56 Hours

Yesterday Barbara, Shane, and I returned from a 56-hour vacation in New Orleans ... of which only six hours (at most) were spent sleeping.  I turn 57 next week, so the number strikes me as a bit of synchronicity, to go all Jungian on you guys.

We did "touristy," of course, but cool and self-aware-ly ironic touristy, and visited Central Grocery (for muffaletas), Marie Leveau's House of Voodoo, Pat O'Brien's Courtyard, Olde Nawlins Cookery (for blackened redfish etouffe ... best in the world), the Sazerac Bar (for sazerac cocktails ... best in the world), the Bourbon Street Pub, Oz (for dancing and gogo boys), Cafe Lafitte in Exile, Lafitte's Blacksmith Bar (ca. 1772), the Clover Grill (for cheeseburgers and waffles ... best in the world), Johnny's Po-Boys, Jagerhaus (to visit my future husband), the Old Absinthe House, Lucky's Hot Dogs on the corner of Conti and Bourbon, Fats Domino's house and the ruins of the ninth ward (with Edna), Muriel's Jackson Square (a hurricane cocktail to give Pat O'Brien a run for his money ... and damn good bread and butter ... oh, and steak for me!), Erin Rose (bad juju), two cockatoos and a really hot young stud with a studded tongue on Dauphine Street, and Good Friends Bar (good juju ... with wrestling bartenders, no less).

We divvied responsibilities for the itinerary--I was in charge of everything involving male nudity and butter, Barbara of everything involving hurricanes (alcoholic and meteorological) and attracting lustful attention, and Shane of everything involving buns, delays, and wisecracks.

Here's some evidence (photos by Joe and Shane):