New Orleans' Indigenous Plants

New Orleans is a cosmopolitan city connected to the rest of the world, even if it doesn't look one.  The Port of New Orleans is the third-busiest port in the United States.  You may not think much of New Orleans is indigenous.  Ours is a city built of brick and stone and concrete, nothing that is naturally found in this part of Louisiana.  New Orleans' indigenous plants flourish in this sub-tropical climate.  Everything flourishes in New Orleans: plants, vegetables, daydreams, good memories----even you.

Animal, vegetable, mineral, and spirit.  These are the things from which New Orleans is made.  This most convivial city blossoms with wishes come true, even at night.

Passions bloom  yellow in the New Orleans side street shadows.

Look around.  New Orleans' indigenous plants sprout from the over-rich damp soil in front yards, in back yards, in the parks, and between the cracks in the sidewalks.  Everything flourishes in New Orleans.  Ask anyone who lives here.  They'll tell you the truth.  In a city of love, the first thing to wilt is hatred.  Love makes New Orleans wake up every morning to embrace the oncoming day.  All is good. There is nothing so sweet and parti-flavored as a day spent in New Orleans.  

Lucky are those who thrive in New Orleans.

New Orleans indigenous plants are everywhere.

What are New Orleans' indigenous plants?  I'm not a botanist so I can't really tell you.  Creole tomatoes are not a particular breed, they are just tomatoes that grow in New Orleans soil.  They are the tastiest tomatoes of all.  This is true of anything that grows in New Orleans.  It you find it in New Orleans, it's gotta be good.  The prettiest flowers grow in New Orleans.  Bees love New Orleans pollen.  They make the sweetest honey from their harvest.

Open your nose.  Flare your nostrils.  Inhale.  Aaaaaahhhhh!  Those are New Orleans' indigenous plants that you're smelling.  That is New Orleans' atmosphere.  There is no other perfume so sweet and intoxicating as the scent of a New Orleans day.

A house on Bayou Road in our neighborhood.

A word from our sponsor:

La Belle Esplanade is a small artisanal hotel on Esplanade Avenue in New Orleans, on a historic and picturesque New Orleans street that is a jungle of New Orleans' indigenous plants.

If you want to discover what it means to really fall in love with the authentic New Orleans, visit La Belle's website.  See what La Belle offers.  If you like what you read, you can stay at a lot worse places in New Orleans; a lot worse.  La Belle has been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans since April 2014.  Two-time winner of the TripAdvisor Travelers' choice award: #2 small hotel in the United States and #16 in the world.  

Get your New Orleans on and visit like you belong here.  You do belong here.  We only have five suites so we tend to fill up early.  Plan ahead and make a reservation today.  You won't regret it.  The best memories are made in our part of New Orleans.

New Orleans Man of the Year.

I took a picture of some joker taking a picture of himself in a Time Magazine Man of the Year mirror.  This was in a men's room in some forgettable 24-hour bar.  He had his pants above his waist, buttoned, zippered, and belted when I took this photo.  I know what kinds of ideas people have of New Orleans.  New Orleans is a city that attracts sinners but it also a city that saints call home.  I am not saying I'm a saint.

Time Magazine's New Orleans Man of the Year.

There are no strangers in New Orleans.  There are only friends you haven't yet met.  Say hello.  You have a friend in New Orleans.  You belong here.  Good memories are made in New Orleans.  The best memories are made on Esplanade Avenue.

New Orleans inspires peace of heart.

No one has taken a census to compare the ratios of saints to sinners by neighborhoods in New Orleans.  Anecdotal evidence leads to the conclusion that they are all pretty much the same as much as they are very, very different.  A New Orleanian is only human, still.  New Orleans is the City Care Forgot.  Elysian Fields Avenue is in New Orleans.

Pinch a New Orleanian and he or she won't awaken from a dream.  They are already living it.  Each and every one is Person of the Year.

