Yeah, yeah, war against Christmas. I got another one for you.
In New Orleans, which holiday is bigger? Christmas or Mardi Gras?
Phfft! It’s Mardi Gras, hands down. Christmas? Maybe you get half a day off from work on Christmas Eve, and then Christmas Day. At Mardi Gras, you get half a day off on Friday (or maybe even the whole day!), because who wants to work when the whole city is going nuts? And then you are off Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday! And maybe even Wednesday, if you want to stretch it to take the religious holiday of Ash Wednesday. Some of the private schools now close for the whole week, to accommodate those families who’d rather go skiing or to the Caribbean and skip the whole thing.
Mardi Gras is a religious holiday, too – my out-of-town church friends spit their coffee across the room at that one, but it’s true; it’s the last feast day before Lent. Monday became a widely recognized holiday some years ago when the city started putting on free outdoor concerts and other activities on Lundi Gras (Monday).
For the last week, the entire city (the news media, anyway) have been obsessing over what the weather will be like on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. The bad news is: it’s gonna rain. The worse news is: it’s gonna rain hard on the big superkrewe parades, Endymion and Bacchus, Saturday and Sunday nights. Booo!! The good news is, the die-hard Endymion parade fans have set up tents on the wide neutral ground (median) on Orleans Avenue so they can watch the parade in the rain. And camp out there to save their prime spots.
One year when I sadly lived Somewhere Else, the church I attended had a special evening event for Mardi Gras. They had a Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper! I kind of watched the whole proceedings with my mouth hanging open. I guess there is some tradition somewhere of eating pancakes on the day before Lent, but the reasoning escapes me. Why a meatless meal BEFORE the beginning of Lent? I don’t get it.
In New Orleans, we do not eat pancakes on the day before Ash Wednesday. We eat king cakes, not pancakes. Also hot dogs, hamburgers, barbecued chicken and ribs, boiled crawfish, jambalaya, and of course one’s favorite beverage in a plastic go-cup. When we go to the parades down on the corner of St. Charles and Napoleon, that smell hanging in the air is not pancakes on a griddle. It’s chicken and ribs on a barbecue grill. My mouth waters just thinking about it.
(For the uninitiated, a king cake is a cinnamon-roll-like ring or oval decorated with purple, green, and gold sugar and icing, sometimes stuffed with a sweet filling. A plastic baby is hidden inside. Whoever gets the baby – supposedly the baby Jesus, as the official first day for king cakes is Epiphany, January 6 – in their piece of king cake gets to buy the next one. Or whatever custom you want to use; it was traditionally used to determine the queen of the first Carnival ball, but the young woman who amazingly got the favored slice was already selected behind the scenes.)
My mother used to say, "Mardi Gras is for children," another saying that makes my out-of-town friends spit their coffee across the room. They think "Mardi Gras" and they picture "Show your wits!" leaning over a balcony on Bourbon Street. But I see extended families on the neutral ground on St. Charles Avenue, the kids up on specially tricked-out parade ladders or on their daddy’s shoulders (as I once was), or running around grabbing for beads being thrown off the floats. Blankets are spread on the ground (or on top of tarpaulins if the ground is muddy), and families are sprawled on them, eating all those things I listed above.
And there’s music everywhere. It comes from the bands, it comes from parade trucks blasting loudspeakers, it comes from boom boxes as people wait for the parades to arrive. A lot of the songs are the classic Carnival standards like "Go to the Mardi Gras," "It’s Carnival Time," and "Mardi Gras Mambo." So much for singing Christmas songs. We’ve got our own, and we know the words, too.
You put a nickel, and I’ll put a dime, and
We can get together now and drink us some wine.
Ah, because it’s Carnival time...
A nickel and a dime? Did I mention these were OLD songs?
Happy Mardi Gras, y’all. Sorry about Christmas. That was so last year.
Friday, February 09, 2018
Monday, January 29, 2018
The accidental vacation
So yes, it was 19 degrees (so they say) when I was expecting 28. So yes, I thought leaving two faucets running was sufficient. Hah. The toilet lines froze. The hot water lines froze. We made a Walmart run for buckets and filled them with water from the two faucets that were working so we could flush the toilets.
And then the temperature began to rise above freezing.
I was outside, checking on the yard, when I heard the hiss of water. I peeked around the north side of the house, where the sidewalk was still slick with ice, and saw the water running from under the house. Uh-oh.
So we had to shut off the main water line to the house. Now what?
We couldn't stay in the house if we had no running water. I remembered that's what finally got the last holdouts living in this unflooded neighborhood to leave the city four days after Katrina: when the city shut off the water. So we made a few phone calls and found a hotel nearby. The dog had to go to the vet. Sweetie the diabetic cat, who needs insulin every twelve hours, went with us. The other cats stayed in the house. We were close enough to come back to check on them during the day.
And so we went on an accidental vacation. It would have been fun if it hadn't been so stressful: life on hold until the plumber could get to us. Don't let the cell phone get out of reach, in case the plumber calls.
But we did have a fun dinner in a Mexican restaurant that had water. By then, of course, the city was under a boil water advisory because the water pressure had gotten so low from people running their faucets -- and, of course, the broken pipes. So the restaurant had to boil water for ice, etc. And the hotel was handing out bottled water to guests so we could brush our teeth.
