There’s flame coming out, it’s breathing and wheezing and whining, you realize the vehicle’s alive. It’s just hanging out there full of 3 1/2 million gallons of rocket fuel, ready to take flight.
—STS-135 commander Chris Ferguson on arriving at the pad on launch morning.

It starts out as this teeny tiny point of light. As you get closer and closer, it keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Even if you’ve seen it before, you keep wondering how much bigger is it going to get?  This thing is huge! Oh my gosh. It’s a building, and it’s running around our planet in orbit every ninety minutes.
—Mission specialist Sandra Magnus on approaching the International Space Station.

Yep. The crew signed my NASA Tweetup badge.

I was invited to cover today’s meet-and-greet with the STS-135 crew held at Stennis Space Center (SSC). Shuttle commander Chris Ferguson, pilot Doug Hurley and mission specialists Dr. Sandra Magnus and Rex Walheim came to personally thank the employees at Stennis for the role they’ve played in fulfilling the shuttle program’s mission. If you’re not familiar with the Stennis Space Center, it’s the facility in southern Mississippi built for static testing of the Apollo program rocket engines, and has since tested all of the shuttle’s main engines to ensure they were flight-worthy.

Stennis director Patrick Scheuermann explained that unlike the Michoud Assembly Facility a few miles away in New Orleans, SSC has a relatively bright future even with the shuttle program coming to an end. Michoud built the non-reusable main fuel tanks for the shuttle and has wound down operations for the most part. Stennis, on the other hand, has been testing the next generation of engines for NASA and has been hired to test engines built by commercial ventures as well. Sheuermann expects that not only will Stennis not lose any employees, it may gain some in the near future.

Chris Ferguson presents SSC Director Patrick Scheuermann with mission photos and a flag that was brought into orbit on STS-135.

Signs on the interstate as you approach Bay St. Louis state you’re entering Stennis’ buffer zone. Use of the 125,000 acres surrounding the facility is limited due to the noise generated by testing the big-ass rocket engines. I can personally vouch for that. On occasion when I was living in Slidell, about 20 miles away from Stennis, I would here what sounded like thunder, although it was more like a low roar that went on for a time, like a plane passing overhead. The first time I heard it, I asked my neighbor, “What the hell was that?” He replied with one word: “Stennis.”

Despite the curiosity that raised, I’ve never visited Stennis before today. I was one of the many people who, as Scheuermann pointed out, zip by the big green sign on I-10 without a thought. A new visitor’s center is under construction now right at Exit 2, where visitors now must park and be bussed in for tours of the present visitor’s center on site in the test area. It is worth the trip, though, with a surprise attraction: the re-entry scarred command module from Apollo 4 (an unmanned test mission).

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." STS-135 crew members Ferguson, Hurley, Magnus and Walheim at Stennis Space Center.

After a video presentation of the mission, the astronauts gave their personal observations and fielded questions from the audience. Ferguson talked at length about the mission and shuttle program in general. He said this of the Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSME):

They are one of the true success stories of the program…

Someone likened the SSME to a 7000-pound Swiss watch. If you look at it from the operating temperatures and pressures at which it runs, it is an incredible piece of machinery and it’s one thing I brag about everywhere I go. The amount of horsepower you can generate from a 400-pound LOX or hydrogen turbopump is just incredible.

When you start talking numbers like that to young men who are interested in Camaros and tell them, ‘I can give you an engine that puts out 85,000 horsepower as opposed to your 400 horsepower,’ they’re going to be suitably impressed. And they are.

Hurley told the Stennis crowd that in 135 flights, there were no SSME malfunctions, “A flawless, flawless, 135 flights and everyone in here should be very proud of those engines and what they’ve done.” He also went through the launch from a pilot’s perspective. After going through ignition, lift-off and throttle down, he said:

Throttle-up is just like a catapult shot for us Navy/Marine Corps guys who got to do that. You get kicked right in your bottom side and get headed towards the space station at that point. As we go towards MECO [main engine cut-off],the engines start throttling as the orbiter builds G’s. That really does feel like someone sitting on your chest. And then, boom! Cutoff, and you’re floating in your straps instantaneously.

Ferguson went on to talk about the last shuttle launch, STS-135, which I witnessed in person, thanks to the NASA Tweetup program, in particular what happened when the countdown stopped at 31 seconds:

The age-old question of, what happens to the astronauts when the clock stops at 31 seconds? The image probably is, we’re very professional, we know exactly what to do, we have checklists, we have switches to throw…in reality, we all looked at each other and said, “Huh?”

We really don’t practice things like this, but I was absolutely amazed at how quickly the launch team was able to identify the problem. From the time you realize has started ticking again from 31 seconds, it takes about ten seconds to realize that, “Whoa! Maybe we’re not going to be here in ten minutes, we’re really going to be in space.” The engines start at 6 seconds so that leaves you with 15 seconds to come to terms with the fact that you’re leaving. Considering that just a few short seconds earlier you had an abort/recycle procedure open and you were ready to start shutting the vehicle down, it happens really quick, 3,2,1…boom! You’re on your way. I think I launched with the abort procedures in front of me.

Sandra Magnus answered a question from a young lady (about 10 years old, I’d guess) about being the only woman on the mission by saying the guys had become like brothers to her, and, like the young lady would know, “Sometimes you have to keep your brothers in line.” She also fielded a question about the effects of zero-g living on the body and provided her insight:

Bone loss starts after about 2 weeks. Exercise is the key. For longer missions, you must exercise. We exercise 2 hours a day. We do a cardiovascular-type exercise on a bicycle or a treadmill; you strap yourself into a treadmill, and get some cardio and it loads your bones somewhat, too. We have a resistive exercise device on station that really loads your bones and your muscles. If you do that religiously, faithfully, 2 hours a day the way you’re supposed to, you can come back and be strong.

The other thing you have to deal with when you come back from spaceflight, whether it’s a long stay or a short stay, is neurovestibular effects. The fluid in your inner ear uses gravity to figure out your orientation. When you get into orbit, that gets completely messed up.
…

The minute you get a 10th of a G or 2 10ths of a G when re-entering, you feel it. You feel heavy. It’s amazing what gravity’s doing to you just this minute; it’s pressing you into your seats. You don’t realize it because you’re used to it. But, it’s like, “Oh my gosh, this is just horrible.”

I don’t know about you guys, but I can’t get enough of these space travel anecdotes. I’m going to stay tuned for future NASA Tweetups, and Ferguson said that hopefully there will be U.S. manned spacecraft launches starting in 2016. Meanwhile, missions to the International Space Station will continue, although we’ll have to rely on the Russians to get us up there until the next gen of U.S. rockets (tested at Stennis, of course) are in service.

Note: for more coverage of today’s event, see NOLA.com’s write-up and photos.

Koerner has been around over 100 years, with the third and fourth generations of the Koerner family now operating the business that was started in 1906. Ann said she first worked with the Koerner company when it was basically a bakery supply firm. After Katrina, the company regrouped and expanded its offerings to include the cutting-edge equipment and ingredients used in creating the types of dishes and drinks one thinks of when you hear the term “molecular gastronomy.”

Tim Koerner explained that the techniques perfected by chefs like Ferran Adrià at Spain’s El Bulli restaurant (which is closing, I’m seeing on internets) presented flavors of classic ingredients and dishes in new formats. Ingredients—pine nuts, asparagus, fruits or beans, for example—could be transformed into foams, gels, spherical “caviar” or instantly frozen into ices that retain the ingredient’s original flavor. Koerner sells all of the obscure equipment and food chemicals any would-be Ferran Addrià could ever want.

The supplies and ingredients to make “caviar,” Tim said, agar-agar and calcium chloride, are known as spherification agents. Mixing a flavored liquid with agar and then dropping the mixture in the calcium chloride bath instantly creates a gel skin on the droplet which burst when put in the mouth, like fish eggs, thus it’s called “caviar.” Here’s a NYT story on Cointreau’s attempts to get bartenders to spherify their orange liqueur and include the resultant eggs into fancy cocktails.

