spring break part 1: NOLA

Two thirds of my break were spent here in my beloved New Orleans.

SATURDAY

Saturday I missed ALL the St. Patrick's Day parade, which is quite different from last year. I thought I slept through the first two, but I was wrong since they ran so late. Tully drove Whitney, her friend Brittany (heretoafter referred to as "The -Ittaney's") to Babylon for dinner. Chicken tecka. Yum.

Adrian came over to use the kitchen to flex his culinary muscles. Whit, Keenan, and I went down to The Quarter to close out St. Patty's. We went to Pat O'Brien's, where we celebrated with carbombs, hurricanes, and Bailey's. Whitney and I danced to Flashdance's "What A Feeling," which I guess is "our song" now. When that died down, we went to The Palms, which was dead. Whtiney passed out, but I woke her up with the smell of sirloin steak quesadillas. Adrian and Monica were very finished with dinner by then, so I went with them to The Boot for a little bit.

SUNDAY

Tully, The -Ittaneys, and I took a Sunday Drive around the city, which may have lasted a little longer than we planned. We showed her uptown, the quarter, the marigny, and some of the destruction in mid-city. We grabbed a late lunch (mmm, chirashi sushi, salmon, yellowtail, tuna, crab, shrimp, mackerel, octopus, etc) at Mikimoto. We stopped by Blockbuster to pick up DVDs for break. I borrowed three that I forgot about and almost didn't watch.

Later that night, I went with Shannon to pick up her friend Ihita, visiting from Maryland, from the airport. Those two will be hereafter referred to as "Shanita." We met up at Port O Call with The -Ittaneys and Tony for monsoons and burgers.

Shanita was tired and frustrated with the loss of luggage, so they went home. The -Ittaneys and I went to The Pub, which rocks on "Sing-A-Long Sunday" because they play old music video, particularly from the '90s. We bought several rounds and David (my favorite bartender in the world because even though I'm never there he always remembers) gave us free shots. One was an Absolut Pear Kamikaze, which Whitney loved because its main ingredient is her favorite liquor. Then she and I chased whiskey with beer 'cause Garth said so.

After that, we went to Harrah's to play slots and Blackjack. Chad and I texted a bit. He would've been proud since it was an economically productive night.

MONDAY

Monday began with the Harrah's breakfast buffet. (bacon, andouille, smoked salmon, eggs/omelets made to order, fresh fruit, etc) We all ate too much.

After a nap, I went with Shanita to The Daiq Shack to get daiqiris (Starbucks Mudslide to wake me up) and Hana to get lunch (seaweed salad and spicy tuna, crawfish, and California rolls). We took our drinks and food to The Levy for a picnic.

The -Ittaneys and Tully met up with us, armed with daiquiris, and we played Circle-of-Death/Kings until the sun went down.

Shanita and I picked up Wes and Steve and then met up with Sam at Saltwater Grill. I love that place, but be prepared to WAIT if you order oysters. But we felt Ihita needed to try them raw. She approved. The owner gave us a baker's dozen to make up for the wait.

We met up with Josh, The -Ittaneys, and Tully and went to both old and new Bruno's for more drinks and C-o-D/K. I forgot my waterproof cards, but the bartender lent us some. Good times.

TUESDAY

Tuesday I mostly recuperated before a French Quarter afternoon with Shanita. We got dinner at Arnaud's Remoulade, which doesn't serve the largest portions, but they're tasty and filling. I recommend a Taste of Nola: Seafood gumbo, stuffed crab, and red beans and rice.

We got our palms read by Jerrik and tarot done by his daughter. He was amazing. I really do think palmistry can reveal a lot about a person. Her predictions were good to; the forecast is cloudy, with an occasional storm, but beautiful real soon.

We walked down to Frenchmen, which was chill, to grab a few rounds at DBA, and we gave part of the Brangelina Tour by showing Ihita their street, Whirling Dervish, and Angeli.

