Trip to New Orleans

Last week steven had training in NO, which means a free hotel stay:) On Tuesday, I arrived around 3 and by the time I dropped off my bags, parked and got back it was 4. Had a bad headache so I just bummed around the room until steven got back. We met some guys from work @ 7 to go eat. Steven wanted seafood and suggested Deanie's. Everyone loved it. We all ate way too much…we had charbroiled oysters, bbq’d shrimp (my fave) and steven and I split a ½ platter and there was plenty leftover. After eating we moved to the bar because the hornets were starting and the bar had AndyGator. They drank beer, I drank coffee. Even though they sometimes talked about work it was some good conversation and I never felt left out. And believe me, I was waiting for it…there were video poker machines about 5 steps away:)

We headed back to the room at halftime only to discover the hotel TV doesn’t have TNT…so we left again. To the hotel bar to finish watching the game. Another beer for steven, cranberry for me:) Wednesday morning I got up with steven and walked to café du monde. We got beignets for the guys and ate them at the hotel pool. I had a big day planned. I bummed by the pool for about 2 hours then headed over to magazine street for some lunch and browsing. No, not shopping, browsing. That didn’t work out quite like I planned. (Made me appreciate the suburbs) First of all I didn’t bring enough change for parking. That was a pain. I usually keep several dollars change in my car, but a few weeks ago I gave it to some hot firemen on the street. Also, I don’t think I went far enough down magazine for the good shops. I didn’t know where I was going and it was too close to lunch so I had to just stop to eat-quickly. I did have a nice lunch at a greek/Lebanese place. After lunch I left because my parking was expiring. I drove down a little further, but got tired so I went back to the hotel. I parked in the old DH Holmes building so that put me on the opposite end of Bourbon. I walked down Royal and went in and out of a bunch of galleries contemplating what to do with my life (i.e. career). I just can’t stop thinking about teaching. But right now the timing couldn’t be worse.

That night the other wives came to visit and we went to Dickie Brenan’s. I was very excited and have to say I was a little disappointed. But when you have to order your steak medium well (it was actually well) who can blame you. There were some wonderful highlights, though-like Steven letting me have a sip of wine! I think he even suggested it. The waiter poured probably less than an ounce in my glass. It smelled sooooo good. I made 4 sips out of that glass. It was good, but I’m still not jonesing for any alcohol…my stomach/reflux just can’t handle it.

Thursday was a ½ day and the weather was terrible. I went back to café du monde for breakfast and got stuck there in the rain. It was fun watching the tourists and locals there together. You can definitely tell which are which. After breakfast I put on some cheesy movie and picked out some baby essentials to put on my registry. Very fun, but overwhelming! The books I have help a lot. Steven was done at noon so we all went to Spudley’s. Everyone was very happy with all of Steven’s restaurant choices. We hung out with Me-Maw and headed home exhausted. Except for some yucky weather, it was a very good trip.