One other way to molecular bliss is through making foams and ices out of concentrated flavors. Koerner sells all the equipment; the insulated bowls and buckets and so forth, needed to handle it. Tim noted that working with liquid nitrogen is preferred to dry ice as it freezes whatever foodstuffs you’re working with much faster, preventing cell walls from bursting and causing freezer burns dry ice can cause.

Purity Vodka held a brunch at the Bombay Club on Friday where they presented their own spin on molecular mixology. It was a great brunch, by the way, and a typically great Tales event, where free booze and food combine with great networking opportunities. I met up with some old friends and made some new ones as well, Jonas from San Francisco and DrinkofTheWeek.com and Emily from NYC and MouthOfTheBorder.com. The Bombay Club put on a great spread with chicken and waffles, eggs Benedict, gumbo, shrimp creole, creme brulee and more.  But I digress from the molecular thingy.

Making Bloody Marys the molecular way with Purity Vodka.

Rather than mix up a batch of Bloody Marys using tomato juice and other ingredients, participants were invited to place ingredients (cubed tomatoes rather than juice, pickled vegetables, other traditional garnishes and even sausage and shrimp) into a whipped cream vessel that was then charged by a canister of nitrous oxide gas. Under pressure, the alcohol and gas would extract all of the ingredients’ flavors into the vodka and after a 30-second shake, the gas is released, the cap unscrewed, and the mixture strained into a waiting glass chilled with a perfectly clear ball of ice.

That seems to be a lot of trouble to go through, but it really worked. A lot of what was presented at Tales of the Cocktail this year were ideas and products (like bitters) that would serve to give an edge to one product or bartender’s offerings over another. Purity Vodka was a good example, going all out with its promotion and showing consumers how to do something different with their product, which, by the way, is a damn fine vodka that I enjoyed cut with just a little water in the vermouth-less martini they also served. And that’s not just the brunch talking. Really good stuff.

This is where Koerner comes back in. Manufacturer iSi (pronounced “ee-see,” I learned, not “eye-ess-eye”) makes the cream-whippers, soda siphons and gas chargers (N2O and CO2) needed to make the Purity-style Bloody Marys and the Ferran Addrià foams and gels. Koerner, of course, sells iSi products. For you cutting edge chefs out there, you Blackened-Out and Appetites wish-they-could-eat-at-El Bulli-and-never-will-because-now-it’s-closed-forever-types, Koerner also carries the equipment needed to sous-vide, smoke-inject and foam your little hearts out.

You can order for delivery from their very extensive website, or if you’re in town, call to order and pick up items at their headquarters, 4820 Jefferson Hwy. Keep in mind they’re geared to commercial supply and while they do sell to the general public, it’s not a retail store and they’re only open Mon-Fri until 4pm, and closed noon-1pm for lunch.

The Bitter Truth's Creole Bitters.

The German guys behind Bitter Truth, Alex and Stephan, were out at Sunday’s Cocktail Bazaar. Alex said they were just a couple of bartenders in Bavaria when they started making their own bitters, and their business has just taken off from there (their Celery Bitters won a Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Award for best new product in 2010).

Alex gave me a taste of the Creole Bitters. Bright red in color, like Peychaud’s, floral scent like Peychaud’s, but definitely brighter and less sweet and, well, more bitter than Peychaud’s. I exclaimed they would probably indeed make a fine Sazerac cocktail, but Alex quickly noted, “We are not allowed to say the “S-word.” Or the “P-word,” due to the Sazerac Co.’s trademarks. That’s fine, but the guys know what’s what in cocktail history and have a recipe on their website for an “Improved Brandy Cocktail” that is closer to Amedee Peychaud’s original concoction than the official Sazerac recipe is today. Another shopper at the Bazaar said Bitter Truth’s products were available at Martin Wine Cellar. I’ll have to check that out.

Improved Brandy Cocktail

50 ml (1 1/2  oz) Cognac*
2 dashes The Bitter Truth – Creole Bitters
2 dashes Absinthe
10 ml (2 tsp) Sugar Syrup*

Stir in mixing glass with ice and strain into a chilled tumbler or cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.
*Metric conversions are mine,  not the Bitter Truth’s.

Ballast and Keel Bittering House's offerings.

The table next door to Alex and Stephan was occupied by another bitters producer, Ballast & Keel Bittering House. The bitters they are creating are more concentrated flavoring combinations than classic “bitters”—Strawberry & Indian Fennel, Saigon Cinnamon & Walnut, Wild Cherry & Tahitian Vanilla, Cocoa Nib & Chili Arbol are just a few of the combinations. I didn’t detect even a hint of gentian or overt bitterness in anything I sampled. That’s not a bad thing at all, as someone looking to concoct a drink with that “I don’t know what that taste is but I like it” element would be well-served to give Ballast & Keel’s bitters a try.

Throwing out the “P-word,” I told them I’m a big fan of putting a dash of Peychaud’s on top of my absinthe frappes and asked which would go well with absinthe. Without hesitation, I was told the Strawberry and Indian Fennel. Duh. Fennel seed, of course is one of the holy trinity ingredients in that make up all absinthes. He handed me small sample bottle, the taste was aromatic and floral, like Peychaud’s and the Creole bitters, but lacking the gentian bite common to both of those bitters. Again, that’s not a bad thing. They’d probably go good with Ramos Gin Fizz, too.

Let the experimentation begin!

Lift-off Atlantis STS-135!

It was over way to quickly.

One thing I noticed the first time I went to see the ponies at the Fairgrounds was, when I turned the corner coming into the grandstand and saw the pack running on the track, the horses looked to be going MUCH faster than I would have ever thought watching horse racing on TV.

Multiply that by at least ten for the shuttle launch. What looks like a huge, lumbering machine taking off slowly while the TV camera tracks its every move is a lie. It happens just about as fast as that bottle rocket taking off on New Year’s but on the grandest scale imaginable. And there are people riding on it.

We were at the NASA press site. I was situated to the right of the countdown clock with a clear view and could hear the countdown audio coming through the speakers in the tent behind me. When they said “main engine start” I saw the instantaneous blast of exhaust billow out of either side of the launch pad. Lot’s of whooping and clapping from the crowd and then the big boosters kicked in and it was off

Atlantis STS-135 going, going...

They warned us not to watch our first launch through a viewfinder. I kept that in mind, but didn’t realize how right they were. As I kept mashing the camera button as fast as I could, Atlantis was well up in the air in seconds and I decided to put the camera aside just as the sound hit full-force. I perceived it like a breeze, an instantaneous cooling on my bare arms and face, and with an imperceptible lag right after, the thunder hit, cracking in my chest.

The next thing that registered was that it was really bright. That was it. “Wow. That’s really bright.”  Then  Atlantis broke through the cloud cover and it was over.

Poof. Or maybe BOOM. Like that. Over.

The cloud deck kept us from watching it head down range, something I was afraid would happen. But the weather was safe for it to launch, so launch it did. Consolation prize: the shadow cast on the cloud cover perpendicular to the smoke trail below it.

Buh-bye Atlantis!

The aftermath in the crowd alongside the lagoon was one of amazement. One of my fellow Tweetup attendees, a guy well over six feet tall and built like a linebacker, was bawling like a baby and reached out to hug another one of our fellows. Whether bawling from the shear magnitude of the launch or at the realization that this was the last launch ever or from a similar lack of sleep or overwhelming sense of camaraderie or the totality of it all I don’t know and it really doesn’t matter. This launch meant a lot to a lot of people, not just the Tweetup attendees but thousands and thousands more whose lives and livelihoods revolved around the shuttle program. The vast emptiness I felt in the huge Vehicle Assembly Building behind us we toured on Thursday (yes, it was so empty I could feel it) spoke literal volumes (129,428,000 cubic feet, to be exact) on the finality of the launch.

An empty sign in an empty building means it's all over...for now.

