Hughey Hill Unplugged (Or, This Freezer Really WAS Frost-Free!)

    I’ve lost count just how many times I’ve started to write about this experience. But, more than three years after the fact, I’m still trying to find the humor in it. I guess I still kind of blame the whole thing on my Daddy - never mind that he’d been quietly minding his own business in the family plot at Mt. View Cemetery for well over two years when disaster struck.

    But “safety first!” he always taught me. A lifetime spent as first a volunteer and later a fulltime, professional firefighter sparked a level of caution in Daddy reinforced by the hundreds of house fires he’d battled over the course of his career. With that kind of upbringing, it was only natural that every time we left the house for an extended period of time, I would unplug major (ok, and minor) electronics as well as every single lamp in the house. Almost nothing escaped notice; TVs, stereos, coffee-makers (Daddy always called them the biggest fire-risk in any home), the microwave, even the washer and dryer.

    So it was in that mode that I tore though the house, disconnecting every plug in sight as we prepared to leave for two weeks in Alaska. Satisfied I’d done everything in my power to make sure the house would still be there upon our return, I rolled my luggage to the car and left, absolutely, positively, beyond-a-shadow-of-a-doubt certain the iron was turned off (and unplugged!).

    Fast forward two weeks and we were winging our way back from another successful Alaskan adventure. It was during that marathon flight that I contracted a particularly nasty case of the dreaded airplane crud - that flu-like scourge that travels through the tainted re-circulated air that ventilates airline passenger cabins around the globe. In it’s worst form, it can lay you out faster than an overzealous TSA agent and make death seem desirable. To make matters worse, as soon as we landed, we faced an hour’s drive back to where we’d picked up the group we escorted, followed by a nearly five-hour drive home. Hubby stopped and dropped a small fortune on every over-the-counter cold remedy known the man, dispatching me into a drug-induced coma while he drove us home.

    I regained consciousness as we arrived back on Hughey Hill and I dragged myself toward the still-standing house, hoping I could make it to the sofa. As I opened the back door, I was mentally patting myself on the back for thoroughly cleaning the house before we left, when I was stopped in my tracks by an overpowering stench. My first thought was a gas leak, but wait, it was August, so I knew the propane tank was bone-dry and the heaters were off. By now, Hubby was in the house and reeling from the smell, prompting him to bolt back outside and take a critter-count. With all dogs and cats accounted for and convinced nobody had crawled under the house and died during our absence, he returned and thus began the search for the source of the scent.

    Quickly canvassing upstairs, downstairs, kitchen and bathrooms, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Perplexed, we both retraced previously-searched areas again, to no avail. As almost an after-thought, he checked the laundry room and there, discovered a tell-tale trail of water that led straight to the door of our huge, upright freezer. No hum of the motor was audible and quickly it became apparent the appliance was DOA. We’d had the freezer for years, so it wasn’t unthinkable that it had simply reached the end of the road, mechanically. But, as I held my breath and walked into the laundry room to survey the damage, my eyeballs nearly separated from their sockets as I discovered the awful, undeniable truth. There it was, in all its glory - an electrical cord, removed from the wall socket and draped innocently over the top of the dryer. It wasn’t the noxious fumes responsible for the near nausea I felt as the truth slowly and horribly dawned. It hadn’t been the dryer I unplugged two weeks before, but the freezer - the packed-full-of-meat-fish-and-vegetables freezer.

    The phrase “gag-a-maggot” never seemed so appropriate.

    I closed the door, retreated to the sofa and waited on Hubby to figure out the Awful Truth for himself. Much later, he would tell friends that if I hadn’t been so sick, he would’ve gleefully killed me.

    I’ll spare all the gory details of the week that followed, including fumigation fun, like chained-shut-freezer-removal (which didn’t go well AT ALL), and wall scrubbing, all performed from behind industrial strength Home Depot-issued haz-mat masks. Ultimately, it all had to come out - flooring, appliances, everything. 

