Pictures soon to come! Here is one of the edits of my impressions of fantastic Sunday night in New Orleans.
I’m not a football fan. In fact, I’ve never truly watched a game. In all my years of being an American, all my years of living in a house with seven men, I still don’t know purpose the little flags serve. Personally, I think it’s to my credit that I’ve garnered that there are flags involved at all.
I understand there’s strategy involved and I know some people like to draw deep wisdom in life from comparisons of football plays, but I personally find watching football to be the most boring pastime in existence.
What I love about football, though, are the fans. Lifetime fans, generational fans, band wagon fans — it doesn’t really matter.
And so I found myself Sunday afternoon heading out of my New Orleans apartment to join the crowds headed downtown for the NFC Championship game between the Saints and the Vikings. Even waiting for a streetcar, the rabid excitement that had a hold on the city was infectious. Two streetcars passed me by, too full of people to fit the five or six of us waiting at our stop. People hung out the windows and screamed to us, to people walking on the street, to cars with their windows down, to anyone that would listen.
A white convertible with three girls in black and gold spandex and jerseys, Mardi Gras masks, beads and pom poms pulled up to the stoplight next to us. Shrieking with laughter and passing a couple of bottles wrapped clumsily in brown paper bags, it was clear their tailgating had started a little early.
A man waiting for the streetcar jumped in front of their car and started dancing to the bass booming from their car, shouting to them, “Y’all, who dat? Who dat?” They blared their horn, shouting and laughing in response before he jumped out of the way and they zoomed off.
Downtown it was a fever pitch of frenzied excitement. Brass bands went up and down the streets playing “When the Saints Come Marching In,” and other numbers while fans in all sorts of costumes and face paint cheered them and danced. It was like Mardi Gras had come early. Denver during Rocktober or the World Series couldn’t remotely compare. New Orleans is a party town even in years with nothing special to celebrate, let alone this year.
The tailgating lots were as jam-packed as a Calcutta marketplace. It was hard to even see which direction I was moving in. Grills, big-screen TV’s, coolers, camping chairs and other traditional elements were all in place. And somehow I managed to become enthralled with the score. Of course, the only way I knew when the Saints scored was from listening to the raucous cheers that erupted. But I was, somewhat, part of the crowd.
For me the highlights were the universally pronounced “bad calls” the refs made throughout the game. At one point, a man standing about six feet, at least 200 pounds and only inches away from me was so infuriated that spittle was literally flying from his mouth in all directions. He crushed his half-full beer can in his hand and stalked away frothing obscenities. Shouldering through, he unwittingly shoved past a police officer who had joined the crowd at the TV.
“Can’t even watch,” he muttered by way of excuse. “Can’t even watch this crap. Makes me so mad. Can’t watch it.”
Equally memorable was his girlfriend, who, in contrast, was maybe barely five four in heels, but just as explosive in her colorful maledictions on Brett Favre’s many supposed injuries.
“Yeah,” she shrieked at the ref on the TV next to the trailer. “You’re amazed he’s
back in the game because he’s not really hurt, you moron. He’s faking, you idiot.”
More than anything else, though, I soaked in and relished the entire tailgating culture. Around a campfire of strangers, I was handed beers, slices of King Cake, hot dogs, a bowl of jumbalaya. I was offered a chair, a cooler, a seat on a bench. I was given dozens of high fives, though I never knew for what. I was hugged by strangers.
When I finally managed to find a cab home, a newly firm Saints lover, only to be kept awake all night by my neighbors’ bonfire and fireworks in the courtyard, I realized something: that I night, became a football fan.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
A Jeepscapade
Although my Jeep, to my whole family’s surprise, made the whole trip from Denver to New Orleans without incident (discounting that time in Oklahoma when the engine start quacking), today my lucky streak ended.
Or so I thought.
The thought that my guardian angel had run out on me struck me this morning, when I went out around 8 to drive my belongings over to my new apartment to move everything in. And the car wouldn’t start.
I reasoned to myself that it really wasn’t the worst time it could have happened. I wasn’t on the way to a job interview, going to visit a dying relative in another city or trying to flee a hurricane. Any one of those three scenarios might have qualified as the worst time for a car to not start. But, I told myself, I just wanted to move my things in. No big deal. It can wait.
Like a true college girl, I called my dad. He is very manly and said, in a deep man-voice, that of course it sounds like something that would be absolutely no problem at all for him to fix if he were here, but much too advanced and greasy for the likes of me. Far from the most helpful advice my dad has given me in all my life. His only suggestion was to call AAA and have them tow me somewhere. I dug out the phone number from underneath all the clothes, shoes, cleaning supplies and water bottles littering the back seat, and called in the big guns. (The tow truck)
So, Javier the Tow Truck Driver* showed up about an hour later, hooked up my Jeep and took us both (me in the cab) down to the AAA shop.
