I have finished posting the pictures from this weekend, and I believe there are a few that need some explanation beyond what was written in the caption. First, a few were taken at a rest stop outside of the Poconos. This rest stop was like nothing I had seen before — it sold everything one could possibly want or need at a rest stop, from snacks to fireworks. As we debated whether or not buying our friend fireworks would break any laws, we ran into someone we knew from NYC. Small, small world. Before we left, I bought my very first taco from Taco Bell. And, although it wasn’t quite as nasty as McDonalds, as far as fast food goes, it will probably be my last. We opted out of a visit to the mobile chapel, and continued on our ride upstate.

My first day in the Finger Lakes region was spent wine-tasting. We visited three vineyards: Lamoreaux Landing, Shalestone Vineyards, and Chateau Lafayette Reneau. I brought back two bottles, a cabernet franc and a late harvest riesling, for my upcoming wine club society meeting, where we’ll be focusing on the Finger Lakes region (convenient, no?).

The remainder of the pictures are from Jeff’s house on the lake, where we celebrated the Fourth, had a mini luau, and had s’mores two nights in a row. This weekend I learned that s’mores, while they taste amazing, do not photograph well. They were so very tasty, chocolatey, and gooey, I promise. The final two photos are from the Big Dipper, where we stopped for barbecued chicken and milkshakes on the way home. Sure as hell beats Taco Bell any day. You can see the rest of the pictures here.

Okay, it’s time for the full report.

Day 1
We arrived on Wednesday and picked up our first po-boys on the way home from the airport from a local joint out in Lakeview, where we were staying. Ah . . . welcome to New Orleans. After lunch, we followed up with a stroll around the French Quarter. “Food” stop number one was a hurricane, which we purchased on Bourbon Street. Now, for those of you who are not aware, New Orleans is the home to one of my favorite phenomena, the “to-go” cup at bars. Yes, my friends, you can walk into a bar and order a drink to go. We got our hurricanes and continued our stroll around the Quarter. At one point we stumbled upon a gospel choir — between that and the booze in the hurricanes, our spirits were soaring. We rounded off our stroll with a stop at Cafe du Monde for coffee and beignets, which we enjoyed by the riverside. Dinner that night was at Lola’s, where we had some good paella and warm dinner rolls with fantastic garlic butter — mostly garlic. Later that night, we got rocking at the House of Blues with George Clinton and P-Funk. The 60+ year old grandfather out-rocked us that night; we had to turn in at about 2:30 AM.

Day 2
Our first day at Jazz Fest. Our first stop was food — Danielle and Seth headed for the crawfish bread, and I for my soft-shell crab po-boy. Just as delightful as I had remembered — salty, crispy, and briny. Other delicacies of the day included the Nachitoches meat pie (a spicy ground beef concoction wrapped in dough and then deep-fried), a BBQ oyster po-boy, fried plaintains with tangy Jamaican hot sauce, a taste of Danielle’s bread pudding, and, of course, the rosemint tea. We met up with my friend Arielle’s brother David — my prior trips to New Orleans were all with Arielle, and David stepped in on hosting duties during her absence, making sure we had a good spot from which to enjoy the music, and that we always had a cold beer. We were able to catch two acts that afternoon: Allen Toussaint and the Steve Miller Band. Although there were sprinkles throughout the day, it never really rained that hard, and we even saw a rainbow. After heading home, we decided to take a nap before we went out for the evening. When we woke up, it was already 11:45 p.m. So much for going out. We ended up sleeping until about 10 the next morning. Guess we were wiped out.

