Mouthy Femme: Back from the Big Easy (which should be called "the Big-easy-to-get-heartburn")

That's right, y'all...my recent lack of posts springs from the fact that I was in N'awlins for the last 8 days. I just got home last night, have now been in town for about 24 hrs, and have now caught myself humming I Wish I Was in New Orleans about 2,000 times.

Holy smokes. As luck would have it (good or bad, depending on your viewpoint) I launched a new blog for one of my clients the very same day I flew out, so I had to work kind of a lot, so I couldn't just go off the deep end and get trashed the whole time. I did go balls out (making me kind of a hypocrite after making fun of all the other drunk people the whole week) the last night I was there, though, and paid for it all day yesterday, from my drunken call to Mr. Man upon waking, to barfing in the airplane bathroom, to a painful lugging of my huge suitcase up our narrow stairs. In fact, I was on my second flight when I remembered eating a half of a mushroom chocolate at about 2am (my flight was at 11.30). Jesus. Note to self: you're 30.

You may know that I'm something of a has-been vegetarian who even now rarely eats meat. All that went out the window and a few days into the trip, I found myself counting on my fingers how many species I'd eaten in a 24 hr period, and there were at least ten. Crawfish, alligator, duck, quail, chicken, steak, fish, oysters, shrimp, and rabbit. And it's not like eating little pieces of sushi or lean jerky or something; this was shit like "alligator and sausage cheesecake." I'm pretty sure I blew all the food karma I've built up over the years.

I also saw a ton of amazing music, being there with cousin C and her husband, M, who both know a lot more than I do about jazz, and kept me running to shows pretty much every minute that I wasn't emailing, blogging, searching for wifi, eating some ridiculously indulgent shit, or (gratefully) sleeping. We missed most of the biggest acts of last weekend, including Allison Kraus and Robert Plant, and Billy Joel, and Sheryl Crow. Even better, though, I discovered a bunch of artists I'd never even heard of, like Bonsoui Catin, the female Cajun band who fucking rock, and Papa Mali and Henry Butler and Anders Osbourne (who chainsmokes and leans back when he's jamming on the guitar). We also saw the legendary Dr. John and the Wetland All-stars, at least until the huge grey cloud hanging over us opened up and starting pounding us with quarter-sized raindrops. We even saw John C. Riley standing outside the Chicky Wa Wa on Saturday night, looking fucking adorable in an all-black suit with black (bowler-style, I think?) hat. I kicked myself all the way to Tipitina for not telling him what a fucking amazing actor I think he is. Dammit.

Of course, all of this indulgent behavior was hindered by a constant nagging guilt about the shit that has gone down in New Orleans since Katrina (and before). A few of my dearest friends used to live there, and I saw how it broke their hearts--I guess it broke everybody's hearts, and filled us with rage and shame--when it happened. The day that I flew down there, that douchebag Bush was there, too, for some bullshit tree planting ceremony or something. That he has the audacity to show his face in that town boggles the motherfucking mind. I didn't make it to the 9th Ward, covered up with work as I was, but there was evidence of the destruction everywhere we went (except maybe the Garden District) including the fairgrounds where Jazz Fest is held, in the form of now unlive-able houses and in some places water lines. What I didn't see and couldn't judge is how the neighborhoods have changed--who is no longer there--but one of the cab drivers told us that the Marigny district, where we were staying, used to be a "bad neighborhood," one that was "predominantly black," before the storm and subsequent "rebuilding."

Sigh.

I was able, however, to patch up my bleeding heart (no place has ever made me feel like that place did before) manage to meet a great many people who have taken matters into their own hands, given up waiting for the help they deserve, and began to rebuild in earnest, in scrappy teams. People with awesome visions for a fairer, more sustainable, Big Easy. People who are growing copious amounts of vegetables in the middle of the city.

Plus I got to elbow some old man who thought he could feel up me and C while moving past us on the way to the bathroom.

I also saw alligators and turtles in the Bayou.