(*NOT HIS REAL NAME)
Well, Javier and I became semi-friends in the car – he has a daughter in middle school and is a Saints fan – and everything went great until the shop.
I had to go talk to the guy in their little office, and man, he was just a big mean jerk. Like many people who work in offices of mechanic shops, he oozed desire to take terrible advantage of innocent college girls (financially), and wanted to charge me all sorts of money to even look at the Jeep. I went outside to teleconference with my dad as to what he would do in the situation.
I saw Javier coming towards me with a paper to sign for the towing, and I had a little inspiration. Clearly, I couldn’t afford what Mr. Cotton Headed Ninny Muggins Auto Shop Guy wanted to charge me, but neither could I afford to not have a working vehicle for very long.
“Javier, can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” Javier said obligingly.
Looking around furtively, I leaned forward and whispered, “Do you think if I went somewhere else they would charge me less?”
Javier too looked guiltily around, before asking how much they were asking. I told him and he ceded that, in fact, cheaper service at an alternate location might be more economical.
“And would you take me there with my car if I paid the tow rate?”
Javier said that, yes, he would take me somewhere else, but needed to talk to a friend first. I went back to the tow truck cab (scornfully, in case the Auto Shop Office Guy saw me leaving his premises to take my business elsewhere).
After a brief consultation, a mechanic in a jumpsuit sidled over to the truck cab door and motioned for me to open up.
“I don’t really want to give you a recommendation for a mechanic,” was his cryptic opener.
“Um, okay,” was my somewhat baffled and ineloquent response.
“Because,” Marcus* (as his name tag proclaimed him) continued, “if you don’t like the service or somethin’ over there and you call this shop and complain, I could get in trouble.”
(*Close to his real name, but not actually it)
“That’s alright, you can recommend somebody,” I tried clumsily to reassure him.
“See, this guy isn’t AAA, and I really am not supposed to send you to him, as a AAA mechanic.” Marcus’ eyebrows raised conspiratorially.
“So - if you told me – it would be as a – a friend?” I tried.
“Exactly!” Marcus was glad I finally cottoned on.
This friend of his, he told me, was where he took his own car when it needed a tune-up, and he would never, never try to fleece anybody. Marcus added that he lived in Colorado for a while himself, as a further recommendation of his reliability.
He needn’t have tried so hard – I was only sure that I didn’t want to pay one more penny at AAA, and Javier quickly agreed to take me over at the normal rate.
Marcus said he would come along to “make me feel more comfortable,” and started back to his own truck. He turned around, came back, stuck his hand through my window and shook mine.
“Marc,” he said, as if we were meeting for the first time. (I judged permission to call him by a shortened form of his name as an invitation to friendship, and was happy that I now had 1½ friends in New Orleans.)
So after a bumpy but relatively quick ride, we arrived at Sidney’s auto shop. It was a grungy little building in between a couple of highways on a tight, jam-packed little road full of cars of various degrees of broken. I clambered down to go meet Sidney, whom I identified because his name was stitched into his clothes in that way that jumpsuits have.
He popped open the hood and looked at it for about five seconds. He went to the driver’s seat and tried to start it. It didn’t work. He walked back and looked at the engine, hard. He returned to the driver’s seat, and turned the key.
And it started.
I am convinced that, although Sidney had every appearance of normalcy – a huge, black, jumpsuit-wearing mechanic with greasy hands and a rumbly voice so deep I could hardly understand it – he fixed my car with mind power.
Really.
Not only did he use his telekinetic abilities to return the Jeep to full working order; he also refused to accept pay for it. (I was secretly relieved, though I pretended to feel bad)
Then Javier refused to be paid for driving me all around. (He also offered to, in the event of a long rehabilitation period for the Jeep, drive me back to my apartment for free). Again, I was secretly relieved.
Had I owed Marc anything, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he refused payment too.
I swore my fidelity to Sidney as a faithful customer should anything befall the Jeep again, and started back home, realizing that my guardian angel had not gone anywhere.
Or so I thought.
The thought that my guardian angel had run out on me struck me this morning, when I went out around 8 to drive my belongings over to my new apartment to move everything in. And the car wouldn’t start.
I reasoned to myself that it really wasn’t the worst time it could have happened. I wasn’t on the way to a job interview, going to visit a dying relative in another city or trying to flee a hurricane. Any one of those three scenarios might have qualified as the worst time for a car to not start. But, I told myself, I just wanted to move my things in. No big deal. It can wait.
