Krewe of Lego

It's no secret that I love New Orleans, especially during Carnival season. I love the sights, the sounds, the throws,the crowds, and the whole crazy atmosphere. 

One of my bucket list items is to march in a parade... And my sorta-secret wish is to ride with the Krewe of Muses someday. I want to glitter shoes and toss them to the crowd. I am a BEAST with a bottle of glue and a vat of glitter. 

I won't make it to any of the parades in 2014. I'm determined to be there again in 2015. So this year I just lived out my fantasy on a smaller scale...

My Life In Legos: Mardi Gras Muses

If you take a Mom to the MMM...

If you take a Mom to the Million Milf March, she's going to ask to take her friends.
Her friends will want to go, because it's in New Orleans, and they'll want to share a room at the Hilton. Because they're sharing a room they'll start laughing as soon as they start unpacking, because someone probably remembered shot glasses but forgot underwear. When they see the shot glasses they'll decide to go to the hotel bar for a drink.When they have their drink, they'll decide they need to try a new shot too, so they'll ask the bartender to recommend something. When he serves them a lemon drop, someone is going to make a sour face, and everyone is going to laugh really really hard, until people are looking at them like they're crazy.

The people looking at them will remind the Moms that there is a Friday night event that they should probably go to. They'll leave, but decide to walk around a bit. When they walk around, they'll speculate on all the ways they could get in trouble that weekend. Then they'll see something that makes them laugh really hard again. This will make them think of how hard they laughed at the hotel bar and remind them again that they need to get to the Friday night event. So they'll walk to the bar and go upstairs where there are drinks and food and raffles and auctions. They'll get their drinks and food and buy raffle tickets. When they buy raffle tickets they get into a conversation with some women from somewhere else that they didn't know, but suddenly feel like they've known forever. Because it feels like they've known each other forever, they'll end up on the dance floor, dancing really enthusiastically to 80s music. This will go on for a while, until people tell the crazy women to leave. When they leave,they'll decide that they HAVE to go to Frenchmen street, by way of Bourbon street. When they go by way of Bourbon street there will be someone in an enormous yet well made plush vagina costume on the street, which will make them laugh, and they will laugh even harder when one of the friends breaks a flip flop and the night proceeds to get EPIC. When the night becomes EPIC they wonder how it can get any better the next day.

The next day they'll still be wondering when you get to the March. A Mom will  still be wondering when she checks in and gets a Special Cup. When she gets a special cup, she's going to need a drink to put in it, and when she goes to get her drink she finds that Hot Mess Mom has taken over that bar and is mixing the drinks. When HMM mixes the drinks they are strong. When the drinks are strong the MILFS decide to dance to the next bar, and maybe hula hoop and order drinks with giant plastic sharks in them. When MILFS order drinks with plastic sharks in them, they may reenact sharknado, which makes them want to order another drink with a plastic shark in it until it is time to go to the next bar, which people say is even better. When a Mom wonders how it can get better someone throws a blow up doll at her and hands her a shot. She'll dance with the blow up doll and take the shot and laugh when a MILF in a Wonder Woman costume takes the blow up doll and tangos away with it. When the doll tangos away she'll look around for her friends and realize that they're at the bar, watching the guys who are bartending. When she watches the guys bartending she realizes there is a very good reason her friends are watching so closely, and she has to take a picture. When she has to take a picture everyone gets in on it so she has to ask another MILF to take the shot. Then she and her friends and the other MILF will have the best conversation that they won't really remember later, except that they really like each other. They will all dance and sing and take more pictures. When they take more pictures, everyone will swear that they won't post them on Facebook without each other's approval. So when a Mom shares them later,  after everyone has returned to their regular lives, they'll all laugh really hard again. When she laughs really hard, it will remind her of all the fun she had and the great people she met. Thinking of them she'll friend them on facebook. When she friends them on Facebook, someone will ask her if she's going to next year's march.

Thank God for Blur!

And when you ask a Mom if she's going to the Million Milf March again... she's probably going to want to invite MORE friends.

The third annual Million Milf March, hosted by the ever crazy, ever hilarious, evermuch a HOT MESS blogger  Hot Mess Mom,  is being held back in crazy ol' Nola on October 3-4, 2014. Better yet, the proceeds go towards Lindy's Place, a New Orleans charity that helps homeless women break the cycle and become independent again. That's right, we're drinking for charity.  Want to learn more? Find it on Facebook or visit the March page at www.millionmilfmarch.com 

Vaguely amused? Want more? You can hit that follow button thing, or find me on Facebook. Fair Warning- I swear a lot and say the weirdest crap. 

Beads, Financing, and that sweet, sweet Addiction

Tis the Season...

It's 8:51am, and I'm sitting at my dining room table, sleep still heavy in my eyes, morning having come way, way too early. I wish I could say my slow step and mumbled responses come from a night full of celebration for Lundi Gras, but the only celebrating I did was finally getting my feverish six year old to sleep after 1am, only to be awaked far too soon at 6 to take the 12 year old to speed and agility class.

