I try to go to the cemetery (St. Louis No. 1) every year on All Saints day. Save Our Cemeteries is there every year, too, with a list and the map from the Dead Space project to help families locate tombs. They’ve been doing a good job [...]
I try to go to the cemetery (St. Louis No. 1) every year on All Saints day. Save Our Cemeteries is there every year, too, with a list and the map from the Dead Space project to help families locate tombs. They’ve been doing a good job [...]
The Louisiana Film Museum opening was last Wednesday, September 2. The latest addition to the NOLA museum scene is located at the Riverwalk, inside the Southern Food and Beverage Museum (SoFAB), also the home of the Museum of the American Cocktail.
It was a subdued opening with a [...]
Updated 07/23/2009.
Tales of the Cocktail 2009 is now over. From the opening ceremony Wednesday, July 8 (celebrating the 75th anniversary of NOLA’s own Herbsaint), to the Wormwood Society’s grand soirée closing things out on Sunday night, it was a whirlwind of boozing, networking and learning.
Tales [...]
While I’m still working on some more detailed posts on things I learned at Tales of the Cocktail this year, I want to hand out some kudos to everyone involved. Ann and Paul Tuennerman, along with the Cocktail Angels Melissa Young, Christina Gaspari and Michelle Dunnick and the rest [...]
Updated, see below.
So a while back, while researching the Roosevelt Hotel’s opening, I couldn’t help noticing all the references to the Ramos Gin Fizz, along with the Sazerac (at the Sazerac Bar) it’s the hotel’s signature drink. The Ramos Gin Fizz was the favorite drink of Governor Huey Long, famous [...]
The Hotel Montleone, one of New Orleans’ historic hotels, and home to Tales of the Cocktail, is celebrating the 60th anniversary of its Carousel Bar. The Royal Street landmark is famous for its literary connections.
Literary greats have haunted its halls for decades. Tennessee Williams [...]
Tom Fitzmorris opined, back in 1977, that there were three restaurants he couldn’t live without: Antoine’s, Maylie’s and the Bud’s Broiler on City Park Avenue.
Tom would have say whether all of that still stands today, since although Antoine’s is going strong, Maylie’s has been closed [...]
It’s celebrated for its storied dining rooms named after and decorated with memorabilia from some of New Orleans’ most staid carnival krewes. Antoine’s is expanding on its traditions with a new venue, next door to the hallowed restaurant: the Hermes Bar.
The bar’s grand opening was Friday, coinciding [...]
A breezy day. Lots of music and food. Day 1 of French Quarter Fest was a good fest day. I didn’t plan on doing much more than hitting my favorite food booths and keeping in touch on the net to meet up with people. I did meet one; I taunted [...]
New Orleans and cocktails, two things nearest and dearest to my heart. Each year Tales of the Cocktail presents all the best of these two things; cocktails, cocktail history, New Orleans’ cocktail history, and, for the finale, your chance to participate in New Orleans cocktail history in the making.
I’ll [...]
Sylvester Francis runs the show at the Backstreet Cultural Museum in Treme. He’s a film maker, photographer and historian. A world of New Orleans African-American culture awaits inside the museum, located at 1116 St. Claude, across the street and down a little ways in the same block as St. [...]
Last year was my first encounter with Krewe du Vieux. It’s definitely “one for the locals;” highly satirical and raunchy to the extreme, it’s also held early enough each year that it’s off of the regular Mardi Gras beer-and-hand grenade-swilling, boob-flashing tourist crowd’s radar. As KdV’s website says:
It is [...]
As explained in the last post, Sunday was a streetcar hunting day. Besides the lunch at Parkway Bakery, we went to see, as Nola called them, “the bunnies at the brewery.” She said they were part of Prospect.1, so we figured we had to check them out [...]
I let loose my New Year’s resolution a couple of weeks ago: To eat better in 2009. Better steaks, better shrimp, better meals all around. One wag, Yat Pundit, echoed the theme with “less Subway, more Parkway!” Yeah, you rite!
That reminded me of a glaring omission in my life. [...]
I was cleaning up my cube today and ran across a stack of papers left over from some genealogy research I did a few years ago. I took a look at an obituary, my great-great grandfather’s brother (great-great grand uncle?), Paul ______, from 1898.