Like a true college girl, I called my dad. He is very manly and said, in a deep man-voice, that of course it sounds like something that would be absolutely no problem at all for him to fix if he were here, but much too advanced and greasy for the likes of me. Far from the most helpful advice my dad has given me in all my life. His only suggestion was to call AAA and have them tow me somewhere. I dug out the phone number from underneath all the clothes, shoes, cleaning supplies and water bottles littering the back seat, and called in the big guns. (The tow truck)
So, Javier the Tow Truck Driver* showed up about an hour later, hooked up my Jeep and took us both (me in the cab) down to the AAA shop.
(*NOT HIS REAL NAME)
Well, Javier and I became semi-friends in the car – he has a daughter in middle school and is a Saints fan – and everything went great until the shop.
I had to go talk to the guy in their little office, and man, he was just a big mean jerk. Like many people who work in offices of mechanic shops, he oozed desire to take terrible advantage of innocent college girls (financially), and wanted to charge me all sorts of money to even look at the Jeep. I went outside to teleconference with my dad as to what he would do in the situation.
I saw Javier coming towards me with a paper to sign for the towing, and I had a little inspiration. Clearly, I couldn’t afford what Mr. Cotton Headed Ninny Muggins Auto Shop Guy wanted to charge me, but neither could I afford to not have a working vehicle for very long.
“Javier, can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” Javier said obligingly.
Looking around furtively, I leaned forward and whispered, “Do you think if I went somewhere else they would charge me less?”
Javier too looked guiltily around, before asking how much they were asking. I told him and he ceded that, in fact, cheaper service at an alternate location might be more economical.
“And would you take me there with my car if I paid the tow rate?”
Javier said that, yes, he would take me somewhere else, but needed to talk to a friend first. I went back to the tow truck cab (scornfully, in case the Auto Shop Office Guy saw me leaving his premises to take my business elsewhere).
After a brief consultation, a mechanic in a jumpsuit sidled over to the truck cab door and motioned for me to open up.
“I don’t really want to give you a recommendation for a mechanic,” was his cryptic opener.
“Um, okay,” was my somewhat baffled and ineloquent response.
“Because,” Marcus* (as his name tag proclaimed him) continued, “if you don’t like the service or somethin’ over there and you call this shop and complain, I could get in trouble.”
(*Close to his real name, but not actually it)
“That’s alright, you can recommend somebody,” I tried clumsily to reassure him.
“See, this guy isn’t AAA, and I really am not supposed to send you to him, as a AAA mechanic.” Marcus’ eyebrows raised conspiratorially.
“So - if you told me – it would be as a – a friend?” I tried.
“Exactly!” Marcus was glad I finally cottoned on.
This friend of his, he told me, was where he took his own car when it needed a tune-up, and he would never, never try to fleece anybody. Marcus added that he lived in Colorado for a while himself, as a further recommendation of his reliability.
He needn’t have tried so hard – I was only sure that I didn’t want to pay one more penny at AAA, and Javier quickly agreed to take me over at the normal rate.
Marcus said he would come along to “make me feel more comfortable,” and started back to his own truck. He turned around, came back, stuck his hand through my window and shook mine.
“Marc,” he said, as if we were meeting for the first time. (I judged permission to call him by a shortened form of his name as an invitation to friendship, and was happy that I now had 1½ friends in New Orleans.)
So after a bumpy but relatively quick ride, we arrived at Sidney’s auto shop. It was a grungy little building in between a couple of highways on a tight, jam-packed little road full of cars of various degrees of broken. I clambered down to go meet Sidney, whom I identified because his name was stitched into his clothes in that way that jumpsuits have.
He popped open the hood and looked at it for about five seconds. He went to the driver’s seat and tried to start it. It didn’t work. He walked back and looked at the engine, hard. He returned to the driver’s seat, and turned the key.
And it started.
I am convinced that, although Sidney had every appearance of normalcy – a huge, black, jumpsuit-wearing mechanic with greasy hands and a rumbly voice so deep I could hardly understand it – he fixed my car with mind power.
Really.
Not only did he use his telekinetic abilities to return the Jeep to full working order; he also refused to accept pay for it. (I was secretly relieved, though I pretended to feel bad)
Then Javier refused to be paid for driving me all around. (He also offered to, in the event of a long rehabilitation period for the Jeep, drive me back to my apartment for free). Again, I was secretly relieved.
Had I owed Marc anything, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he refused payment too.
I swore my fidelity to Sidney as a faithful customer should anything befall the Jeep again, and started back home, realizing that my guardian angel had not gone anywhere.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
My Driving Companion
Some quotes from and observations about my dear friend Sarah, who drove to New Orleans with me. (Noted down while driving)
“It may surprise you, but I don’t actually know everything.”
