New Orleans 2001 Day 3: The French Quarter Sucks
9/26/1

We had set the alarm for 8:30 so we'd get up at a decent time. Aisai wanted to set it for 8, but I had protested the night before. So, even though I woke up at 5:30 and every 20 minutes after that this morning, I didn't get out of bed until after the alarm went off. Actually, not just after the alarm went off, but after it went off and Aisai got out of the shower and told me to get up. I had already started getting up anyway, I swear.

I had a bit of a headache. Aisai came to the bed with some of those microwave breakfast burritos we bought our first night here [see, I hadn't gotten out of bed yet] and they were nasty. Ooh, they sucked.

Mr. Lizardo showed up for the third time, though I think the lizard on the wall last night was a different one, a little bigger. However, it could have been him. This one was definitely the same one as the first one we saw. In fact, he was in the tub. I had to get him.

Rather than let him go outside, since it was so cold, I let him go in the main room. Hey, lizards are good guys. All we had to do was make sure we didn't step on him for a while until he found the warm warm utility closet that holds the hot water heater.

I took some ibuprofen and after my shower I felt much better. I did mention the headache in a previous paragraph, right?

We ended up eating lunch at McDonald's again. I didn't realize that they'd not be serving breakfast and I really didn't want anything but a breakfast burrito for breakfast. Actually, two breakfast burritos. Well, they were doing lunch so I had a happy meal and a fish no sauce. Aisai got a happy meal also, and we requested the male toys for both so we could get Bionicles. But no, we open our Happymeals and they have key fobs of the evil queen from Snow White and, I think, Grumpy. It was some useless dwarf.

It was then our goal to find the southern port of the Canal Street Ferry. We got on Stumpf [I kid you not] and turned onto Franklin street, which I understand is the way to do this. The neighborhood got bad, then worse, then there were only three types of people, old men in rags, pregnant teens waiting for the bus, and young toughs looking at my out-of-state license plate. Legend has it that if I didn't actually chicken out, then I'd be in a very nice community after that. In Huntsville, property value dynamics state that no good property could be in a slum. But, hey, I'll never know since I'm not going back.

We decided to drive to the Aquarium of the Americas rather than take the ferry. The reason that we'd take the ferry would be that there'd be no parking near the French [Suck] Quarter. As it was, there is no one around since tourism is at an all time low after the Terrorist Attack in New York.

So, after having a nice, but odd, meter maid man help us find where we were downtown, we found the aquarium and parked. We had originally pulled over since the car was overheating and then when I got out to put a few quarters in the meter since Mr. Meter Maid was coming, I just asked him where the heck we were.

We got there, parked, walked, and found out it closed at four that day and that half of the boat tours between the zoo and the aquarium were cancelled for that day. Aisai was able to digest the information quickly and said, "So, we'd have to hop on the boat within 10 minutes to get to the Zoo, and we wouldn't be able to come back until five. When does the aquarium close?" Ends up, it closed early at four. So � lame. No go. So we decided to walk over to the French [Suck] Quarter.

Even though the transsexual parade was over two weeks ago, they were still out in scary numbers. And poor taste too. Ok, if you're going to dress like a gal, you need to shave, and wear appropriate clothing. You can't wear a snazzy evening dress at noon, especially if you have a beard. Tacky perverts.

The lack of tourists had made all the big names stop showing up. All that was left was the dregs of jazz and conmen. I could tell of the three conmen we met, but I won't. They were conmen. It left a bad taste to the whole experience. We wanted out.

My notes say "Cafe Du Suck" at this point. We went by Cafe Du Monde on our way to the car. I got a cafe au lait which was a little light on the lait if you ask me. Aisai got a chocolate milk and we also got a souvenir mug. Very reasonably priced souvenir mug too, $3.40.