Day 3
During our 14 hour “nap,” there were constant bursts of thunder and lightning, and torrential rains. Conditions were so bad that Jazz Fest got rained out for the first time in ages — perhaps over a decade. We decided to make the best of it, so we ultimately headed down to Bourbon Street to start drinking. We started at Pat O’Brien’s — I had a hurricane and Seth started with a bloody mary. He would later graduate to a mint julep, while I continued to nurse my hurricane (give me a little credit — it was easily twice the size of his bloody mary). On a side note, while we wandered around the Quarter our first day, we had set out some “goals” for our trip — little things we were going to try to accomplish while we were there. They included shaking hands with a famous person, singing into a microphone, riding on the back of a motorcycle, getting a business card from a stranger, and eating a food we had never eaten before. Our first day at the Fest we were each able to eat something we had not eaten before, and at Pat O’Brien’s, we got word that there was a famous person at the bar inside — Yanni. After much debate about whether (a) Yanni actually counted as a famous person and (b) the person sitting at the bar was, in fact, Yanni, we decided to pass on that particular opportunity, even if one of our goals was left unaccomplished. Later in the day, we ran into my friend Erika and her posse at the House of Blues. We were walking by to check out what was playing later that night. We all retreated to a bar offering 3 for 1 drinks to decide on our musical plans for the evening. We made the mistake of ordering white russians as our drink of choice — they were each the size of my head (I think they combined the three drinks into one huge cup). Now I know why white russians are usually served in a very small glass. Ugh — way too much milk. Determined not to sleep through another evening despite having spent our entire day getting boozed up, we went home, quickly showered, and headed out to Mid-City Lanes Rock ‘n Bowl to see the Rebirth Brass Band and Kermit Ruffins, both New Orleans institutions. It was a fantastic show, but incredibly crowded, even for little miss New York City. At sometime during the second set, we called it a night — we needed to be well-rested for our next day at Jazz Fest.

Day 4
To make up for our rained-out day, we got up early so we could put in a full day at the Fest. We certainly got started with some good karma — someone gave me a free ticket as I was walking up to buy one. In typical New York fashion, I asked Seth if we should check to make sure it was valid. He looked at me as if I were insane. Maybe it’s time for me to leave the city for a while . . . Anyway, back to Jazz Fest. We started off (after a round of beignets, of course) at the Blues tent, where we saw God’s Followers of South Africa, who are reminiscent of Ladysmith Black Mombazo. We then went to one of the main stages, where we wanted to set up camp for later shows. While we were there, we saw Marc Broussard, who was unknown to either of us, but was definitely the hidden gem of the day. He couldn’t have been more than 20, but his voice had a depth and maturity way beyond his years. We predict big things for this guy in the near future. Leaving our chairs to mark our turf, we went over to the Congo tent, where, despite the geographical inconsistency, they were focusing on music from South Africa. We saw Busi Mhlongo and Vusi Mahlasela, who were joined by the legendary Hugh Masekela. While we were at the Congo tent, we guided Arielle’s friend Bebe (who I’ve seen on all of my previous New Orleans trips) to our stuff, and met up with her after we had both returned from our ventures to the smaller tents. Thank god for cell phones. We picked up some food on the way back — a chicken taco for me, and a steak pita for Seth. And, of course, more rosemint tea. Back at the main stage, we caught the end of the Funky Meters, and ran off to grab a catfish po-boy before Santana got started. As we were winding our way back through the crowds, we heard Santana off in the distance — they had started early! We made it back to our chairs, and were treated to some of the best guitar playing in the world. Incredible. Towards the end of the set, we could see the black storm clouds moving closer and closer. We only missed a few songs, but made it back home before the rain came crashing down again. We planned to take a nap (not a 14-hour one, but a short one), but were sidetracked by the National Spelling Bee, which was being broadcast on ESPN2. Strangely enough, we had been talking about Spellbound the day before. The winning word was pococurante. After the Bee, we geared up for our night with Jurassic 5 and Galactic. Although the show was good, it made me think that I might finally be turning into an old woman. It was unbearably loud — so much so that I wished I had brought earplugs. After several hours of having our eardrums blasted into oblivion, we headed to the Clover Grill for some late night burgers. Gotta love a place that cooks their burgers under hubcaps. Satiated, we returned home.