But it’s not that there isn’t a future to the country’s space program, it’s just that it’s not super clear, and that there will be a period of inactivity before the next big thing and a lot of people are going to lose jobs in that period. A little bit of the future was on display at the Tweetup site as Lockheed Martin and Boeing both had mockups of their contributions to the Orion program on display. While not as roomy looking as the shuttle, the capsule did look like it had a lot more room to work in than the proverbial FEMA trailer, not bad for something that’s got to spend time in the vacuum of space (and go to the moon, and asteroids and possibly Mars, actual missions in mind when designing it).

Local-area space facilities, the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans East and the Stennis Space Center just across the Pearl River in Miss. will remain in business. Michoud was where the Saturn V first-stage booster module for the moon launches was constructed in ’60s and ’70s and where the shuttle’s main fuel tank has been built. It will be involved with the Orion capsule manufacture and testing along with some of the systems for the Ares cargo rocket systems. I was told, though, that the work was not as extensive as in the past and the workforce needed would be in the hundreds rather than the thousands. Stennis will continue its role in as an engine testing center, testing the newer and bigger rocket engines Ares will require. Here’s some pics of the Orion mock-ups:

Lockheed's Orion testing model.

The experience was overwhelming. I’m writing this after getting the first sleep I’ve had after 40-plus hours of no sleep and non-stop activity. I want to thank Dvora, Alex and Oscar who were my passengers to and from NASA and Orlando on launch day. I greatly appreciated their company and navigational help as we re-routed around a traffic jam on the way back to Orlando. From Mexico City (by way of Philly and New Jersey), San Francisco and Los Angeles (by way of Puerto Rico), respectively, I loved hearing their stories and hope they didn’t mind my rantings as we had a short tour of off-the-beaten path American rural south. We saw giant alligators (fake), orange groves and what I’m assuming was a sandhill crane. The big bird (looks kind of like the herons we see all the time but at least twice as tall) aren’t as rare as I thought (I told my passengers they would be able tell their grandchildren they saw one) but it was still a neat sight.

"Swampy" on Hwy. 50 outside of Titusville.

I came back to the hotel after a shower and a trip to the get some dinner and could hear the post-launch gathering of  some of the group who were staying at the same La Quinta as me. Too tired and grumpy to be good enough company to join in, I did hear, though, over and over, one common theme floating out of the lobby: “THE most amazing experience of my life!” As we say in NOLA: Yeah you rite!

And it was. Overwhelming and unbelievable and two straight days of “Wow!”

Launch is set for Friday, July 8 at about 11:30 a.m. Eastern time. I’m leaving New Orleans tomorrow for Destin, where I’ll help celebrate my cousin’s 50th birthday, then head to check in at the hotel in Orlando and hopefully have enough time to pick up my credentials before 4 p.m. on Wednesday.

Thursday is Tweetup activity day. I just got the email for the itinerary. Highlights for the day include a bus trip to the launch pad to view one of the pre-launch procedures, retraction of the Rotating Service Structure, followed by “a tour of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, including visits to the Apollo Saturn V Center and the Vehicle Assembly Building and a drive by the Launch Control Center, Mobile Launch Platform and Orbiter Processing Facility” to quote the email.

Launch day starts at 5 a.m. NASA Tweetup pro @ageekmom gave us a heads-up to this Florida Today article about how they’re expecting 1 million spectators in and around the space center for the launch. They are also predicting the three roads leading back to Orlando probably are going to be choked with traffic for at least five hours after the launch. So I plan on leaving Orlando early. Like 3 or 4 a.m., then camping out at the press site for as long as they let us after the launch.  If there’s a delay, there are launch windows for Saturday and Sunday mornings, and I’ve got the room booked until Sunday just in case. But there will be no delays!

Anyone who wants to catch the action can check the following:

Beginning at 10:30 a.m. on July 7, NASA will broadcast the Tweetup program on http://www.ustream.tv/nasatelevision. Other portions of the Tweetup may be broadcast on NASA Television, online at http://www.nasa.gov/ntv. Photos will be posted online during and/or after the event at http://www.flickr.com/photos/nasahqphoto.

If you’re not familiar with the New Orleans area’s connection with the country’s space program, take a look at this from the Times-Picayune from yesterday. I’m also going to try to meet up with some Slidell folks from the Stennis Space Center, where they test the shuttle engines, and will be interviewing Stennis’ director for the day job the week after the launch.

I’ll be posting later on once I get situated.

Nonetheless, I’ve been selected to attend a NASA Tweetup and if all goes well have the best seat in the house to watch the space shuttle Atlantis launch on July 8, 2011. Tweetups, for those who don’t know, are get-togethers IRL (in real life) organized by people who are on Twitter who normally only communicate to each other on the internet. I’ve been to lots of tweetups. Mostly organized as get-togethers for drinks or lunch in New Orleans. I’ve met a lot of good people through these things.

I was late in the game learning about the NASA tweetups, not really hearing about them until Leigh, one of our local bloggers (Liprap’s Lament) attended Endeavour’s launch last month (her posts are here). A couple of weeks ago, she tweeted that it was the last day to sign up for next NASA tweetup and posted a link. I decided what the hell, signed up, and last Friday got the email that I had been selected.

Now, everyone who’s been chosen has been whooping and hollering and jumping for joy. They’re big fans: engineers, teachers, scientists and students who’ve been waiting for this chance and applying forever.  My reaction was, wow, great. Now what am I going to do?

It’s not that I don’t realize the enormity of the situation. It’s the last space shuttle launch. Ever. I was one of only 150 people out of about 5200 who applied. And now that I’ve got some arrangements made and financing in place, I’m beginning to get to the whooping and hollering stage myself.

I’m not a scientist or teacher, I’m a writer. It’s going to be a great story. And I’m a fan. Here’s my space story so far and I’m ready to write the next chapter.

I vaguely remember (I would have been 4 or 5) watching one of the Gemini missions launch on our black-and-white TV. In first grade, my brother and I built a model Saturn V rocket that was taller than both of us. That was all normal kid stuff back then, but why I’m starting to get psyched for the NASA tweetup is this: I was THIS (tiny pinched fingers) close to watching Apollo 11 launch but wasn’t quite there and I have ALWAYS wanted to see a launch since that disappointment as a 7-year old.

We were living in New Iberia, Louisiana and my dad was great at piling us all into the Country Squire and going on a long vacation every year. The summer of 1969 happened to be a Florida vacation. We were in Fort Walton when Apollo 11 launched and then traveled to Miami, where I fell asleep in front of the TV what must have been just a few minutes (I tried so hard to stay awake) before Neil Armstrong took his one small step and his giant leap all in one breath.

Update: Mom called. She says she woke all of us kids up when Armstrong was first setting foot on the moon. I must not remember it. She also says she made sure my older brother was looking at the TV when Alan Shepard launched (from his crib, he would have only been about 7 months old at the time). Plus, she said, going to the Apollo 11 launch was never in the plans.

I never found out why we didn’t go to Cape Kennedy to watch the launch. Maybe they felt it was too much to handle with all the crowds and three very ill-behaved children. Maybe it was just the timing. I don’t know. I was still a fan, though, and watched all the Apollo launches after that.

In 1981, I was a freshman at college and anticipated the first shuttle launch. I remember dreaming the night before the launch that I was at the launch and that I watched it launch but that it blew up in sky. That wasn’t really a premonition of Challenger; there was a lot of talk about the untried technology and how that was a possibility which must have crept into my dream. Needless to say, I was very happy nothing like that happened.

In 1984 I was working in a camera store in New Orleans doing photo processing. One of our customers worked at Michoud, where the shuttle’s main fuel tank was manufactured.  He had gotten VIP employee access to one of the launches and let me keep a copy of one of his photos. His description of what it was like to feel the launch planted the seed, that one day I would go witness a launch.