I guess I hadn’t paid much attention [...]
“On my honor I will do my best: To do my duty to God and my country…”
Oath, Boy Scouts of America.“I vow to personally buy the first Sazerac for any visitor who asks ‘Hey, where do I get a Hurricane?’ and pledge to pull out the Herbsaint and Rye [...]
I’ll let the press release from Ann Tuennerman explain all the good news:
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 BARNEW ORLEANS, LA—December 1, 2008 – Tales of the Cocktail, a cocktail [...]
I interviewed an artist up in Covington for my day job. He asked if I had seen any of Prospect.1, the international art exposition going on all over New Orleans. There are installations and showings of 80 artists from all over the world. The U.S. Mint and the Contemporary [...]
Halloween 2008. It’s been planned for at least a month now. Flash mob, Jackson Square, New Orleans. Pirates vs. Ninjas. Pirates gathered in Pirates Alley (duh), Ninjas in Pere Antoine Alley. At 5pm sharp, an air horn sounded, both sides met at battle in front of St. Louis Cathedral.
Now, [...]
Met the folks today for a nice little brunch at Ralph’s on the Park. Before heading to the park, that is, for some Japan Fest at NOMA.
Started things off with a Sazerac and a little chicken and andouille gumbo:
Finished with the BBQ shrimp and grits. Pretty good, [...]
We went to catch up on streetcar photos for StreetCarArt.com today. They placed another set last week; Nola caught the ones in Lakeview last week and today we went to get the ones installed on Chartres, Jackson Square and at Cafe du Monde. They’ll be posted at the streetcar [...]
Great news via a press release I received today. The opening is set for this coming spring:
FAMED ROOSEVELT HOTEL IN NEW ORLEANS BEING REBORN
AS WALDORF=ASTORIA COLLECTION PROPERTYNEW ORLEANS – Oct. 9, 2008 – The revered Roosevelt Hotel name – which for nearly a half-century meant the finest luxury accommodations, [...]
As Maitri, Karen Gadbois and NolaNotes and many others have pointed out, Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes sustained major damage from Hurricane Gustav. Everyone in the small fishing and shrimping communities, like Dulac, Pointe Aux Chene and Chauvin are severely affected, most are now homeless. Hard-hit were the [...]
It was quite the strange trip yesterday, Labor Day 2008. Gustav beat the odds and made landfall at the exact spot the models had it going to 18 hours before, and within 50 miles or so of the models from 48 hours before. It was not nearly as strong as [...]
Well, it’s two days since the Katrina Anniversary date and here we are expecting another hurricane, Gustav. The storm’s birth and slow growth and progress in the Caribbean have been torturing us for over a week now. It’s certainly distracted me from keeping up with my promised picture-a-day Katrina memorial.
The [...]
One effect of the storm that couldn’t go away quickly enough for some was the proliferation of signs. In the grand scheme of things—like the large pile of debris in the background, flooded homes, lost lives—the temporary signs advertising demolition and construction services that sprouted up and covered every available [...]
This isn’t a destruction photo. It’s from St. Louis No. 1 cemetery on Basin Street. Our family has a tomb there. The archdiocese opened the cemetery on Nov. 1, All Saints Day, in 2005. It was the first time since the storm it had been open to the public and [...]
View from the roof of Harborview Condominiums. You can see where the roof was peeled off, exposing the units in the front of the condos. Out of 100 units, only a few escaped wind and rain damage. Flooding wasn’t an issue for the living units; the building’s ground level was [...]
Alright already. So we’re running behind a bit. Can I say I spent the weekend hunting streetcars for StreetCarArt.com?
Remains of the West End lighthouse and Southern Yacht Club.
A view up the canal along Hwy. 11 in Slidell, you know, where Tites used to be.
[...]
In the Lakeview area off of Fleur De Lis. I never paid attention before, but the car has its own rescue X heiroglyph.
Boat houses along West End that line the marinas. Right after the storm, NOAA release a series of high-resolution aerial photos of New Orleans and Slidell. You could see how bad things were all around West End, the burnt remains of the Southern Yacht Club, the boats piled up in [...]
Alright. The craziness has subsided at work. This should be the last multi-day posting for this series. Here are three from Slidell, where I was living at the time. I came home the last week of September. Most of the trees in the yard had been blown down, but all [...]