Then we hit up Tropical Isle and Pat O'Brien's so she could try hand grenades and hurricanes. She prefers the grenades. I (stupidly) combined hand grenade leftovers with hurricane leftovers and chugged it. We were all drunk, so we barhopped some more. We stopped by The Pub, where it was apparently lesbian night, so that was kind of funny, and then went to Cat's Meow. I was supposed to sing "Get Ready" with Shannon on back-up vocals, but they played "Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch" instead. All the drunk people told me I was "the best," but consider the source. Ihitia bought a little pizza (8 inches in diameter?), and we drove home.

WEDNESDAY

Wednesday we took Shannon's RAV4 to the Toyota dealership to get it checked out. We cruised the mall, like teenagers. Ihita and I hiked over (gasp) grass, her nemesis, to the Aveda Institute. She got a facial and, since it was the first day of spring, I chopped my hair off.

We went to Vietnamese lunch at Tastea Caffé. We all got bubble tea and beef. Grilled, vermicelli, and pho.

We stopped by the quarter again so Ihita could get some souvenirs.

We met up with Sam at Dick and Jenny's for dinner. I had an "escargot-boy" (a garlicky snail po-boy with creamy mushroom sauce) for an appetizer and a sampler entree (pain perdue, fried oysters, and crawfish alligator sausage cheesecake). We split a Nolamisu (tiramisu with local ingredients, Mom) and creme brulee for dessert. It's really good, but it's similarities to Jacques-Imo's invite comparison. My heart (aka stomach) still belongs to Jacques.

Back here, I went over to Whitney's to watch LOST and Saw 3, which we'd borrowed from blockbuster.

Satur(ated )day

So I woke up around four in the afternoon, I think. I returned a few phone calls and considered having the remainder of Marney's chocolate chip cookies for breakfast when Carter called. He came over to pick me up and apologize for the night before. (And I'm cool with everyone now even though I went to bed cursing everyone who was part of my night from 3AM to 9AM.) We went to "brunch" (really dinner) at Port of Call. Huge burgers, extremely loaded baked potatoes, and their signature "monsoon" drinks.

We watched Endymion from downtown. Some 13 year old girl with a mother nowhere in sight had taken off her shirt and was jumping up and down demanding beads from all the floats. She lots of them and lots of disapproving looks from riders and passersby alike. After the parade we hit up Handsome Willy's in the Central Business District. It's undoubtedly the coolest bar in the CBD because they had a television set dedicated to a SUPER NINTENDO ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM. So we played Mortal Kombat 3 and Mario Kart. (I forgot how much the 90s liked spelling C-words with Ks.) Good times.

After that, we showed Alex the craziness of Bourbon and got him the signature drinks. Pat O'Brien's hurricane, Tropical Isle hand grenade, etc. The crazy Christians told us we were all going to hell, but I met my new hero... a sane Christian holding up a huge sign saying "I'm sorry" to apologize for all the nut jobs who misrepresent us.

We left Carter and Will to Napoleon's Itch and went to the dance club next to Napoleon's Itch, where some girl offered to give me head for the huge beads I had on and I was sure it wasn't worth it 'cause she was gross. We then started heading back to Esplanade and Bourbon where we parked. (We had fantastic luck with parking spots this weekend, even better than Ryanne Clarke's.) Carter and Will went to Cafe Lafitte in Exile (gay bar) while Alex and I hit up Jean Lafitte's Blacksmith Bar (oldest bar in the quarter).

We finished off the night in the piano bar of Lafitte's before heading home to crash so we could get up on Sunday for the big camp out!

F-ed Up Friday

It was... in both the good way and the bad way.

First class: Canceled after we turned in our discussion topics. Second class: Short. Third class: First exam. SERIOUSLY WHO GIVES AN EXAM THAT'S NOT ON THE SYLLABUS AT THE START OF THE YEAR ON THE LAST FRIDAY BEFORE MARDI GRAS SAYING THE ONLY OTHER DAY WE COULD HAVE HAD IT IS THE FIRST DAY AFTER MARDI GRAS AND DOESN'T OFFER MAKE-UPS? Joyce. That's who.