   All I know is that when it was all said and done, I wound up with a bright, shiny, state-of-the-art, brand new laundry room I never knew I wanted!

A Supa-Beauxl For The Ages! (& Definitely NOT The Age-d!)

So here I sit on Super Bowl Sunday, debating between buffalo or honey barbeque sauce for the wings that still sleep in the freezer and really not giving a rat's pa-tootey about the game, but looking forward to the commercials................

I am, however,  dreaming ahead to Super Bowl XLVII because it returns to my beloved New Orleans and the Super Dome and come hell or high water (wait, forget that last part), if the Saints go marching into that one, so will I!! It's actually taken that long for me to recover from the LAST time I did the Super Bowl in New Orleans - twenty-two years ago, to be exact!

Going to the biggest football game of the year was nowhere on my radar back in 1990, so when a former co-worker walked into my office that morning, wildly waving four Super Bowl tickets in my face and about to faint,  I absently smiled and congratulated her (yes, HER), waaaaay more concerned about the pile of annual report documents on my desk, screaming to get to the printer. Turns out, co-worker had more to offer, including the story of how those tickets came to be in her mail that morning. 

Now, this woman was the most ardent San Francisco 49'ers fanatic on the planet earth. Tennessee born and bred, it made no sense, but THE famous pass that Joe Montana connected with Dwight Clark back in 1981 apparently ignited her fever, which had failed to find an upper limit even nine years later. She followed the team, literally, to Atlanta (back then, the closest NFL franchise to us) when they played the Falcons and apparently, she bumped into team owner, Eddie Debartolo, Jr. (still in his glory days and that unfortunate Club Fed "vacation" nowhere on HIS radar) at the hotel bar. And there, over drinks, she charmed him out of Super Bowl tickets, should the Montana/Rice powerhouse get the team that far. Still, she was way more excited about charming her way onto the floor where the team was housed and managing to snag hallway pictures with the MAN himself. That would be Joe Montana. That picture remained framed on her desk for as long as we ever worked together.

Of course, when the 49ers won the NFC Championship that year, she thought about that fateful conversation with Debartolo. Still, never expecting him to actually make good on his promise, she nearly passed on when four tickets arrived in her office mail that magic morning. And here she stood at my desk, asking if Hubby & I wanted to go...................

In what had to be the most hastily-thrown-together trip in history, I managed to talk my mother into keeping the boys for the weekend, Hubby got a work buddy to take the fourth ticket and we departed Hughey Hill after work on Friday, landing in The French Quarter just shy of midnight - just as the party was getting cranked up. And, thus began a 72-hour non-stop throw-down, the likes of which I'd never experienced before and really never have come close to weathering again. I doubt we collectively napped more than four hours in the next three days and the funny thing is, my memories of that weekend are crystal clear all these years later. Even then, it seemed like a constant surge of adrenaline more than compensated for the alcohol consumption, because we kept going round-the-clock as football frenzy reached a fever pitch.

I'll never forget sitting in that dome, close enough to the sideline to have an unobstructed view of Joe (Montana) and Jerry (Rice) going through a series of warm-up passes before kickoff. Turns out, it was a blow-out as San Fran routed the Denver Broncos (near the height of their Elway era) 55-10. But, while hubby and work buddy left in search of refreshments by half-time, our ticket benefactor and I remained til the final snap, steadfastly screaming our lungs out for our quarterback hero to kick some Bronco a- 'er, butt, afraid that if we budged from our spot, it might actually throw the game and cause our team's defeat. Oy! At one point, the guy in front of us turned around and drunkenly asked us where we'd been all those years ago when he'd been searching for a wife. We turned him back around and propped him against a railing, lest we miss another first-and-ten.

The exhilaration of that weekend adventure took a long, long time to subside and every time we drive across Lake Pontchartrain. Hubby and I still laugh at how we all actually drove back to our Picayune, Mississippi motel (the closest lodging we could find) for a two-hour nap in the midst of all the melee'!

