A 2 Hour Tour

Saturday morning Brie and I meet up with my Aunt Judy and Uncle Dale for a walking cemetery tour. As we made our way to St. Louis Cemetery #1 we stopped to admire various architecture in the French Quarter and hear stories from days passed. 

In the old, yet still active cemetery, we saw three possible tombs containing Marie Laveau's remains. Due to less than stellar records and the fact that the famous Voodoo priestess had multiple daughters with the same name, there is uncertainty as to which tomb truly holds the 19th century legend. 

Is she in this one?

Or maybe this one?

Could be this one:

All three tombs, which are scattered throughout the cemetery have offerings to the spirit of Ms. Laveau as well as "XXX" marked on them. We were told that people do this and request that a wish be granted from her. Since she was a hairdresser as well as a Voodoo priestess, there are a fair amount of cosmetics left as offerings. 

Judy & Dale along with other tour members listening to our guide. 

It was a really gorgeous day to be out walking and exploring.

A lot of the tombs are run down. This one was unique...and tall.

The guide explained that when a person passes away their body is placed in a coffin inside of a tomb where it is left for a year and one day. During this time due to the excessive heat in this area of the country the body is turned to ash. The ash is then transferred into an urn that is placed in the back of the tomb making room for the next family member's coffin when the time comes. This way multiple people can fit in one tomb. The above ground system of burial is used because the city is below or barely above sea level and bodies float, therefore putting them under ground would prove ineffective .

Scattered throughout the older vaults are newly constructed ones. Included among the newer styles is a rather large white pyramid shaped crypt that will one day be the resting place for Nicholas Cage. 

Games with Friends

First it was Words with Friends (scrabble), then it was Hanging with Friends (hang-man), and now I can't seem to stop playing Scramble with Friends (create words by connecting letters)! I play more games on my phone these days than I ever have in real life. I am also into currently into a non-"with Friends"-game called Draw Something. Brie and are super in sync on this one! It is basically Pictionary on your phone. Fun! 


Countless hours have been wasted spent staring at my phone screen trying to outsmart my friends in hopes of acquiring enough coins to earn some menial reward. After running my battery down to almost empty, I put down my phone last night and played a real-life game with Brie, AV, and the new roomy Michelle. Let me just say, the four of us are relatively smart folks, but we had a heck of time figuring out how to play Cranium! We muddled our way through 2 games, but I'm not convinced that we were playing by the correct rules. None-the-less, it was a lot of fun acting out famous characters, humming/whistling songs, drawing things with our eyes shut, playing word puzzle games, and answering trivia questions! Cranium is definitely a game we will whip out next time a few more people are over :)

Marines in the Kitchen

Earlier in the week we had a group of Marines, who are in town for New Orleans Navy Week, stop by for a tour of the confection studio. Tariq led them through the kitchen showing them the different areas and introducing all of the employees while treating them to cupcakes and gelato along the way!

I put together some little swag bags for them (that is what is on the table in front of them) with cookies, brownies, chocolate bars, and marshmallows. Since the ratio of men to women in the office/kitchen is 2:1 I think that day we had more men in the building at one time than ever before!

Salu to You

Brie and I enjoyed a lovely meal at Salu last night. We pass this place on our way to Rum House frequently and decided it was time to stop in. The outdoor seating option drew us in first since it was a gorgeous eveing. 

We both started off with salads; mine being the duck breast salad that included spiced pecans, dried cranberries, and a red wine vinaigrette. Then our second course came out. Brie got sauteed mushrooms and a plate of crispy oyster nachos. I chose the lobster macaroni and the pecan crusted scallops with pumpkin risotto and brown butter. Oh my! Very rich, flavorful foods indeed. Everything was delicious and we both had doggy bags to take home afterward. 

While this was not a cheap meal by any means, it was nice to eat some "sophisticated" food for a change! I would love to go back with a few more people and try some of their other plates--it is a good restaurant to order a bunch of different things and share :)

Roommate Day

The three amigos (Evan, Brie and myself) drove down to the Quarter to enjoy the huge free music festival known as "French Quarter Fest". There are tons of stages all over the FQ and up by the river with lots of different styles of music playing. We all indulged in our favorite festival fare: crawfish bread. OMG. It is possibly the best thing I have ever put in my mouth.

