heart, it is who you are, inside, that matters.  New Orleans brings out the best in everyone. 

Better one day in New Orleans than a year as a sheep.  Free New Orleans.

Set yourself free in New Orleans.  The alligator lies down with the pelican in the middle of City Park.  You will never see a skinny pigeon in New Orleans, or a skinny crow.  You will never see a skinny rat in the French Quarter, either.  There isn't one skinny experience in New Orleans.  The food is too good.  The culture is too rich.

When somebody is cooking Creole, they rely on the Trinity: onion, celery, bell pepper.  As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.  You can fiddle with tradition in New Orleans but don't mess with it.  Everything Creole starts with the Trinity.  That is what makes it Creole.

I love Viet-Creole.  

What's a person to do in New Orleans during the coronavirus pandemic?  The only reasonable option is to make the most of it.  

All the evidence I see is that people are making the most of their time.  No one is busy but no one is idle, either.  Everyone is being a real New Orleanian, true black and gold.  New Orleans strong.  Who dat!?!

The buses and the street cars continue to run on time.  Life moves at its own New Orleans pace.

Nobody can put a price on happiness, even if bar owners try to do just that on Bourbon Street.  

No cover doesn't mean no rules.  Some people take "do whatcha wanna" too literally.  All they can think of is where they are so that they forget who they are.  Be your best self in New Orleans.

Free New Orleans means free to be you and me.  Be your best self in New Orleans.  You know you want to.  You belong here. 

A word from our sponsor:

   La Belle Esplanade.  

When you are ready to visit New Orleans like you mean it, there is only one B&B hotel where you should stay.  It's La Belle Esplanade, the small hotel that will respect your intelligence.  You belong here.  Here's the link to La Belle Esplanade's blog.  This New Orleans State of Mind blog is good but La Belle's blog is "The Best Written Blog in New Orleans."  

Visit New Orleans like you belong here.

New Orleans Misses You.

               

It isn't the end of the world as we know it but it isn't the beginning of anything great, either.  Life goes on.  In New Orleans, life goes on every day in the best of all possible ways.  What's to complain about when you live in New Orleans?  Well, some people don't have a job, but, aside from that, not much.

I'm one of them.  During the coronavirus pandemic, with no one traveling, being in the hospitality industry isn't a sweet spot to be in.  Most years it's comfortable, if no way to get rich.  Not this year.  This year is a double negative.

19.5 million people visited New Orleans last year.  In 2020, it will be noticeably less when they finally tally the total at year's end.  It will be a sad December.  Happy New Year, I hope.

It is good to be alive in New Orleans, even when it's not great.  Usually, it's great.  2020 is an annus horribilus but what's a body to do?  The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.  There is nothing going on except social distancing.  

The New Orleans economy is based on tourism.  We don't take it personally that no one is visiting this year.  Everyone is sheltering at home.  Wish you were here.

When the time finally comes that you can finally no longer resist the siren call of seductive New Orleans, Louisiana, we hope you won't waste any time to come back.  New Orleans is calling you.  You belong here.  Use your best intuition.  New Orleans is here for you.

New Orleans misses you.

New Orleans is a sponge that absorbs love from the rest of the world that knows New Orleans is special.  How many millions of people have to be right to prove it to you?  

New Orleans has an oyster heart.  You'll find what you deserve in this wonderful city we call home.  Home is where the heart is and you are the pearl.

There are no strangers in New Orleans.  There are only friends you haven't yet met.

If you find yourself bored in New Orleans, you're lost.  You either have a hole in your heart or you have a hole in your imagination.  Hopefully, you'll find a wine cork big enough to plug it.

People come to New Orleans to catch a wish.  If wishes were fishes we'd all be eating crawfish, which, in New Orleans, is what we do.  Be nice or leave.  

The sun shines even when it's raining in New Orleans, especially in August.  When the streets flood, the water is never cold.  Calf-deep on a storm-flooded street, everyone is smiling from the waist up.  It's something to talk about.  Another story to share at church or at the bar.  Even a the worst day in New Orleans is better than the best day of fishing.

Well, there is always next year.  This year, we've had our fun all to ourselves.  New Orleans missed you.  I know.  I live here.  New Orleans missed you.  It misses you, still.  

Get your good self down here when you have the chance.  No regrets.

---Have a great New Orleans day today, wherever you happen to be!

New Orleans' Badda Bing Club

 

I went to the Badda Bing club.  It's not for you.

Kevin invited me to meet him there.  I had been there once before, years ago, and it wasn't for me, then.  Kevin told me the club was under new management.  He told me they have great hot wings.

I like Kevin so I wasn't going to argue.  I figured why not?  I don't normally like hot wings but, being the kind of person who has to make recommendations to people looking for particular things, I figured I should sample the wings and everything else the newly managed Badda Bing Club offers.