A Word From Our Sponsor:

If you want to visit New Orleans like you belong here----and you do belong here...  If you want to discover what it means to fall in love with the real New Orleans----I know where you should stay.

Nobody ever says their visit is too long.  Stay for as long as you can.  Nobody ever is bored in New Orleans.  If you are a sinner drawn to New Orleans' reputation or if you are a saint looking for a place to call home, we hope you consider staying at the #1 small hotel in the city: La Belle Esplanade.  We look forward to meeting you and sharing our part of the city with you.

Ask the New Orleans Answer Man

Zip-a-ding-ding-dong.  When you are in a New Orleans state of mind, you never know what you'll discover.  There are surprises around every corner.  Ask the New Orleans Answer Man.

I'm in your corner.

I'm not saying that I'm a know-it-all or an expert.  I am not.  I can only share what I know about New Orleans, which is more than a dram and less than a hogshead.  We've reinvigorated our YouTube channel.  It's called New Orleans State of Mind, naturally.  Subscribe.

Here is Episode 1 of Ask the New Orleans Answer Man:

I have a new assistant.  Ms. Richardson is born and raised in Louisiana, the great Pelican State.  When she isn't helping me manage all the projects on my plate, she is helping me shoot videos.  The format is that she asks me questions about New Orleans and I answer them.  

As someone prone to digression and with a lot of facts bouncing around in my head, my answers are rarely straightforward but they are always informative.  If you want to learn more about New Orleans, subscribe to our YouTube channel or just keep following this blog.  I'll post links here every time a new episode is published.  

I detect the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Ms. Richardson and I are in discussion about starting a podcast.  What do you think about that?  I know you can read all you care to about New Orleans from the convention and visitors' bureau website and from top ten lists on Eater or Thrilllist or wherever.  There is more to New Orleans than that off-the-shelf search-engine-optimized chum.  There is tourist New Orleans and then there is real New Orleans.

If you are on this blog, you know that we are all about the authentic New Orleans state of mind---what it is like to live in this wonderful city we call home.  

Your man in New Orleans, ready to answer any question you may have.

When you are ready to visit to New Orleans, we can only recommend La Belle Esplanade.  This small craft hotel has been ranked the #1 place to stay in New Orleans since April 2014, and it has also been ranked the #2 place to stay in the United States and the #16 place to stay in the whole world.  #16 in the whole world.  All those reviews can't be wrong.

You have two friends on Esplanade Avenue.  Get your head wrapped around the New Orleans state of mind and visit New Orleans like you belong here.  You do belong here.  Visit like you mean it.

New Orleans Will Survive Hurricane Barry

The phrase I heard the most today?  "Somebody shut that Weather Channel off!"  No one I know in New Orleans is freaking out over the storm predictions.  New Orleans will survive Hurricane Barry.  How do I know?  I live here.

I didn't take any pictures of the flooded streets the other day.  I'm not going to take any tomorrow, either.  Instead, I give you a picture of a squirrel in City Park.  He is as concerned about Hurricane Barry as any other New Orleanian.  Que sera, sera.

Mr. Nutty

When you watch TV, you think the world is ending, especially when a tropical storm is brewing in the Gulf of Mexico.  In New Orleans, we take these things in stride.  I have a prediction:  Hurricane Barry will not be anything like Hurricane Katrina.  Get Katrina out of your mind.

New Orleans will survive Hurricane Barry.  New Orleans, like you, has miles and miles of heart.  New Orleans perseveres.  New Orleans will go on.  NOLA forever.  New Orleans strong.

New Orleans has stick-to-it-iveness and gumption and bravado.  New Orleans is devil-may-care about whatever the weather wants to dish out.  With a cavalier laugh and mischievous wink, New Orleans will live to fight another day.  New Orleans is resilient.  Nothing can keep this good city down.

Two pigeons on a lion in New Orleans City Park.

New Orleans' spirit is as immortal as it is infectious.  New Orleans is about seizing the day.  New Orleans is about making good memories, tonight's better than last night's.  New Orleans will survive Hurricane Barry.  For the people who live here, thinking otherwise is preposterous.

