Day Four

Day Four in New Orleans started with a pilgrimage to the Café du Monde. It was time to eat a Beignet. A Beignet, if you don’t know, is basically a Zeppole that’s been sat upon. Or saw I thought.

It was a hot, really hot, fucking hot, humid, hazy day. It was so hot and humid it was actually dark out, if that makes any sense. It looked like this.

Here’s the famous church in Jackson Sq. you have to pass before you get to your Beignets.

And here’s Andrew Jackson, backlit, triumphant. They talk about him on “The West Wing” a lot.

And here are the Beignets.

Garrett had been talking about Beignets for weeks, months. He was very excited.

Beignets give me instant heartburn. As do Zeppole. These were fantastic, though. . .and the fried quality was crispier, and the dough fluffier, than your average Zeppole. So there is a difference. Whoever brings Beignets to the north will be a millionaire.

After this we took a line from the song and visited the tackiest and most overpriced of the tacky overpriced souvenir stores: the French Market. Here we saw hot sauce:

(note the political side to some of these bottles)

We then walked outside the quarter toward the Faubourg Marigny, which, so they say, is like the Williamsburg of New Orleans. To get there we walked on Decataur across Esplanade. There, on the left, somewhere in our imagination, is the site of Sunshine Daydream, the collective headshop that may turn tacky tourist shop and starting point of so many romantic misunderstandings.

Frenchman Street is where all the hip kids staple signs to lampposts. Looks like someone takes them down.

It suddenly got so friggin’ hot that despite our recent consumption of Beignets we had to sit down somewhere. We wound up at The Praline Connection and had an awesome, air conditioned early lunch. I had some red beans and rice, Ann had collards and mac & cheese. I forget what Garrett had, but I’m sure it was good. We got some candied pralines to go, but they were just too sweet. They were kinda disgusting.

After this we took a long walk back to and through the Quarter and took a number of photos:

I like how the birds are evenly spaced here.

We wound up at a yarn store. Cute dog.

Ann stayed inside to look at yarn and actually wound up getting a lesson in knitting. Garrett and I went to an Internet cafe to check our email (I did this there) and then it started to pour. And I mean pour. Next door was the Chartres House where Garrett & I took sanctuary and had some Turbodog. Ann didn’t have her cell phone, but we borrowed the bar’s yellow pages, found the only fabric store on Chartres St., and called her up to tell her we were in no rush. Some time later she stopped by the bar and we all went to Johnny’ Po-Boy because, believe it or not, we were hungry.

At Johnny’s, I was forced to have the special. Here’s how: I got up to the register and I looked at the blackboard. It read, “Johnny’s Special,” so I said out loud, to myself, “Johnny’s Special.” The woman behind the counter then shouted to the cook, “Special!” Anyway, who was I to argue. . .it was good.

Then we headed back to the pad. And I may as well let you know – after 4 days of extreme eating, drinking and carousing, that it was here and now that I had what might be the largest, loudest, fiercest and most explosive bowel movement of my life. I took some time to recover and then we went out for the evening.

First – Preservation Hall. I expected it to suck, to be touristy, to be facile. It was not. It was terrific. Sure, they should put some seats in, serve drinks, turn on the A/C – the whole near-religious quality of the place is a little retarded considering they also sell hats and T-shirts, but this is neither here nor there. The music was fantastic and we stayed for two sets, twice as long as we expected.

Here, literally, was a jazz cat.

We then cabbed it over to Frenchmen. We went to d.b.a (yes, I know there is a d.b.a. in New York, but this is where we went) to see the Rob Wagner Trio.

About as dissimilar from the Preservation Hall Jazz Band as you could get. Sometimes they were funky and groovin’ in a near “jamband” sort of way. . .then they went completely free. Either way they were great and I bought a CD. And the bass player, James Singleton, is a wild freak of a man who, I’m told, plays in a number of other great New Orleans groups. Of equal importance, d.b.a. serves Anchor Steam and Peche Lambic. And Irish Car Bombs!!

Across the street, at the Spotted Cat, were the New Orleans Jazz Vipers.

They were somewhat in the spirit of the Squirrel Nut Zippers. That’s a compliment.

And it’s here where we finally met up with the great Oscar “Oskie” Creech IV, my old suitemate from Hayden Hall at NYU!!

We caught up and gossiped and, the more I drank, the more bile I spewed at friends we both had who are now doing very well in L.A. I believe the phrase, ‘They all can suck a dick!” came out of my mouth.

Anyway, Oskie (who, oddly enough, is in New York these days as much as New Orleans – who knew??) was kind enough to drive us back to the hotel. Drive us back via the Krystal – the South’s version of White Castle. We needed a late night taste test.