Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans?

[BOSSHOG]

[JanMichael]

1. Yes, I do.

North Carolina here.

But, I loved New Orleans.

I am so sorry.

Stephanie

[Inland]

2. I don't know New Orleans. But there are cities I love.

I can imagine the loss of place, of home, of community to a permanent exile. I hope for better.

[Straight Shooter]

3. Home is home and there is no place like it on earth.

Did Dorothy click her heels together and say "There's no place like relocation"?

F*ck bush.

[Kukesa]

4. That was a song by

Louis Armstrong, wasn't it?

It seems so appropriate at this time.

[Catherine Vincent]

5. I'm just glad I was able to visit New Orleans

when it was still New Orleans. :-(

[annabanana]

6. having a tough night?

It is a sorrowful thing what happened to your beautiful city,
I am so sorry.

[Somawas]

7. Lord, yes.

I was posting on another board tonight about the differences between Antoine's creole remoulade and Galatoire's. And almost cried.

[Rowdyboy]

8. Yes, I do

We grieve together

[roguevalley]

12. The city always reminded me of something with one foot in the world

and one foot beyond. What a delicate and intricate and wonderful jewel it was. I am AGHAST at a level I've never felt still over this.

[BOSSHOG]

13. Thanks Rowdy

Great pic. That's been awhile ago huh? Mona's Boutique? Did that evolve into Mona's? And now is gone? I'm a little whiney tonight. I'm getting a little personal about all the bulldoze this and bulldoze that and reduce the size of the city crap. If my tax dollars can be spent in Iraq they damn sure can be spent on Levees in New Orleans. Silly me, its only the port city of the Gulf of Mexico.

And the next time some neanderthal motherfucker starts yacking at me about the sanctity of marriage I'm gonna ram my Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal up their ass.

All the Best to you and yours Rowdy, BH!

[Alamom]

9. No, I don't know your pain. I can only try to imagine what you

must feel. I can try to visulize what the once beautiful coast from Al and so much worse, Ms and La must look like now. I lived on Mobile Bay near Bayou La Batre for several years. We made the trip via I-10 to New Orleans as often as possible. We walked and shopped on the Riverwalk. Danced to the music on Boubon Street. Ate at one special place in the French Quarter. Visted the Aquarium. We drove through neigborhoods and took in the sights and sounds of the old and beautiful streets, homes and buildings.
No I can not know your pain....I can only imagine from the pictures I see and find it hard to believe (still) that this has happened and I am truly sorry.

[SammyWinstonJack]

10. I think I do? Plenty of history there! A great American city!

I was lucky enough to visit once in '95. It was a life long dream that I finally was able to realize! I had a great time! I hope your city comes back BOSSHOG!

[AccessGranted]

11. I Truly Loved New Orleans....Almost Moved There

I had always wanted to go to new Orleans, so about 4 years ago my fiance took me for my birthday. We loved it so much we seriously considered moving there. We had actually started looking at houses and jobs in and around New Orleans, but then I did some research on the possibility of flooding and we decided against it. Also, the salaries and job market were not like they are where we live now.

Before I went to New Orleans I'd always had this image of a city that was just one big non-stop party, but when I got there I realized that the tourist area is a lot of fun, but small.

It was the people that I fell in love with and the vibes I felt. The people were so nice. They were so full of pride and so willing to talk about their history in New Orleans. Almost everybody I talked to was like a historian about the place. There was such a powerful feeling of warmth there.

I did the tourist thing. Went on the riverboat. Partied. Enjoyed the food. Jazz clubs. The street artists and performers. Just watching the sunset over the Mississippi. Cemetery tour. Ghost tour. Sex shops. Voodoo shops. Jackson Square. Horse and buggy ride through the French Quarter. I even stayed in a historic bed and breakfast instead of a hotel. We didn't rent a car, so we just rode the trolley car up and down St. Charles, took cabs and walked. I even went to Anne Rice's house and talked to a member of her staff and took a handful of dirt and leaves from the front yard (I still have it).

The best part of all was listening to the stories from the old-timers. I went all over and everybody I met from the senior citizens to the teenagers were pleasant and friendly. From the French Quarter to the Garden District to the Ninth Ward I met some of the most pleasant people ever.

I am so sorry about what happened and I pray for all that were affected by it.

