Travel Tuesday: Walking Around New Orleans

 Continuing the theme of lots of photos and very little text on Tuesday 

A Little Walk Around New Orleans.

Moody Monday: Going Away and Returning Home

 It is no secret that I like to travel. I like the adventure, I like airports, I love flying.  

There are multiple stages to this joy. 

I love planning travel, figuring out where I am going, how I want to get there, picking out travel options, booking hotels, ground transportation, thinking about what to do, where to eat.  There are trips, sad to say, where the planning is the best part.  

Then I like the experience of travel.  I love taking off on an airplane, or getting on the expressway.  I love travel by train, the train moving away from the platform, and gliding along through the countryside.  Granted long trips can be boring, they are also a great time to catch up on reading,  or zone out and take a nap (as long as I am not driving.). 

I like being someplace different.  I often get out and walk around the neighborhood just to see what is there.  There are lots of ah's and wonders to be seen and experienced.  

I also enjoy returning home.  I know my local area, on a good day the plane comes in over CIA headquarters (literally at times) and lands to the south, down the river past the most iconic monumental parts of Washington DC.  There is always a sense of relief when the adventure is over, I am back home and the bags are being unpacked, photos downloaded.  

And then planning starts for the next adventure.  

The Sunday Five: What to ask?

1: What would you like to know about me? 

2: What do we not know about you? 

3: Where have you been that would surprise us? 

4: If we met in an elevator what would you say? 

5: What question should I ask next week?

My answers:

1: What would you like to know about me?  I am looking forward to hearing what you are curious about. 

2: What do we not know about you? That I voted for Gerald Ford. 

3: Where have you been that would surprise us? A tea party hosted by Archbishop of Canterbury  

4: If we met in an elevator what would you say? Hey, I read your blog! 

5: What question should I ask next week?  Well I am listening? 

Please share your answers in the comments.  

The Saturday Morning Post: Things Kids Today Won't Understand

 

• I was so mad, I slammed the phone down good and hard. (Why would you shatter the glass on your phone?) 
• The meeting was so small we could have held it in a phone booth (What is a phone booth?) 
• Directory assistance (remember calling the operator and asking them to find the number for you.)
• Long distance phone charges (it used to cost extra to call to the next town.) 
• Reverse the charges, or collect calls (Unless they have an uncle in prison.) 
• A floppy disk. (What is a disk?) 
• Don't touch that dial. (When was the last time you had a TV with a dial knob on it?) 
• VHS or Betamax? 
• The flip side. (Remember 45 rpm records with the B side?
• Pick up on the extension. 

Thinking about it, technology has changed so much in the past 30 years, things that were commonplace, are now unknown, things that were science fiction, are commonplace.  I will leave it to the anthropologists to theorize if the pace of technological change is accelerating, or not.   But the high tech of today, is likely to be the museum piece of 30 years from now.  

The rental SUV in Cleveland last weekend, had GPS in the dash, not new but it is becoming ubiquitous. It had active lane departure warning, side radar (handy on something only slightly smaller than an aircraft carrier.) Tech that 25 years ago didn't exist and now is common.  I am looking forward to self driving cars.  I hope they are perfected and commonplace, by the time I need to quit driving.  

Funny and Fabulous Friday - Seen on the Streets of New Orleans

A hurricane is a frozen drink popular in New Orleans

 

New Orleans is a fun city, people who play hard, and take silliness seriously.  It is a party town, yes people walk the streets with drinks in their hands - just don't carry a glass container - that will get you fined.  Even Krystal burger, sells alcohol. 

I enjoy funny signs, and rude T-shirts. I guess the golf cart didn't pay for parking.  

Thursday Ramble: Not going off the deep end

A friend recently sent me an email with a list of Darwin Award nominees, I read through, laughed at the stupidity, and realized that at least one of them was not true.  It was an old story, told on and off for decades, it keeps coming back.  It has been proven wrong, and yet people keep falling into the deep end over it.  