I kept up with the shuttle as best as a twenty-something with a lot on his plate could do, but it is Challenger, unfortunately, that is the next thing that sticks in my mind. I remember that day. I was back at LSU. It was cold, I had ridden my bike to class. In class, I wondered if my mom was watching the launch because she was a teacher and this was the one with the teacher in space. I decided I’d go straight home and catch the replay and when I got home and turned on the TV it was the replay, the replay of those two pillars of smoke coming out of those two boosters as they started to fly uncontrollably apart. It took a few seconds and I still hadn’t realized what had happened when Dan Rather’s voice kicked in to tell me. Later I learned that my mom’s class (I think she was teaching kindergarten then) had not been watching the launch.

After that, graduation, work and life happened. The shuttle returned and became, once again, routine.

In 2002, I was reading about an upcoming shuttle launch. I thought, I have some extra time. There’s nothing stopping me from driving down there and watching a launch. And I was ready to do it, too, only to hear about some problems and a very long launch delay that went past my personal window of opportunity. Then the Columbia tragedy the next year, and I pretty much put any thought of going out of my mind.

So that brings me to now. And I’ve been picked to see the last launch and meet the people who have made it all happen and meet the people whose tweets and Facebook postings I’ve now been following. And I’ll get to write about it, too, for my day job. I think I’m starting to get a little tingly. And thanks, Leigh!

For a time, there was the Maison d’Absinthe and the Absinthe Museum of America which opened on Royal Street in 2008. I heard rumors last fall that it was closing (sad) and then, not too long afterward, that Ray and B.J. Bordelon’s collection of vintage absinthe ware, bottles and ephemera would find a new home at the Southern Food and Beverage Museum at the Riverwalk (yeah!). Both rumors proved true; business turmoil on part of one of the owners resulted in losing the Royal Street lease, and Liz Williams, SoFAB’s director, offered the collectors space in the Riverwalk museum. It’s a perfect fit, as SoFAB is also home to the Museum of the American Cocktail; La Galerie d’Absinthe is a perfect complement, with an expanded focus on absinthe’s role in the culture of both Paris and New Orleans.

Saturday March 26 was the grand opening. B.J., Ray and T.A. Breaux were there and slinging Lucid samples to visitors, many of whom had seemed to just have wandered into the Food and Beverage Museum without a clue that the Green Fairy was about, until they saw the girl dressed as a green fairy who was serving pastries.

Ray has done some tireless research and uncovered some of the earliest documented mentions of absinthe in New Orleans. He has reproduced a newspaper ad from the New Orleans Bee in 1835. It was common for suppliers to take out ads listing the goods they’d just received from the latest ships arriving at the port, and the ad touts the arrival of cases of absinthe from France. Other ads on display include some from the 1870s taken out by Cayetano Ferrer, owner of the shop that became first the “Absinthe Room” and then re-named the Old Absinthe House.

The exhibit goes on to display vintage absinthe bottles from France, as well as a display of antique absinthe ware.

A most pleasant display is the re-creation of a Parisian sidewalk cafe setting.

There’s more at the Gallerie d’Absinthe, displays of ornate absinthe spoons, and a sampling of contemporary absinthe bottles and packages.

One thing I’ve learned, and anyone interested in absinthe needs to learn, too, is that there are no set standards for what can and cannot be put into a bottle and labeled absinthe. For example, for a product to be called Bourbon, it must, by law, be made of 51% corn and aged in new oak barrels for at least two years. There are more regulations, but those two help set a baseline for what someone can expect if they buy a bottle labeled “Bourbon.”

Unfortunately, anyone can add wormwood oil and food coloring to grain alcohol and label it absinthe. Traditional methods involve the maceration of whole herbs (anise, fennel and grand wormwood at a minimum) in alcohol (traditionally grape alcohol) which is then distilled; essential plant oils in the distillate flavor the product and create the “louche,” or cloudiness, when water is added. The product is then naturally colored green by chlorophyll extracted from an additional soaking of fresh herbs. Adding wormwood oil to alcohol and calling it “absinthe” is no different, Breaux explains, than adding vodka to Welch’s grape juice and calling it “wine.”

There’s a video display at the museum of Breaux’s segment on the History Channel’s Modern Marvels which follows Breaux as he makes a batch of his super-premium absinthe Jade Nouvelle-Orléans. I highly recommend watching it for an appreciation of how the hand-crafted product is made. The layers of aroma and complexity of flavor in traditionally made absinthe brands make them well worth the price.

The Krewe of Hermes floats are designed in the classic style by Henri Schindler.

On Friday, as always, Hermes and Le Krewe D’etat rolled Uptown. The weather was sketchy but the showers held off most of the evening. We caught the parades at Magazine and Napoleon, where Mardi Gras guru Arthur Hardy was there, doing parade spots with reporter Siemny Chhuon, who was enjoying her first Mardi Gras.

Arthur Hardy and Siemny Chhuon get ready to report on Friday's parades for WDSU.

Krewe D’Etat didn’t disappoint, the satirical theme this year was “D’Etat’s Wild World of Sports.” The Krewe’s “Dancin’ Darlin’s” performed as the LSU Turf Munchers, skewering LSU coach Les Miles in advance of a float doing the same that was entitled “Two-Minute Thrills.” An unlikely cast of characters caught the sports-themed roasting at the Dictator’s hands; Bobby Jindal (“Featherweight”), Brett Favre (“Pocket Pool”), Lil’ Wayne and Edwin Edwards. (No float pics this year, I only had the cell phone camera. Maybe NOLAnotes has some to share? But I see Uptown Messenger has some, as does Liprap’s Flickr, along with Muses and Hermes parade pics). New Krewe D’etat throws included krewe logo blinking rings and bracelets.

Le Krewe D'etat's new blinky skull ring.

Marching on…

Saturday all hell broke loose weather-wise. Endymion had been canceled and re-scheduled for Sunday night, to parade Uptown after Bacchus. The weather was great Sunday, and after a long odyssey (is that redundant?) trying many different routes to get to Point B on the other side of Napoleon and Magazine, I parked and walked the mile or so Laurel St. near Tipitina’s. Armed with the big gun camera, I continued my yearly quest to capture some of the motion and action of the Mardi Gras night parade. I think I did o.k. See for yourself.

[Show as slideshow]

The result is a comprehensive guide to early Louisiana furniture with over 550 pages and 1000 images. I’m not a furniture collector or scholar, but love the book for its comprehensive coverage of our history and culture as reflected in our natively-crafted decorative arts. Chapters on early cabinet makers, woods and hardware not only talk about the “nuts and bolts” of furniture making, but tell the stories of early Louisianians as their country changed from colonial French to Spanish, then to American control, influence and, finally, statehood. And it’s all beautifully illustrated with period maps and images in addition to the photographs of furniture.

The colonial times are interesting, as we forget that Louisiana once encompassed the entirety what is now the United States west of the Appalachians.

"La Louisiane et Pays Voisins" by Jacques Nicolas Bellin, 1763; The Historic New Orleans Collection, 1975.35.

Items of early Louisiana furniture are rare finds. Fire destroyed many a plantation home along the river over the years and most of the city of New Orleans—twice—in 1788 and 1794. Another hazard, flooding, is illustrated by this engraving of a levee breach near Bonnet Carré from 1871.

"The Landing Near Bonnet Carré" by Alfred Rudolph Waud, 1871; The Historic New Orleans Collection, gift of Harold Schilke and Boyd Cruise, 1953.100ii. Note the armoires and tables being rescued on the right.

Some of the stories are tales of intense research and detective work. City directories of the late 18th and early 19th centuries list many names that have the occupation of menuisier or ébéniste; cabinet and furniture makers and inlay specialists; however,  correlating a piece of furniture to a particular maker is often difficult as pieces were rarely signed. Vermin, mold and all the other hazards of a hot and humid climate destroyed paper labels.

To a certain extent, the story of a craftsman dubbed “The Butterfly Man” (for a signature device he used to join side panels) and the extant furniture attributed to him, make his armoire the star of the book.