Day 5
After two days fighting crowds at Jazz Fest with a day boozing in the French Quarter in between, we opted to take our Sunday at a slightly more subdued pace. We started off with brunch at Lulu’s in the Garden. Not wanting to go into shock from lack of fried food and shellfish, I ordered a dish called the “Hangtown Fry,” scrambled eggs with bacon, fried oysters, and fried onion rings. Delicious. Not light, but fantastic. The best quality of well-done fried food is that it isn’t at all greasy, which surprises me every time. We were able to walk off some of the brunch with a do-it-ourselves Garden District walking tour. We purchased a great guide book, we were off. After our tour, we returned back to the Quarter for one last drink in to-go cup. After taking in a few more sights, sounds, and smells, we opted to finish off our weekend with a quiet, lovely dinner at Cafe Degas, outside of the Quarter. For whatever reason, we were both craving beef, so we each had a steak. A simple, yet tasty finish to our culinary adventures.

Day 6
We awoke at the crack of dawn and headed home. People were still out partying as our cab drove off to the airport. Thanks to Seth for being an ideal travel partner, to Danielle, Alan and Ela for letting us stay with them, despite our keeping odd hours and sleeping half the time, and to David and Bebe for chipping in on hosting duties at the Fest. You can see the pictures here.

Considering that I spent the better part of four beautiful, mild, sunny days inside a Hilton, I actually had a good trip to Atlanta.

I was there for the Equal Justice Conference, and moderated a panel presentation on disaster legal assistance. I hadn’t met any of my co-panelists before we got there — we coordinated the whole thing by phone and email — so I had arranged to meet them in the lobby an hour before our panel. The two women were at our assigned meeting point, and all I knew was that I was looking for a guy named Mark. I started asking around the lobby — I approached each man sitting alone and asked if he was Mark. One gentleman, in his late forties, when I asked if he was Mark, literally looked me up and down, lingering a tad too long on my cleavage, and said, in a deep southern drawl, “no, but I wish I was.” I spun on my heel and walked away, thinking of all the clever things I should/could have said. Ick. I wanted to take a shower. Blech. Southern gentlemen, my ass, although I’m sure he thought he was giving me some sort of compliment.

If that was the low point, the high points were the people, a few good meals, and a forty-five minute stretch of lounging in the sun by the pool. First and foremost, I’d like to thank the Atlanta-based Chowhounds for responding to my post — I had two great meals thanks to their suggestions. First was Watershed, a calm, soothing, airy spot in Decatur that features new Southern cooking and is co-owned by Emily Saliers, one of the Indigo Girls (the name is a tribute to their song). We had fried catfish and some of the best onion rings I have ever had — light and crispy on the outside and sweet and chewy on the inside. I got the duck as an entree, served simply with figs, sauteed bok choy, and roasted parsnips (which I have currently declared to be my favorite vegetable). One of my co-workers got the special that evening, which was a Greek-style roasted fish. It was delicious. They also served warm cookies and milk for dessert.

The next night was Harold’s Barbecue. As we walked up to the place, there was a cop hanging out in front. I snapped a picture of him there, but was too self conscious to take a picture of him later, despite the fact that he was standing right next to a porcelain pig. It was so perfect — you’ll just have to imagine it in your mind. It was definitely a down-home, old-school barbecue joint. Our hands-down favorite of the dishes we ordered was the pork ribs — juicy, tender, and succulent, with a tangy, vinegar-based sauce. Each plate was served with Brunswick stew, fantastic (non-mayo-heavy) coleslaw, and came with chips and a platter of cornbread. As I was inspecting the cornbread, I noticed chunks of something in it — at first I thought it was apples, as they were sort of square and had the translucent quality of a cooked apple, but when I picked a chunk out and tasted it on its own, I realized that it was . . . pork fat. Nice. A special thanks to Tiela and Teresa for joining me in my adventure.



Finally, I got to spend time with the extended Pro Bono Net family — folks we work with all over the country — and meet some great new people in the public interest legal community, mostly from California. It was a pleasure hanging out with Becky, the “legions of Stephens,” Amy, Michelle, Tamarra, Marni, Megan, McGregor, and everyone else. We even made the most of being trapped in the Hilton by visiting all the hotel bars, including getting a round of drinks at Trader Vic’s, the cheezy Polynesian-style joint. How can you resist drinks served in a conch shell?!