New Orleans streets flood city-wide 2-3 times a year.  It doesn't make the national news but it does happen.  People who live are used to it.  We adapt.  We survive.  

Tropical rains inundate New Orleans every summer, more times than anyone outside the city realizes.  It happens all the time.  We've adapted to it.  We thrive.

NEW ORLEANS' PROTECTION AGAINST HURRICANE DAMAGE

Our lady of Prompt Succor is the patroness who has a special place in her heart for New Orleans.  She is also the patron of all of Louisiana.

Our Lady of Prompt Succor, hasten to help us.

Every day, New Orleanians ask our Lady of Prompt Succor to pray for us, to intercede for our city to spare the people who live here from loss of life and property due to hurricane damage. 

NEW ORLEANS WILL SURVIVE HURRICANE BARRY

There will be wind and there will be rain.  Then it will all blow over.  It will be a memory.  New Orleans will still be here.

When you are ready to visit New Orleans, La Belle Esplanade will be here, too.  Go go our website to see what we offer as the #1 small hotel in New Orleans and (according to TripAdvisor) the #2 small hotel in the United States AND the #16 in the world. 

Friday, July 12, 2019: Wherever you are today, whatever the weather, we hope you'll have a great New Orleans day today.  Stay dry, friends!

A toast to New Orleans!

Providence and New Orleans.

What is steamboat gothic?  You'll know it when you see it.  It's not steampunk.

I was in New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward the other day to poke around and to see the two steamboat gothic houses that are located down there, at the end of Egania Street.  They are beautiful houses.

Here's one:

The garden-ringed steamboat gothic house in New Orleans.

Here's the other:

The levee-side steamboat gothic house in New Orleans.

They are exact replicas of each other.

People ask me about the 9th Ward.  "I hear that's where the flooding was the worst after Hurricane Katrina," they'll say.

Well, 80% of the city was flooded to one extent or another.  What makes one part of the city worse?  Most everyone lost everything they owned, both house and contents.  It's a matter of degree, perhaps, but it's the nth degree.

The Lower 9 is part of the 9th Ward.  The 9th Ward is the biggest ward in New Orleans, by far.  It includes the Lower 9, the Upper 9, Gentilly, and New Orleans East.  Wikipedia describes the boundaries helpfully, though, for whatever reasons, the article doesn't describe the East.

The thing about New Orleans is that you have to live here to really get a handle on all this convoluted city's facets.  New Orleans is a kaleidoscope, different every time you take a turn.  Familiarity breeds bewilderment the first couple of years but a person eventually gets an instinctual feel for the neighborhoods after enough time spent here.   With practice, New Orleans is as navigable as a familiar dreamscape.  

I don't know why H.P. Lovecraft never felt at home here.  New Orleans is Providence on steroids.

New Orleans City Park.

I've been to Providence.  I love Providence.  It is my favorite city in New England (and, as someone from Connecticut, that takes some guts to say that).  I live now in New Orleans.  I love New Orleans.  I know very few people who don't love New Orleans.  There is only one Providence.  There is only one New Orleans.

Tennessee Williams said there are only three cities in America: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans.  Everywhere else is Cleveland.  Tennessee Williams was wrong.  There are plenty of cities in America that are interchangeable with Cleveland but Providence isn't one of them.

Back to New Orleans....

La Belle Esplanade, the #1 small hotel to stay at in New Orleans, is located in the 6th Ward.  Where's the 6th Ward at?

These boots were made for walking to the most colorful houses on Esplanade Avenue in New Orleans.

In New Orleans, if you meet someone you know, you don't say hello or "How are you doing?"  You say, "Where y'at?"

We live on the 6th Ward side of Esplanade Avenue.  The other side of our street is the 7th Ward.  The 6th Ward is bounded by Esplanade Avenue and St. Philip Street and the Mississippi River and Bayou St. John.  The 6th Ward is four blocks wide and forty blocks long.  