I’ve been remiss in my postings. I know, how long can it take to upload a picture? Well, I’m busy.
Here are two more boat-out-of-place photos. The first is a boat I just couldn’t get enough of, photographing it several times until it was finally removed. It’s been tossed up at [...]
Since I was out of the office yesterday, I’ll make it up by posting two pictures today.
The first is a photo of a Porsche Boxter UW (under water edition) that got left behind in the parking garage under my sister’s condo building near the Marina.
The second shot [...]
Well, this one is the house that I believe once stood on the spot where I took yesterday’s picture. It ended up a few blocks down at the corner of Bellaire and 36th Streets.
This is the side of a house on Bellaire. Its backyard was bordered by the 17th Street Canal levee; which broke directly behind it, to the right in this picture. It’s a wonder the whole thing didn’t get washed away. I’d like to be able to say something poignent, like [...]
Taking a pause from cleaning up my sister’s Lake Marina condo, I was intrigued by the way the light struck these mops leaning up against the wall.
This is one of my favorites. It’s a few hundred thousand dollars worth of sailboats that had been lifted up out of their slips and deposited in West End Park on the side of the road. This was near the entrance to the Southern Yacht Club parking lot.
[...]
This is a shot taken looking east across Bellaire Drive down Spencer Avenue. The 17th Street Canal levee breach is directly behind me, making this Ground Zero for the Lakeview flood. Notice the house in the middle of the street in the background. That’s not right. Taken October 30, 2005.
[...]
So for the month of August, I will be posting one picture per day from my Hurricane Katrina aftermath photo collection, in no particular order. First up, the debris pile gathered up on the neutral ground between West End and Pontchartrain boulevards. Probably taken in the middle of October, 2005.
[...]
More from Tales of the Cocktail, day 2 for me, day 3 for everyone else. After attending the absinthe seminar, we headed back downstairs to formulate a plan. A plan never actually materialized, in no small part because we chose the hall outside one of the tasting rooms to [...]
YLC Streetcar artists Paulette Lizano and Will Smith popped up during Tales of the Cocktail at the event’s Cocktail Marketplace on Saturday. Paulette, who is in the process of building her streetcar, “Perley’s Barnyard Party” was there selling glass coasters and plates featuring martini glasses and S&WB meter [...]
I’ve decided to break this Tales of the Cocktail post into a few non-linear small parts. This part covers the first and last happenings of the day, the absinthe seminar and end-of-day cocktails at the Carousel Bar (below).
I continued on my quest at Tales of [...]
With that challenge, Kevin Brauch (the reporter on Iron Chef America who is not Alton Brown, thank Gawd) opened up Tales of the Cocktail.
But first things first. Today’s kick-off event was Toast to Tales of the Cocktail in the Riverview Room of the Hotel Montleone. NOLA [...]
I believe we have a winner of a new tradition in the works. It’s called San Fermin in Nueva Orleans, or more appropriately, the Running of the Bulls in New Orleans. See other coverage here and here.
Held this morning in the Quarter, the New Orleans event pays [...]
Editor’s Note:
Nola’s post on da Schegmann’s jogged many memories. I started to share one in a comment, but it grew out of hand, so it’s now a post.
When I worked at Martin Wine Cellar on Baronne Street while I was at UNO, I once went to the Schwegmann’s [...]
I went on a trip to Houston this weekend for my nephew’s (he’s also my Gawd-child) 11th birthday party. Houston is not my favorite place. Other than my brother’s family, a few friends and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the city just sucks to me. It’s just too big. [...]
Yesterday’s coffee klatch evolved into the ultimate tweet-up: lunch with Nola, Yat Pundit and Ryan (joined by his lovely fiance) at Galatoire’s Restaurant.
Galatoire’s is on Bourbon Street, near the corner at Iberville. Besides fantastic Creole cuisine, it’s famous for quite a few [...]
Well, some folks from the Titterverse broke the cardinal rule of internet socializing and actually met face-to-face yesterday in the real world, or “meat space” as some call it. Nola, Ryan (WarriorEngineer), Ed, (the YatPundit), Charlotte and myself managed a get-together at CC’s on [...]