After we had gotten our fill of sun, music, and people watching we left the crowd and went back Uptown for dinner a Mediterranean feast at Courtyard Grill. We are now all sitting in the living room watching Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window. I have never seen it, but I have seen the more recent remake Disturbia, we'll see which one I like better.

From One Obsession to the Next

So as I may have mentioned a time or two on here, I sorta-kinda-most definitely-with-out-a-doubt LOVE watching Dexter. At this point I have watched seasons 1-5 (the ones that are available on DVD) 3 times and season 6 (the most recent) twice. At approximately 50 minutes a pop, 12 episodes a season, I have spent a little over 7 days of my life watching this show. 7 glorious days I might add! Season 7 will begin on September 30th and I have already started planning a premier party! (Let me know if you want to come!) Yeah, I might be a little obsessed.

However, I have been introduced to a new show that may distract me from popping that first disc of season 1 of Dexter back into my DVD player... for a while at least. The Walking Dead. Ever heard of it? Well in the last week I watched all 19 episodes of seasons 1 & 2. My plot summary: A zombie apocalypse causes a group of strangers to band together in an attempt to survive their new world. What's not to like? There is:

• a super hot sheriff with a moral compass of gold
• a complicated love triangle
• suspense, humor, drama, and conflict in every episode
• a feisty redneck who could challenge Katniss to a bow & arrow stand off any day
• TONS of really awesome special-effects make-up

There is a very strong possibility that I will be re-watching this show from beginning to end again soon. The next season starts in the fall so I have plenty of time to juggle my two obsessions :)

Goofing Around

Here are some videos I find entertaining :)

I know that a woman my age should not admit this, but Justin Bieber is so stinking cute! This song is corny as hell but light and fun!

I think I prefer this version to the original Gotye one. They are rather resourceful since they apparently only have one instrument to share among them.

This is a little out of date and the singing is certainly not Grammy winning but clever none-the-less!

Excel

I could make Excel spreadsheets all day every day. By no means am I an expert, but I love learning new ways to make the program do what I want it to. My job requires me to make quite a few spreadsheets compiling sales numbers, projections, and other pertinent information; thus I have figured out some handy formulas and tricks to generate what I need. Give me some information you need put into an easy to understand format and I will make you the prettiest, coolest document ever! Does this make me a dork? Haha!

Hoppy Easter Everybody!

Happy Easter everyone!

Last year I was able to drive home and surprise my family on Easter, but this year, with the job changes/responsibilities, I was not able to arrange a trip. Lucky for me the Easter bunny has connections at the post office and sent me a little something :)

Even at 26 years old I still get a basket of goodies!

For as long as I can remember my mom has gotten each of us a home-made chocolate egg for Easter from Collierstown Methodist Church. Mine is always peanut butter filled (the best of course!), but there are other options. It arrived a little smooshed in my package, but it still tasted great!

Obligatory Jelly Bean picture

Aww Shucks

Brie's 2nd Annual Birthday Boil was this past weekend. It was a co-birthday boil of sorts since Brie and Evan's birthdays are only one week apart. Per usual, lots of friends, food, and fun was had. To shake things up a bit though we added some oysters to the mix.

Oyster shucking lesson

BIG and little crawfish

Playing with his food

I had a boil to go to for work as well, so I got to double up on all of the yummy little crustaceans! Lucky me :)

The Black Keys

The NCAA Final Four games were played at the Superdome this weekend and to celebrate there have been a series of FREE concerts at Woldenberg Park by the river. I did not care to see KISS on Friday, but Saturday I wanted to see The Black Keys!!

Brie and Me in the crowd

Zach loved the show!! I did not know all of the songs they played, but he certainly did!

After sweating and jamming we were in need of fuel! Katie's in Mid-City was calling our name. Delicious as always. Post dinner we went to Angelo Brocato for some tasty gelato and cannolis.

What a great Saturday!! :)

River Time

Last Sunday Brie and I hung out with our buddy Eddie down in the Quarter. It was such a beautiful day out we just wandered around the market and up by the river. We had some juicy burgers (Brie's was of the vegetable variety) at Angeli on Decatur and strolled around some antique shops.

Cruise ships make all of the other boats on the river look like little toys

A Pimm's Cup kind of day :)

Just a lovely day by the Mighty Mississippi

Eddie is a a cigar aficionado, so when we hopped into his big ol' truck there were numerous cigar boxes lying around. Luckily for Brie and me he does not find them nearly as cool as we do and therefore told us we could have them! Score!