If you want to learn more about New Orleans, I know a good place where you should stay when you visit.  La Belle Esplanade is staffed by New Orleans goodwill ambassadors who offer personalized recommendations tailored to what interests you.  Even if you aren't interested in New Orleans wards or steamboat gothic, there is plenty more for us to talk about.  Make a reservation today at the #1 small hotel in New Orleans.  We'll be more than happy to share what we know about this wonderful city we call home.  It is what we do.  We love what we do.  You will fall in love with New Orleans, too.

La Belle Esplanade: Price is what you pay; value is what you get.

You'll Never Guess What I Saw in New Orleans.

I'm often surprised that more children's books aren't set in New Orleans.  You'll never guess what I saw in New Orleans.  It was a pleasant surprise, as most things that I see in New Orleans are.  In New Orleans, even more than in Chicago, it's your kind of razzmatazz and it has all that jazz.

New Orleans is a city full of magical vistas.

Life and death.  Pleasure and pain.  Angels and devils.  Samaritans and Philistines.  Gain and loss.  Providence and misfortune.  Laughter and tears.  A rollercoaster.  Orange and blue.  Sunny and rainy.  Day and night, and day again---and night, again.  

Shall I list all the streets where you can find pleasant surprises in New Orleans?  Not here.  We don't have the space.  There are books written about New Orleans street names.  You'll never guess what I saw in New Orleans.  You won't find it any book unless Frau Schmitt chooses to publish my posthumous memoirs.  Frau Schmitt is the better half of this operation.  I doubt she would inflict my memoirs on the world.  Tulane University Press, though, that's another story.

Welcome to the New Orleans state of mind.

Life is a parade.  More so in New Orleans.  Life goes on.  It goes on, and on, and on, and on, & on, & on, & on....  One blessing follows the one before it.  Guess what's going to happen tomorrow?  If you said more blessings, you're right.

Spend a week in New Orleans.  Let New Orleans get under your skin, deep in the heart of you.  Let it get so deep that New Orleans will become a part of you.  Then, you'll be changed for the better.  Outside the Garden of Eden, there is no place so nice on God's green Earth as New Orleans.  Many people leave their heart here; then they come back to find it.  New Orleans never disappoints.

You'll never guess what I saw in New Orleans.  We live in a kaleidoscope of a city.

New Orleans is calling you.  You know where you should stay, dontcha?  La Belle Esplanade, the #1 place to stay in New Orleans (according to TripAdvisor) since April 2014, and the #2 small hotel in the United States and the #1 small hotel in the world (as I never get tired of repeating).

You should read the blog on our official website, too.  Here, you are getting a different version.  La Belle Esplanade gone acoustic and uncensored.  On either site you can spend a lot of time trawling through the archives to discover New Orleans secrets and get yourself into a proper New Orleans state of mind.

Speaking of the New Orleans state of mind.  Follow La Belle Esplanade on Facebook.  We post items 2, 3, 5 times a day to share what it is like to live in this wonderful city we call home.  No pictures of Bourbon Street and rarely pictures of the French Quarter.  La Belle Esplanade is located in authentic New Orleans, the part of the city where people live out their lives and make good memories.  You can make good memories here, too.  You should.

Get off the tourist radar and stay at La Belle Esplanade, a small craft hotel on the second-most beautiful street in the city.  Our address is in a very interesting neighborhood full of small museums, nationally famous restaurants, off-the-beaten-path diversions, and all the things that will help you know what it means to love New Orleans.

We're here for you,
La Belle Esplanade
Wednesday, June 26, 2019.

Get Your Good Self Down to New Orleans.

When you have New Orleans on your mind, you're in love.  Ours is an easy city to love.  Love is in the air in New Orleans.  New Orleans will get under your skin, deep in the heart of you.  I see it happen all the time.

