although i'm not sick, i'm not quite away from illness, either. my sinus tapping of yesterday has turned into a chest cold today. at least i think that's what it is, because i'm also clearly allergic to something in this area (it might be mold), so it may be nothing more than just weird offsets of allergy. i had bad allergies as a kid, but they've gone totally away as an adult (which, by the way, is a possible indicator of severe arthritis in old age), so who knows?
the important thing is i'm running under full power ... so as long as i have a kleenex, i'm set to go.
first stop, cafe du monde. the new orleans place so famous that even anne's heard of it and been there.
from there it was out for a swamp tour. as hard as it is to believe, i actually do do some regular tourist stuff ... as long as it's interesting and fun. (for the purists, this is the honey island swamp.)
this is a shot of the boat moving forward -- these are tiny water plants on the surface, not grass.
cypress knees -- canjuns tend to use these for electric lamp stands
overall a good, but not great, tour. the cajun steering the boat wasn't fully swamp knowledgeable -- he'd spent several years as a firefighter in new orleans ... i got spoiled several year ago when i was on a fan boat with a cajun that was so hardcore that, really, he preferred to speak french -- he was also only one of two people i've ever met that could spot wildlife faster than i do (the other was in kaziranga -- a displaced nirobi tribesman).
we had evening plans and just enough time to take a side detour to the original abita brewery ... pretty much everywhere they're well known for their beer, but that's not why i'm interested in going ... they also have a sugarcane rootbeer that ranks up with the very best softdrinks in the world.
we were both a bit peckish, since all we'd had was sugar-covered fried dough for the day, so we split a catfish po' boy as well.
but the key point of the day was to be rock n' bowl. this is a place from the 40's that was completely destroyed by katrina, only to be re-established elsewhere. it's a bowling alley, yes. it's a concert hall, yes. it's both, yes. but it's more than that. depending on the music of the evening, it can be the very core hub of all things that are new orleans, but not obvious ...
the thing you want to look for at rock n' bowl is zydeco night because new oreleans is the very core of this sound. a musical style that's essentially ignored or unknown by the rest of the world, you know this place is hardcore when you walk in and see a larger-than-life cut-out of clinton chenier (you can think of him as the bob marley of zydeco).
nathan and the zydeco cha chas were to be playing and this is a band to see because they're on the way up (as much as any zydeco band ever is) and will be playing at the grand ole opry next month.
now, i was on a big 8 team in college, which is to say i've spent way way way too much time in bowling alleys. i'm certain that i've bowled more than 15,000 lines, at more than 100 lanes in my life. and i can tell you, with absolute certainty, that i have never bowled at an alley that not only doesn't have a step-down from the lane to the score-keeping area, but also immediately becomes a dance floor ... and that's exactly what happens at rock n' bowl.
nathan and the cha chas rocked and rolled. they played well more than three hours with no breaks. my accomplice and i both bowled three games (which was the first time in a l-o-n-g time that i not only used a conventionally drilled house ball but also house shoes) ... for the most part, college kids bowl and older white canjuns dance.
(the band had the best frottoir player that i've ever seen.)
just a tiny bit hungry, we went once again to get small dishes at angelo brocato's ... and didn't have a full meal all day.
spectacular day.
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