Ah, parenthood.

So I'm sitting here with a steaming cup of coffee, trying to pretend that it's really chicory cafe au lait and wishing it was gearing me up for a day of parades and revelry rather than a day of smiling politely and asking customers if they have everything they need, and if they're aware of financing opportunities. Today is Mardi Gras, and I want, more than anything, to party. I want to dance and sing and laugh and shout and reach for throws. I want to make new best friends whose names I may never remember.

I'm not a native New Orleanian, or Louisianan. I'm not even a transplant. I'm a tourist, someone who saves her money for 51 weeks in anticipation of four glorious days surrounded by the sights, sounds, and smells (oh, the smells!) of southern Louisiana. I don't go for the cheap thrills, the titilation of naked flesh, or the drunken debauchery. I go because I have to. It was a done deal by the end of my first trip. New Orleans is not an option; it's a necessity.

I believe there are two kinds of people in this world- those who can take or leave the city and those for whom it gets into their very blood, their soul, and settles in all comfortable like. The former can certainly enjoy the city; they can rave about it's cuisine, and how the city seems to have really bounced back from the horrors of years past. They can enjoy the music and the street performers. But it doesnt' become a desire, the nearly physical need to return and hear that music, smell the thick perfume of the camelias in the air. The former doesn't go through the twitching withdrawls when they see images of the Butterfly King's float gliding majestically down St. Charles, or when they pass the jazz station on the local radio band. The former can pack their bags full of trinkets and treasures and head for home with a smile, a fondness perhaps, but nothing more.

A junkie can't do that. And that's what we are, isn't it, those of us who crave New Orleans deep inside? We're hooked on it's atmosphere, it's energy, it's spirit. We're hooked on that mix of Southern gentility, European sophistication, African mysticism, and Caribbean soul, that particular social gumbo that swirls around like eddies in the Mississippi. Getting people to understand can be difficult. People still hold onto the images of a post-apopolyptic Waterworld, of vice, flesh, corruption, and crime, or that of a perpetual spring break, where the booze is cheap and the participants are easy. With a single raised eyebrow they'll pat you on the back, nod politely, and then go back to gossiping behind your back about what dickens you must be getting up to down in the Big Easy. They'd never believe you if you told them your greatest vice was devouring an entire Xocolat mousse on your own.

One day, I like to dream, I will own a little piece of NOLA for my very own. An apartment, perhaps, in one of the grand old homes in the Garden district, with a little courtyard to sit and have a cup of coffee in while the world wakes up around me, and enough room to bed down my friends who have caught this particular bug as well. Until that day comes, I will keep saving my pennies and looking south. And on this particular day I will finish my coffee, smile at the cold sunshine outside my window, and throw on a few sets of beads before I head to work. Now, would you like to hear about our financing offers....

Now THAT is indulgence...

Delicious.

Slap Me!

One of the prevailing mental images of New Orleans, especially during Mardi Gras season, is that of the Go Cup, alcohol on the move. Its true- in New Orleans there's no need to curtail your drinking to the inside of an overcrowded bar. Feel free to grab that perspiring bottle of Abita Amber or that glistening plastic cup of a classic Hurricane and set out to see the sights.

This February marked my third annual trip to the Big Easy for the classic French Quarter Krewe du Vieux parade, a bawdy, satirical poke in the eye that never fails to leave me shaking my head and asking myself "Did I really just see that?" On each trip I've learned something to make the next year's journey better: when is the best time to get to Cafe du Monde to beat the crowd (too early for this girl)? Where can I find a good, hearty, cheap breakfast the morning after (Daisy Duke's on Chartres)? Which corner marts will open your purchased bottle of beer for you, and which ones will have you asking a guy toting a cooler for assistance? And just how DO you score sweet parade throws (showing the "girls" is just a myth, people. Unless you're on Bourbon, keep em covered!) Going into our 2012 adventure, I knew one thing I needed for this year's trek- a good koozie.

Yes, a Koozie, those wonderful neoprene cup holders designed to keep your beverage frosty and your hands dry. This is important, people. Slippery hands can be a drink's- and your own- downfall. An uneven sidewalk, the press of Gulf humidity, the jostle of a raucous crowd on Bourbon Street... any of it can lead to a bittersweet ending. If you're not careful, that tasty local concoction you just waited 15 minutes in line for could quickly become gutter water- if you're lucky. Many times I've seen some poor girl in a bar bathroom, clothes splattered in that tale-tell Pat O Hurricane red, bemoaning the drink that quite literally slipped from her grasp. And no matter how laid back the Crescent City is, sucking spilled rum from your soiled t-shirt is always a no-no.

