Rex Hollywood In New Orleans

2216 Esplanade Avenue in 2012

It's always nice to see people twice.  Frau Schmitt and your humble narrator know we'll see some of our guests again, eventually, some day, in the future, but, when it happens in reality it always warms our hearts.  

It's always nice to see people again.  We saw someone this week who's presence especially always tickles us.  When I saw the reservation come through last August, I sent a brief email.  "This is an unexpected surprise," it said.  "We look forward to seeing you and your lovely bride again," it concluded.  Unfortunately, the bride in question couldn't make it at the last minute.  Next time.  There is always a tantalizingly possible next time over the horizon.

Our friend, the man-of-mystery, Rex Hollywood, who didn't get himself killed while he was here, wore dress slacks and flashy ties the whole time he stayed with us.  He's a dandy.  That's his nature.  He wasn't showing off.  He just likes to look good.

Wanna know a secret?  Rex Hollywood and I get our shirts from the same place. When one Kirkland man sees another, they recognize that mark of distinction.  It's like a Masonic handshake.  There's an unspoken bond.

When people love New Orleans, there is an unspoken bond, too.  If you don't like New Orleans, you're just not right in the head.  

Some people like New Orleans.  Some people love New Orleans.  Some people get New Orleans, or, rather, New Orleans gets under their skin.  The city is like a Sinatra song.  It's for lovers.



After Rex Hollywood left this afternoon, I thought about Frank Sinatra.  They have similar mannerisms.  They are both the epitome of cool in their own ways.

Just before he sped off to the airport in his sports car with the top down, I shook Rex Hollywood's hand for what I hope wasn't the last time.  "I just wish Cathy could have been here," he told me.  I seconded the motion.

I say the same thing about Frau Schmitt when I have some great experience in New Orleans.  For Rex Hollywood, it was after spending three days in New Orleans.  For me, it's usually after I've picked up a box of donuts in the morning.  It's a crazy world down here.  It's a crazy mixed-up world.  

You never know who you will meet in this kaleidoscopic city.  You can be sure to make friends here, though.  Good friends make the world go around.

2216 Esplanade Avenue yesterday

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.

This one goes out to Chris.  A tip of the fedora in his direction.  

New Orleans' Best Bed and Breakfast Blog

Everyone has an opinion

If you'll allow me a moment of false modesty, I'd like to start today's entry with a paragraph that most other B&B blogs can't.  Please bear with me:

When a travel guide writer was touring our inn a couple of weeks ago, she said I should publish our blog as a book.  She said it's that good.  A lot of other people have said the same thing.  Me?  I just blush.

I don't know how good this blog is, or how useful it is.  I know that I enjoy writing it and that many of our guests enjoy reading it.  It gives them a taste of what it's like to stay with us.  At least, it gives them a taste of what it's like to talk to your humble narrator.  Our blog tends to ramble.

The Lost Innkeeper

I was walking our dog in City Park the other day, the dog that nobody ever sees, when I saw a tree that reminded me of a painting by Rene Magritte.  There is no New Orleans connection to this story beyond the bare tree in the distance.  It's not relevant to anything, really, except that I find it interesting---another example of you never know what you'll see in New Orleans, I suppose. How's that?

For those who don't know, Rene Magritte was a Belgian surrealist painter.  We can have some fairly erudite conversations around the breakfast table if you want to.  We can also talk about getting drunk on Bourbon Street, too, if that's your fancy.  We run a real renaissance B&B.

You know the picture of the pipe that says, "This is not a pipe."?  Magritte painted that.  

The Treachery of Images

He painted another one, too.  He called that one The Lost Jockey.  See any resemblance to City Park? and I don't mean the snow on the ground.  I mean the tree.

The Lost Jockey

I went to some innkeeping convention a few months ago where I attended a seminar on blogging.  The speaker said he or she writes the blogs for about 400 B&Bs.  If you look through this site's archives, I've gone on record before saying that when I've read other B&B's blogs (not all of them, mind you) they all seem the same.  Jiminy Cricket!  Now I know why!

