Thursday, April 12, 2012

Les Bon Temps, They Will Roulez

We are heading down to New Orleans on the morn, meeting up with Uncle Dave, and Ms. Rupersberg, for to spend five days in The City That Care Forgot. The French Quarter Festival will be going on, and that will be grand, but there is really no bad time to be in N'awlins. People there know how to live- music, food, drink, conviviality are important there. And it shows in every respect, but, arguably, most in the food. (This keeping in mind uh, JAZZ!) I have yet to visit Paris or anyplace in France, but if there's a better place to eat, I don't know if I could survive it. (Uncle Sean, having been to all three, rates them thus: #1 Seoul, #2 New Orleans, #3 Paris.)

We travelers have been corresponding and plotting for the last weeks, getting more excited by the day. Nicole came forth with mention of many of the things friends had suggested she must do, and I was compelled to respond with a sort of a manifesto:

Coops is mandatory. Good food, good atmosphere. The lamb ribs are mighty fine, and their jambalaya is really good. Sorry, bro, it's got bunny in it....

I will eat fried chicken from Willie Mae's Scotch House, or die trying. I will eat many, many oysters. Ditto mudbugs. Ditto ditto mudbugs. I will have a pils or two at Crescent City. I will eat beignets. (My spellcheck helpfully suggests 'signets' instead.)(Cygnets, maybe...) I will down Guinni at Monaghan's. I will be thrown out of Avenue Pub for drinking all of their beer. I will down more Guinni at Monaghan's. I will throw down to Bonerama. And Evan Christopher. I will eat too much at Jacques-Imo, Cochon, and elsewhere. I will sing inappropriately at odd hours and places. I will buy cookies from the dessert guy on Frenchman Street at 2AM. I will discover many more new and glorious things, mostly by chance. I will be very, very happy. Furiously happy.

Many, many mudbugs.

Seriously, if you've never been to NOLA, put it on your 'to do' list. You can thank us later. With beer.

(Apologies to Jenny Lawson for appropriating "furiously happy;" I think she would approve of my furious pursuit of happiness.)

4 comments:

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  2. Addendum by Mrs Cicerone....while not thrown out of The Avenue Pub for drinking too much beer, we were treated to a bit of an "anti-Cicerone" tirade, by the resident Cicerone! It mostly concerned "discrimination against bartenders", meaning that the Cicerones out there were blaming bartenders for things beyond their control, like dirty beer lines, etc. Anyway, the next beer we ordered, an 1809 Berliner Weisse (pale yellow, cloudy), was presented to us (by the bartender, not the Cicerone) as a totally clear, colourless, non-carbonated liquid. Clearly not beer, and when questioned we were given the "you just don't know what Berliner Weisse is" attitude. It was line cleaner in the glass!

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  3. Yikes.
    I'll put that place on the "too many excellent places to go to, so why bother going there" list.
    Too bad. Any place with Berliner Weisse on tap sounds great- on paper.
    BTW did they at least offer a Schüss of sweet woodruff in your line cleaner?

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