Last time I was settling into life as a shift worker and am now well adjusted to not having a set schedule. So many things have been happening at work to screw up my shifts that I don’t think I’ve managed to complete a full 2 week cycle. Does mean that I can quickly adjust to a new schedule pretty quickly now.
Life in the US has been good recently, plenty of socialising and new activities. A few of us went and played a few games of whirlyball a couple of weeks ago. Whirlyball is basically a mix between polo, lacross and basketball played on bumper cars. A tremendous amount of fun with much screaming and shouting, I highly suggest it to anyone who finds themselves in the Chicago area for whatever reason.
A fairly large group of us recently went on a one day ski-trip a couple of hours away in Wisconsin. The place was called Wilmot Mountain. I’m not 100% certain what the definition of a mountain is but this place definitely wasn’t one. Still I had a great day zipping up and down the small runs. The most amusing part of the day was spent watching one particular friend who suffers from a slight over-confidence problem attempting to ski. He perfected the method of stopping where you fall on your back and spin around. How he didn’t hit anyone, I will never know. I also had my first experience as an instructor guiding two friends, who had never been skiing, down a slope. Can’t say I was the greatest instructor, but they got down in one piece.
I also had my first big trip out of Chicago last weekend. For those of you who don’t know what Fat Tuesday is allow me to call it by it’s more common name. Mardi Gras.
Have to say that New Orleans way of celebrating the beginning of Lent is much more amusing than Shrove Tuesday. A group of 6 of us made the trip down. After looking into flights it was decided that it would be better and cheaper to rent a car and drive down. 14 hours and one speeding ticket later (not me I hasten to add) we arrived in New Orleans and prepared for the 4 day extravaganza that is Mardi Gras.
The first night we spent at the parade route. Mardi Gras has no shortage of parades that get bigger and better the closer to the actual Tuesday you get. This parade was nothing special. The floats drive by and throw beads at you. The atmosphere was extremely festive, everyone was out to have a good time. After a dinner at a Chinese restaurant (I say Chinese and I say restaurant, the food was so bad I’m not sure if I can call it that) some of us crashed at the hotel and the rest went out to Bourbon Street, the local party area. I was in the group that crashed, 14 hour drive combined with the inability to sleep in cars meant I was shattered.
The next day we decided to do some touristy things so we went on an airboat tour out in the Louisiana swamps. Fantastic fun, the guide was extremely knowledgeable and funny and he managed to catch an alligator, so we all got a chance to hold it and have our pictures taken. One woman on the boat was completely freaked out and it was only after some teasing from her husband that she decided to hold it. Afterwards we were directed to a local Mom and Pop restaurant where we sampled the local cuisine. The evening was once again spent at the parade route. We picked a spot along the main route and discovered that Sean Payton was on the balcony just above us. Sean Payton is the coach of the New Orleans Saints, who had won the Superbowl a week before. So he is considered royalty in New Orleans now. The parade was much the same as the previous night’s one. One highlight being the float with Drew Brees on. Drew Brees is the New Orleans quarterback, so he is also royalty in that city. The rest of the evening was spent on Bourbon Street. We found a very amusing karaoke bar called the Cat’s Meow. The atmosphere in this place was that of a small gig with an extremely popular band. The difference being the band was whichever drunken person got up the courage to go on stage and perform. Fantastic fun especially when people were clever with their song choices. By this I mean they chose songs that the entire crowd would know, therefore they didn’t have to sing and just acted out their rock star dreams on the stage.
Monday was spent wondering around New Orleans, after lunch we wondered down to the riverside and chanced upon a small stage with some bands playing. This was the Lundi Gras festival (Fat Monday) we decided to stay and watch for a while. The MC got on stage and announced they had a very special guest. The guest was the rapper Ludacris. Admittedly I’m not his greatest fan. But it was still pretty cool getting someone as big as that as a guest performance. After his 30 minute set, we went to a nearby casino, where I managed to only lose $10. Another one of us lost $90. He wasn’t that happy with himself. The evening was spent in a club called The Beach. An entertaining club, that played a large mix of music. They were playing standard club dance music, then completely out of the blue Enter Sandman was played, followed by a couple of songs such as Limp Bizkit and Iron Maiden. Then back to dance music, very odd.
The final day was spent again wondering around New Orleans. As this was the actual Mardi Gras, there was a parade that seemed to go on all day, made getting around the town quite interesting as there were very few places where you could cross the parade route. During this day we encountered a very entertaining break dance toupe. A second much smaller parade and a guy who made fantastic paintings using spray paint. The evening was again spent at The Beach.
That’s the update for now. Hope you are all well and thanks for reading.
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