I've also gone on record saying that (some) other B&B blogs are just boring links to festivals and recipes.  I'm sure some people like that kind of thing.  I'm not one of them.  When I asked Frau Schmitt if our blog should be about festivals and recipes, she said, "Write about what you want.  You're going to anyway."  She is usually right about these things.

Guess what advice I got at the seminar.  "If you can't think of anything to write about, you can always write about festivals or post your favorite recipes."  I was taking notes.

Apropos of nothing, it's been awhile since we plugged our friends at Find Everything Historic.  Click the link to find out more.

findeverythinghistoric.com

In other news, during the weekend of May 15 this year, it's the Mid-City Bayou Boogaloo, a music festival on the shores of Bayou St. John.  

You think I'm trying to be funny when I write about this but I'm not.  I got a call from Armand today and he asked if we would sponsor one of the shows during the festival.  I told him we'd be pleased to offer our support.  Proceeds from the festival help to fund a number of initiatives to improve the environment of Bayou St. John.  So there.  Plus, it's good advertising.  Don't call about availability for this year, though.  We're already booked solid that weekend.

[I was going to put another picture here

but it took too long to upload and I

got tired of waiting.]

You wouldn't know it from watching me in action all day but I'm a pretty busy man.  I don't have time to read a lot of other B&B blogs.  It's probably been a year since I read my last one.  Shame on me, perhaps.  That's why we don't serve cranberry nut bread at breakfast.

We do have something else, however.  We have New Orleans' best B&B blog.  That's what some people say, at least.  I haven't the nerve to ask Frau Schmitt what she thinks, but she's usually right about these things.  That's why I haven't asked her.  That, and I don't even think she reads our blog.  She's busy, too.

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.

Calling New Orleans Home.

It's amazing what a zoom lens can capture

Regular readers of this blog often think I walk around with a camera around my neck all the time.  Untrue.  Other people think I have a cell phone that takes pictures.  That's untrue, too.  The photos I post here are just a fraction of a fraction of a percentage of what I see everyday wandering around this kaleidoscopic city we call home: New Orleans, Louisiana.  When something interesting presents itself, I'm always thinking I should have my camera, but I never do.  Most of my life is undocumented in either pixels or film, like most people throughout history, I suppose.  I'm a dinosaur.  Let your imagination and intuition be your guide.

Spend enough time in New Orleans and you'll be blinkered before you know it.

No wonder these posts ramble from topic to topic without much continuity.  That's the way it is when you walk around New Orleans.  You never know you'll find when you turn a corner.  A person needs to be on his or her toes to react and respond to the magic in the streets.

The band plays on

A German guest and a Canadian guest from Montréal went to the Rock 'n' Bowl for Zydeco Night (every Thursday), and the German half of this pair told me that, for her, it was like being in a movie.  New Orleans is like that.  Life is but a dream in many ways, but in New Orleans dreams become real.  Dance like nobody is watching.  You have to be dead from the neck up if you don't enjoy Zydeco Night at the Rock 'n' Bowl.  You've gotta be dead all over if you don't enjoy New Orleans.  Something's wrong with you if you don't have a good time in The City that Care Forgot.  

A parade went by our house the other day.  It was the Friday before Mardi Gras.  If you don't live here, you don't know what that means.  If you are here during Mardi Gras season, or if you live in New Orleans, it means everything.  We live in a magical city. 

New Orleans isn't magical only during Mardi Gras.  It's magical all the time.  It is nothing like where you are from.  Let me be frank, I have no vested interest if you visit New Orleans or not.  If you don't come, someone else will.  Let me tell you this, though: if you visit New Orleans, you won't be the same again.  It's like riding a motor scooter, or a little Fiat 500, or a Mini Cooper, or a great big yellow 1979 Cadillac with fins in the back.  It will change your life.  It's like parachuting, or parasailing; it's paranormal without being occult.  Who does the kind of voodoo New Orleans does?  Nobody. Nowhere.  No how.  Don't ask.

