More New Orleans

Oh yeah, one thing I forgot to note from day one of the adventure - two celebrities on the plane. Taylor Hicks, of American Idol fame (the girls in the seats behind us insisted on singing to him from 20 rows back periodically thoughout the flight ... oh the joy) and Nancy Lenehan, who is one of those actresses whose face you always know but never the name. (As it was, we spent the entire flight trying to figure out something specific we'd seen her in this season, and standing collecting the luggage in New Orleans it finally hit me - MY NAME IS EARL.

OK. So we're up to day two. We sleep in a little bit, and are greeted by Michael's mom with coffee and King Cake. King Cake. If you don't know what that is, well, I feel sorry for you. :)

First thing - Shelley checks in on her luggage. Oh, they tell her, it's only gone on the truck as of 11:45 this morning. Well, we have to leave at 12:30 to meet my dad for lunch. By this time Michael's parents are both gone, and we finally leave a note for the delivery people to leave the luggage at the back of the house.

Off to Metairie, to meet my dad and my cousin Nichole at Bozo's. Now. My dad originally said Mandina's - which I was DYING to go to as they were finally re-opening after a year and a half - but we had big dinner plans that night and I didn't want to indulge quite that much. So I told him to pick somewhere else. He picked this place because I'd "be able to get something light".

Yeah. Well, only if your version of "light" is fried. All fried. All the time. I shouldn't have been surprised but ... ugh. I settled on a bowl of gumbo.

It was good to see Nichole. She's getting married next month ... she's only seven years younger than I am, but I still think of her as being so so young. LOL. She's great though; one of the few sane people to spring from my family. And seriously against all odds.

Home again, home again. And shock of shocks - no luggage! She calls ... they say it'll be another hour, there's only one person ahead of her. An hour later? They say it'll be several hours, and there were several people ahead of her. She complains, she argues ... none of it will make her luggage magically appear. I loan her clothes and makeup (thankfully I'm too lazy to hem my pants!) and off we go to the French Quarter, where Michael joins us at Court of Two Sisters where Erin cooked us a fabulous meal JUST FOR US. Her first ever tasting menu as a chef. it was spectacular. :)



We all went out afterwards ... we talked, we drank, we drank ... I don't think I've done shots in about six years. Oy!



Oh and the good news? Shelley's luggage appeared around 10pm that evening, after claiming they couldn't find the address ... and according to the Sullivans, they were pretty surly about it when they did arrive. The bad news? Eddie the Garden Gnome suffered an arm break. (More on Eddie later ... but just think about how hard luggage has to be thrown around to break something made of cement.)