The Agrinautica

   Back in OC after a week living the dream in New Orleans.

   We got there through George Bush International Airport in Houston, TX. It was there taking a picture of George Bush Senior as a fashion model that I realized I'd forgotten the memory card for my camera. As new one's were 40 bucks (at least in the airport) I decided I'd rather go without than spend $40 on something I already had at home, so all the subsequent pictures were taken by Mark or at least with his camera.
   In New Orleans, or as the locals abbreviate it, Nola, Mark & I caught up with Aaron Aviv & his cousin Coralie (sp?) at Aaron's place in South Carrolton. (The four of us pictured at right). The trolley line right in front of Aaron's place down St Charles Ave had just reopened two days prior, providing us with very convenient transportation options.

   The first evening (Friday) we went to a bar called Cooter Brown near the St Charles / Carrolton intersection and I had a spicey alligator sausage "po boy" (Which is NewOrleansian for "sandwich" apparently). On other evenings we visited other bars and altogether played a lot of darts and pool and even some jenga (Also Mark was undefeatable at "connect-four," damn mormons and their family games nights!).
   We also went out to Bourbon Street several nights and it was always crazy out there. Even the first night, which should have been far enough from New Years to be more or less just a random night in December, it was wild out there like it would only be on a holiday in most towns. Every night the police had these mobile sniper nests set up at intersections on Bourbon Street. Also the police tended to lollygag about in groups of seven with their backs to the crowd and by all accounts are more or less useless. The place was always swarming with them though -- I think the city keeps thinking "man our police are useless, they need more money and men!" and throw money at them without ever actually making them more useful, so they just stand around in big gaggles. Also, and perhaps because of the uselessness of the police, apparently the military police STILL have jurisdiction in New Orleans and can often be seen driving around on patrol.

   Anyway, the first day, Saturday, we went down to the National WWII Museum and checked it out (hence the tank in the background of the above picture). And since I was wearing a Navy watchcap, Navy peacoat, and combat boots, my friends made me take a picture in front of a boat. (=
   Aaron had a 24 hour shift in some locked cryptological coastguard room from 8am Sunday to 8am Sunday so took the trolley down to the French Quarter and wandered about. That evening we walked down to the corner of St Charles & Carrolton again but all the sources of local faire were closed or super busy so we ended up having chinese food, which was alright. One of the quotes of the week came out of a fortune cookie there: "A bullet is a dream with a deadline" Cold! Actually it said "goal" not "bullet," but I misheard. Then we trolleyed ourselves downtown.

   Monday, New Years Eve, we spent the day wandering the French Quarter again. That evening we ate at this Louisiana Pizza Kitchen (which was really just ordinary Italian food, but delicious!), also at the intersection of St Charles & Carrolton. I had a pizza w/ pepperoni, sausage, & fresh basil and omg it was delicious.
   For New Years Eve evening we decided to truly live it up and went to a club called "Ampersand" (&) with Aaron's roommate Jeremiah and former roommate Jeff. There we caught up with Aaron's friends Pierce & Pierce's Boyfriend who happened to have a VIP booth that they smuggled us all into, so we were feeling really hoity toity for the new year. I also befriended this girl Amanda from the next booth over. Good times ensued.
   Tuesday I believe we went down to the French Quarter and wandered again. That night we went to trivia night at an Irish Pub between two FEMA trailers and won a plate of potatoes. Also the owners heaped beer on us for some reason (bottles of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, I'd a rather had guinness though).

   Wednesday we went across the longest bridge in the world, 28 miles seriously, right across the middle of lake Punch-a-train to Mandeville to visit my 96-year-old great-aunt Iseult. There we ate at a nice restuarant she recommended and experienced turtle soup. We also ordered mint juleps to heighten the southern experience, and, enforcing our southern stereotypes, our waittress had a black eye like she'd been hit in the face. d=
   Also all the buildings in Mandeville are on really high stilts.

   Wednesday evening I checked out the Camellia Grill (at the usual intersection of St Charles & Carrolton), which apparently is famous enough to have a wikipedia page but it really didn't seem that exciting so I ate across the street at the Italian place again, which once again was totally delicious. From there Amanda and I caught up with Mark & Aaron where they were playing trivia at this packed bar called The Bulldog. Good times were had.

   Thursday Mark & I returned to OC. This morning (Friday) Mark left for Portland, and I'm catching a train in three hours for Flagstaff, Arizona, to experience some snow and search for a silver pinecone.

