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Gulf Wars, Part 1, Nawlins
2001-03-23 - 06:17 p.m.

The Gulf Wars Saga, Part One -or at least Gen's adventures

Let me introduce our wonderful cast of superheroes:

Kevin "The Large One" Thornbury- Kevin is one of the sweetest gentlemen on the face of this planet and it doesn't hurt that he could intimidate the Rock if needed at 6'6" tall. His wife calls him "The Large One" especially when looking for him. "Jake, have you seen the Large One?" etc.

Isobel, the "Angel of Death"- Laura joins our party and we are lucky for it since she crams easily into small spaces, lucky in a packed vehicle. She earned the title of "Angel of Death" from a friend who she accidentally tried to kill by feeding her something she's allergic too. Obviously this friend survived to give her the title. She is married to the "Minister of Pain", who sadly could not attend.

Alan "Hmmm..." Gravesend- Alan is a man of many thoughts and few words, and my sweetie!

Gen, the "Angel of Minor Irritation"- I play not only Tour Guide Barbie (TGB) for the trip, but the cute and most organized, God help us now!

Day 1, Friday March 9th

We greet our intrepid heros as the Angel of Death, Mr. Hmmm. and TGB are trying to pack all their stuff into Alan's truck on Friday morning to then drive down to the Large One's to repack into the Suburban and trailer. We had set a randon goal of leaving after morning rush hour but before evening rush hour. Glad I left us a big window. Gen and Alan hadn't actually finished packing so we left MD around 10am to then reach Kevin's before 11. We walk into his house and can't find him anywhere, look upstaris, downstairs, everywhere, on well, Laura finds something to nibble on and Gen makes herself some scrambled eggs. They always tell us to make ourselves at home, so we did. Kevin emerges from the basement where he was playing on the computer with last minute EPM stuff, that's Electronic Publications Manager stuff, for his meeting at the War. We then take a gander at the trailer, a 6x9 foot monstrosity with 15in new wheels and a 4ft tall plywood box. "How do we cover it?", "what do we need?", "I forgot a swim suit, I should pick one up", etc. we decide to make the Wal-Mart run before hooking the trailer to the 'burban so off we go to Wal-Mart. Gen begins to think that leaving town by 1pm was a bad estimate. So needless to say, we do WM, we swing by BK for eats, we pack, and search the house for tent related goodness, Gwen comes by with tons of food for the ride down (like we can't stop for drinks and munchies at a gas station?, oh well), fill the bottom of the trailer, fill the back of the 'burban, finally get on the road around 3pm. Yes, Children's that is 3pm. Technically it was after the morning rush hour and before the evening rush hour. sigh. We make our way to Bristol for food, and stop for a bed outside of Knoxville. Not quite to Chattanooga as I had expected, but on the road nonetheless. Also, despite my Tour Guide Barbie nature, don't let Gen pick a hotel at 12:30am. If Gen says to turn left into the Comfort Suites instead of right into the Super 8, just don't listen, okay? sigh. So we end Day 1 in an expensive hotel 2 hours behindish schedule with the Large One all tuckered our since he was keeping the trailer behind the truck by sheer force of will power, really, honestly...

Day 2, Saturday March 10th

Laura is up early, but she rarely sleeps so the rest of us are bumms and wake up sometime after 7 or 8, I forget. We pay out, get on the road, and stop at the Crack house down the street for breakfast. Crack House=Cracker Barrel. Normally an Awful Waffle House or Shoney's would have been fine, but I guess when you stay in a Comfort Suites they have a Crack house in the neighborhood instead of a WH. sigh, good food though, someone exclaimed "Cracker Barrel does breakfast?" silly bunny, Trix are for kids, duh! It was a new experience. I get one of those buckwheat shell neck pillows for the car at the insipid Country Store to ease my dozing. We get on the road eating said Gwen munchies for lunch and snacks and finish up the drive through the rest of TN, tiny piece of GA, diagonally across godforsaken Alabama, and through MS to the mecca of drinking, New Orleans. Mind you all the time I am living up to my name of the "Angel of Minor Irritation" by saying Chattanoooooga in the most redneck southern way possible. :) We arrive at my aunt's place in our original pieces, and happily due to her good directions and start to unload our personal stuff for the stay in New Orleans. Now for those who do not know, my aunt, sister of my dad, is the coolest woman on the face of the planet and allows me and my friends to take over her house before Gulf Wars. Mind you the place only holds 4 guests, so 4 guests is the limit. Remember this. My aunt's place has among other distinctions of being 20 minutes from the French Quarter, vaulted ceilings, a baby grand piano, a hottub, two seperate guests rooms and a full and stylish liquor cabinet. Ah... and she let's me stay there rent free. If anyone wanted to suck up to me, now is the time, Alan and I always get spots, but the other two spots are continually negotiable.

