It Starts With a Sandwich

I had an interesting evening – the evening that will color my memory of New Orleans… and it will color it an interesting shade of green. More on that later

So, Getting a bit peckish at around 6.30 I wandered down to the lobby and asked the people behind the counter where would be a good place to eat, they asked what kind of thing I felt like – and I responded in the most helpful way I could think of – food. The look they exchanged said a great deal. But they replied with “Mothers”. Somewhat of a local legend apparently. Basically a diner with local specialty foods like jambalaya, Po-boys (like a subway except better), red beans and rice, etc. So I went, and stood in line outside for I guess 30 minutes at least. Assuming correctly that if people are willing to line up for food, then it must be pretty damned good.

So I stood in line.

While waiting in line a guy in front of me asked me a few questions, which I didn’t know the answers to, but we ended up chatting about other stuff. He was a theatre/TV producer in town looking for a location to film something or other… really interesting guy. Not that it makes any difference but he was black… which made it more interesting for me that he even spoke to me at all – mainly because from what I’ve experienced so far from the black community in that they tend to keep to themselves… Definitely not the case in New Orleans… it’s been really good in that respect. He found my tales of traveling around by myself intriguing (I’ve found this a fairly common response – apparently its not something that’s very common for Americans to do… *Shrugs*) anyway, I apparently amused him enough that he shouted me dinner – I guess almost as much for the company while eating as anything… not being entirely comfortable with being bought dinner I told him that he better be coming out drinking so I could buy him a few drinks.

Anyway, we chatted while eating our sandwiches and he said he wanted to head back to the casino where he was staying and play some more blackjack – which he had been having a good run at yesterday. So off we wandered and I found myself sitting at the high rollers table in the casino (free drinks for just sitting down!!!), where he pulls out a wad of cash – about $1500. I’m like… whoa… and he asked me if I was going to play – I said $100 (1 chip) was the equivalent of 4 night’s accommodation for me, not the sort of money I have to throw away… so he started off doing quite well, and then lost it all. But in between all that “excitement” this other guy comes and sits at the table and puts down $1000, blows it all in 2 hands, then gets a $10,000 (he’d asked for $20,000) line of credit and eventually leaves us to sit at his own table… after we’d finished we went and joined him. Really nice guy, but money to burn… crazy… each chip was $500. I think the biggest bet I saw him place (and win) was maybe somewhere in the vicinity of $8000… maybe more… amazing.

So after that we headed down to Bourbon street – the heart of the French quarter and a buzzing hive of activity even on a Tuesday night… amazing place, it was like you turn off the main street and you’re instantly In another world… you go from a normal weekday night, do the midnight on a Friday or Saturday night. Walking around first thing I saw was a sign advertising “The strongest drink in the world” a mixture of 151 proof rum of some sort and something else, all mixed together in a slushy and served like a frozen coke. Except green and sickening… it was very strong though… walked up the street a bit further and found an awesome band playing covers – really amazing. They guy on the saxophone was unbelievable… the singers were both as good as anything I’ve ever heard.

We then found a group of fortune tellers sitting on the side of the road doing palm readings and tarot cards – the guy I was wandering around with wanted his fortune read and sat there and got both palm and cards done, didn’t say much, but at the end he said it was pretty accurate… I thought what the hell, it will be interesting, and so I got my palm read. Always something I’ve wanted to do… Apparently I’m going to live into my 90’s (nice to hear) have 4 kids (bit of a worry), be reasonably wealthy, but have to work for it, have 2 life partners (the second of which I will meet while studying!!!), I’m a reliable person, etc, etc… love to travel… and I have a “work hard; play hard” attitude to life… funny cause earlier that day I’d been wearing my FCUK WORK t-shirt which says Work hard play hard underneath… hmmm… spooky… overall I was impressed. There’s heaps of other stuff that he said, and I wish I had been more sober at the time so I could remember it all… but anyway… whatever…

Great night…

WARNING: MUM YOU MIGHT NOT WANT TO READ FROM HERE ON…

The night came to a conclusion with my first (and maybe last) visit to a strip club. I will say one thing for the girls, as gorgeous as they are, they are mighty strong. A couple of them could climb all the way up a 27foot pole and slide down it slowly using nothing but their legs… crazy stuff… I’ll say firstly that I didn’t get a lap-dance or anything like that… in fact I’m not sure what was going on, but it wasn’t really that interesting. My friend went for a 30 minute “private” session for a good 45 minutes and I sat at the bar… chatted to a couple of girls – most of whom when they realized that that they weren’t going to get any money out of me, left pretty quick. The exception was a girl called Ryan. Absolutely stunning girl who was interesting, well traveled, smart, and just seemed happy to have someone to talk to that didn’t want to rub their face in her chest… (Not that I didn’t want to… but I guess I wasn’t in the mood) anyway, she’d come over and chat to me between “working” it was actually the most fun I had all night just talking to her. Bizarre. My friend left at about midnight citing exhaustion… I stuck around until about 2… at one point a girl came over and I laughed at her… I think she was a bit offended… but I was so drunk… the whole place just seemed ridiculous…

Anyway, that’s my excitement for the week so far… I’ve spent today sleeping off a pretty terrible green hangover… not nice at all…

Talk to you soon – probably after St Patrick’s Day!




Though I am not naturally honest, I am so sometimes by chance. - William Shakespeare