Mardi Gras!!!

Whooooeeee! That was some party. I am pretty exhausted, and my cold has made a comeback - I'll be recovering the rest of the week, I think, but it was worth it. I would be writing all night to tell the whole story. Suffice to say, Carnival in New Orleans has something for everybody - live music, colorful parades, dances, dancing, food, drink, smokes, costumed crazies - almost any party/fun you want to have, you can over here during Carnival.

I'll just tell you how it all ended. It turns out that Bourbon Street gets shut down at midnight on Mardi Gras - fitting, since Wed is Ash Wednesday. It's he only day of the year they have to close. I didn't know this, and so I wound up in section just outside the French Quarter, where the bars were still open, and a couple bands were playing. A DJ was set up outside one, and was jamming all kinds of latin music, and everybody was dancing in the street. I joined in and stayed out there until 2:30 in the morning. The street was not closed -passing cars just had to run the gauntlet of gyrating people, who would rock the cars, dance in front of them, and generally be silly, but let them pass. It started raining, but the party kept going. Me too - ditching my shoes to splash in the puddles. Finally, fatigue and the rain thinned the group enough that it was clear it was time to go home, so I hailed a cab and that was it.

You can see all the photos I've put up in the Parades Galore blog - the photo gadget there automatically updated to include the new uploads.