Back to the Bunk House-Hands On New Orleans

 Back in the bunk house...

First a little background...
Last year I was in South America with no plans to return to the States for a good while.  I was feeling high and happy and very fortunate to have dodged the economic crisis by selling out my California life: selling my business , my sweet little house that I had lived in for 25 years and raised my children in and by getting out of the stock market.   I'm no financial wizard but  I was blessed with a wise and rueful nephew who pushed, educated and encouraged me to sell until I finally listened.  The crash for me started in January 2005 and by September 2008 I was relatively protected, resigned and tired of thinking about it.

While the world was melting down, thanks to my guru Galen, I was safe but I was still feeling a need to escape the fallout.  I didn't feel like watching what was happening around me, the stress was escalating and many friend were not happy with the choices I was making.  Besides, my adventurous spirit, long dormant, was waking and calling me out to play, mostly in the form of travel.  My gratitude towards life and my nephew in particular for steering me through the  meltdown unscathed, left me with to strong desire to give back. Who and how could I help?  I had been a chef and business owner for thirty years and I had no other particular skills.  In looking to be of service in a more committed way, I went back to school, became certified to teach English and took off for South America.

In the midst of my wanderings, in Ecuador and Peru, I began to get emails from old friends, who were going to Jazz Fest.  This is a sacred sojourn for many and a twenty year ritual for my friends.  Would I please join them?  At first thought this made me laugh.  It was a ridiculous idea.  So not on my radar.  But a few emails more and I began to give it more serious thought.  It was a crazy thing to do and perhaps partly because it was so, I warmed to the idea.

Hot night on Bourbon St.

I'll Fly Away-1st Krewe of the Dead Pelicans Parade

back on track

In my first week back I wrapped up 4 days of glory at the French Quarter festival. Made new friends in strange and sudden ways, I’m sure that the alcohol had something to do with it.  But not entirely. Spent three action powered days with Larry my chef friend from LA., who swears that he will be coming back, the place has gotten under his skin just as it has mine. The saying here is that the mud is thick-it sticks to you.

When walking down St. Louis we spied an interesting scene that we couldn’t identify so we paused and turned to ask the guy on the stoop what we were looking at. He said that it was his home and when we jokes that “Well honey I’m home” he invited us in to his private party, treated us to some really decent red wines . The house formerly belonged to Al Hurt and as is typical of houses in the Quarter, it took up a small amount of curb but once inside, went on forever. out into an open courtyard.Out back by the old slave quarters there were giant boats of crawfish and bowls of sweet southern praline’s. We stayed for hours and swapped restaurant stories.

Life is grand. Sitting C.C.’s on the internet and having my french roast. I must return to Robiere’s and pack. Today I move to Napoleon to D’s and start my work with her. I think today we will start with steam cleaning one of her apartments so that she can get some rental income.

D. is my Blanche, right out of A Streetcar Named Desire.  She smart and spun, cultured and careening, a once moneyed old New Orleanean, who would be comfortably retired if it were not for Katrina. .I suspect that she suffers from PKSD- Post Katrina Stress Disorder. Her house in the Garden district once belonged to Earl Long, Huey;s brother and governor of Louisiana. The roof was breached in the hurricane and she has not been able to get her insurance company to pay out.  Common story We met in a soup kitchen that she was running and I was volunteering in. Her food sense is refined and she is demanding and the result was probably the best food that any soup kitchen has ever produced. For my birthday last year she took me Galatoire's. Before we went she called to make sure that her favorite waiter would be waiting on us, they assured her he would. In old world New Orleans you are nothing without your own waiter at Galatoire's and your family tomb in a reputable cemetery. 

I have been busy rebuilding again.
(I've already installed a toilet, raised a roof, worked a machete until my arm refused to move, installed dry wall and ancient cypress mop boards and got back my favorite tool, the chop saw) connecting with old friends and going out to clubs day and night reveling in all this rich culture, ever flowing generous music, and eating, always eating.

I am way behind in my emails and in writing for myself. Have to figure a way to correct this soon. 

.  If you have HBO please watch 'Treme' I know quite a few of the 'real' characters in it and it gives you a some idea of why I'm so in love with this place.

Bon temp

Paradise Lost

Last night I went to hear Kerry St. Pe speak on the gulf oil disaster. Kerry is a marine biologist and the director of the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program. Not only is he a marine biologist but his family first settled in the estuary in the 1760s!.

People came for the information but also to commune with others. We are anxious and grief stricken and stuck to our computer screens with not much else to do. Although the news was far from good, the chance to process it with others was. We are a volunteering bunch here was no opportunity to put our energies to work. We watch our screens.

Unlike before and after a hurricane, when there is plenty of work to do (and during as well, although that might consist of the heavy lifting of glasses) we can't DO much. Clean up poses serious health risks and they don't want us anyway.

We got a good education on how toxic this stuff is and a feeling that the hubris of man has allowed us to create technologies that can destroy what is not in our power to fix.



What I'll never forget is Kerry saying repeatedly, "We are losing our culture, we are losing our culture". It is different here and these differences need to be saved now, as well as protected and preserved.


Free buffet was served after. Nothing flies here without good food.

BTW-In the last three years BP has had 760 safety citations while Exxon has had one.

Back To New Orleans

Free Black Men of Labor Parade

Last year, starting at Sweet Lorraine's. This year stay tuned for my second annual Bayou Bogaloo Pub Crawl to the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club.

Original Prince of Wales Social Aid and Pleasure Club