Creole-style inlaid armoire, attributed to the “Butterfly Man,” 1810–1830, from the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Robert J. Patrick, New Orleans; photo by Jim Zietz.

Coming out of the collection from the Houmas House plantation in 2003, this armoire set a record for Louisiana furniture when it sold for $140,000. The detailed account of the experts who examined the armoire’s construction and style of its inlaid decorations in an attempt to identify its maker is one of the book’s engrossing mystery stories (in a geeky, research-y kind of way; not necessarily one for Scooby and the gang).

History buffs will also be interested in the account of Creole and Creole-style furniture found in the Mississippi Upper Valley—in Missouri, Indiana and Illinois, for example—and the appendix listing furniture makers found in early city directories and newspaper advertisements.

Furniture buffs can spend countless hours perusing the catalog that makes up the bulk of the book. Photos and descriptions of every piece of furniture the authors could get their hands on are displayed in sections divided by armoires, chairs, bedsteads, buffets, tables, utilitarian pieces and the furniture of the Upper Valley.

The book is available for pre-ordering online through the Historic New Orleans Collection’s website, and I assume at the Collection’s gift shop at 533 Royal St. when it arrives (which, they say, should be sometime next week (of Dec. 13). Check the website for updated information or call the shop at 598-7147.

The Collection’s Royal St. gallery now has an exhibit of Mignon Faget’s work throughout the years. The research center at 410 Chartres St. features an exhibit of early Louisiana furniture from the Magnolia Mound plantation in Baton Rouge and an exhibit of photographs documenting life in New Orleans’ 7th Ward.

Update: I mentioned artist Rolland Golden’s work in a previous post. Fourteen of the 32 or so works he painted in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and exhibited at NOMA were acquired by the Historic New Orleans Collection and New Orleans Museum of Art.

This isn’t new news, but I thought anyone who’s interested should know they are on display at the Collection’s Williams Research Center. It’s free and open to the public, so if you’re wandering around the quarter think about popping in. There’s the furniture, the paintings and the photography to peruse. While you’re there you can take a peek into the reading room upstairs. It’s an impressive space, the former courtroom of the building’s original incarnation as a police precinct and municipal courthouse. The Williams Research Center is open Tue-Sat and the gallery and gift shop on at 533 Royal from Tue-Sun. Both are free.

Preeminent bluesman Robert Johnson was dubbed “King of the Delta Blues.” Johnson’s early recordings influenced legions of musicians, both pure bluesmen and rock ‘n rollers who followed him. He is the stuff of legend, allegedly selling his soul to the devil in exchange for blues prowess. The story is he made his deal with the devil at the crossroads of Hwys. 61 and 49 south of Clarksdale. Johnson’s song “Cross Road Blues” (which doesn’t address any satanic deal-making) has been covered by over 30 artists. The most famous version is Eric Clapton’s arrangement “Crossroads” performed by Cream.

So what made the Delta region (not to be confused with the Mississippi River delta found where the river meets the Gulf) the cradle of blues? The region covers (according to the Wiki) north west Mississippi, along the river from Vicksburg (Willie Dixon’s birthplace) in the south to Memphis in the north, and east to the Yazoo River. It’s the ancient flood plain of the Mississippi River and seems even flatter than the swampy ground surrounding New Orleans, if that could be possible. Thousands of years of the river’s meandering and levee jumping  have tortured, scoured and scarred as well as flattened the land. Louisiana and Arkansas have their own Delta regions encompassed by the alluvial flood plain on the west side of the river with similar agricultural and cultural background notes (musicians Jerry Lee Lewis and Conway Twitty from the Louisiana Delta; Johnny Cash the Arkansas Delta).

Satellite view of a portion of the Delta country illustrates the tortured scarring inflicted by the river over millennia.

Cotton was king here. Many of the blues artists came from sharecropper families or worked at one time or another in the fields. It was oppressive work performed by poor people who weren’t treated much better than the slaves they descended from. The Delta country was the scene of much bloodshed and violence during the civil rights era, and it’s no wonder that following WWII returning GIs fled the area in search of better living in cities like Chicago, where blues recordings by Chess Records made the likes of Muddy Waters famous and paved the way for Chuck Berry and the rock ‘n rollers. The movie Cadillac Records provides a well-produced but fictionalized account of the Chess Records story.

Hwy. 61 (Airline Hwy. in the New Orleans area) starts in Louisiana and ends in Minnesota (where Bob Dylan is from, his album Highway 61 Revisited is a classic), following the river most of the way. It cuts right through the Delta and is the route I take to get to Arkansas every Thanksgiving.

Traveling through the Delta from Vicksburg to Greenville (where there is a bridge that crosses into Arkansas). I jump off Hwy. 61 on to Miss. Hwy. 1 where 61 meets the town of Rolling Fork, home town of Muddy Waters himself (links to DeltaBlues.net, a great resource on the Delta’s byways and juke joints).

It’s always been the week of Thanksgiving that I take my trip through the Delta, and the weather is usually cool and clear. The fields have been harvested and tufts of leftover cotton gather up along side of the road like mini-snowdrifts. Looking at all the fields and the run-down shacks and shanties, silos and cotton gins alongside the road and I can tell I wouldn’t want to be working outside in the summer around here.

The Delta fields stretch on forever.

It’s not without inherent beauty, though. I’ve always been struck by it, the vast emptiness of the fields, the rusted-roof shacks and the occasional splendid plantation home. I’m not the only one; scores of photographers and artists have tried to capture the Delta’s essence. Mississippi public radio was playing an interview with artist Rolland Golden while I was driving through the Delta. He talked about the Delta scenes he’s painted for decades and remembered the days when, as a boy, his family lived in Grenada, Miss. and his father would take him on drives through the Delta country. Some of Rolland’s Delta work can be seen here, here, here and here. His latest exhibit of Mississippi River paintings is on display in Jackson now.

I love the Algiers ferry pictures here and here, he said they were painted recently from photos he took in the ’60s, when, as an artist raising his young family in the French Quarter, he and his wife and kids would occasionally ride the free ferry back and forth on weekend outings. The free ferry ride is still something people enjoy today; being on the river amid the ships travelling to and from foreign ports, enjoying the New Orleans skyline that, in Rolland’s paintings, is bare but for the cathedral and Hotel Monteleone as his photos pre-dated the CBD building boom of the 70s.

I always forget to pack a tripod and camera when traveling through the Delta country, but listening to Rolland on that beautiful afternoon  inspired me to at least get some shots with my phone.

Crop dusters in their hangers along Highway 1.

Grain silos in the Delta country along Hwy. 1.

Elmwood Cemetery outside of Rolling Fork.

We took a side trip to Avery Island, home of the Tabasco sauce factory and other attractions. I remember visiting it as a kid, driving around the pretty island, seeing the sites, and touring the factory. I remembered a warehouse full of oak mixing tanks 2o feet tall and stacks of oak casks aging the fermenting pepper mash, which, after 3 years, will be mixed with vinegar to form the sauce that is eventually bottled and sold throughout the world. To this day I remeber the aroma of fermenting peppers that hit you in the face as soon as we got out of the car at the factory.

Unfortunately, that version of Avery Island no  longer exists. There is no driving around the island any more. You are directed straight to a “country store” where all manner of Tabasco brand regalia is offered for sale. We took the tour of the new factory, built after my childhood visit sometime in the 1970s. Alas, you’re not allowed in the aging facility, but herded straight into a small auditorium for a 10-minute film hosted by TV’s Susan Roesgen. They do show all these things you can’t see in person in the film, but it’s not the same experience at all. Directly afterwards, you are herded past the bottling facility; sterile, idle, and uninteresting the day we toured.

Bright spots: I picked up some Tabasco products not readily available everywhere else. A bottle of Thai-style sweet chili sauce, some of their teriyaki sauce that has a lot of ginger as well as a pepper kick and a three-pound bag of the pepper pulp left over after they bottle the Tabasco sauce. It’s got that same pungent aroma I remembered from the factory as a kid, so there’s that.