(After swerving for a tumbleweed) “I forgot I was driving a jeep. I forgot about ground clearance.”
Sarah is a “hand-talker” and can’t keep herself from gesturing dramatically to make her point, whatever she may be talking about. When driving at high speeds, every hand wave translates to a corresponding jerk of the car into the neighboring lane.
Sarah likes to make connections of names of towns with other pieces of information she has stored in her head.
“Burlington, Colorado. I wonder if the Burlington Coat Factory is in Burlington, Colorado, or in Burlington in another state or just named after somebody.”
“Does Colby cheese come from Colby, Kansas or Colby, Wisconsin? No, I’m serious, I don’t know.”
Seeing a sign for a town named Ajax, Sarah gave me a knowing smirk. I mimed a scrubbing motion with my hand at the same time that she clenched her fist and raised in a “victory” gesture. Realizing she was thinking of the ancient hero, I said, “Oh, I was thinking of the cleaner.” She promptly replied, “Well, I was thinking something more epic.”
“It may surprise you, but I don’t actually know everything.”
(After swerving for a tumbleweed) “I forgot I was driving a jeep. I forgot about ground clearance.”
Sarah is a “hand-talker” and can’t keep herself from gesturing dramatically to make her point, whatever she may be talking about. When driving at high speeds, every hand wave translates to a corresponding jerk of the car into the neighboring lane.
Sarah likes to make connections of names of towns with other pieces of information she has stored in her head.
“Burlington, Colorado. I wonder if the Burlington Coat Factory is in Burlington, Colorado, or in Burlington in another state or just named after somebody.”
“Does Colby cheese come from Colby, Kansas or Colby, Wisconsin? No, I’m serious, I don’t know.”
Seeing a sign for a town named Ajax, Sarah gave me a knowing smirk. I mimed a scrubbing motion with my hand at the same time that she clenched her fist and raised in a “victory” gesture. Realizing she was thinking of the ancient hero, I said, “Oh, I was thinking of the cleaner.” She promptly replied, “Well, I was thinking something more epic.”
On the Road
I wrote two entries on the road down to New Orleans (one today and one yesterday). Since there was no internet in the car, I'm just posting them together now.
On the road.
1:30 p.m., Monday
Once I decided to forego the Greyhound experience to drive my own car to New Orleans, everything magically fell into place. My surplus possessions quickly sold on craigslist, a former roommate texted me out of the blue wanting to know if I wanted company and a co-driver for the trip down, another old friend called asking me to carry a bicycle for her son (at college in Alabama) down to the general region, and those little mini oranges went on sale at King Soopers.
So, fitted with a car companion, two bicycles lashed to my car with copious amounts of bungee cord, and an ocean of little oranges, we set out this morning.
For such a relatively monotonous road, the first few hours have been pretty interesting.
I discovered that, no matter how mature I may think I am, the day I truly grow up will be the day when I can see a car with an Oklahoma license plate without feeling the impulse to break into my rendition of Rogers and Hammerstein. Also I realized anew the creative genius rampant in rural America when it comes to the naming of small towns. Bovina, Arriba and Bethune have been some favorites so far, but we are keeping a list to compare. Also, on the Kansas/Colorado border, a strange hybrid town called “Kanorado.”
I also have learned that when I drive on long, straight and empty roads (as I did for the first 4-hour leg of the trip), I tend to drift, a lot. But that’s still better than my driving buddy, Sarah, who neglected to tell me until 200 miles east of Denver that she didn’t really remember how to drive a manual. (She’s ok now.) Other driving quirks of Sarah’s include sharp braking and highway swerving to avoid tumbleweeds and furious muttering whenever semis come close to us and.
Most of all, though, I’ve been sinking in the sparse beauty of the plains. It’s a really easy place to get bored and start wishing for the mountains or something a little more varied. But, as a friend of mine recently said, the key to situational contentment is in staying present and living in each moment. I’m trying to live in each second of this long, unending plain, and, doing that, finding it subtly and wonderfully beautiful.
2 p.m., Tuesday. Somewhere in Louisiana.
Louisianan impressions: It’s much greener than Texas already. Also, Louisiana has crazy amounts of road kill. Don’t ask me why. But the side of the highway is littered with poor little critters who have crossed one too many speeding Southerners.
Since crossing the border a couple hours ago, Sarah and I have been maintaining a constant high, and keep reminding each other “We’re so almost there!” despite the five or so hours we still have to go before we reach New Orleans.
