They might have made a commerical like this:
Hotel room in New Orleans: $500
Flight to New Orleans: $250
Meeting Mark Mullins’ twin brother, Bruce: Priceless
There really are some things that money just can’t buy.
After a bit of sleep (Mike and Lisa get up way too early), we enjoyed our tasty complementary hotel breakfast, and prepared to head out. We walked up Magazine Street. It was very quiet. Lisa then took us on a tour of the Garden District and we hit a cemetary. There was VooDoo BBQ for lunch and then we came back to the hotel to recharge ourselves and our camera batteries. My pedometer says that we walked almost six miles this morning!
I’m uploading a lot of sight seeing photos in the Day 2 album.
Day 1 is over and it was a great first day.
Tracy and I enjoyed a good lunch and a luxurious afternoon adjusting to the hotel and unpacking.
Lisa and Mike arrived around 4:30 and after we all changed and primped for no good reason beyond we are on vacation. Then we went to Napolean House to meet up with Stacey and have some Pimm’s Cups, a tasty house specialty consisting of 7-Up, lemonade, and gin, served with a fresh cucumber slice. Lisa described them as “refreshing” and she was right. Its a very “sit out on your big porch wearing a big hat trying to stay cool” type of drink.
From there we headed to Electric Ladyland tattoo as Lisa was planning to meet with a tattoo artist there and discuss a design she planned to get today. Mike, Tracy, and myself had also planned to get tattoos when Lisa got hers. But schedules got changed around and last night, Mike, Tracy, and I all took the plunge. Lisa has to wait until Friday afternoon now. It was fun and impulsive and, yes, it did hurt. Mike went first and his was the largest so while he got inked (and after we took a bunch of photos of him in the window), Leroy and Katja met up with us and we went and hung out with them at a little bar across the street. So nice to see Leroy. Not sure if we’ll see him again before St. Anne’s on Mardi Gras day or not.
After Mike was done, I was next! I got a solid black fleur de lis on my inner left ankle. I was originally thinking I wanted it to be shaded in Mardi Gras colors like Stacey and Lisa have, but then I decided to go with black because I want a tigerhawk on the other ankle and that will definitely be solid black and well, I just have to have things match. And as the guy at the shop pointed out, black goes with everything. *chuckle* Tracy was last and she was as cool as a cucumber in a Pimm’s cup ;)
After the ink was semi-dry, we went to Port of Call for Lisa’s favorite hamburgers. They were quite tasty and were served with a baked potato on the side. Really good food. Really slow waitress. I’m cutting NOLA a ton of slack because I realize the position a lot of these businesses are in, but this was one of those cases of the chick just basically forgot our table existed while everyone else around us got plenty of service. But the company was good.
After that we headed back to the hotel. We are already seriously getting our walk on. We walked down Bourbon Street and it was pretty sparse. Its interesting to see Mike and Lisa’s reactions to the post-K NOLA as they were here right before the hurricane and they really know and love the city. More serious thoughts later.
Now we are gathering ourselves together to go out and spend the day walking. Our tour guide, Lisa, has our itinery all planned out. Seriously. Its printed. I had Doogie flashbacks. ;)
Day 1 photos, including my tattoo, are up.
Tracy and I are all set up and unpacked in our suite at the Marriott Residence Inn.
No travel problems. I even got from CID to ORD 20 minutes early! And I saw a woman traveling with a baby monkey. Seriously. It was so small.
The only frightening moment came when we arrived at the hotel and they had cancelled our reservation last week. A reservation that we had made in April of last year and that we’d be calling the hotel and checking on every month since Katrina. But we got lucky and they had another room available. But it was a bit scary for a few moments. The weather is currently a beautiful 79 degrees and we’re just waiting on Lisa and Mike’s arrival to see what the rest of the day will hold.
you gotta go see the Mardi Gras.
So says the song.
I’m off in less than 12 hours. More like 9 hours now.
I’m in total freak out packing mode.
Watch this space for updates!
Sales chick in Junior’s dept: No one has said anything all day about my sassy flip! I guess my hair looks really bad.
It didn’t look that bad.
But it wasn’t sassy.
I spent my lunch hour running around town going into multiple shoe stores and leaving empty-handed. *sigh* I need new shoes. I need new shoes for my trip to New Orleans. My trip is in 2 weeks and 1 day. You live and die on your feet in NOLA. The last time I went in 2003, I had a pair of Nikes and a pair of Birks. After a day of walking and standing for nearly 16 hours on various hard surfaces, including cobblestone streets, my feet were just killing me and it was clear neither pair of shoes that I had had enough support to get me through the rest of the trip. My trip roommie, Erica, decided she was in the same boat and she was determined to get new shoes. We went to the mall and walked into the first shoe store she saw and basically just asked for the most comfortable shoes they had. The saleman put us both in a pair of Merrells that were just rock star. I wore them the entire rest of that trip and I’m actually wearing them right now.
They’re still comfortable but I’m thinking that after three years and a lot of use that the support and padding have to be a lot less than what they were originally. So I’m on the hunt for new shoes. Of course they don’t make the style I already have anymore, because that would be too simple.
I’ve tried on at least a dozen pairs of different styles and brands at about seven different shoe stores. I’m currently in shoe shopping obsession mode. Which sucks, because, I hate shoe shopping. HATE. I always have an idea of exactly what I want and I can never find it. It used to be that I’d find it but it would be the most expensive pair of shoes in the store and that would stop me, but no more. I’ve realized that its better to pay $150 for a pair of shoes I’ll wear constantly for three years than to pay $70 for a pair that I just kind of like and then they’ll sit in the closet and Mac will sleep on them. However, giving into the idea of just buying whatever I want no matter the cost (do note however, that I would never pay $400 for a pair of Jimmy Chos, I’m not a shoe person. I just want them to be comfortable and not tacky) seems to have really only meant now I can just never find ANYTHING I like.
I asked Lisa what she had for NOLA shoes and she told me she had a pair of Skechers, which I’d dismissed as a novelty shoe line… something to do with American Idol winners shilling for their product probably did it. I was just perusing their website and found these: 
They have rhinestones, they have to be considered.
I showed them to Lisa. They’re the exact shoes that she already has! Too funny. We’re too predictable.
Afterwork tonight I’m buying new shoes of some kind. I am on a mission. It must be done.
This was hands-down my favorite Super Bowl commerical. You may have missed it because it didn’t air until the third quarter, but it made me smile and brought me general joy for the rest of the game.
Oh wait, that’s not until next month. Oscar post still forthcoming.
Instead I’d like to thank my aforementioned super geek who henceforth be granted the title of Super Dave for going above and beyond the call of duty getting my new system up and running.
I know you want all the geeky details, so here are the specs… actually, I’m not even sure of the final specs, but the computer is telling me that it/has:
How many points does this get me in the Technology Arms Race: Work Version?
