Mardi Gras

The one thing that did come out of the New Year’s festivities was that I agreed to go down to Baton Rouge, Louisiana the following month for my friend Corinne’s Birthday. It just so happened that it also happened to be the same week Mardi Gras fell on. What fun that was! I met Corinne’s roommate, Ambre, and some of her other friends from college. They were all so nice. Having never experienced a Mardi Gras, I was amazed by the excitement and energy generated by the revelers. The first night Corinne had work, so I ended up being ‘babysat’ byher friends Ambre and Stacey and went with them to New Orleans. We stopped off at Stacey’s parent’s house first. Stacey grew up in Louisiana, so she was a native. Then we met up with two girls named Alison and Regan and followed them to some guy named Jason’s house. There we met Jason, Jennifer and Sean. Sean was Regan’s brother and was dating Alison. We followed their car to New Orleans.Our first stop was “The Cat’s Meow” bar in the French Quarter.After that I went to my first Mardi Gras parade. At the parade we met a really cool Marine named Jim from Minnesota.and stationed in Mississippi. Regan and Jim hit it off, so Jim came with us to a bar called The Fourth Quarter after the parade. At the bar, we met more New Yorkers who naturally hit on the girls we came with. Alison had really took a liking to me. It may have been because I was from New York or the fact we were both big Beatles fans, but no matter what the reason, her boyfriend didn’t like how his drunk girlfriend came over and bounced on my knee while I was trying to talk to Jim. And this was after she kissed one of the New Yorkers. Things turned South pretty quickly. Ambre and I had to get a very drunk Stacey home and away from the guys. Alison was in tears because her boyfriend broke up with her. As we tried to get Stacey to the car she would bolt for any open doorway in which music would resonate making things quite interesting.

The next day we were supposed to stop at that Sean’s apartment before going to one of the day time parades. Alison and Sean made up but after we got there, that same girl was parading around in just a t-shirt and panties while we were waiting on others. Her boyfriend scolded her for not putting on pants around me and she shot back that it wasn’t anything that I wouldn’t see at a beach. That was apparently not what he wanted to hear. When he glanced over at me I shrugged my shoulders and pretended not to notice. We agreed to meet them at a certain location and quickly left. I was informed by her later at the parade that she wasn’t allowed to talk to me anymore. I understood, but I was unnerved by the fact she wore huge sunglasses the entire time. I didn’t want to give in to the red-neck southern abusive spouse stereotype, but it did occur to me. Or it may just be because she had been crying. Needless to say, after the parade, we parted ways with that group and went our own way. We had a blast. By then I was a pro at collecting beads from the floats. I knew the cheap ones from the valuable ones. The last parade we attended had 158 tractor trailer floats with David Schwimmer as Grand Marshall. I still have a stack of plastic cups he threw out to me from the float. Halfway through this parade both Stacey and Ambre had lost their inhibitions and were flashing each truck that past. Luckily for me, they were both short, and I caught any valuable beads that went over their heads.

  Corinne was shocked by the quantity of beads and miscellaneous spoils we had acquired (My favorite being a leather canteen). Afterwards, we went bar hoping in which the girls flirted with some guys and I flirted with random girls, giving away some most coveted beaded necklaces and then earning them back. I met one girl named Alphia from Tennessee who was so sweet and I loved her accent.

  Overall, I was shocked at the culture surrounding Mardi Gras down there. Malls close early when a parade is scheduled nearby. Younger children make money by collecting beaded necklaces and selling them back to parade organizers for pennies on the dollar. Then, after the parades, a huge street cleaning machine follows that sucks EVERYTHING up. Not like the ones in New York that just push things around under the guise of street sweeping.

I had a second bag for the return flight home just to bring back all my ‘treasure’.  I had so much fun. I always said I was going to do it again.  Why haven’t I?