With all of that in mind and an epic weekend in the making, I turned to the awesomeness that is Team Cocktail (www.teamcocktail.com) . Described as a "drinking team with a clothing problem," Team Cocktail produces those perfectly soft and worn-in island style t-shirts that will have you daydreaming about island waters and rum punch. They also sell a little something called the Slap Koozie.

If you remember the slap bracelet craze of the late 80s and early 90s, you've got the form and function of the Team Cocktail slap koozie. All rolled out it's a rigid, insulated reminder that Team Cocktail is "Where Happy Hour Never Ends." A simple flick of the wrist and a pop around your bottle or cup, though, finds your drink cozy and your hands delightfully dry.

Therein lies the beauty of the slap koozie- it fits EVERYTHING. Drinks in New Orleans are far from "one size fits all", and while a regulation cup holder may easily fit my bottle of LA-31 biere pale, what about the shorter, stouter bottle of Purple Haze I pop next? And while my usual koozie will take that standard size cup of rum punch I purchase from the outside window of Maison on Frenchman, I'm hosed when I go for the ridiculously oversized Bourbon Street Kool-Aid. The Slap Koozie is an equal-opportunity device- no beverage too large nor oddly shaped. Like your wingman, it's always got you.

It wasn't just my crew (or krewe, perhaps) that was loving on the koozies. All over New Orleans eyebrows raised when we slapped on our brightly colored beverage accessories. So pretty! So functional! So awesome that you didn't have to worry about spilling your drink as you snuggled it in. Even the bartenders were loving on it. Raven, our mixologist at the Rivers Edge, was totally smitten. She and her housemates have all types of drink holders, trying to make sure there's a fit for every cup, can, and bottle. The idea of one item taking the place of their entire collection? Inconceivable. And the fact that it comes in twelve amazing colors? Beyond belief.

In total, the two slap koozies that made their way through the streets of New Orleans snuggled up to 24 cups or bottles of local beer, 10 glasses or plastic cups of rum punch, 8 of Pat O'Brien's potent Hurricanes, 4 large bottles of water, 2 Diet sodas, a beautiful blue Margarita, and a couple of 57 Chevys that came out of nowhere and left us flat on our backs. Every beverage stayed safe in hand as we dance, sang, and yes, even stumbled a bit through our adventures. The final verdict? Next year, we're buying a Party Pack and handing them out.

Cheers!

The only way to walk your Hurricane!

Missing NOLA

Four years ago, staring down the barrel at thirty, I did what every not-quite-midlife crisis’er does and created a bucket list. If you know me and my boogie shoes, you won’t be surprised to find out that a large percentage of my list had to do with travel. I’m a wanderer at heart, dead set to experience as much of the world as I can in my time here. I want to gorge my mythology loving self on the Greek Isles, I want to drive Route 66 in a convertible, I want to party in Iceland in the middle of June. But first, I had a little business to take care of Down South:

New Orleans during Mardi Gras season.

If you’ve never been to New Orleans, well, what’s wrong with you? There are few places in the world where so many lifestyles blend seamlessly in a kind of steaming cultural gumbo. Where else can you cross yourself with holy water as you exit a Catholic cathedral, only to turn the corner and find yourself in an honest to goodness voodoo shop? It's where the United States meets the Carribbean, where European and African cultures colide in a whirl of color and sound and amazing smells. If you let it, New Orleans will work its magic on you; you just have to let go and let be.

With that in mind, is it any wonder that lately I’ve been jonesing for a trip to the Big Easy? It doesn’t help that I have friends down there, and every mention of beignets, café au lait, and music makes me twitchy. And since Fat Tuesday is officially February 21^st, we are under six months til I head on back… so doesn’t it make sense on Travel Tuesday to take a look at a few of my favorite things about New Orleans?

Of course it does.

I've always thought St. Louis Cathedral looks like Cinderella's castle....

... and even moreso at night.

How we got up this high above New Orleans is a secret, but this man's generosity is not. Eric and Alfred talked for a good twenty minutes about Alfred's life before Katrina, where he worked when the storm came, and what he's done since.

 

Everywhere we go, we hear stories. Maybe we draw them in, maybe there's something about the cameras. Renette was one of those people, one of those stories we won't forget.

My son asked if Smitty lived here....

The first year we happened to plan our trip for the weekend in between the NFC Championship and the Super Bowl, and right in the middle of the Buddy D parade. Merriment commenced.

One of the greatest things about our New Orleans trips is the people we meet. This was Boomah- 87 years old and the life of the party!

Looking out from high above Canal.

February, and the scent of flowers was thick in the air...

A lot of people warned us about the crime. It exists in any city, but everyone seemed certain we'd come back in body bags. This was about as scary as it got.

You have no idea what I'd do for a plate of hot beignets and some frozen cafe au lait from Cafe Du Monde right now. The scent of fried dough and sugar mixing with the first rush of morning caffiene is better than any high around.

Be back soon, dear.