headed homeward from NOLA

[jay]

I'm in the Continental lounge at IAH airport in Houston... tenacious_snail and I were on separate flights from New Orleans to here, hers arrives in 45 minutes, then we both connect to the same flight to San Jose.

The Louisiana leg of this trip started off stressfully... while I had no problems on Southwest from Hobby, Les was nearly stranded here Friday evening because Continental's servers all crashed... and she didn't have a boarding pass. They were hand-writing them... then once she arrived (late), we went over to her mom and stepfather's place. That was pleasant enough... except that unbeknownst to us, her mom had made us dinner. Comprised of things that I was allergic to (mushroom casserole, for me) or couldn't eat (bread toppings on veggies, and fruit, for Les). It was... awkward. (long pause) Her mom finally picked up on our joint distress, bundled up the food and we headed out to a local restaurant instead. Still, I appreciated her efforts.

Yesterday was much smoother... slept in a bit, then we headed out to the Garden District near Tulane, Audubon Park, and along St. Charles Avenue. We also geocached... found 2/3, including one in a playground that was my 200th. (smile) Then headed to the Vieux Carre, found another geocache, then a languid taste-intense-but-small-portions light lunch at Bayona, where we were able to get a table without reservations. And chatted with the chef, briefly (Susan Spicer). Then to more geocaches and wandering, ending up with a find on top of the menu box outside of a favorite place of mine and patgreene's, K-Pauls.

Enough play... Les dropped me midafternoon back at the hotel, where I worked on proposal budgets while she went out with her mom. But her folks treated us later to wonderful blackened redfish and andouille-crawfish eggrolls at Ralph's On The Park, a spinoff of Commander's Palace. And tenacious_snail and I finished the evening back in the Quarter at Cafe Du Monde, as I *had* to get my beignet and cafe-au-lait fix before leaving town (grin). She was gracious and bouncy and even tried a beignet corner, carb-wise.

This morning... up at 4am, to the airport, and then back here (to Houston) before heading home. Where I'll undoubtedly spend more time working, later. But it has been a lovely break. Thanks greatly to my sweet patgreene holding down things at home this week, and helpful cyan_blue who took the kids overnight after W&S and all day yesterday, easing the load on Pat. :)

Comments

[anaisdjuna.livejournal.com]

Sweet :-)

Cafe du Monde rocks!

[samtosha.livejournal.com]

I had to have the 17 year old Dude at IAH on Friday night for a 7.15 flight. Thankfully we got there early. But the server crash issue caused Dude's flight to be delayed until after 9. They did not even leave the gate until after 9.25. I was just there myself this morning and left before 7. It was a clusterfuck today also because when I got there, they had signs posting saying that all domestic check ins for Continental needed to be done thru terminal E as opposed to the usual terminal C check in. Terminal E has a different connection to Continentals server systems and E was working this morning when C was not. OY. I am glad you were not caught up in the interesting cluster that was IAH this morning. Here's to a conflict and glitch free trip the rest of your way home!

[brian1789.livejournal.com]

Thanks... that explains the crowds coming through security at Terminal E... I was having breakfast around 9am with tenacious_snail at the Ruby's just through security there, and noticed that it was much busier than usual.

[tenacious-snail.livejournal.com]

CDM photo

[fluffthebunny.livejournal.com]

New Orleans is a magical place. I'm glad it proved itself to be so, for both of you.