“Cigar Box Guitars”
On Tuesday evening, we drove over to visit Merry Lee and Jeff at their condominium in the Warehouse District. It’s very modern and comes with lots of nice amenities – pool, bike room, gym, game room etc. The Superdome is just a couple of hundred yards away.
It’s quite the opposite of a Garden District home built in 1860. It’s nice that we’re just a five minute drive apart.
We had planned to eat at Tito’s on St. Charles, but with the bitter cold, decided on something very close to the condo. Merry Lee organized Maypop. This is how they describe their food:
“Our dishes are inspired by the vibrant, diverse culture of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, creating unique flavors and bringing a contemporary, locally-sourced twist to classic Southern-Asian dishes.”
The food was different, interesting, and very tasty. We tried the satsuma octopus and tuna appetizers. I had the spaghetti with crab – absolutely delicious with great broth to sop up with the Roti bread. Here are the appetizer and dinner menus:
The restaurant was quite modern and almost industrial looking:
It was well below freezing on Tuesday night and so we had all the taps dripping overnight. No damage so far. Phew! The New Orleanians never lack for humour – here’s the Mardi Gras beads being utilized as snow chains:
The next couple of days were cold, but not as cold, and so we stayed inside for the most part. Things warmed up on Thursday and I suggested that we go for an afternoon walk. We wandered down the street car line on St. Charles – enjoying watching folks setting up their front yard viewing platforms for the parades. They go to quite a bit of work to make sure they 
are appropriately decorated. Next week I’ll share a picture of the Mardi Gras flag and decorations that we have on the front of the house. Right when we arrived at Jefferson Ave., about 1.5 miles from home, the heavens opened. I had just a t-shirt and jeans on and got completely drenched very quickly. We ducked under the library porch and waited for the heaviest rain to pass. I was hoping to jump a streetcar back to Washington Ave., but none came. Oh well, let’s make the 1.5 mile trek home in the drizzle and light rain. I did check the forecast and radar minutes before our walk – how can a huge downpour be missed like that?
Diana met up with Merry Lee on Friday. They walked from our home down to Magazine for a sushi lunch at Sake Café. The Chihuly glass sculptures coming down form the ceiling caught McD’s attention. We did a walking tour of those at the Dallas Arboretum that was really something.
They wandered through several shops after lunch but didn’t purchase too much. Not knowing the weather for Mardi Gras makes it tough to decide.
We were double booked on Saturday – we had tickets to the New Orleans Cigar Box Guitar festival and the Chewbacchus parade was happening – with Kara, Nina, and Debra all walking as Wonder Women. I’ll talk about the Cigar Box event first.
This was a three day festival with cigar box guitar nerds from around the world exchanging tunes and tips. Argentina, France, and all over the United States were represented. It was nice to observe the close knit community they have developed over the years. The event ran from 3pm until 6pm, an hour for dinner, and then 7pm until 10pm. Here’s one of the early set performers – he was working really hard.
We walked a few blocks to Manolito, a tiny Cuban restaurant for dinner. Here’s what they say about themselves and their name:
Our dinner and drinks were excellent as always from this little, delicious place. Kenny thinks their banana daiquiri is the best he’s had. His brother owns several daiquiri shops on Bourbon St. – quite a different drink!
The second cigar box set was excellent – starting out with the New Orleans based Cigar Box Serenaders. Sounds like something you might here in the Spotted Cat Music Club on Frenchman Street – but precisely executed:
That was a dresser drawer bass and a drum kit of pails and coffee cans. Very clever.
After this set, we braved the cold wind to watch a bit of the parade. No sign of Kara and the Wonder Women amongst the 3,000 walking participants:
Kenny and I returned to the inside and warmth pretty quickly, while Diana did her best to wait for the Wonder Women. After 45 minutes, she was back inside for this treat:
Memphis Lightning had huge energy and amazing guitar skills, capped off by his demonstration of being able to play guitar with both his right and left hands on this crazy double neck cigar box guitar.
We stayed for a couple of songs of the final act, Erin Coburn. A pretty lady who took us by surprise with a very heavy and noisy set to finish out the night. We left after a couple of songs. What an eclectic and somewhat typical NOLA day.
During the week, Billy (handyman), dropped off some delicious gumbo for us. Would a handyman in McKinney ever do that – no way. That’s on top of the fresh crabs and sauce he dropped off last week. I showed him my diagnosis on one of the faucet leaks – needs a new O-ring here:
We figured out the other leak as well. Kohler provides lifetime free replacement parts – so this should be with me for installation next week. We’ll see how I do. Better than a very expensive replacement faucet if I can make it work reliably. The service from Kohler was amazing (a total contrast from Thermador) – I would recommend them to anyone that plans to have their products for a few years – free replacement parts and instructions.
I’ve just watched the NFC Divisional game between Detroit and Atlanta – a really competitive game that the Lions won. Just when I’ve almost put the Cowboys disappointment behind me, another online joke picture comes along:
I was reading some New Orleans history – particularly about some of the great writers who have lived here. Most notably, Tennessee Williams, who wrote “A Streetcar Named Desire” while living here and remained until his death. And of course, Anne Rice and her vampire novels, written in a house just around the corner from us. I was taken with an explanation of where the title, “A Confederacy of Dunces” , came from. This is the title of a well known New Orleans based book by John Kennedy Toole. The book’s title comes from Jonathan Swift’s essay “Thoughts on Various Subjects, Moral and Diverting”: When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.
I really didn’t love “The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store.” I tried, given so many number one best of the year reviews. Way too many insignificant and underdeveloped characters – I almost had to make a chart to keep up with them all. The main characters in a story like this need to be more fully developed. I almost felt like McBride was trying to appeal to every ethnic and religious group. Did any of you really enjoy this book?
I sampled a decent amount of “Let Us Descend” by Jesmyn Ward. Really not my scene at all.
All the rave reviews:
“OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • Instant New York Times Bestseller • Shortlisted for the 2024 Carnegie Medal for Excellence
From Jesmyn Ward—the two-time National Book Award winner, youngest winner of the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, and MacArthur Fellow—comes a haunting masterpiece, sure to be an instant classic, about an enslaved girl in the years before the Civil War.
“‘Let us descend,’ the poet now began, ‘and enter this blind world.’” —Inferno, Dante Alighieri
Let Us Descend is a reimagining of American slavery, as beautifully rendered as it is heart-wrenching. Searching, harrowing, replete with transcendent love, the novel is a journey from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation.”
This was just too harsh for me to bear. I know it’s historically accurate, but not what I need to spend my free time reading about.
This is the first time in a long time that I’ve returned two books to the library unfinished. I infer that I need to stop following the “best of” reviews.
Let’s start with a fantastic song from the Kinks.
“You can see all the stars as you walk down Hollywood BoulevardSome that you recognize, some that you’ve hardly even heard ofPeople who worked and suffered and struggled for fameSome who succeeded and some who suffered in vain”
To honour the passing of Shane McGowan. We loved seeing him at Tipitinas last year:
And finally, something from the king of “laid back.” Found it on a Spotify J.J. Cale radio station:
Coexist peacefully, with patience and compassion for all!