I know someone who is convinced that Ukraine is not at war, because he looked at several webcams online and couldn't see fighting.  He is convinced that it is all a fake.  He has taken a deep dive into it if he can't confirm it, it can't be true.  

There are messages of love, respect, and sharing in religions.  Many people find comfort in this.  Some are seeking answers to unanswerable questions.  Some go off the deep end, believing that everyone must believe as they believe. A failure, that overshadows the essential message that we need to be good to others and ourselves to find happiness.   Faith is weaponized by those off the deep end. 

There are always politicians at the fringes. Ultra conservative, Ultra liberal, off the deep end on both sides.  There is a vast middle ground that sensible minds can agree on, yet the shouts (sometimes literal shouts) from the deep end tend to drown out the voices of common ground.  

The experts say, that minds are changed, when they get to know, like and trust someone who is different, and a realization strikes that they might be off the deep end.  It is possible to swim to the middle.  

The Wednesday W's: 2023 - 8

Where have I been?  Cleveland, well slightly to the south of there.  

Why would we go there at this time of the year?  A family winter picnic.

What are they crazy to have a picnic in winter- someone asked?  Yes, in a good sort of a way. 

What did I observe? In the hotel mother and young son, he was probably 5 or 6 walking down the corridor hand in hand, he was not keeping up, she said, you are going to have to keep up, or I am going to drag you down the hallway.  His response was "DRAG ME, DRAG ME!!!" Yes, she did. 

Where to next? No out of town travel plans for a couple of months.  After three trips in a month, it will be nice to be home. 

Was it really that snowy?  Most of that is man-made snow at a ski resort, near where we were staying.  Yes it did snow, but the roads remained clear and dry for the most part.  It was a bit chilly. 

Who have we seen?  J's two brothers, Paula the sister in-law, Riana the girlfriend - well  Riana was there for 2 minutes, then she left to take something to the car, and she left - she is a little as my mother would have said, flighty.  And Cousin Joan who lives in California, Joan is always great fun.  It was good to see the brothers in-law, bright interesting people. We really should see more of one another. 

What have I been eating?  Anything that does not try to eat me first. Great Lakes Perch, freshwater fish, from close to the source.  

What have I seen? I don't ski, and find ski slopes interesting.  We had a couple of free hours and drove over to two nearby ski centers to have a look and take a few pictures.  It has been a warm winter, most of the snow is on the slopes, and most of that is man-made.  

Who deserves an atta boy this week?  The rental car desk person, assigned me a really nice Toyota Four Runner.  

Who deserves a slap this week?  The person responsible for the lack of signage for finding the rental car center at the airport in Cleveland.  I will break with my be kind, this is needlessly difficult, and easy for someone to remedy. 

What didn't surprise me this week?  The flight to Cleveland being delayed a couple of hours.  The flight home was early, left the gate early, arrived early, baggage was waiting when I got there. 

What did surprise me this week? The low price for dinner at a nice restaurant, there were five of us and it cost little more than dinner for the two of us last week near home.

What am I reading? Kept, An American Househusband in Paris, a fun read. 

What did I learn this week? That political attitudes in middle America are very different than here near the beltway. Fox News is not news.  

What is good in the world? When I was growing up, my one-horse-town had a local pharmacy, the pharmacist retired for health reasons 30 years ago, and died this year.  His estate was surprisingly large, his first bequest was $1-million dollars to the local schools, for academic programs and scholarships. With a message that more surprise gifts will be announced soon.   

What is ugly in the world? In the same newspaper, a fight over LGBTQ books in a local library, and needing to define LGBTQ in a newpaper article.  

What made me sad this week?  News that Auntie Glad died just short of 103.  Though we never met, we feel that we she loved us, and we knew her.  

 

 

Travel Tuesday: Fat Tuesday Edition

 Continuing the Tuesday Theme of lots of photos and little text, in honor of Fat Tuesday, there are the images from the Krewe Du Vieux 2023 Parade, at least the ones that are postable without having to add an adult content warning on the post. This particular parade is known for two things, mule drawn floats and an adult theme.