[Kukesa]

14. Here are the words to Louis Armstrong's song:

Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans
And miss it, each night and day
I know I'm not wrong, the feelings getting stronger, the longer I stay away
Miss the moss covered vines, the tall sugar pines
Where mocking birds used to sing
And I'd like to see the lazy Mississippi, a hurryin' into spring
The moonlight on the bayou, a Creole tune that fills the air
I dream about magnolias in June
And soon I'm wishing that I were there

- Louis Armstrong, "Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans"

[me b zola]

26. Thanks for that. I was going to reply, "And miss it each night & day"

[Kukesa]

33. You're quite welcome.

It's terribly sad and terribly appropriate.

(BTW I stole the words from VolcanoJen's blog -- she included the song early on.)

[DemoTex]

15. My small jazz band and big band played gigs in NO in the 60s.

My Dixieland band went to the Dominican Republic during the revolution there in there mid-60s. We also played in NO in 1966. My college band, the Auburn Knights, was a 16-piece swing-band that had regular gigs on the Gulf coast. I was the string bassist in both bands. So .. yes, I know what it means to miss New Orleans. In fact, I have the Galatoir's (and Pascale Manalies') twitch. I need a Crab Imperial fix, quick!



Bennett in New Orleans!

[BOSSHOG]

34. We're gonna do that DemoTex

Crab Imperial or Deanie's foot high Seafood Platter or whatever strikes your fancy. I'd love to hear your band. Live. In Jackson Square.

[ismnotwasm]

16. No

I couldn't possibly. It was one of my goals to go, and it will never be the same when I do. (I'm still going) One of my daughter had planned to go for her first time this year. New Orleans ran so deep in American culture, I think there was a little piece in everybody. Now that little piece has been ripped out. I grieve New Orleans, and I've never been there. I don't know if many of us will ever be able to fully comprehend it. Only the ones who knew and loved the city and it's history. The lore keepers. I hope as much as possible can be saved.

[alarcojon]

17. I lived there one summer and one winter

and it is one of a kind. It is too sad for words what has happened to it.

I used to take the trolley every day from the end of the line at Carrolton/Claiborn, down past Tulane and into downtown, eat some delicious grub, listen to some great music....

[Carni]

19. The music/ just by street musicians was UNREAL

I heard the best blues guitarist ever there...some old guy (like 75)
was just jamming on a tiny platform in a dumpy bar.

I have seen a lot of the so called guitar greats a couple of times in concert and they could not hold a candle to the old guy I saw.

He was the real deal and doesn't it figure that I don't even know his name.

[KamaAina]

20. Holy cats! You lived in my old neighborhood!

I used to take the trolley every day from the end of the line at Carrolton/Claiborn

I lived three blocks riverside from there ('89-'91). I had a roommate who used to sell tamales out of a cart right in front of the grocery store at that corner (closed well before Katrina). Believe it or not, in a place that had so much political apathy, that was where I got radicalized; fell in with a bunch of wild wanton feminists :loveya:

Mom now chides me for "obsessing" over New Orleans. So what if I was only there two years? I was only at Yale for less than two years (transfer student), and that was a formative experience for me, too!

[alarcojon]

22. I lived a block south of that CVS

This was back in '95.

[Carni]

18. I have missed it since 1988

I was there for a week on my honeymoon and by the end of the week I wanted to move there.

If they displace the people they plan on screwing out of their homes the city will never be the same.

The old buildings are beautiful, the food is wonderful, but it's the people and their spirit and their unique character that make that city what it is.

I cannot express to you how sick I am about all of this :(

[shenmue]

21. Great city

The people were wonderful and the place had such incredible character. I still can't believe what happened.



:cry:

[KamaAina]

23. What's with all the "was" and past tense stuff?

We will be back. We are already back, some of us; French Quarter bar owners are already bitching about the midnight curfew, claiming, with considerable justification, that it's costing them much-needed business!

Don't believe everything (or much of anything, actually) you see on CNN. Bosshog's invitation to the French Quarter Festival in April '06 still stands, I do believe.

[alarcojon]

27. Amen to that

I plan on going and leaving some tourist dollars behind sometime soon.

[mcscajun]

28. April '06 -- sounds like a Damned Fine Notion.

Penciling it in now.

[BOSSHOG]

30. New Orleans IS, WAS and WILL BE

Thanks so much to KamaAina for setting that straight. Get thee to the Quarter with great haste and the festival, oh my!!!!! And there is a bar in the quarter, don't have no key, so can't lock up. Don't tell nobody but Johnny White's Sport's Bar will be there when you are.