As of today, NOLA BFF and Football-Comrade-In-Arms Mary reminds me there's exactly 37 weeks left until we can once again spend our weekends e-mailing, texting and Facebook messaging each other our armchair coaching/quarterbacking wisdom during College Football Saturdays and NFL Sundays  (we start singing "It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year" every July in anticipation of the pre-season). That should give our home-boy Brees plenty of time to get his arm and his aim in shape.

And, that should give me just enough time to get my mojo cranked up enough to experience the Bowl that is Super in person one more time before I die! 

Come to think of it, with his hometown ties to The Big Easy, Eli Manning's participation in today's game is reason enough to root for the Giants, but in my heart, I'll really be thinking

GEAUX SAINTS!

A Nana By Any Other Name (or Mr. Baby Goes Bananas)

How does something as innocuous as bananas weave their way into a grandmother’s identity crisis?’
Very unexpectedly!
While neither I nor any of my BFFs are anywhere nearly old enough to be grandmothers, we have, nonetheless, been blessed with little grand-progeny at an alarming rate over the past couple of years. Some of us have zoomed from zero to two and even three in just twenty-four short months (the three thanks to the unexpected jolt - er. joy - of twins). It stands to reason, then, the favorite parlor game of late has become choosing what these munchkins will call us.
And, since Goldie Hawn snagged the very hippest handle of all (grandson Ryder famously calls her “Glam-Ma”), what’s been left to the rest of us mere mortals has run the gamut. In my circle of girlfriends alone, we have a GiGi, a Sasha, a CoCo, a Ghe, a Nana, a Nonnie, a NeNe, a Mai, a MiMi, a Grammy, a Gran………………(notice, if you will, there’s not a granny or even a grandma/grandmother in the bunch)! After test-driving several monikers, I settled on “Nana.” Though it may not have quite filled the bill as “too cool for school,”  still, I reasoned, it didn’t make me sound - or feel - too ancient. My own very adored grandmothers - Bubba and Nannie - would have approved, I decided.
In retrospect, just how deluded was I to think I really had the final say in this decision?
My new name became official on September 26, 2009 with the birth of our first grandchild, Julian Evin, and irrevocably sealed on February 11, 2011 with the arrival of his sister, Collins Joy. Or, so I thought.
As those early months quickly passed, and Mr. Baby (a nickname I bestowed on him shortly after we first met) progressed into the stages of cooing and babbling, I eagerly began coaching him to try out my new name. I mean, c’mon!  Nana is easily as entry-level as Dada and Mama. One syllable repeated repeatedly, so just how hard could it be?
So, imagine my euphoria when, during a weekend visit to see our Prince Precious and his parents, I awoke early one morning to the delightful, albeit insistent, sound of Nana! Nana! NaNA! NANA!! coming from the direction of the living room. Never mind that I’m not now, nor will I ever be, a morning person. I bolted from my bed and burst out of the guest room in response to this unrelenting summons from our little prince.
Rounding the corner, tearing through the living room and into the dining room, I found our Adorable Precious enthroned in his high chair (actually one of those plastic, strap-on, booster contraptions this generation tries to pass off as a respectable high chair), continuing his chant, NAAAAAAAAAAAA-NAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! Through cobwebbed eyes, I replied in froggy morning voice, “Nana’s here, baby!”
But, he had other ideas.
Peering backwards over the top of his chair, he was clearly calling “NaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaNaaaaaaaaaaaa” toward the direction of the kitchen. Out rushed his daddy, fumbling with a ba-nana, struggling to peel it quickly enough to break off a chunk and shove it into Mr. Baby’s chubby cheeks.
With a sheepish look, my son reluctantly explained that in the World ‘O Mr. Baby, NaNa indeed referred to a tropical Chaquita or Dole and not me.
So much for so carefully choosing my own name!
But, it wasn’t many weeks later, as I was talking on the phone with Mr. Baby, that he blurted out “NANNIE!” To me! On purpose. And, the next time we went to visit, he ran to me shouting “Nannie! Nannie!” as I got out of the car. At that point, he could’ve called me Dirt Bag and it would’ve been ok, because I’d never heard anything sweeter in my life! (I must admit it took time to shake off the sense of unworthiness at sharing the same name as one of my own precious grandmothers, but I’ve finally gotten over that).
So, from that moment, Nannie it was, Nannie it is and Nannie it will be!
Never let it be said that a grandmother EVER has the last word!

