Everyone has their shit

Writing you from Maine. YAY. My computer has been acting up and there are no Apple stores here. So I am doing the best I can. After we left Austin we headed over to New Orleans. Got caught in a wicked awesome (met a bartender at the train station in Boston who talked like that) traffic jam on the 10. Stopped for 1 1/2 hours!! Here are some mud flap girls.

Traffic finally moved and we was HONGRY. On recommendation from Max we went to this off the path restaurant called Pat's. Esther drew the owner (you can see it in an earlier post). It was perfect. Good "bad" food, bad meaning covered in cheese, deep fried dipped in tartar sauce. Saw some gators and a large amount of cats milling about the parking lot. Friendly people.




Next stop New Orleans. The traffic jam threw a kink in our plans to relax in New Orleans, made us very late. Really wanted to sleep but you just can't do that in N.O. Esther of all people insisted we go out. You'd think it would have been me. Anyway...Headed to Bourbon street. Very surreal if you aren't drinkin. It was full of sweaty, drunk businessmen in khaki's and golf shirts holding neon plastic daiquiri sculptures. Seems to be more strip joints than I remember from my jazz fest days. Finally found a place that wasn't blaring Def Leppard covers, listened to a little jazz drinkin' a glass of bad wine in a plastic cup. Old people. Here pictures of ladies of questionable intentions.



Next morning. Our French Quarter hotel had a make your own belgian waffle bar. Yeehaw! Headed to Jackson Square, got iced cafe au lait at Cafe du Monde. GOOOD. All the wait staff in Cafe du Monde are Asian. Curious. Could feel the sweat dripping down my back. Dang it was muggy. Wanted to interview someone there but they were super busy.


Instead we had our charicatures done by James. We interviewed him about beauty. Esther wrote about him earlier. He was headed to Venice Beach to work for a few weeks on the boardwalk. You should go visit him, if you are down there. He was cool. Ended with hugs.


Then we drove through the 9th ward on the way out of town. We had planned to interview folks, but somehow felt icky and intrusive and shallow talking about beauty when people are trying to rebuild their lives. I don't know, maybe people would have wanted to share. We didn't want to be gross. Maybe we shouldn't have been chicken. People surprise you sometimes. You know? I do think there is beauty in how people overcome the terrible crap that happens and that life keeps going on. Most people don't give up.


So I'll end on this note with a quote from Sara Paul, who we interviewed in Pittsfield, MA. "Everyone has their shit they deal with. We should just give each other a break." More tomorrow.