I talk about it all the time.  A day in New Orleans is time well spent.  People stay at La Belle Esplanade and after their first day out in the city they tell me that they've never seen another place so beautiful.  Tell me about it.  I live here.  I go up and down our street several times a day.  I think the same thing.

Sometimes, I'll stop dead in my tracks, struck by some detail that has caught my attention and I'll say, out loud, to nobody in particular, "I love it here."  I mean it.

I am embedded in New Orleans, of course.  I live here.  I love here.  I spend most of my time in a mile and a half radius of La Belle Esplanade's address.  I go out every morning to buy bread and pastries from our neighborhood bakeries and coffee shops.  I know all the gossip.  I have my finger on the pulse of our part of the city.  When I get back to home base, I share that intelligence with our guests.

Visit New Orleans like you belong here.  You do belong here.  New Orleans is a magical city.  Everyone is welcome.  There is more to New Orleans than getting drunk on Bourbon Street.  When was the last time I was on Bourbon Street?  Hmmmmmmm.  Last September?  I wasn't drunk.  I was just passing through.

Don't pass through the rest of New Orleans outside of Bourbon Street.   There is so much going on here.  People live their lives and make good memories that will last a lifetime every day on every block of New Orleans' fancifully named streets.  Not just on Esplanade Avenue but on Humanity Street and Arts Street and Music Street and Mithra Street and Clio Street and Napoleon Avenue and Socrates Street, and on Magic Street and on Mystery Street and on Allard Avenue and on Terpsichore Street and Tchoupitous Street and Bernadotte Street and Bienville Street, outside the French Quarter, and on Caffin Avenue and Nuns Street and Dante Street and Olive Street, too.

Good memories, the best kind, are made in New Orleans in every way, every day.  You'll see. 

--- If you are looking for someplace to stay when you visit New Orleans, I happen to be an innkeeper.  I run the #1-ranked place to stay in New Orleans (it's been #1 since April 2014 according to TripAdvisor).  You could do a lot worse.  Believe me.  You can choose a lot worse.  If you are looking to experience authentic New Orleans off the usual tourist radar, you know where to find us: in the bright orange house with blue shutters on Esplanade Avenue: La Belle Esplanade.

Lake Pontchartrain monsters

Lake Pontchartrain is the body of water directly north of the City of New Orleans.  New Orleans is on the South Shore.  Directly south, by the compass is the Mississippi River.  New Orleans is on the East Bank of the Mississippi.  It gets complicated, the way most things are in New Orleans.  We live in a different world.

Lake Ponchartrain isn't a true lake.  It isn't self contained and it isn't fresh water.  Lake Pontchartrain is brackish because it opens to Lake Borgne, which is even less of a true lake, which is connected to the Gulf of Mexico.  Atlantic Ocean water enters the Gulf and it enters Lake Pontchartrain through the Rigolets.  I'd draw you a map but that would make about as much sense as this description or the picture above.  Just take my word for it.

Lake Pontchartrain averages about 12 feet deep.  It's shallow.  Blue crabs come from there.  They are the tastiest blue crabs you'll ever taste.  They turn red when they're boiled.

Manatees live in Lake Pontrchartain.  So do various varieties of fish that prefer brackish waters, a combination of salty and sweet.  Dolphins sometimes venture into Lake Pontchartrain.  A narwhal was once found in Lake Pontchartrain in the 19th century.  One of its ribs is on display in our lobby.

What about cryptids?  Is there a Poncho, the way there is a Nessie or a Champ?  Nope.  No sea serpents, aquatic dinosaurs, giant squid, or other unexplained creatures have been sighted in Lake Pontchartrain, unless you count the time Tammie the Housekeeper's Aunt Millie was found by a US Coast Guard patrol in the middle of the lake stark naked and singing "Sugar, Sugar," at the top of her lungs. 

