So much fun in NOLA!!!!

Jazz Fest
This weekend I went to NOLA to their Jazz and Heritage Festival which I’ve been going to every two or three years since 1993.  (side note, as I love a good side note:  Brad and I eloped, sort of, while we were busy and stressed planning our November wedding and we got married by the Justice of the Peace in April then hopped on a plane and  headed to our very first Jazz Fest (Brad's only gone that one time).  Brad likes to tell people how he spent his wedding night with four women – as we were sharing a room with some friends back in the day)  Anyway – I had a blast, as always, at Fest.  I started my time down there with a bloody mary, crawfish bread and Buckwheat Zydeco – an amazing combination if ever there was one.  And it just continued from there.  There was a truly amazing tribute to Mahalia Jackson on the 100^th anniversary of her birth done primarily by the great Irma Thomas, lots of wonderful Zydeco, Marcia Ball (one of my all time favorites!!), Better Than Ezra, Geno Delafose (he's new to me, but I think I'm in love), and the list goes on and on.  Great food!!  Great music!!  Great friends!!  It just can't be beat, I'm already looking forward to the next time we go!!

It's important to get in your veggies while in NOLA - if that means olives and green beans in your bloody mary so be it!!


One of my favorite things to do, of course is to go people-ing.  And while this isn't all that news worthy I felt I had to do a little PSA right here in the middle of this post.  No one wants to see your thong.  Okay.  Let's all say it together.  No one wants to see your thong.  And.. well okay, that's not completely true.  When you're 20 years old and truly have the body for a thong - lots of 20 year old boys want to see your thong.

But... if you're over 50.

No one wants to see your thong.

Okay, are we all good on that now?

I may have been a little stupid with the sunscreen on the second day.  In my defense I was leaving Fest early to go meet John and Theresa.... but... okay.  I'm just dumb.

John and Theresa
I am in love.  Seriously I am.  I think I'm going to see if they'll adopt me - I know that means they would have had me a little before or after the time of their births - but I'm thinking that's just a little detail and we'll be able to work around it.  I can't tell you how excited I was to meet them.  I can put up a good face walk in a room like I own it and all - but usually the idea of walking in alone to meet people for the first time would just about kill me - but I was so excited my Fest friends wanted to stay longer at the Fest and I was going to get to hang out with them all by myself for a while.  I know many of you have experienced this before - but I totally wasn't going to meet these new people I was excited to meet - No way!  I was going off to play with my good, old, dear, friends; John and Theresa!

I can't tell you how wonderful it was that they made the trip into NOLA when I was there - I'm so glad they got a night away to themselves - but I'm all kinds of excited I got to spend a fair amount of it with them - it was just so wonderful that they were able to make the timing work like that - I can't tell you how much I appreciate it!!


But - so - I am meeting them at a karaoke place on Bourbon Street.  Have I mentioned, I don't do karaoke, I mean seriously!  Sing at the top of my lungs in the grocery store - sure.  Sing on a stage with a mic in my hand - no fucking way in hell.  It's a long known fact about me.  Read doesn't do karaoke.  Unh uh (shaking head vehemently), No way.  Not gonna happen.  But...!! I'm totally up for watching them do it.  I'm thrilled in fact.  Cuz you know, maybe they won't like me, and/or the conversation will stall - we'll always have the singers to talk about - so, I'm thinking it's actually the perfect place to meet old friends for the first time.


Anyway - there were no such worries as I loved them both immediately and I don't think they hated me.  They are just as wonderful and funny and fun and sweet and lovely as they are on their blogs.  It was so immediately like we'd known each other forever - I was completely comfortable and at ease the second I walked into the door.  It's possible that there were a few lake sized cocktails consumed.  

My first Gin and Tonic

And maybe, possibly, though I won't confirm or deny, there were some jello shots sucked down. (seriously - jello shots.  I'm going to be 45 in two weeks - I can't remember the last time I did jello shots).  

 Theresa made lots of new friends and had a little fan club forming in the corner next to her.  It was a little extra work for John and I, what with crowd control and having to get all their names and addresses so they could be added to her mailing list, but it was well worth it to see how quickly she had them eating out of the palm of her hands.  There was a little Cupid Shuffle (which I'd never before heard of, though Theresa was a pro at), John tried to teach me how to two step (he had to keep reminding me he was the one leading - I promise I'll do better next time, I swear!!).  There was John telling me how wonderful Theresa was - over and over.  "Look at her, isn't she amazing"  Yup!! she absolutely is!  And then there was the singing.

They got up and did some karaoke both separately and together.  I have them doing a Beatles song together on a video on my phone and I'll get it up on Youtube soon! (I'll figure out how to do that tonight or tomorrow).  They are both fantastic up there - it was so so so much fun watching them!!!  They're total naturals!  Then, there was this great guy - I forget his name - but he was amazingly bad.  I mean seriously, seriously bad.  He couldn't find a note to save his life; but he got up there time after time and belted them out one after the other and it was just about the best thing I'd ever seen because he had no idea he wasn't the next American Idol!  I totally loved it!  And then that mean old Theresa conned me into going up with her and singing too.  I mean - right there up on the stage.  With a microphone.  We've discussed this.  I don't do this kind of thing.  I'd really, really like to say I was kicking and screaming the whole way up there, but it was more like... 


Theresa: So, you ready?
Me: sure, let's go.


OMG.  And then John had to go and take a video - which actually I'm beyond thrilled by (and maybe begged him to do) cuz it's never going to happen again (well maybe I'll do it again in Chicago if there's enough alcohol involved.)  I'm going to do my best to pressure him relentlessly until he puts it up on Youtube as well, cuz I was way too drunk to have any sense of what that was like.


We were supposed to meet my friends for dinner... uh... but well let's just say that didn't happen and leave it at that.  I will say there was some more alcohol involved and some really good bar-b-que shrimp that's served in this bowl full of all this yummy sauce that you then dip the really good bread into.  

Little known medical fact: apparently when lubricated with jello, a band is primed for bread to slide on through.






This is evidence of my brilliance (or maybe a teeny, tiny bit too much alcohol).  I couldn't tell the difference between movie and picture on my camera.  This was supposed to be a picture - but.. not so much.