After that, I checked mail and found I'd gotten a package of homemade chocolate chip cookies from Marney, mother of my brother's best friend, lovely woman that she is. Makes me wonder what she send Adrian or her own actual son. That was a nice pick-me-up after the exam

Carter & Co came over to meet up with Peter and me, and we went to happy hour at the boot for a quick round before some shopping on Magazine St. (Apparently Carter missed certain stores and me as a "shopping buddy.") We picked up some new duds at the style lab and found exact replacements of ruined clothing at buffalo exchange.

Ben was nice enough to put us on the guest list for watching the Krewes of Hermes, D'Etat, and Morpehus at his St. Charles condo, so we stopped by The A&P to pick up some ice, Jim Beam, and a bottle of Grey Goose as a present for our gracious host. (We later found out that during the parades I ended up drinking half the bottle of Beam by myself; no mixers for it and no one else wanted it straight up.)

After the parades, we went to Sake Cafe and had a sushi feast and then went to Bruno's for a few rounds. Ben and Peter went their separate ways, but I went to Frenchmen Street with Carter & Co. Cafe Negril had an amazing live reggae band playing, and James Gandolfini was hanging out there too. We made eye contact and I mouthed "Tony Soprano." He responded with a smile and handshake and told me Happy Mardi Gras. Awesome

The rest of the night (or morning since it was 3AM at that point) went downhill from there. We should have followed Tony Soprano's lead and gone home and crashed, but we didn't.

A few highlights of the short version are:

• loud, sloppy Bourbon St
• tired and drunk and annoyed at the bar
• Carter&Co, aka my ride home, wanted to stay
• quest for a cab with Ben
• We became the drunk guys with dead cell phones and no rides.
• minor bitchfest with Ben
• almost fist fight with cab driver
• loud altercation at my front door with Carter

The story ends with me going to bed at 9AM.

the week so far

"I saw you at Krewe de Vieux the other night, Andrew. Not going to say what you were doing but I saw you there!" - Professor Cunningham

Sunday:
Harrah's
Cafe Brazil
Krewe de Vieux
DBA
port of call
Bubba Gump

Lauren hates when anyone grabs her boob(s).

Monday:
classes
gym
Adrian time

Tuesday:
terrorism classs
Tara time
screenwriting class
Ben time
Martinique Bistro
Pitt St. Pretties time
Lauren time

"dress up fancy" ... just a little

Wednesday:
class
Rachel time
classes
nap
LOST
studying

no classes = awesome

Lauren and I closed out Sunday night by goin' to Cooter Brown's, which I think qualifies as our regular haunt now. Lizzie came too and was nice enough to drive. We played pool, split a pitcher, and (of course) ate cheese fries.

Yesterday was entirely laidback and chill. It was great. I spent my day cooking, eating, going to the gym, watching television with Peter, seeing Blood Diamond with Shannon and Lizzie "Blood" Diamond, chatting online with Lauren, and going out with Josh, Joe, and some of their friends.

We went to Dragon's Den on Frenchmen, where Jody eventually met up with us because apparently Tucks wasn't that fun last night.

Apparently "the alley pic" is a tradition.

Then we went to F&M's for a quick round and snacks.

You know F&M's is dead when people actually play pool.

After quick stops at both Bruno's (old and new) and seeing The Boot closed at only three in the morning, we decided to call it a night.

Peter left for home a few hours ago.