   So this evening as I'm coming home from hanging out with Aaron & his friends in Coto de Caza, I see Feldspar sitting on my lawn. "Strongsauce!" I think, since I haven't seen Feldspar much lately. I call to Feldspar, but he seems intently interested in a nearby shrub.
   Suddenly he pounces on it, and out rushes a little bird with Feldspar in hot pursuit. The bird looks mostly grown up but its flapping its wings in a wholly unsuccessful attempt to fly. )=
   So I run in to intercept and break Feldspar's chase. Then for a bit Feldspar & I are both stalking the bird, him on one side of the car and me on the other. Eventually the bird stops and actually lets me get close enough to touch it.. pretendign to be an inanimate object I guess. It flaps wildly if I try to hold it, but it lets me nudge it so that its standing on its own on my hand. I put it on top of a nearby thick hedge. Hopefully it will be able to stay out of Feldspar's reach up in there. The end.

   I arrive at Court on Friday to find a table there is absolutely heaping with St Patricks Day themed desserts & snacks -- including TWO complete cakes, a set of cupcakes, as well as chips & dip et cetera. Someone remarks "If you want healthy food, its all in criminal division, they have celery & carrots and things." I wonder if the different faire is caused by subtle psychological nuances related to working in criminal versus civil division, or merely a groupthink effect forged by the personalities of people who happen to work in the respective divisions.

   On Saturday Kristy & I made an expedition to Roseville and retrieved my Mercedes.
   On Sunday I put the car through a trial run .. by driving it the 400+ miles from Davis down to Orange County.
   On Monday I hung out with my good friend Petty Officer 2nd Class Aaron Aviv, who's back on leave from the USCGC¹ WPC-13² Shamal. We (Him & I plus two of his friends) were nerdcore and went to this place that has like 200 networked computers and played Battlefield 2.
   Today is Tuesday, I don't know what I'm doing this evening yet, but hopefully I'm doing something.
   Tomorrow, Wednesday, I return to Davis.
   On Thursday, Kristy & I are seeing Franz Ferdinand in Sacramento.
   On Friday a large group of us, approximately consisting of the group of people who usually go on the annual New Years Tahoe trip (which didn't occur this year), will go on a roadtrip down to Vegas. We will return on Monday.

¹United States Coast Guard Cutter
²W? Patrol Coastal


   My internet is acting extremely wonky at the moment. Pages on livejournal & wikipedia are opening fine, but most other pages are not opening at all. Previous to these problems there had been no changes to the set up here since last night when everything was working fine -- except Myspace;
   Myspace is also not loading at all now, but yesterday my login would bring me to the "register new user" page. If I typed in an obviously bogus login, it would tell me I had the wrong username/password, and I further confirmed that it was recognizing my login by telling it I forgot my password and verifying that the information it sent back to me was what I was typing in -- so for some reason its recognizing my login as not a nonaccount or incorrect login, but sending me to the register new account screen.
   And of course AIM is down. This is all extremely alarming because AIM is the principal way I communicate with people and during my very short stay here its extremely important to me to try to make the most out of my visit and see as many of my friends as I can. Myspace is also important to this goal.. I was able to briefly get through and post a bulletin announcing I'm in town, but otherwise I'm cut off from myspace as well for some reason. )=
   Update 9:24pm - things seem to be working better now.


In Other News: So I have a radio in my room here, unlike in Davis, so I'm catching up with whats on the radio now ... and its SHIT. Man what crap, I'm not missing anything. I'm suprised by how often Green Day - When September Ends is still on, man I loathe that song. I can't believe such an obnoxious affliction to the ears was spawned by Green Day. --update 6:44 GOD ITS ON AGAIN!!!! IT MAKES ME WANT TO DIE


Picture of the Day

Bailey celebrates St Patricks Day
He had a moment of celebrity as the St Patricks Day image on the front page of Daviswiki for most of the day.
See also: stuffonmycat.com

   So New Orleans has been completely destroyed. My best friend Aaron Davis and Grear Aunt Iseult live there (well in neighbouring Biloxi and Mandelburg respectively).
   Iseult is 93 and still has a thick Irish accent despite having lived in Mandelburg for the past fifty or so years. Apparently she got a ride out of town before the hurricane and returned to find her house in pretty good shape, on account of it being built on stilts and thusly avoiding being flooded. Craftiness.

   Haven't heard from Aaron yet, but I'm sure he was right in the middle of it. And I'm sure he was alright. Petty Officer 3rd Class (or something) Davis is in the coast guard you see, so I don't expect to hear from him until he's done doing some serious lifesaving. Here is a picture of him sitting on $80 million worth of cocaine.

   Local Diedrichs urchins Kyle and Matt Christie apparently are planning on volunteering with Red Cross and getting shipped to the New Orleans area to help in shelters.


   Computers are still crashed here. This computer is ancient and for unknown reasons will usually not get an instant messenger connection, but does sometimes randomly. Thing won't play music but has a CD Burner so I resorted to burning the few songs I could find onto a CD and playing it on a nearby stereo.