On the way back to the camp, we passed through Delcambre were Nola spotted “Shawn’s Cajun Meats, Too,” and we turned around to do some shopping. I was hoping for some home-made andouille and/or tasso, but all they offered were seasoned fresh meats. We bought a stuffed brisket (slow-cooking in the oven as I write) and some items to throw on the grill. We spotted what looked like some fresh pork sausage, but it was labeled “Syrup Sausage.” A customer overheard us speculating about the contents. He said, a) It’s good stuff; and, b) it’s spicy pork sausage that has Steen’s Cane syrup added in.

We also purchased some bacon-wrapped stuffed jalapenos, bacon-wrapped stuffed boneless chicken thighs and pork-stuffed portobello mushrooms. Grilled, all these were tasty, spicy and worth a drive to Delcambre from NOLA even for no other reason.

1. Old New Orleans by Stanley Clisby Arthur. A walking tour of the French Quarter written by the man who also wrote Famous New Orleans Drinks & How to Make ‘Em. Old New Orleans is full of interesting historical tidbits; for example, the building that houses The Coffee Pot restaurant on St. Peter was the first home of Antoine’s Restaurant and the buildings known as the “Spanish Stables” on Gov. Nicholls are neither Spanish nor stables (alright, they were stables originally). They were built by a French Creole, Gallien Preval. An exile from the colony of San Dominque, he was an attorney, justice of the peace and judge who was fined for holding a ball on the premises without a permit. A ribald ditty about the dance was a popular tune in the African-American community. Preval also happened to be my great-great-great-great grandfather.
2. The Pirates Laffite: The Treacherous World of the Corsairs of the Gulf by William C. Davis. This is an interesting book I highly recommend to everyone interested in local history. Do you remember the movie Goodfellas? Where DeNiro and his gang would hijack trucks and steal their cargo, often with the cooperation of the drivers? Jean and Pierre Laffite built an empire doing the same with Spanish ships, whose captains tended to turn over control of their ships rather than risk injury and ill-treatment at the hands of the pirates. The Laffites then sold goods on Grand Terre island or shipped them to city via Bayou Barataria to New Orleans merchants, who avoided paying import duties. The brothers also sold hijacked slaves, a very lucrative business at a time when it was illegal to import slaves into United States territory.The Laffites’ story as told in the book is unseemly, however, at times, humorous and often complicated.  Beyond that, the book’s interest lies in Davis’ weaving in little known details of daily life in an era of change for Louisiana, as it transitioned from Spanish colony, to French colony and to American territory and statehood in 1812 and beyond.
3. New Orleans as It Was: Episodes of Louisiana Life by Henry C. Castellanos.This history of New Orleans was originally published in 1895. It’s a series of vignettes about life in the city, mostly from the early 1800′s to the 1860′s.
4. The World That Made New Orleans: From Spanish Silver to Congo Square by Ned Sublette. Sublette’s book is a thorough examination of the “gumbo” of French, Spanish, African and Haitian cultures that came together in the city’s first 100 years. He makes a strong and fascinating case that New Orleans culture would be far different— Mardi Gras Indians, the Second Line and jazz music may never have existed—had just a few things gone differently in the early days of the French colony.
5. Bienville’s Dilemma: A Historical Geography of New Orleans by Richard Campanella. An essential guide to understanding how the geography of New Orleans shaped its history from Native American times to post-Katrina. Campanella includes excerpts from the journals of the earliest Europeans to explore and settle the area. One memorable source is a young girl shipped off to New Orleans from France in care of the Ursulines nuns. Her letters back home to her father in the 1730′s give a portrait of the city not unlike what we know today…she says that the men of city are idle and lack industry; interested only in hunting and fishing. Add LSU football and we can see how things never changed around here.

It’s always been a great place to take pictures, and yesterday was no exception. No doom-and-gloom moody cemetery shots this year; it was a bright, clear day, the sun strong so that the marble structures seem to glow. I was struck more by the shapes and color rather than individual details and that’s what most of the photos below depict. The light was so bright coming off the marble the camera has to “squint,” the sky is underexposed and dark so that the marble isn’t completely washed out.

While the big Voodoo fest (not so much the Afro-Caribbean religion, but music) was going on in City Park, someone started a staged a voodoo ceremony at Marie Laveau’s alleged tomb as I was getting ready to leave. It’s the last picture in the set. I was told it was being filmed as a promo for groups offering destination weddings for goth types: “Vampire Weddings” and “Voodoo Weddings.” I thought the Haunted History tours were enough of all that. Oy. Isn’t New Orleans interesting enough without having to make stuff up? But, as the Yat Pundit said, “I‘m always amazed at the things that make a buck in this town.” So it’s a good thing, right?

The thing is, last year (which, admittedly, was my first) at times, it felt crowded and congested and hectic, whereas this year things flowed much, much better. So here we also have to give some kudos to the Hotel Monteleone and its staff, who got all the right products and glassware and ice and water to the right rooms at the right times for the 40-some odd tastings that took place, and for all of the seminars held at the hotel. All this while handling every other detail it takes to run a luxury hotel that’s 100% occupied.

Of course, I’ve got to thank everyone, from the hundreds of sponsors, media, bartenders, apprentices and enthusiasts who came from all over the globe to Tales. I met quite a few of you (and a bunch of new locals who showed up for Tweetups and tasting rooms), and hope everyone had a good taste of New Orleans.

Literary greats have haunted its halls for decades. Tennessee Williams was a frequent guest, Truman Capote often quipped that he was born in the Monteleone (his mother was living there at the time, the hotel staff got her to Touro Infirmary where he was actually born). Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, Winston Groom, Richard Ford and Rebecca Wells have all been guests as well. Hemingway, Williams and Capote were known to do their share of writing while sitting in the Carousel Bar.

An Old Fashioned going for a spin at the Carousel Bar.

There once was a cocktail called the Monteleone, its recipe lost in time. To celebrate the bar’s 60th anniversary, the hotel held a contest for folks to come up with a recipe for a new version. The winning contestant would receive a free 4-night stay for Tales of the Cocktail.

Final judging was held May 22. The top 5 cocktails were judged by four of the chefs from season five of the Bravo network’s  Top Chef reality TV show. Mr. and Mrs. Cocktail (Paul and Ann Tuennerman) MC’d as show winner Hosea Rosenberg and chefs Jamie Lauren, Leah Cohen and Jeff McInnis tasted the entries.

Mr. & Mrs. Cocktail with Top Chef winner Hosea.

Top Chefs Jamie, Leah, Hosea & Jeff give each other a toast as the judging begins.

It was a great time, with champagne served to all the visitors, who got to sample the entries as well. Nolanotes dropped by, as did Blackened Out, a NOLA foodie blogger who had submitted his own cocktail to the contest, which, alas, was not a finalist. After the judging, we retired to the Carousel Bar ourselves to do a little judging of our own of a couple of rounds of Ramos Gin Fizzes. Then to the Greek Fest later that evening, but that’s another post (from last year).

Brian Robinson of Arlington, Virgina’s concoction was the winner. Here is the winning recipe (courtesy the Hotel Monteleone):

Monteleone Cocktail

2 oz Rye Wiskey
1 ½ oz St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur
½ oz Domaine De Canton Ginger Liqueur
2 dashes Fee Brothers Orange Bitters
Splash Ginger Ale

Shake ingredients and strain into a julep cup or cocktail glass with crushed ice. Garnish with orange slice.

Tom would have say whether all of that still stands today, since although Antoine’s is going strong, Maylie’s has been closed for years now (the also-defunct Smith & Wollensky last occupied Maylie’s site) and the Bud’s Broiler on City Park Avenue has been closed since Katrina.

The original location of the Bud’s Broiler chain, the City Park restaurant first opened in 1952. I’m not a great repository for the rest of Bud’s history, but they do have a website, www.budsbroiler.com, that has the history and menu, etc.