It's a parade in front of our house

I don't know what happens in front of the house you live in but I can make uninformed suppositions.  I've lived in plenty of houses where nothing much happened in front, or in the back for that matter.  It's nice when life is predictable and uneventful.  It's less exciting and interesting, but at least you know what to expect.  Now, I'm gonna tell you a secret: it's better when magic happens in front of your house.

It's better when magic happens on every street in your town or city.  I'm not talking about garbage cans being emptied on time or the recycling bins, either.  I don't mean that the mail shows up at the same time every day or that the FedEx guy drops by when you're Amazon package is scheduled to arrive.  I'm talking about real magic.  I'm talking about music.  I'm talking about an unpredictable improvised rhythm of a day.  What do I mean, exactly?

Come to New Orleans.  Then, I won't need to explain it.  Seeing is believing.  Living is living the good life, at least for as long as your vacation lasts.  Remember:  Nobody ever said their stay in New Orleans was too long.  Everybody says the opposite, and that they wish they didn't have to leave.

Speaking for Frau Schmitt and myself, we're here for the duration.  We call New Orleans home for a reason.

À votre santé,

La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.

Who Was Paul Morphy?

Paul Morphy

People who play the ponies in New Orleans often wonder who Paul Morphy was.  That's because there's a street named after him on the way to the Fair Grounds.  Have I mentioned recently that our house is only a ten minute walk from the Fair Grounds?  That tidbit of information is valuable if you are going to Jazz Fest next year (NOT this year, we don't have any vacancy).

Paul Morphy Drive runs through a neighborhood that is called the Fair Ground Triangle.  The neighborhood designation seems to be a fairly recent invention, but I like it.  It fits.  The Seahorse Saloon is in the Triangle, too.  I enjoyed reading the reviews for the Seahorse Saloon on Google+.  

I don't know what Paul Morphy Drive was named before it was named Paul Morphy Drive.  I assume it had another name at one time and it was renamed posthumously.  It is a mystery.  I wish I had a little emoji of a ghost to put here, but I don't.

Paul Morphy died in 1884 at the age of 47.  That's a little younger than your humble narrator is as of this writing (I am, also, thankfully alive, I should add).  Paul Morphy's life was a tragedy of sorts.  During it, he was known as "The Pride and Sorrow of Chess."  People who know who he is still call him that.  I do.  So does Jennifer, who lives next door.  So do the bartenders at the Seahorse Saloon.  

Paul Morphy was born in New Orleans and he died in New Orleans.  Between those two important periods, he traveled extensively, most notably for two years, between the ages of 19 and 21, during which he was proclaimed the greatest chess player in the world.  All he really wanted to do was be a lawyer, so when he reached the legal age to practice law in Louisiana, he retired from chess.  He never played again.

He never made a go at law.  According to Wikipedia, from which I'm cribbing all this information, he "ultimately lived a life of idleness, living off his family's fortune." That's pretty nice work if you can get it.  Unfortunately, Frau Schmitt and I have never been able to get that kind of work, so we picked a profession that is equally nice.  That's why we're innkeepers.

If I may put forth a personal opinion for you to consider, Paul Morphy had a beautiful head of hair.  Look at that photograph at the top of this blog.  If you're curious who's hair that reminds me of, specifically the prominent swooped upward bangs, it's Morrissey.  

If anyone wants to start an online fanzine about La Belle Esplanade, let me know.  I'll give you exclusive access to the behind-the-scenes workings.  You can even interview Tammie the Housekeeper if she agrees.

Tammie the Housekeeper

Scratch that last part.  Tammie the Housekeeper, reading over my shoulder, tells me she isn't interested in dishing the dirt.  Her job is to clean it up.

As usual, another salute to Tammie the Housekeeper, the most valuable member of our team, aside from Frau Schmitt, of course, who is the nicest person you will ever meet.

À votre santé,
La Belle Esplanade bed and breakfast.