   Recently halved my workweek down to 40 hours a week.


Picture of the Day

   Saturday was Sashie (slosha)'s birthday party. She reasoned that the cops were gonna break up the party after 11 anyway, so they might as well get as much partying in before that as possible - so the party officially started at 5pm.

   But first, Saturday morning, Sashie and her boyfriend Nizzle made a sumptuous breakfast of eggs and bacon for several of us.
   Kritsy and I got to the party at around 6 I think but there was already a nice little party underway. Originally they had around 180 jello shots made (and they mix them so that they're like a shot per jello shot), and a cooler of jungle juice¹ (along with some other beer). When I arrived a guy with no shirt who goes by "smilie" was distributing jello shots. I had about six in the first five minutes, and I think he must have had like nine or ten. He was also pushing what he called a "slimey carbomb" (jello shot in beer), and then invented the "slimey jungle" (jello shot in jungle juice). I found both of these rather tedious - the point of a jello shot is it doesn't involve drinking isn't it?
   Anyway the party was pretty excellent. Lots of people showed up, even Azver eventually. I commandeered one of the disposable cameras for awhile and took some pictures, notably I documented Rennie seducing Little Colleen.

   Eventually as the night wore on, people started scampering off to safeway for food and returning - the convenience of living right next to safe-way.

¹I don't know how universal the term is but jungle juice = strong alcohol (in this case vodka) in juice.


Quote of the Day: "Kris and Aaron aren't similar - they're the SAME person" -Olivia. Incidentally upon meeting Aaron, Adrian described him as "Kris and Azver's lovechild."


Dad-dad - from the mail-bag!
   Got an email from my paternal grandfather, "Dad-dad" (it all started when while my brothers and are were still very wee, my paternal grandmother asked us to call her "Daddy's Mum." Daddysmum spread to Dad-dad and Mum-mum, but didn't effect my maternal grandfather, who is called by everyone, his own children included, "Roger"). I always find is emails interesting. Here is an excerpt:

I just returned from Germany, where I attended a humungous photographic trade show called "photokina" and where there was a formal press reception to announce a large bi-lingual book entitled "50 Years Leica M", for which I had provided the English translation under horrific time pressure.

   Wednesday afternoon my good friend Aaron Davis arrived in town. Its been two years since I last saw him, as he's been on a coast guard ship on the East Coast.

   Wednesday night he and Kristy and my roommates got our drink on.. Jill even drank again, I'm so proud of her.

   I woke up today aching all over and with a fangorious sore throat. Tried to function normally despite this but it became painfully clear that I was very sick.. fever and everything. As of right now I'm feeling somewhat better, I don't know if thats my immune system regaining control or just the medicine Kristy finally convinced me to take.

   Aaron went to HIS138A with me, and even participated a bit in class discussion.
   Then Kristy and I took him to The Nugget to experience the divine paninis there. At this point I was definitely losing the battle to act not deathly ill. Then I came home and slept until now.


Poll Results
   The word by far least understood / recognized in the last poll was "Hind." The reference was to the last section of the update three days previous to that one.


Unrelated
   An amusing article
   Snail Warrior - a poem


Related
   Year Ago Today: Report on Bill & Kris' Excellent Birthday Event


Poll of the Day
[Poll #296624]

   So after the MUN meeting today I go to the Coffee House, where Brillaint Red Lights, The Fiery Furnaces, and Ted Leo & The Pharmacists are playing for free.
   Shortly after getting there, Azver gives me the rest of his bottle of wine (in a brown paper bag of course), and then Entertainment Council director Andrea Chalupa gives me a peice of pizza. Mmm everything is better when its free.
   Hung out with my apartmentmate Adrian was at the show. Briefly our other apartment-mate, Jill showed up as well. In an unprecedented display of roommate bonding we all completely incidentally found ourselves standing together at a show.
   Then I walk over the The Colleges where Kristy is at the apartment of Courtbutt, Christie, Sarina, & Adam. While finishing my conversation with Aaron on the phone I see my friend Nat(alie Kempkey), an unusual happening since she no longer goes to Davis. Apparently she came in just for the show. And scarcely had I finished greeting her then Brian McInnis emerges from a nearby apartment to say hi. Kristy then emerged and saved me from more random encounters in the Colleges.
   Courtbutt sewed two of the three missing buttons on my pea-coat back on (the third is missing). That was strong sauce.


Apartment-Mate Needed
   In completely other news, we need a new roommate here next year since Adrian is leaving us for a better place (a house in downtown Davis to be exact). Anyone who wants to have the Casbah experience may contact me asap. The end.


Picture of the Day

Cow Diseases, Part 1 of 4
inspired by newspapers during MUN class
© Kris Fricke 2001