It re-opened yesterday, April 20, to much fanfare and long lines. The new owners have been working hard on getting the location up and running for a few months now. All their work paid off, it’s clean, freshly painted and cranking out burgers cooked over real charcoal as fast as people can order them.

Well-wishers included the old-line New Orleans white-tablecloth restaurant Tujaque’s, who sent these flowers:

I got a No. 4 with some cheese fries. (Sorry, I always forget to take pictures until I’ve already started eating).

I’m guessing these were the original bathroom doors, they crack me up.

What’s your menu item number? Do you have any Bud’s trivia to add? Did you go opening day? What are your memories of Bud’s on City Park?

I’ll have more details for everyone later on, but right now you need to start making plans to attend, Wednesday-Sunday, July 8-12. While there are seminars geared more toward food and beverage industry pros, there are  plenty of events for the enthusiast to take part in. Some will be held at other venues all over the city, but most will be at the Monteleone Hotel on Royal, a.k.a. Tales Central.  Tickets are available for all of the lunches, dinners, drink contests and happy hours. Free tastings go on all day long.

Last year absinthe made the biggest splash. This year, I think the handcrafted (and legal) moonshines are running neck-and-neck with cachaça (Brazil’s national spirit, and main ingredient in its national drink, the caipirinha) as Tales 2009’s most buzz-worthy boozes. Only time (and your imbibition) will tell. What are your picks?

That reminded me of a glaring omission in my life. I’ve yet to have a roast beef poboy (or any other) from Parkway Bakery & Tavern, a poboy institution that’s on everyone’s short list for best poboys in town. So, while out and about hunting streetcars with Nolanotes, CS and Sun last Sunday, we decided to go there for lunch.

It’s in the heart of Mid City at the corner of Hagan and Toulouse streets, on the Uptown river side of Bayou St. John a block or two from Orleans Avenue.

So here’s the sandwich. Let’s get it out of the way, because it’s not necessarily the only reason one would want to visit Parkway. Good, super-sloppy roast beef that’s edged its way into the top 5 pantheon of roast beef poboys.  Very similar to Parran’s, in case you’re wondering.

No, there are other reasons to visit Parkway. It’s got what appears to be a pretty decent bar area, and there’s lots of seating, covered and open, outside. But the main, must-see character of Parkway lies in the gobs of New Orleans memorabilia (NewOrleaniana, to coin a term?)

Here’s the order window. To the right (not in the picture) are a Pontchartrain Beach poster and copies of the New Orleans Item (a defunct daily newspaper), one announcing the start of World War II and another its end; WAR and PEACE proclaimed in 10-inch tall headlines side-by-side).

There’s a little touch of Elvis there at the window and there’s more Elvis to come. Although there’s nothing specifically connecting Elvis and New Orleans; when you think about it, NOLA is a most Elvis kind of town, though.

A close up by the window shows some cool NOLA stuff—signs from the original Zephyr roller coaster and a promotional placard for Morgus the Magnificent. An old K&B bag (that’s Katz and Besthoff, to you, buddy) and an old Schwegmann’s bag, the kind we used to cover our books with, flank the Woolworth’s Luncheonette sign, once a landmark of Canal Street, known to ‘da yats as “‘da Woolswoits.”

More Elvis, this TP front page announcing Dead Elvis (as opposed to Comeback Elvis).

This is kind of obscure, a campaign poster for Hale Boggs, the U.S. House of Representatives Majority Leader (and member of the Warren Commission) from New Orleans. Boggs was presumed dead when his plane went missing in Alaska in October of 1972. Although missing, he was not yet declared dead and was re-elected in November of 1972. I can’t tell if that was the election year this poster was created for, but that’s some interesting trivia. (More trivia—Alaska congressman Nick Begich was also on the plane with Boggs, his son, Mark, was just elected senator from Alaska, de-throning Mr. Intertubez felon Ted Stevens.)

There’s also a concert poster from the Rolling Stones May, 1981 appearance at the Louisiana Superdome. I was there, by the way; George Thorogood and the Destroyers opened up, if I remember correctly.

Here’s the best piece of NewOrleaniana in the whole joint—a genuine Aints bag from the dismal 1980 season, when the Saints were 1-15-0. It’s customized for wearing over one’s head, rather than risk being identified as a Saints fan at the Dome, in case you don’t remember those days.

Update: I stand fully corrected. As reader Brad points out: “Nothing connecting Elvis and New Orleans??? What about King Creole? My neighbor when I was a kid used to tell stories about how her mother worked on the production and got to have an audience with the King.”

Maybe the correct statement would have been “nothing my dumb, non-Elvis fan ass would know about.”

TALES OF THE COCKTAIL OPENING RECEPTION TO BE HELD AT THE NEWLY RESTORED ROOSEVELT HOTEL
TOAST OF THE EVENING TO OCCUR AT THE ORIGINAL SAZERAC BAR

NEW ORLEANS, LA—December 1, 2008 – Tales of the Cocktail, a cocktail and culinary festival celebrating the history and culture of dining and the cocktail in New Orleans, has chosen The Roosevelt New Orleans as the site of the July 8, 2009, opening-night reception for its seventh anniversary event.

Tales of the Cocktail runs through July 12, 2009.

The historic downtown New Orleans property, a Waldorf=Astoria Collection property shuttered since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, opened in 1893 as the Grunewald. In 1923, it was rebranded The Roosevelt in honor of President Theodore Roosevelt and retained its distinctive moniker until the hotel changed hands in 1965 and was renamed The Fairmont. The grand hotel will reopen in late spring 2009, reborn as a Waldorf=Astoria Collection® hotel.

The summer’s most spirited event, Tales of the Cocktail explores the history and contemporary life of the cocktail at various locations in the New Orleans French Quarter. The event welcomes celebrities, mixologists, chefs, authors and cocktail experts as presenters and special guests from around the globe for seminars, dinners and galas.  Top spirits names such as Dale DeGroff, Tony Abou-Ganim, Robert Hess and Kevin Brauch once again will take part in educating industry and consumers alike about the cocktail.

In more than a century of operation, The Roosevelt served as the backdrop for many historic events and often made history in its own right. Key among plans to restore the property to its previous grandeur and appeal will be the reopening of the hotel’s famed Blue Room and legendary Sazerac Bar. In the golden era of supper clubs from the 1930s to the 1960s, the Blue Room played host to some of the best-known names in entertainment and big bands – including Tony Bennett, Louis Armstrong and Sonny and Cher – as well as to elaborate floor shows. The Sazerac Bar, a Roosevelt landmark for decades, again will serve its signature Sazerac cocktail and Ramos Gin Fizz – both invented in New Orleans and made popular worldwide by The Roosevelt – among other delights.

“Hosting our opening night in conjunction with the newly restored Roosevelt is an honor,” said Tales of the Cocktail founder Ann Tuennerman. “Tales of the Cocktail celebrates the history of the cocktail, and what better way to introduce visitors to our city than with the city’s official cocktail, The Sazerac, at the original Sazerac Bar,”

The New Orleans Culinary and Cultural Preservation Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to raising funds to benefit hospitality industry members, produces Tales of the Cocktail annually. Its mission is to preserve the rich history of the restaurants and bars of New Orleans and the unique culture of dining and drinking famous to the city, while educating locals, visitors and the hospitality industry about this culinary heritage.

Tales of the Cocktail, a culinary and cocktail festival, allows the connoisseur or amateur to fully experience (taste, see and learn about) cocktail culture in New Orleans and around the world. The event’s annual components are Spirited Dinners, a Seminar Series, Cocktail Hour, Cocktail Luncheons, walking tours of the French Quarter, and classic and contemporary cocktail parties — all presented by the country’s hottest chefs, authors, bartenders and cocktail experts.

For more information on Tales of the Cocktail, visit the Web site at www.TalesoftheCocktail.com and register to receive email updates, or call 504-948-0511.