Tammy the Housekeeper

You never know what you'll find in New Orleans but you can be sure that there aren't any unexplained creatures in Lake Pontchartrain.  New Orleans has enough mythology about it that the city doesn't need to add sea serpents to the list.  You can find vampires in the French Quarter, mermen in the Industrial Canal, fairy washer women off Florida Avenue, and all sorts of other things within city limits.  We don't have any need to make up things that lurk offshore.

New Orleans is full enough of surprises as is.  

LIFE IS GOOD IN NEW ORLEANS.

--- If you are looking for someplace to stay when you visit New Orleans, I happen to be an innkeeper.  I run the #1-ranked place to stay in New Orleans (it's been #1 since April 2014 according to TripAdvisor).  You could do a lot worse.  Believe me.  You can choose a lot worse.  If you are looking to experience authentic New Orleans off the usual tourist radar, you know where to find us: in the bright orange house with blue shutters on Esplanade Avenue: La Belle Esplanade.

New Orleans Sugar

There's a new brass band song making the rounds around New Orleans at parades and weddings and at impromptu street corner jam sessions.  It's based on an old tune, a classic tune.  You can hear it from the bars on Frenchmen Street, and also from where the brass bands practice, in the music halls and neighborhood bars on Claiborne Avenue or A.P. Tureaud Avenue, or any number of back-a-town backstreet joints.

If you are of a certain age, when you hear the trumpets and the trombones and the tubas and the cornets and the drums play this song, you'll recognize the tune.  It's a classic.

If you are too young to know the original song, you'll still be tapping your toes and shimmying to the beat and the melody anyway.  This was a number one song in its day for many good reasons.  It is a pure pop confection of danceability and lighthearted bliss.  In New Orleans, we dance like nobody is watching.  We love happiness as much as the next person, but, perhaps, in New Orleans we treasure our happiness more.

Here is the song's original version:

The words for this newest, latest version of the song are similar to the original but different in important ways.  The lyrics have been pressed through the New Orleans filter.  They've become customized to ring more sweet and more true.  Welcome to The New Orleans State of Mind:

Sugar.
Ah, honey, honey.
New Orleans is my candy city
And it's got me wanting more...

Honey.
Ah, sugar, sugar.
New Orleans is a chocolate city
And it's got me wanting more....

I just can't believe the loveliness of loving New Orleans.
I just can't believe it's true.

When I spent a week in New Orleans, I knew how sweet a kiss can be.
I now know how sweet a kiss can be....

Like summer sunshine,
Pour New Orleans sweetness over me.
Pour that magic all over me.

Oh, New Orleans, pour a little sugar on it, honey.
Pour a little sugar on it, NOLA.
You make my life so sweet.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

LIFE IS GOOD IN NEW ORLEANS.

--- If you are looking for someplace to stay when you visit New Orleans, I happen to be an innkeeper.  I run the #1-ranked place to stay in New Orleans (it's been #1 since April 2014 according to TripAdvisor).  You could do a lot worse.  Believe me.  You can choose a lot worse.  If you are looking to experience authentic New Orleans off the usual tourist radar, you know where to find us: in the bright orange house with blue shutters on Esplanade Avenue: La Belle Esplanade.

Sweet Home New Orleans

The view out our window yesterday

Like our guests, we sometimes like to escape from our daily grind, such as it is.  Unlike you, we have company coming tomorrow so we couldn't travel too far.  We just got away for two nights before the busy season starts.  We're not going to have another day off until June.  I know, it makes you pity the life of an innkeeper.

Where do you go if you live in New Orleans, where everybody else in the world goes?  We went to Alabama.  It was as exciting as it sounds and that suited us just fine.

We stayed at a bed and breakfast, naturally.  We didn't know it when we made the reservation, but Trip Advisor ranks the B&B we stayed at as #2 in the whole country.  We can see why.  What a pleasant surprise.  Point Clear Cottages.  Now you know.

Talking to our fellow innkeeper this morning, he said he was very blessed in this life.  One of the blessings he counted was, "I've lived my whole life in Fairhope, Alabama."  I can't comment on the other things he listed, but I have to agree with that one.  What a gem of a town.  We didn't know anything about it before we arrived but after a visit to the local history museum, we sure know a lot about it now.  