After we unload our crap, change clothes, noodle around a bit, relax, we unhitch the trailer and decide to venture into the French Quarter (FQ) for dinner. It is decided that Kevin does not want to drive the truck again until it is time to hitch the trailer back on so Gen kicks into TGB mode full time! yay! We do manage to find our way to the FQ using the tiny little map on the Atlas and decide whilst there to pick up a Nawlins map for the rest of our adventures. This was a very good idea. We eat dinner at the Seaport on Bourbon St. and have excellent seafood and yumminess abounds. Kevin and I take turns finishing Laura's meals. It is at this time that we realize that she doesn't eat or sleep much... After dinner we are too tired from the road to enjoy Bourbon St. too much so we troop back to the house and abuse the liquor cabinet and hottub. It is during this night and the next morning that a member of our party, not the Gen, determines that Beer, Scotch and hottub are not to all three be mixed. ewww....

Day 3, Sunday, something...

We wake up eventually and gradually to eventually join the world. We drink our various caffinated beverages in my aunt's little courtyard while the one suffering from mixing three bad elements sleeps a little longer on the couch. Eventually we make our way to the FQ and Cafe Du Monde for beignets and coffe for breakfast/lunch. For those who have never been to Nawlins this is a must experience. Coffee is good and the only thing this place serves is little french dough pastries deep fried and then covered in powdered sugar. Think finger sized funnel cakes. Mind you I went off the Atkin's diet for this week, knowing there was no way in hell I would survive not having beignets in New Orleans. We then proceed to the French Market where the Large One, who is an excellent cook by the way, gets lost in the racks of spices and cajun cookbooks etc. which we eventually extract him from. We also see the Maxson Building which houses the Gargoyles goth stores, which is very cool! It starts to rain off and on during the day and we dodge the rain mostly by visiting the tacky stores on Bourbon St. the Voodoo shops etc. After having a drink at Jean Lafitte's Bar (in the oldest building in the FQ, I believe) we head off to dinner at this place on Royal St. that smelled great when we passed it earlier. Um, if you ever have the chance to eat at Tortorici's on Royal St., DON'T!!! The food was most certainly excellent, but the service was soo slow I saw mold grow, and the waiter had a fake and stupid Italian accent and a bad toupee and smelled like a herald, AND the entertainment on the piano was so bad, Laura wanted to hurl. Food good, everything else bad! I think we left a $6 tip for a $100 meal, or something. And I ain't cheap like Wayne when it comes to tipping. We quickly decided we had had our fill of the FQ for the day and decided to dodge the rain drops back to the vehicle and take off for the hottub. :) Once we reach Decatur St. we see that there is no cover to duck between and decide tha Laura in her cute Gothness shouldn't get wet (She might melt!) and Kevin and I run the rest of the way for the truck. We pick up Laura and Alan and head back home to have another drink and soak in the hottub some more. Gen wonders about the wisdom of soaking in an outdoor hottub during a thunder and lightening storm, and the general group decides that the tree and house will likely catch it first. Laura thinks of wussing out but doesn't want to be the one person left with a tub of electrified friends so decides to join in the gamble. Eventually the Angel's of Death and Minor Irritation do wimp out and go inside for showers and futz around while Laura plays on the baby grand. Glad I told her about it before hand so she brought some sheet music with her. Ahhhh..... good night!

Day 4, It must be a weekday since Cafe Du Monde was less crowded.

