Look! Posts Two Days in a Row!

Knitting update: I was sitting and knitting on Bev’s fingerless mitten in my Women’s Spirituality Group this morning, when I decided, for whatever reason, to try it on. Just for grins. Well, I didn’t grin. It fit my forearm very nicely. The only problem is, of course, that that means it’s too small for Bev. Frog, frog, frog. (Rip-it, rip-it, rip-it.) I have started over, with two more repeats. (That puts the stitch count up to 84, for anyone who’s counting.)

This of course makes my startitis very happy. The other good news is that that pesky hole in the wrong place mistake got ripped out with everything else! Although I don’t really know how that mistake got in there, I do know how to keep it from happening – keep counting stitches! So, I’ll be doing that.

Oh, and I got Bob’s Sock to a point where I won’t have to cry too hard if I have to frog it, but it should be enough for him to say if he likes the pattern. So I’m stopping there.

The other good news from today is that I have discovered where the negative influence in my community has gone. There’s a somewhat larger alternative church sort of “up the road” from us, to which we have “lost” members before. A few of them I was even sorry to see go! She is evidently radiantly happy there, having joined on their first day there (nothing like taking a look around to see what suits you, huh?). I have before felt like we owed them an apology for some of the folks that moved there, but never so much as now! However, they evidently have a different sort of community structure and possibly a different attitude that enables them to absorb these folks with less damage to their community. Good for them! And good for her, too. I doubt it will take too long before she begins to grab power and start dividing folks in angel and devil camps again; she can’t help it, I guess. And in a few months I’ll likely be able to feel sorry for her (and for them). For now, I’m just happy that she is permanently gone!

And now back to New Orleans pictures.

Saw this bumper sticker parked outside our hotel on the street, the whole time we were there. We saw a shirt later that said something about crawling home, too. I liked both of those!

This was a bar up the street from our hotel called the Erin Rose. If you look at the sidewalk in front of it, there was a picture on the sidewalk. (I think a shamrock, but I never got a good look.) It looked like chalk, but I saw someone sweep over one time and rinse it off on another, so clearly it wasn't chalk! Although the major cultural influences in the Quarter are French and Spanish, the Irish have certainly added their flavor, as well. And, as you can see, the two-story building has a small living quarter upstairs from the bar, with a balcony, not a gallery, nicely decorated!

This was the view down Bourbon Street (towards downtown) from Conti Street. It looks clean and nice, doesn't it? Looks are deceiving, folks. Even first thing in the morning, when the garbage had been picked up and everything looked lovely, it stank. And it wasn't, as one would expect, the smell of urine or vomit or any other bodily fluid, or even mold or something from the hurricane. It smelled of garbage. And it was much worse at night. Much. We only walked along Bourbon Street a very little bit, as I just didn't care for the smell at all. And I don't have a terribly sensitive nose, either!

And this is Bourbon Street from Conti, looking up the street. A bit less clean and neat and a bit more seedy-looking. Still smelled bad, though. We didn't go hang out in any of the bars -- climbing the stairs up to our room would have been very much harder on me if I'd had a drink or two!

This is a statue of Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, the Sieur de Bienville, founder of New Orleans, along with a Native American (with whom he had good relations), and a monk. Here is a website with some information about Bienville and his brother, who were very important in the development of the Gulf Coast. (My favorite part is the explorer who first found the Mississippi River who, when he came back to the area, couldn't find it!) There is a Bienville Parrish in Louisiana, but it's not the parrish New Orleans is in. (That's a very Texas way of doing things, actually. There is an Austin County here, but Austin the city isn't in it. Houston isn't in Houston County. I do believe that Dallas is in Dallas County, but Dallas always was weird.) Here is a much bigger picture of the statue, from a different angle. A fairly obnoxious, nose-in-the-air look on his face, isn't it? The statue is between North Peters and Decatur Streets, at about the point the French Quarter becomes downtown New Orleans.

I was told that Bienville put the city where he did because it was the best place between the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain. It was the least swampy and highest above sea (and River) level land in the area, which is why the Quarter had almost no flooding during Katrina. Supposedly, Bienville chose this land on the advice of the local natives. Good choice.

And here is a look up Decatur Street, towards downtown. (The statue would be to the left, just out of the picture.)

Poor DH. On our last night there, he was determined to find gumbo. He grew up on gumbo and all sorts of Creole-type food, and doesn't get much of it any more. I can't stand the stuff, myself, or the smell. And I don't allow him to eat crawfish in my presence. (I played with the things when I was growing up! They're toys or maybe sort of pets to me! Would you eat a cat?) Anyway, I was feeling fairly exhausted after a long day on that night, so he set forth to find gumbo, the less fancy the better. His first stop was the sign you can see in this picture: Gumbo File. He assumed, as would anyone just seeing the sign, that they served gumbo there. Sadly, not so much. Instead it was just another t-shirt-laden tourist shop, which Decatur is littered with. I think he did finally find some gumbo, somewhere, and he brought me back a very yummy hamburger and a beer, so it could have been worse.

OK, we still haven't really started our first day good! But I think this post is long enough as it is. I think there's maybe one more post before the actual site-seeing stuff started (maybe two, come to think of it), including some of the t-shirts with which those shops were laden, a very, very odd statue, and a creative and friendly panhandler. Stay tuned!