In the past, people have asked us what there is to do in Mobile, AL.  Since we hadn't been there, all we could say is that we didn't know. We went yesterday.  We're still not sure what to do.  Instead of staying in Mobile, go down the east shore of the bay a spell and stay in Fairhope.  Stay at the Point Clear Cottages if you can.  There are only two cottages, so you have to book early.  Go during off season, which is anytime but summer.  You have a fair hope of reserving a spot in January.  The weather was gorgeous while we were there.  

Now that we're back home, Frau Schmitt and I were looking at one of the paintings in our lobby.  This one:

I love New Orleans

That painting says a mouthful.  You'll feel the same way after you've been in New Orleans awhile.  You'll want to be back.

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.

New Statue in City Park, New Orleans

Happy Mardi Gras

There's a new statue in City Park, up the street from us.  Actually, there are two statues, but I think one of them is ugly and I can't make myself take a picture of it.  What is it about post-modern art, anyway?  Either you love it or you hate it.  I don't like the new sculpture that's been installed next to the art museum.  Some people call me an old fuddy duddy, though.

Of course, the newest sculpture you see is the one on the front lawn in front of the art museum.  Did I mention I'm not going to take a picture of the sculpture I think is ugly?  I don't mind saying it again.  You'll have to walk up there to see it for yourself.  The sculpture I like is a bit deeper in the park, by the Festival Grounds where they hold Voodoo Fest.  

It takes about twenty picturesque minutes to walk from our house to City Park to see the ugly statue that I didn't take a picture of.  It takes a bit longer to get to this one:

Iconic roses

It's a spray of roses that could have been cast by Cleas Oldenburg if they were painted differently.  Oldenburg was a Pop artist, not a post-modern one.  We can debate that last point if you choose, but I'm sticking with the assertion.

Everyone who sees the rose statue talks about it at breakfast.  Nobody talks about the other sculpture (I can't bring myself to call the other one a statue; it's just a gaudy thing). 

Look up close at the roses:

It could be a Febreze ad

It's made of painted stainless steel, Nida-Core, fiberglass and paint. That's what the plaque says.  It was made by William Ryman (b. 1969) and was made in 2011.  It's called "Icon."  That's as good a name as "Roses," I suppose.

If you go into the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) you'll see a gold log cabin that Ryman also made.  See what you think.  I have little to say about it.

I go to NOMA all the time.  They have a very good photorealist show in there right now.  They have a little bit of everything.  NOMA isn't MOMA by any stretch of the imagination, but it's a nice place to spend some time to see some really good art.  I find the permanent collection very interesting and enlightening.  If you go the third floor, you'll pretty much have the place to yourself.  It's full of African, Asian, and Polynesian art.

There are all sorts of things to see in New Orleans.  If you get bored here, it's your fault.  It's not the city's.  The city is a cornucopia that overflows with delights for all the senses.

A rose as tall as a tree

You'll see when you get here.  There is a genuine Claes Oldenburg statue in the sculpture garden behind NOMA.  It's of a giant safety pin.  I like that one, too.  It's almost as good as the Oldenburg in Minneapolis.  

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.

Authentic New Orleans

Mayor Mitch Landrieu, courtesy of nola.gov

The city's website used to be cityofno.com.  Not too catchy, is it?  When Mitch Landrieu was elected, he changed it to nola.gov.  I'm not here to play partisan politics, as most visitors are not terribly interested, but I will quote something I read a while back.  Mitch Landrieu seems to be holding the job he was born to have.  Whether you think it a case of privilege (his father was mayor) or a case of a man who is enthusiastic about going to work, that's not much of my concern.  I think he's a good mayor, for whatever my opinion is worth.

Frau Schmitt and I met him once.  We were at the coffee shop in The Rink, which is on Prytania Street.  A bald guy was buying a pound of coffee in line in front of us.  He turned around and introduced himself.  "I'm Mitch. What are your names?" he said.