We get to breakfast earlier and meet up with Wayne and Kelly from the other troop of mismatched travellers. Wayne/Galmr is my coworker and our resident big, scary, angry white man. Kelly/Ragnel is soon to be Oswulf's wife and a fan of Wayne, aren't we all? Their other companions Shane/Llewellyn (Galmr's usefuyl squire), Eric/Bohemond (not as active in the SCA thanks in large part to his new wifey), and Clint/Sir Christian (um, not the German from SC) gambled until too late the night before, or should we say morning so they were rightly comatose. We split after breakfast for more shopping and running around. We somehow got split up and the two with cell phones were in the same party. Tell me this makes sense? sigh. we found them again, not that I was that concerned since you see, I had the keys to both the house and truck! :) After suffering much rain and misery, we decide to fetch the truck and go home to meet up with my aunt and uncle who were getting in town that afternoon. Gen and Kevin run through the rain again, I'm sensing a theme here, to fetch the truck getting throughly soaked this time since farther from the truck and of course it stops raining shortly after we pick up Alan and Laura. We also once again split up into the two parties, one with cells and one without pitifully and have to search over the FQ for them some since we were each confused by what corner we picked them up at last time. St. Louis, St. Peter, details details... This was also the time that Gen took her ever popular with the owner U-turn in the middle of Decatur St. in the 'burban! tee hee... We then decide that before running back home we'd stop by the music store advertised on Canal al Blvd. Silly us! After just avoiding parking by valet Gen turns onto a st. and has to back up 30 ft. to get into the spot she wanted to park on the st. Ever tried parallel parking a Suburban?!?! All this only to find out from the hotel that the music store in up two blocks and over two blocks in Decatur St., near to where we had parked originally. Can you say Comedy of Errors? We got more sheet music and wiggled out of the parking space just in time to avoid the meter maid and headed for home. We ended up changing our of our (Kevin and I's) Wet clothes and taking naps on the couches until my Aunt and Uncle arrived. Then we chatted and I made the introductions and we hng out until it was time to head off to Ralph and Kacoo's in the FQ for dinner with the other pod of friends. After much failure to communicate, shocking I know, we manage to get a table, eat to our hearts content and have a great dinner amongst friends. It is around this time that Kevin and I realize that the Angel of Death lives off of Caffiene, Nicotine, Alcohol and Men's Souls. She doesn't eat and doesn't sleep so she just can't be mortal. We then troop over to O'Flarehty's to see Byram's Bouzoki playing goddess Beth Patterson play for the rest of the evening. I had a blast. Alan and Laura eventually parted off for a bit to go to Preservation Hall to listen to Jazz music. Apparently they had a blast, but I was content after raindrop dodging to stay in one place. We also got to see Logan and Arielle and some squire guy for about half and hour in the pub before they took off. By the end of the evening we were tired, beat and needing sleep so we skipped the hottub and went directly to sleep resolving upon only one thing, that we would spend one more day in Nawlins instead of heading up to site on Tuesday. Laura and I had thought of getting tatooed in NO, but ended up not due to lack of time and such. I think we still have plans to do this at a later date, baby!!! But, back to sleeping, which we did.

Day 5, Tuesday? I think?

More beignets! More caffiene and sugar and more shopping! While having lunch at the Seaport, Kevin's cell rings with Rags on the other line. For those not aware, Rags has justifiably earned the name Slacknar. He's calling us at 3:30 Nawlins time, 4:30 EST, to ask Kevin to pick them up at the Airport at 7pm. It occured to cute Rags that while he had mentioned this to Gwen and Kymber and other folks, he had neglected to actually ask Kevin about this. sigh. we talk amongst ourselves and decided for the lovely Kymber's sake we would save Slacknar from himself and pick them up. We made a plan to leave Alan and Laura in the FQ searching for a place to eat that night while we would pick them up. In the meantime we had to inform my aunt of two more visitors for one night only since we sure as shit weren't taking them up to the site until Wed. when we went. We then scooted up to the Riverwalk mall to meet up with Shane and Wayne to pick up a charger for my phone since my battery had run out and Gen was too dumb to pack her own charger. Then we decided to take a driving tour of the Garden District to kill time sitting down before the airport excursion. Ah, the large houses, the iron work balconies and fences, the lovely gardens, the camillas in bloom, my oh my what a wonderful hour that was. Some random biker pointed us to Anne Rice's house, which used to have a large fake dog on the upper balcony, but now can be easily distinguished by the tons of security cameras. Anne Rice, what a freak, but hey Nawlins and Vampires go hand in hand, just don't take the goobie tour thing, says Laura.

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