Miss C in the Big Easy: Prologue

This will be my last post on New Orleans, promise!  It's just that New Orleans was a phenomenon, a crazy alternate universe that can only be described by living it yourself. I want to leave my journey by feeling grateful I was there and retelling some of the highlighted items I grew to appreciate about the city.

Stuff I loved:
1. The food. Amazing! I can’t believe I have now returned to my regular California diet of leaves and twigs. Sooner is better than later though, as I think I gained about 20 pounds.

2. The nightlife. Crazy! It was so fun to walk down the street and find a place to go every two feet, each one better than the last

3. The fact that they won’t let you leave the bar with a glass. They give you a huge plastic cup to pour it in and encourage you to walk the streets like a lush. My kind of place!

4. The music. Going to a place where music fills the streets, where it acts as the blood in the veins of the city, is a wonderful thing

5. The folks. Meeting Southern folks with Southern hospitality and country folks with attitude to boot was a great experience

6. The strange accents. I couldn’t understand a thing some people said. But they said everything with passion and conviction, and that’s good enough for me!

7. Tee-shirts and beer stores. No explanation necessary, just awesome. Get your souvenirs and your drink on!

Stuff I thought was either creepy or strange but dammit l have to mention them anyway:
1. Pizza and daiquiri places. There was one on every single corner, highlighted with tacky neon signs like it was the hippest nightclub. I saw more of these than gas stations. Seriously, who thought up that combination?

2. The smell of the city. Monday wasn’t too bad. Smelled like smoke. By the last day they had left the trash out all week, so the city reeked of sewage, trash, cigars, and dirt. It took me a week to wash that out.

3. Brothels. Ok, they were strip clubs, but I was reminded of the brothels in the old west where half naked girls stood on the corner trying to lure drunken men into the bars to spend all their cash. Seriously, women stood in the doorways in thongs. Pictures of porn were taped to the walls. Sick.

4. Taxi drivers that thought they owned the road. They tried to kill people on multiple occasions.

5. Buses that thought they owned the road. They would literally pull a giant U-turn in the middle of the street and hold up traffic for 10 minutes. Dude, you’re a huge bus! You can’t do that!

6. Pedestrians that thought they owned the road. People in New Orleans don’t follow traffic signals while on foot. At all. If the cars aren’t that close, they just dump themselves onto the road. Hell, they even did that a few times when the cars WERE close. Death wish anyone?

7. Hurricanes and other deadly fruity drinks. I call them hangovers in a glass. And devil juice.

8. Saints trying to save all of us sinners. Yes, Bourbon street was not only crawling with drunks, but infested with bible thumpers. Each one claiming the second coming of Christ and we were all going to hell. One yielded a giant crucifix in the street. Man, you’re ruining my buzz! If you want to banish the devil from NO, go after those awful hurricane drinks.

And yet through the good and the bad, the pretty and the pretty ugly, I had myself a blast. I couldn’t do it every day, but it sure was fun. Next time I go I’ll make sure it’s for vacation and not work. I think I could handle a few more of those hurricanes if I didn’t have to be up in the morning working a show.

Anyway, thank you New Orleans for being you! Until we meet again….Corey out.

 
 
 
So long evil devil juice!