The drive through Kansas finished uneventfully (very uneventfully, if you count geographic features as events), and Oklahoma passed with almost no features.
It was dark all the way through Oklahoma, so if the car had performed ideally we probably wouldn’t have seen any of it except the road lines. But being the unreliable machine it is, about 100 miles north of Oklahoma City, the engine started emitting a frightening sound as if a duck had gotten stuck in front of the passenger seat and was quacking frantically for release. We pulled over at a truck parking spot and called dads and boyfriends for advice while performing a ludicrous “examination” under the mysterious hood.
It was then, in the pitch dark, that we realized the true extravagant gorgeousness of the plains: without interfering mountains, valleys or trees, the sky was like an incredibly vast upside-down bowl. As Oklahomans don’t really believe in street lights, the thousands of stars invisible over the Denver sky were twinkling and shining in their amazingly bright glory.
We pushed on through to Texas and spent the night with some old family friends. The car made it fine, but thanks to our star-gazing time spent to let the engine cool down, we ended up getting in around 1 a.m. and dragging them out of bed.
We’re both hoping, one, that our excitement at being in Louisiana lasts the entirety of the state, and, two, we would keep our clean record with avoiding local traffic controllers.
On the road.
1:30 p.m., Monday
Once I decided to forego the Greyhound experience to drive my own car to New Orleans, everything magically fell into place. My surplus possessions quickly sold on craigslist, a former roommate texted me out of the blue wanting to know if I wanted company and a co-driver for the trip down, another old friend called asking me to carry a bicycle for her son (at college in Alabama) down to the general region, and those little mini oranges went on sale at King Soopers.
So, fitted with a car companion, two bicycles lashed to my car with copious amounts of bungee cord, and an ocean of little oranges, we set out this morning.
For such a relatively monotonous road, the first few hours have been pretty interesting.
I discovered that, no matter how mature I may think I am, the day I truly grow up will be the day when I can see a car with an Oklahoma license plate without feeling the impulse to break into my rendition of Rogers and Hammerstein. Also I realized anew the creative genius rampant in rural America when it comes to the naming of small towns. Bovina, Arriba and Bethune have been some favorites so far, but we are keeping a list to compare. Also, on the Kansas/Colorado border, a strange hybrid town called “Kanorado.”
I also have learned that when I drive on long, straight and empty roads (as I did for the first 4-hour leg of the trip), I tend to drift, a lot. But that’s still better than my driving buddy, Sarah, who neglected to tell me until 200 miles east of Denver that she didn’t really remember how to drive a manual. (She’s ok now.) Other driving quirks of Sarah’s include sharp braking and highway swerving to avoid tumbleweeds and furious muttering whenever semis come close to us and.
Most of all, though, I’ve been sinking in the sparse beauty of the plains. It’s a really easy place to get bored and start wishing for the mountains or something a little more varied. But, as a friend of mine recently said, the key to situational contentment is in staying present and living in each moment. I’m trying to live in each second of this long, unending plain, and, doing that, finding it subtly and wonderfully beautiful.
2 p.m., Tuesday. Somewhere in Louisiana.
Louisianan impressions: It’s much greener than Texas already. Also, Louisiana has crazy amounts of road kill. Don’t ask me why. But the side of the highway is littered with poor little critters who have crossed one too many speeding Southerners.
Since crossing the border a couple hours ago, Sarah and I have been maintaining a constant high, and keep reminding each other “We’re so almost there!” despite the five or so hours we still have to go before we reach New Orleans.
The drive through Kansas finished uneventfully (very uneventfully, if you count geographic features as events), and Oklahoma passed with almost no features.
It was dark all the way through Oklahoma, so if the car had performed ideally we probably wouldn’t have seen any of it except the road lines. But being the unreliable machine it is, about 100 miles north of Oklahoma City, the engine started emitting a frightening sound as if a duck had gotten stuck in front of the passenger seat and was quacking frantically for release. We pulled over at a truck parking spot and called dads and boyfriends for advice while performing a ludicrous “examination” under the mysterious hood.
It was then, in the pitch dark, that we realized the true extravagant gorgeousness of the plains: without interfering mountains, valleys or trees, the sky was like an incredibly vast upside-down bowl. As Oklahomans don’t really believe in street lights, the thousands of stars invisible over the Denver sky were twinkling and shining in their amazingly bright glory.
We pushed on through to Texas and spent the night with some old family friends. The car made it fine, but thanks to our star-gazing time spent to let the engine cool down, we ended up getting in around 1 a.m. and dragging them out of bed.
We’re both hoping, one, that our excitement at being in Louisiana lasts the entirety of the state, and, two, we would keep our clean record with avoiding local traffic controllers.
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