Cruising New Orleans (aka "Eating")

Did you know New Orleans is a fun place to go on vacation? Really! In our hurry to hit the water, we had kind of forgotten that. This weekend was a good reminder and has served to kick us out of frenzy and into cruising mode.

In New Orleans, it's all about the food. Here's what we've been eating:

Friday night, Frank and I joined friends Bob and Anita at the Lousiana Grill in Mandeville (across Lake Pontchartrain from N.O., reached by means of the 25-mile-long Causeway). Our purpose in visiting this particular restaurant was to see the show put on by Big Daddy O, known to his friends as Owen Tufts. Owen was already on the music scene back when Frank was playing music and is really coming into his own in his current bluesy incarnation. Also, his wife, Gretchen, was at UNO with Frank and Bob, and - as it turned out in one of those "New Orleans is really a small town" coincidences - at Mt. Carmel High with Anita.

Anyway, the music was fabulous and seeing Owen and Gretchen was really fun. The meal also turned out to be a big highlight. We started off with crab-stuffed mushrooms and a scrumptious crawfish, spinach, and pepperjack cheese spread on toast points. Our entrees included filet mignon for Frank (he needs the red meat after working in the heat all these weeks!), a big crab-and-tomato salad for Bob, fried shrimp for Anita, and speckled trout, fried and topped with crawfish, for me. We were too full for dessert, but we didn't let that stop up! We had strawberry shortcake and a little mini-frypan of bread pudding, with four spoons!

Still feeling full Saturday morning, Frank and I skipped breakfast and headed across the lake to pick up some parts and do a little Christmas shopping (yes, really, but just a little). It was really, REALLY hot, so we fortified ourselves with some snowballs, tall cups of shaved ice flavored with your choice of fruity syrups. Even so, a few errands turned into a real endurance test, and by the time we returned to Slidell, we felt deserving of a(nother) reward and some food. We accomplished both by stopping in at Captain Humble's for a couple of his "world famous, New Orleans style" oyster po-boys.

The Captain himself took our order. He's a former New Orleans radio personality, so the walls of the restaurant are covered with photos of a younger him with various 70's music stars. He seems perfectly happy in his new(er) career, though, granting a cheerful exception to his ban on personal checks to the cash-strapped mom in line ahead of us, and then even more cheerfully promising us we would love our sandwiches. He was quite right; we burned the roofs of our mouths in our eagerness to get at those oysters.

A word about oysters from the Gulf for those of you more familiar with Pacific oysters: They are small, tender, and usually *very* fresh. If you don't like Pacific oysters, you might like these, and if you like Pacific oysters, you'll LOVE these. Frank and I are in the latter category. In a po-boy, they are deep fried, nestled on a bed of lettuce (get your po-boy "dressed" or be spotted instantly as a tourist), and slipped between fresh French rolls. YUM!

Sat. night, we met up with our daughters (who spent the weekend with cousins Lori and Brian, their two dogs, and their trampoline) for Brian's poolside 12th birthday party. Unbeknownst to her, it was also the not-quite-50th birthday party for Frank's baby sister, Judy. The party took place on an old converted barge at a marina in Madisonville that turned out to lack air conditioning. Bad timing, since it was such a killer hot day. The kids solved the problem by spending about 5 consecutive hours in the pool.

We finished off the weekend with a day spent stowing stuff. What will and won't be coming with us is becoming clear, with a surprising amount in the "will" column. Preplanning and organization - not to mention a variety of storage contraptions and bungee cords - are serving us well.

Speaking of bungee cords, Mezza and Snowball seem unperturbed by the new location of their cage: suspended above the dinette and free to gimbal. We hope this and the homeopathic anti-nausea remedy supplied by their vet will keep them comfortable under way.

KreweQueen Ronnie