I really wanted to take the tour of the Superdome. We drove across town while having the car borderline overheat in the stop and go traffic and found out that the tours are postponed indefinitely. Tonight when talking to a yappy guy at the Swamp Tours we found out that this is because some Superbowl, maybe this years, is going to be there and since all this terrorist yadda yadda. Heck, I could have walked in there. If it wasn't for Aisai, I probably would have just gone in. It was open. Heck, buy a clipboard and, if asked, say you are from the city and you're getting a count of interior spigots or something. Of course, I'd never do that though.

I took some pictures since I was there and then we took the car, still overhot, and drove along a road I figured would get us to another road which would allow us to get over 35ish mph so the car would cool. It seems that the AC does hurt the car's ablility to cool, but once it's hot, it says that way unless the AC is off and the air, meaning airspeed, is on, meaning driving continuously.

Saint Charles was not the right road for continuous movement.

We ended up driving through the Garden District, which is beautiful and much nicer than the French Quarter, but then again, the 7-11 on the corner with trash in the parking lot is nicer than the French Quarter.

[Note: I wasn't impressed with the French Quarter.]

It wasn't until the good old Huey P. Long Bridge that the car got it's temp under control. The night before, when we were travelling across it when I was sleepy and it was dark, I compared it to the game Wipeout for the Playstation. I was right, the southbound Huey P. Long is like one of the track's in Wipeout 3. One of the later tracks I'm no good at. But I wasn't bouncing off the walls of the bridge in real life, mind you.

Finally, we got home in the afternoon. Aisai and I felt drained and discouraged. She got her book, The Green Mile, which she has already read, and I put the kitchen table out on the deck above the water and wrote when listening to soothing music. It was really nice. The fish were jumping and the Diet Mountain Dew was cold.

After quite a while, we headed out to Frickey's, a place that was recommended to us. On the way, which wasn't far really, we stopped by the swamp tour people and the chef for their cafe started talking to us. He talked and talked and, like many people in New Orleans, didn't realize that we wanted nothing to do with their French Quarter afterhour partying. He actually said the French Quarter was best at night because that is when you see the "crazy, out of control behavior". Oh, that's what I value, chaos.

[Note: That was sarcasm.]

Frickey's didn't have adequate parking. In fact, it had three parking spots and I couldn't figure where to park. So we picked another place on our list from Brad's mom, New Orleans Food & Spirits. After passing it and not seeing it, we stopped and Aisai looked in a phone book and I asked this guy who's family was getting haircuts in Fantastic Sam's [or similar talent-free hair cutting joint]. With his slightly wrong secondary instructions, we found it. In fact, we found it was closed after four on Wednesdays. We ate at the Copeland's on the corner.

Copeland's is a chain that we actually have at home, but we've never eaten there. It's billed as New Orleans cuisine. There must be some colloquialism about eating at a chain when you're in the city it themes itself after.

The food was excellent and we took home most of it since they tried to kill us with the generous portions. Our restraint allowed us to stop by Sonic, where I accidentally engaged the gal who brought our shakes in conversation. After a while, I made my second mistake by speaking to her again when she had misunderstood what I had meant. Finally, we left and I told Aisai that I need to learn when to shut up, or the gal there does, or both of us.

Then we got home, dispatched a scary looking spider to the bayou, listened to The Police while sorting our Mardi Gras beads by color, and now I'm typing this while listen to my "Alphabetical Alanis [Morissette] Mix".

Oh, and a great blow to me, at my lowest point, I had put my Tamagotchi, which I had been raising since 11:30 p.m. Friday, in my key pocket. It beeped so I got it out and it had reset itself. The time was 0:00 and I was looking at an egg rather than my little man who was on the road to getting those black ears. If you don't know Tamagotchiness, then ignore me. But, aah, my little man. Now I have the secondary blob dude and I hope I can do well enough again to get legs rather than lips.

It seems that one of the unspoken Japanese stereotypes is the long legs are heroic and big lips are lazy. I feel that my lips are too big, and thus I tend to wear a goatee. But Aisai says I'm sexy, which, hey, baby, I am, but I still think my lips are too big.

But hey, I'm not kuchipachi.