And then there was one...

back by popular demand

Once upon a time in October 2006, Andrew never actually updated his journal, which has happened before but not during school, so he wrote an entry after the month ended detailing in run-on sentence that his high school English teachers would detest exactly what he did during that month: With Stephanie free of the LSAT, her birthday was finally celebrated and involved a good amount of Harrah's, drinking on the patio, drunk people at the piano bar, and Pat O'Brien,s Tara turned 21 about a week later, and she and Andrew celebrated by making a spectacle of themselves with a spectacular pub crawl that semi-began with margaritas at dinner at Taqueria Corona and pre-gaming at home but really began with Abita Amber at Cooter Brown's, then bypassed the closed Daiq-Shack, and into Madigan's, then Uptown Cajun, then TJ Quills, then past an early-closed Vera Cruz in favor of both Bruno's, and after Phillips was sadly closed as well went to The Palms, and then The Boot, and then The Palms again for a long timg, dancing and drinking and dancing and drinking and then doing five shots each to hit the 21 mark before going to Big Easy to get laughed at by the workers and then taking a picture with the Tulane sign before the sun came up, there were more birthdays and parties (kegs for Curry, Chris' graduation celebration, and the noise-violatin' gettin' shut down Freaky Friday the 13th all come to mind) that were fun as well, and lots of barhopping and picture-taking, some of which the subjects don't remember, but that's okay, and Cowboy Mouth played a show for homecoming (which Tulane won against Army), and Andrew couldn't refuse to go since Curry was in charge of it and it was his birthday and personally invited and recommended that people go, and it was loud but the band basically forced people to have fun and brought Matt on stage because he didn't look like he was having fun, and as a finale brought literally everyone on stage to sing their last song, and Lauren got into med school, so that was celebrated with brownies and champagne after anticipating the victory a few nights earlier by going to Phillips after David and Andrew went to AEPi's Original Sin and Zeta Psi's Bayou Bash and tried to remember how they went to several of these parties freshman year and didn't get tired of them then, went with David and Peter to go see The Departed which was violent but amazing, and everyone should see it, and watching the new mini-season of Lost which will be over sooner than it should be, and random nights of hanging out with Adrian or running into him and/or his friends at various nightlife locations here in uptown (funny that Adrian and Andrew both went to the Jazmine Café on separate occasions without hearing from each other and really liked it and thought it was cheaper yet better Viet food than at home), Halloween was suddenly here and began a couple nights early, naturally, and there were lots of parties, and people madly hunting for costumes last-minute, and most of the girls dressed like sluts because that's what the holiday celebrates, and there were lots of Quail-Men (Nickelodeon's Doug, anyone?) but they were all cool, and there were at least five of them throughout the “long” weekend even though the best costume this year I think was the Two-Face walking around Frenchmen with half a head of make-up, half a wig(?) or half a dye job, a suit half in animal-print and “matching” shirt, tie, and probably hands and shoes even though they weren't seen, and Stephanie and Andrew went to The Rocky Horror Picture show which was disturbing/entertaining as ever and got hooked up with VIP passes (thanks David) and sat in the front and experienced rice, water, the actors, the candy, and all such antics even though Stephanie thought the walk to McAlister was really long because they were dressed funny, and Ted suddenly decided to tell us that he was leaving for Texas but with much less notice and fanfare than last time and apparently this time for real, and conversely Jacque was back in town, so that was fun and it was like old times except with legal drinking and going to the levee with her and Tara and talking about how no one - not even Jacque surprisingly – knows what they're doing with their life, what the Pitt St. Pretties are doing with their Thursday is going to Vaughan's Lounge to see Kermit Ruffins and drink with professors and eat late night red beans and rice, which is fun and they've taught Andrew to go (he goes to Café Luna, their workplace, a lot to visit also), Tara is really into the red wine and split a bottle of it with him and Alifun even though Alifun only really drinks a glass, but it was the thought that counts because red wine is medicinal for tragedy, and then St. Joe's and Monkey Hill and other places twenty-one year olds can go, and pictures that people don't remember. The end.

So if you really want to kill some time, wrestle your way through that. It'll be like reading James Joyce but without the intellect and deftness in the writing or Victor's chapter in The Rules of Attraction without the sex and drugs.

There will be pictures as soon as Microsoft PictureIt repairs itself.