The Twitter is all a-twitter; even a reporter from the Chicago Tribune who came down to cover the storm used Twitter to quickly connect with NOLA area sources. He’s written a story (featuring our own NolaNotes) about the use of Twitter by people keeping up with everyone’s preparations; whether they’re staying or evacuating; where they’re going, what they’re taking; and, the status of traffic along the various evacuation routes.

It’s a great topic. I was convinced for a year after I first signed up for Twitter that it was absolutely useless. I’ve seen the light since then, and I’m glad the national media is recognizing how useful the service is in emergency situations. Twitter was put to good use during the recent San Diego wildfires and Los Angeles earthquake, too.

Twitter also lets people vent. Following regular updaters, and their 140-character tweets, since Gustav formed up reveals all the stages of hurricane angst. Tweets have gone from interested concern, while it was south of Haiti, to growing concern as it strengthened past Jamaica, then terror as it exploded to a category four as it approached Cuba.

But along with the concern was a spirit of defiance. We remembered (and tweeted about) a time when approaching storms weren’t that big of a deal. Neighbors and families boarded houses together. There were block parties with cookouts featuring all that meat that was fixing to go bad when the power went out. We made sure each of us had enough candles and flashlights and radios and batteries. But we were not leaving. When the winds passed, we got together and fixed what needed fixing in the neighborhood and kept our collective bravado together.

When Gustav approached, the NOLA bloggers and tweeters talked about not leaving. About getting generators, supplies, making arrangements for friends in flood-prone areas. We wanted to keep up the family/neighborhood traditions. But Category 4 status and forecast models pointing it right to NOLA got the best of us. On Friday, Gov. Jindal gave a very nervous press conference. On Saturday, Nagin did one of his patented freak-outs with his “Mother of all storms” quote. Aaron Broussard, seemingly again on the verge of tears, mandatorily evacuated the west bank; then later the entire east bank of Jefferson Parish.

Everyone was tough on looters. In Jefferson Parish, if you were out after curfew you would be considered a “suspicious person.” In Orleans, where 1500 National Guard troops have doubled the size of the NOPD, Nagin promised looters would “be taken straight to Angola…,”put in general population at the big house.

What happened? Rather than see what the hurricane would actually do, everyone left. By most accounts, getting out of the city wasn’t too bad. But bottlenecks at the I-55, I-12 and I-55 interchanges created parking lots. As of 10pm Sunday, there are reports of slow-moving, jammed-up traffic even as the first squall lines of Gustav’s outer bands approach.

Twitter is full of angry tweets. Angry because people feel forced out on an unplanned road trip, including pets, and forced to do so in many cases without too much spare cash. Now, they are angry because the pets and the kids are squalling because THEY’RE angry they’ve been stuck in a slow-moving car for 10 hours and aren’t any closer to their destination than they were 5 hours ago.

On a positive note, what these angry tweets can add up to are the tweets we never hope to read-the desperate tweets. “I’m on my roof, come get me!” tweets. Or, “I’m in my house, and the water is two feet now and keeps coming!” tweets. Or, “My parents are trapped. Can someone check on them?” tweets. A week after Katrina, I saved the HTML file of the nola.com forums that contained hundreds of such postings. I still have it, and read it when I feel able.

We don’t know what the future is going to hold. Is it, as NolaNotes asks, global warming? Is this going to keep happening every couple of years? Can we handle it if it does? If the city floods again, is it “game over”? Who knows. I just hope we don’t have a future with desperate tweets.

Will Smith’s streetcar is located at the Prytania Theatre. It features Stella and Stanley from Streetcar Named Desire. He added sponsors John and Gayle Gish to it as well. Will was at Tales selling his Mardi Gras krewe giclees. He also had a new line of burlesque girl paintings on hand for sale.

Also posted at StreetcarArt.com.

So we basically played Mario Kart for the Wii all day. His grandparents bought him a telescope, and last night we went out to try to find the moon. The moon, alas, was not to rise until after midnight, so we looked at random stars.

The highlight of the trip was this giant frog painted on the I-10 overpass at Rayne, home of the Frog Festival, where we stopped for lunch on the way home.

You see, there was also a public art project in San Francisco, called Hearts in San Francisco. It’s been over since 2005, when most of the hearts were removed from around town and placed with their owners. There are a couple left, like the one above in Union Square. It was just today, going through the pictures, that I actually read the plaque.

Yep, that’s Tony Bennett’s, Mr. “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,”‘ heart that he painted and presented to the city to kick off the project.

There’s more on “A Streetcar Named Inspire” at StreetcarArt.com. The first streetcars are being placed, including Dennis Procopio’s “Hands Across the Water” at 909 Poydras.

This one sums it all up…10:20 a.m. bubbly.

The winery from the road:

Ready, set, taste!

There were these tiny women trying to climb on a chair on the highway across the entrance to Gloria Ferrer.

Then off to Sebastiani, or as one of our crew called it, the “Disney Land” of wineries. It was huge, very well kept, had an enormous gift shop/tasting room and was full of tourists. Good photo ops, thought. A private tasting room with stained glass, a 60,000 gallon wooden tank and some of the winery’s original pressing equipment.

The most educational tasting was had at Ravenswood just outside of the town of Sonoma. Ravenswood specializes in Zinfandel. Our host there was Peter, who took us into their barrel room for a tasting of some of their private reserve stock.

Then off to lunch in Sonoma, a quick stop at the Whole Foods store in town and first full-on exposure to California douchebagery in the form of a happy cashier, or HC, who had those big hoop earrings stretching out his lobes and a raggy beard.

There’s an older lady in from of me. HC says, “Wow, how’s your day so far? I’ve seen you here before.” Lady says, “I live around the corner I’m here all the time.” HC, ‘That’s great. I’ll be seeing you.” He turns to the kid bagging the lady’s groceries. “Thanks, Ryan, that was a great job.”

I know what’s coming next. He looks at me and says, “How is your day going so far?” I tell him it’s pretty good, just riding around enjoying the sights. “Wow, fantastic. Where are you from?” I tell him New Orleans. “Well, how are things going in New Orleeenzzz?” They’re great. We just had a couple of hundred thousand in town for a festival, and another half million or so for Jazz Fest next week. “Wow, amazing!”

I took my amazing lunch at a windy picnic table—something called the Petaluma Express was keeping wind speeds at a constant 40 mph. This was at a winery called Gundlach Bundshu.

This was a really beautiful place. I was done with tasting by then and interested only in getting some good shots while the gang drank. The late afternoon sun gave a real Van Gogh-in-Arles (with trolls) look to the landscape that was hell to capture. But I tried.

More scenes from Cline Cellars and Viansa winery, a Tuscan villa set in the hills above Sonoma.

Viansa…

Stunning views all the way around. My theory is that living in this area ruins a man, thus the number of douchebags wandering around with their heads up their asses. Alright, I’m jealous. It’s too gorgeous out there not to be.

Our last stop on the way back into San Francisco was the Marin Headlands. These bluffs overlook the Golden Gate and San Francisco Bay beyond. Very windy and a tough climb to get up, but dude, it was worth it.

I think that’s going to be it for San Francisco postings. I may have another one in me, but it may be a while coming.

All in all, it was a great trip. I’m very envious of San Francisco. I was of the opinion the New Orleans had more character in her little toe than most every other city in world contains in its entirety. San Francisco is, without a doubt, the exception. Miles and miles of neighborhoods that give the aura of the French Quarter and Canal Street all rolled into one. Thousands of tourists from all over the world roaming the streets there, not because a convention brought them, but because they want their families to experience it.

It’s not a perfect place. Perambulation is almost impossible, even the locals say they’ll walk three blocks out the way to avoid going up one block on a hill. It is very expensive, I’d say tack on 35% to everything you’d expect to spend. Panhandlers abound and they can be very aggressive.

I’d have to say though, that given a $200 million Powerball victory, after buying a few buildings in the Quarter, I’d make my next purchase in San Francisco.