Boy, was I satisfied.  

It's not for you.

Kevin was there when I arrived.  He was sitting at the bar, already pie-eyed.  He had already had a snootful, if you know what I mean.  No worries.  I was sober.  I know enough not to trust him when he's in his cups.

"I was just talking to the most beautiful woman.  Where'd she go?"  Kevin said.

The bartender told him, "She left."  

"Damn my luck," Kevin said to the bartender.  "Still, it's nice to see you here," he said to me.  "I didn't think you'd show up."

I was thinking to myself that the feeling was mutual but then, out nowhere, who to my wondering eyes should appear but KETTLE-HEAD!  Alright!

Kettle-Head came over and we hugged.  Man, it was good to see him again.  He was wearing a mask over the crawfish pot he wears over his head.  He's so considerate.

I introduced Kevin to Kettle-Head and vice versa and I said we were going to order some wings, would Kettle-Head like to join us?

"No," he said.  It is usually hard enough to understand him when he talks out of the mouth slit he cut in the crawfish pot he wears on top of his head.  Wearing a mask made it even harder, especially over the music.

"I've been in the kitchen," he said.  "You don't want the wings here.  You don't want anything.  I've been in the dancers' dressing room----you don't want anything."  

If I didn't mention it before, the Badda Bing Club is a strip club, as if the name didn't already give that away.  Most people I know say they go for the food.

Kevin said, "I love it here.  It's my second home.  I eat here all the time."

Kettle-Head said, "I know.  I see you here all the time."

I said to Kettle-Head, "If you don't want anything here, why are you here as much as Kevin, who doesn't know any better?"

Kettle-Head turned the eyeholes of his crawfish pot straight at me.  "Public service," he said.  He was dead serious about it, too.

I turned to Kevin. "I don't think I can stay here," I said.  

"C'mon," Kevin said.  "The wings are great here, better than McHardy's." 

Strong words.

The bartender overheard our conversation.  "I'll tell you what, buddy," he said to me, "If you stay, everything is on the house for you and for your friends here."

I thought about it.  "Thanks, Mac," I said to him, "I'll take you up on that offer."  So, I stayed.  So did Kevin.

Kettle-Head excused himself.  He said there was the opening of a puppet show on Castiliogne Street that he was promised to be at.  He loves puppet shows.  Who doesn't?  Kettle-Head is a real connoisseur, though.  His reviews have been published in Gambit.  He's their unofficial puppet show expert.  He's really into the scene.

I'm not going to say the wings at the Badda Bing Club were better than McHardy's but I will say they were pretty good as far as hot wings go.  I didn't look inside the kitchen.

I didn't go into the dancers' dressing room, either.  While I was there, I didn't pay too much attention to the show, but, from the little I did see, I can say that the dancers are very talented at the Badda Bing Club.

Total cost:  Priceless.  Another typical New Orleans adventure completed and another good New Orleans memory was made.

---Have a great New Orleans day today, wherever you are.

The Pandemic Has People Loopy.

 

I forgot I had this blog.  That's how loopy the coronavirus shutdown has made me.  Days of nothing happening, drifting along, had made me unmoored.  It's not just me.  The pandemic has a lot of people loopy.

Here's the update:

I was talking to Diane and she told me that she hadn't shaved under her arms since April.  "Who cares, anymore?" she told me.

I was talking to Brian and he told me that he had to take his family to the beach just to get out of the city.  There are no beaches to speak of in Louisiana so he went all the way to Alabama.  They call that Alabama stretch of Gulf Coast, The Redneck Riviera.

I was talking to Cynthia, who is a musician in normal times, and she told me that she is doing things for money that she normally wouldn't do for free.

I was talking to Kermit (not Kermit Ruffins) while he was lying over a storm drain, puking into it.  He told me he's been drinking more than he did pre-pandemic.  "There's nothing else for me to do," he said.

I was talking to a young lady who I only know as 'Shammy.'  She works at City Hall.  She complained that she had to go to work next week.  She's been collecting a paycheck the whole time.  A lot of people envy her.

The clerks at CVS encourage everyone to use the self-checkout machines.

The taco truck next to the Lowe's parking lot has been open the whole time.  When there is no competition being the only place open for miles is a sure-fire way to make money.  Expect a boom in taco restaurants when this pandemic is over.

I was talking to Ernie.  Lovable Ernie.  He lives to walk his dog.  He's happy that he never has to look out for cars anymore.  "Miss Frisky is happy, too" he said about his dog.

I was talking to Father Tom.  "We live in dark times," he told me.  I agreed with him.  We live in loopy times.

The pandemic has people loopy, it has the whole of New Orleans topsy-turvy.  We will get through this, of course, but I don't want to do it again after this.  Once is enough.