Snowed in

My roommate and I spent the entire day playing classic nintendo games at consoleclassix.com. Tetris and Super Mario. Seriously. It's free, and you'll never leave the house again.

Mardi Gras in New Orleans was a blast, with the exception of my delayed plane flight (don't ask) and the fact that I got a free ticket that I can't even use on most of the days I've tried to use it for future travel. I may never fly US Airways again.

I met up with my old DC roommate Chris, who is now living in the Garden District and working (again) for the Times-Picayune. It was his first New Orleans Mardi Gras.



Breland and I also went to the Bacchus Ball and watched the parade come through the convention center. James Gandolfini of the Sopranos was the King and Drew Brees its Grand Marshall. Quite the show. None of my pictures really came out, unfortunately.

I've really enjoyed catching up (over the phone) with some of my old friends from college and working at The Daily Reveille. I think I have almost talked myself in to going to LSU Law School. The amount of money they've offered in scholarship dollars and the ease of moving back to Baton Rouge into my old place where I already have a group of friends is extremely appealing.

Unless Tulane comes through with $$ I think I'll be back in Baton Rouge next year. I'm visiting LSU April 13 just to be sure.

Tomorrow I'm off to the Oral Surgeon to get a consult on getting my wisdom teeth out. No fun, especially in this snow and ice. That's all for now, will write more this week.

Uphill, both ways

Today, for the first time in my life, I walked through snow to get to work. This wasn't pretty, awe-inspiring Colorado snow, though. I'm used to that. This was the disgusting, muddy, exhaust-infused snow/slush that covered downtown Washington on my walk to work.

I received the best text message ever this morning -- that I didn't have to arrive to work until Noon instead of my usual 9 a.m.. My boss had determined that since it took a car 10 minutes to drive up the hill near his house because of the road conditions that perhaps it wasn't safe to require people to come in so early. I slept until 11.

Saturday I am heading home to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, and Breland and I will be attending the Bacchus ball on Sunday night. I'm very excited and can't wait to get home.

Mardi Gras goes crazy

Who would have thought that I would party more here in Washington, D.C. for Mardi Gras than I have for the actual event in New Orleans the last few years. This entire week has been filled with great king cake parties, happy hours and most importantly, Louisiana food. From Hot Boudin to white chocolate bread pudding, it was like being home for the week. The arrival of a few of my friends from Baton Rouge and New Orleans helped make the week go by quickly (especially since I spent a lot less time sleeping and a lot more time out and about).

And it all led up to the D.C. Mardi Gras ball last night (and this morning). I didn't return back to my apartment until about 4 a.m. In a word, it was amazing. Definitely the most fun I've ever had at a Mardi Gras event.

We began the day Saturday around 1 p.m. at Old Ebbitt Grill for my friend (and old roommate) Jason Doré's birthday. Needless to say that's where the drinking started. About five hours (and a number of cocktails) later I found myself in my tuxedo in Rep. Bobby Jindal's suite. Jason and I took the picture with the man who wants to be Louisiana's next governor.



I met up with the rest of the LSU in DC crew at Rep. Richard Baker's suite. All of the congressional delgation as well as the ball's royalty had hospitality suites where they invited constituents and friends to come and eat, drink and basically be merry.



After the suite-hopping we went down to the actual ball, where a few of my friends and I had secured a place in Bobby Jindal's box (thanks to his communications director). From there we watched the parade of princesses and queens, the krewe and the congressional delegations' entourages.
(Below) King of Washington Mardi Gras Boysie Bollinger and Queen Elizabeth Chance, an LSU student, from their seat on their float which toured the football field-sized ballroom.


The most fun thing about the ball for me was walking around and playing find the politicians. Kathleen Blanco, Mitch Landrieu, Ron Forman, the entire Louisiana congressional delegation and a few former legislators as well.

As the night began to wind down, my new roommate Veronica and I caught up with former Sen. John Breaux.


It was a great night. Definitely one for the books.

Protest Pics

When Breland was in town two weekends ago we went to the anti-war protest on the mall (much to her objection, she's a Republican, don't ask). It's taken a while but I finally downloaded the pictures to my computer.



The protest was interesting, I don't have any pictures but I wore one of the "no troop surge" stickers for a little while... Then I took it off because I still can't get over that whole journalistic ethics thing.

There were lots of students there, holding banners and yelling for and end to the war. I understand why people are so passionate about this issue, I know I feel strongly about bringing our troops home, and it felt good to see that many people rallied together for one cause. It was quite a scene. Providing background music was the group of guys dressed in black armed with a megaphone, shouting the clever protest phrase: "Hey Bush, what do you say? How many kids did you kill today?"



My favorite was the "Impeach Cheney First" posters. Can't say I disagree with that one. News reports said that there were close to 50,000 people there. Didn't look like it at this point, but this was well before the marching part of the protest.



Back later this weekend with more information about DC Mardi Gras. What a week this has been. The ball is tomorrow (Saturday) night.