Life coming at me

For part of Bobby's Christmas presents, I got him tickets to the New Orleans Bowl, where his alma mater, Troy University, was playing. We left Tuscaloosa Sunday morning to head down to the Big Easy, and we spent a good chunk of the afternoon exploring a portion of the French Quarter (after getting only slightly lost trying to find it — freakin' New Orleans streets don't want you to turn left ANYWHERE).

Once we parked we hit Decatur Street. After walking around and just looking for a few minutes (and, funnily enough, running into someone Bobby knew — people from Troy who went on and on about how great he is ;)), we ended up in the Crescent City Brewhouse.

The sign outside boasted that this place brewed its own beer, so we decided that would be a great place to sit down and have a drink. We decided to each have the five-beer sampler, which was a sample of each of the in-house brews (I would share the names, but I can't remember all of them ... I know one was the Red Stallion, one was the Weiss and another was the Christmas Weiss; can't remember the other two). The beer was pretty good -- definitely strong, I thought. I think the Red Stallion was my favorite, and the Weiss was probably my least favorite. The Weiss tasted like banana and cloves. Yeah, not a good combination.

We had planned to eat dinner in the French Quarter, so we went ahead and ordered a couple of things off the menu at the Crescent City Brewhouse, too. We ordered the Baked Brie (an appetizer), which came with an apple chutney, roasted garlic and fresh green grapes. Oh, my goodness. It was DE-LICIOUS. Bobby also ordered a side of andouille dressing, and it was even better than the Brie, if that's possible. It was seriously delicious.

After our beer, Brie and dressing, we wandered around for a little while longer and came across what I think was Bobby's favorite place we visited: a cigar shop called "Cigar Factory." The people there hand-roll the cigars. As Bobby put it, the place smelled like leather and tobacco; a "very cowboy smell," I say.

Bobby bought a pretty nice cigar that he smoked while we continued to walk around. Due to my apparently pea-sized bladder (yeah, pun ... ha ha), we ended up in a bar called The Green Room, drinking Vodka Gimlets so I could use the bathroom. The gimlets were not so great; it was my first experience with one, and it didn't really make me want to try it again. Way too much lime. Bobby says that's not really how they're supposed to taste.

It finally got to be about game time, so we hopped back in the car and headed toward the Superdome. We ended up getting a good parking spot, but we had to pay $20 for it! By the time we got all that settled, I was in painful need of a restroom again; there was the horrible tease of a couple of port-a-potties that ended up being padlocked before we finally made our way around to our gate and into the blessed, wonderful (and warm) bathrooms of the Superdome.

The game itself was fun, even though Troy ended up losing. We spent the night in Slidell and headed back to Tuscaloosa this morning. We are going back to NOLA next week for the Sugar Bowl, and we'll get to spend a couple of days this time instead of just a quick trip. I'm excited!

(And another pic just because I like it -- taken in the New Orleans Hotel in the French Quarter:)