The son of a good friend from the New York City area was coming to town that weekend. All I could think, gritting my teeth, was how hard the city had struggled to get past "Third World and Proud of It." And now this New Yorker was coming to a city where you couldn't drink the water.
Fortunately, the boil water advisory was lifted by the weekend and the city had some semblance of normalcy again.
And the plumber arrived Saturday morning. There were so many pipes spurting water ("leaks" is a word that does not do it justice) under the house that he lost count: "seven or eight," he said.
But we were able to check out of the hotel and get the dog back from the vet. The accidental vacation was exciting, to say the least. But there's no place like home.
And then the temperature began to rise above freezing.
I was outside, checking on the yard, when I heard the hiss of water. I peeked around the north side of the house, where the sidewalk was still slick with ice, and saw the water running from under the house. Uh-oh.
So we had to shut off the main water line to the house. Now what?
We couldn't stay in the house if we had no running water. I remembered that's what finally got the last holdouts living in this unflooded neighborhood to leave the city four days after Katrina: when the city shut off the water. So we made a few phone calls and found a hotel nearby. The dog had to go to the vet. Sweetie the diabetic cat, who needs insulin every twelve hours, went with us. The other cats stayed in the house. We were close enough to come back to check on them during the day.
And so we went on an accidental vacation. It would have been fun if it hadn't been so stressful: life on hold until the plumber could get to us. Don't let the cell phone get out of reach, in case the plumber calls.
But we did have a fun dinner in a Mexican restaurant that had water. By then, of course, the city was under a boil water advisory because the water pressure had gotten so low from people running their faucets -- and, of course, the broken pipes. So the restaurant had to boil water for ice, etc. And the hotel was handing out bottled water to guests so we could brush our teeth.
The son of a good friend from the New York City area was coming to town that weekend. All I could think, gritting my teeth, was how hard the city had struggled to get past "Third World and Proud of It." And now this New Yorker was coming to a city where you couldn't drink the water.
Fortunately, the boil water advisory was lifted by the weekend and the city had some semblance of normalcy again.
And the plumber arrived Saturday morning. There were so many pipes spurting water ("leaks" is a word that does not do it justice) under the house that he lost count: "seven or eight," he said.
But we were able to check out of the hotel and get the dog back from the vet. The accidental vacation was exciting, to say the least. But there's no place like home.
Wednesday, January 17, 2018
Winter. Yes, in New Orleans
We are having an ice day. Not a nice day, but an ice day. Well, the sun has been shining, and that's nice, but last night the temperature went down about ten degrees lower than it was supposed to. 19 degrees is not the same as 28 degrees, especially not when you have exposed water pipes under your house and you only left two faucets running just in case.
Thank goodness for those two faucets, because that's the only running water we have today. It has gone up to a steamy 35 degrees, which isn't enough to melt the frozen pipes that are, shall we say, where the sun don't shine. So...no hot water. No shower. Toilets, yes, but we have to fill buckets with water from the running faucets to flush them. No dishwasher, no washing machine.
Shut up and be glad the power is on, I tell myself. It went off for a few minutes in the middle of the night, and there are people today who don't have power. Or heat.
The powers that be have been telling everyone to stay off the roads because of icy conditions. Last night we had sleet, lots of it. Snow is pretty. Sleet isn't. Be glad the ancient power lines outside our house, the ones that survived Katrina, didn't get enough ice on them to break.
It's supposed to get very cold again tonight. And then, surprise! It will be warm by the weekend! (Winters in New Orleans are like that.)
Warm again too late for my plants that froze...the ones I thought I could leave outside if it was "only" going down to 28. Those two pots of lavender were so pretty. They aren't any more. And I think it is time to harvest the frozen broccoli.
And when the thaw does come, I'm going to find out if any of those pipes under the house froze. The local plumbers are going to be soooo busy for the next few weeks!
And I have a new name for the cats: Organic Portable Lap Heaters.
Thank goodness for those two faucets, because that's the only running water we have today. It has gone up to a steamy 35 degrees, which isn't enough to melt the frozen pipes that are, shall we say, where the sun don't shine. So...no hot water. No shower. Toilets, yes, but we have to fill buckets with water from the running faucets to flush them. No dishwasher, no washing machine.
Shut up and be glad the power is on, I tell myself. It went off for a few minutes in the middle of the night, and there are people today who don't have power. Or heat.
The powers that be have been telling everyone to stay off the roads because of icy conditions. Last night we had sleet, lots of it. Snow is pretty. Sleet isn't. Be glad the ancient power lines outside our house, the ones that survived Katrina, didn't get enough ice on them to break.
It's supposed to get very cold again tonight. And then, surprise! It will be warm by the weekend! (Winters in New Orleans are like that.)
Warm again too late for my plants that froze...the ones I thought I could leave outside if it was "only" going down to 28. Those two pots of lavender were so pretty. They aren't any more. And I think it is time to harvest the frozen broccoli.
And when the thaw does come, I'm going to find out if any of those pipes under the house froze. The local plumbers are going to be soooo busy for the next few weeks!
And I have a new name for the cats: Organic Portable Lap Heaters.
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