We had a nice conversation.  He seemed genuinely perplexed that we would move from Boston to New Orleans.  "It's so nice in Boston," he said.  We pointed out that there's more snow in Boston than there is in New Orleans and he couldn't argue that point.

There's an interesting article in Politico Magazine that highlights the mayor and his crime strategy.  We don't often discuss the murder rate in New Orleans unless someone asks.  It is high enough to curl most people's hair.  It is much, much, much lower than it was when we moved here four years ago.  It is still more than double the murder rate in Boston, and Boston has twice as many people.  

St. Jospeh Altar, New Orleans

We don't shy away from talking about crime in New Orleans with our guests.  They're already here so there's no point in hiding the truth.

The truth is that we don't see a lot of murders.  Actually, we haven't seen any.  Our part of the city is peaceable.  There isn't even a lot of petty crime in our neighborhood.  It's basically a working families' neighborhood.  It is slowly gentrifying, but it hasn't reached the tipping point, yet.  Once the property values in the Bywater reach their ceiling, I suspect our part of the city will be the next hot real estate market, but that's about a half-decade down the road.  We do have a new Whole Foods supermarket and property values are rising.  Give it time.

People who walk to the French Quarter from our house have to walk under the highway overpass on North Claiborne Avenue, and it's ugly the way most highway projects are.  There are sometimes a panhandler or two under the overpass holding out a sign to the cars stopped at the traffic light, but do you want to know where most of the panhandlers are?  It's where most of the pickpockets and purse snatchers are, too.  They're where the easy marks are: the French Quarter.

Looking up from the Clio Suite balcony

We live a relaxing stroll away from the French Quarter in one direction and from City Park in the other direction.  Tour buses and bicycle tours pass by our house all day, but the neighborhood, overall, isn't inundated with visitors.  It's very peaceable in this part of New Orleans.  It's close enough to the action while being far enough away that we get a good night's sleep without many cares or concerns.

A lot of people who stay with us want to get an authentic New Orleans experience.  This means different things to different people.  A night on Bourbon Street is as authentically New Orleans as a night on Frenchman Street; the only difference is one of degrees.  Emeril Lagasse has a restaurant called Nola.  Is that more authentic than a dinner at Mandina's?  I'm not one to judge.  It's hard to have a bad meal in this city.  Emeril is pure New Orleans even if he is from Fall River, Mass.  We've never eaten at one of his restaurants, but we're not opposed to it.  They just always seem to be crowded.  

Another tree in front of our house

We've never eaten at Couchon either.  Last year, just about everyone who stayed with us arrived with reservations at Couchon. It's in the Warehouse District and last year you needed reservations to get a seat.  We don't spend a lot of time in the Warehouse District.  Everyone who ate at Couchon enjoyed their meals.  Having a good meal is an authentic New Orleans experience, but is Couchon?  I don't know.  I haven't eaten there.  I can tell you about the jazz brunch at Buffa's though.  I recommend it.  The kitchen is open 24 hours and it's right down our street.

I will tell you something that I've found to be true.  If you have heard about it, it's probably not a place we go to often.  It is probably crowded because these places have to advertise to attract the kind of national attention that they do.  The kind of places we go to don't issue press releases or have PR people.  They don't need them.  They've been around for a long time and they have a dedicated clientele of people who live here.  We live here.  When we go out, we like to see people we know.

Our Lady of Prompt Succor, St. Joseph Altar, New Orleans

When you live in New Orleans and you go into a shop in the French Quarter, the person behind the cash register asks, "Where are you from?''  You say, "Esplanade Avenue."  They say, "Is that where you're staying?"  You say, "We live on Esplanade Avenue," and the whole tenor of the conversation changes.  

Nobody asks us where we're from at the places we usually go to.  They don't need to.  Nobody cares.  When you are in the weave of New Orleans, we're all in it together.

A votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.