[Merusault]

24. Absolutely

I live in Jefferson Parish. But school, work, and friends were all in Orleans. At least I will be back to school in January, and the office will be moving back to N.O. early next year.

[mcscajun]

25. Yes...but mostly No. Unfortunately.

I have a feel for Louisiana, but have never been to the Big Easy.
I've been to Louisiana twice in the past 10 years, and neither time did I get to N.O. My plans (pre-Katrina) were to finally get down there this fall. Now, when I do get there, it won't be city that was. :(

It'll come back, but it'll never be exactly what it was pre-Katrina, and those of us who never knew N.O. are the poorer for that.

[NMDemDist2]

29. you probably didn't see the thread we started in the lounge of our

New Orleans stories

IIRC it was brainshrub (or maybe unblock) who started it as the horrible pictures started rolling in that first few days.

when the advanced search is available again I'll see if I can find it and PM you a link

[CrownPrinceBandar]

31. I do....

I lived there for a year back in the early 90's. One of the most magical places I ever had the fortune of spending time in. I loved that place.

Fuck the naysayers, BOSSHOG. NOLA will be back, and with a vengeance. And when it does, I promise I'll meet you at Cooter Brown's and buy you an Abita.

[Just Me]

32. *cry*,...I can't say that I literally do,...

,...but, I can imagine being in the shoes of those who have lost their home 'cause,...I have been through that.

:hug:

[Rex]

35. No

The scale of the destruction and response by FEMA has fucked up my head.

[peekaloo]

36. Not yet. Won't sink in until I make another drive from Tx. to Fl.

ALWAYS spent the night in N.O. on the return trip. :-(

[newspeak]

37. love New Orleans

Beignets and chicory coffee--yum!!! The food, the music, the people, the history---miss it!!!! Niece lived in Metairie and we loved visiting. First time I had fried pickles!!!!!

[ornotna]

38. No, I do not

But I have an idea. It's home.


Heard this interview on NPR...quite moving.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4852058


Click the listen button

[Booster]

39. There's not another place in the entire United States that's even

close to what New Orleans is. And as soon as she's ready to receive visitors, I'm coming over there and party my butt off. I'm tearing up just thinking about the good times I've had there, and I hope the next Mardi Gras is the biggest and bestest ever cause you guys deserve a great party.:grouphug:

[VPStoltz]

40. I knew I had to go from the first time I heard the Stones singin'

about it. It really is like nothing else - the weather is positively sensuous. Any street in the FQ except Bourbon is worth exploring. I've spent enough time to there to cover the cemeteries, a party over in Algiers at the float factory, Tipitinas every night for a week, out to the MapleLeaf for the mid-summer Mardi Gras, shave ice out at the lake. I love it there, and the MUSIC? No sense talkin' about it.

[KamaAina]

41. Actually even Bourbon can be worth exploring

downtown from about Dumaine, Bourbon loses the touristy/fratboy vibe and becomes another interesting street in the Lower Quarter.

I once went to a crawfish boil some friends had on lower Bourbon. Yeah, "suck the head, squeeze the tip!"

I fully expect that the Quarter will become more residential, and thus even more worth exploring, as people look to return to the not-quite-as-low-lying historic core of the city. There are many marginal B&B units there (that were banned in my day!) that are probably worth more as apartments now.

[in_cog_ni_to]

42. I do.

:loveya:

[OneBlueSky]

43. somethin' like this? . . .

Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans
And miss it each night and day
I know I'm not wrong... this feeling's gettin' stronger
The longer, I stay away
Miss them moss covered vines...the tall sugar pines
Where mockin' birds used to sing
And I'd like to see that lazy Mississippi...hurryin' into spring

The moonlight on the bayou.......a Creole tune.... that fills the air
I dream... about Magnolias in bloom......and I'm wishin' I was there

Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans
When that's where you left your heart
And there's one thing more...I miss the one I care for
More than I miss New Orleans

(instrumental break)

The moonlight on the bayou.......a Creole tune.... that fills the air
I dream... about Magnolias in bloom......and I'm wishin' I was there

Do you know what it means to miss New Orleans
When that's where you left your heart
And there's one thing more...I miss the one I care for
More.....more than I miss.......New Orleans

[lies and propaganda]

44. with every fiber of my being

no BushCo folly has ever killed me more. Im from Shreveport and have been out of state for 6 or so years, but I had beautiful plans about my little southern belle daughters,a nd how I would be that creepy garden District lady on all the damn commitees.

I just hope one day it would be possible without poisoning myself to be there.