The "Shoe" Must Go On! (Or SJP I'll Never Be!)

Rumor has it that yet a third installment of the popular Sex & The City movie series is in the works. If that's true, no doubt the spotlight will shine on Sarah Jessica Parker's (hereinafter known as SJP) extensive wardrobe of Mahnolos, Weitzmans and Choos..........which reminds me of an incident when Mother Nature cruelly reminded me that I ain't 35 anymore!

Proving once again that fat and fashion don't mix, my efforts at appearing at least 25 pounds taller by donning a pair of uber-hot five-inch-heeled metallic bronze stilettos left me very nearly lame and only a hundred bucks lighter before everything was said and done. Yes, this escapade took me from stilettos to stability in a flash - and at a pretty (painful) price!

It was the first week of 2007.  This found the whole Hughey family in New Orleans and I was a blissfully happy camper for many reasons, because
a) I had just bid 2006 - my own personal version of Queen Elizabeth's "annus horribilus" - good riddance
b) I was in my favorite city on the planet earth with my three favorite men (Hubby and our two boys) for a deliciously long, rare stretch of family time, and
c) we were there to celebrate the wedding week of our "Baby Girl," Aynsley Fein and her dashing fiance, Jason LeBlanc and all its associated fun and festivity.

Our arrival coincided with the Sugar Bowl's triumphant return to the Big Easy for the first time since The Storm (aka Katrina) and the atmosphere was super-charged and jubilant. Coincidentally, LSU just happened to be one of the competing teams, which turned the whole thing into a "homecoming" of sorts and only added to the fun. Never mind that our son and our money had gone to the University of Tennessee, I enthusiastically donned my purple and gold Mid-City Lanes Rock & Bowl(ing) shirt and waded into the mob on Bourbon Street yelling "Geaux Tigers" as loudly as anyone else. Must've worked because the boys from Baton Rouge blew that Notre Dame yankee bunch back to South Bend to the tune of 41-14. What a great way to kick off a week of celebration!

Game won, we turned our attention to the serious business of the wedding revelry, which included the bridesmaids luncheon (for me), the rehearsal dinner (for the entire family), the wedding in St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square and a second-line parade to the gala reception at The Court of Two Sisters afterward. With that many social engagements, not to mention all our usual running around, I could have used an old-fashioned steamer trunk to accommodate all the clothes I hauled from home, complicated by the fact that I hadn't quite decided what to wear to the wedding.

Still coping with the consequences of a seriously ridiculous weight gain in 2006 (see my blog post, Puttin' On The Spanxx), I had managed to piece together all the necessary ensembles and was actually quite happy with what I had chosen to wear to the bridesmaid's luncheon at Arnaud's. Not wanting Baby Girl's and her mama, Mary's, friends to think they had imported Elly Mae from the backwoods, I put extra effort into looking my best. I was particularly proud of the killer high-heeled copper metallic pumps I had scored one heck of a bargain on just the week prior. They were the PERFECT way to accessorize my black pants and black & copper metallic jacket. Little did I realize when I paid next-to-nothing for them that "killer" would be the operative word when I tried to walk in them. Yes, the five-inch heels that made them so sharp-looking were significantly higher than I was used to wearing and yes, I had tried them on and yes, they fit. But in my haste, I hadn't bothered to actually stroll around the store in them. And that oversight would wind up costing me big-time.

The morning of the luncheon, I was up early. While I worked on getting ready, my guys were busily planning their own adventure, which meant they were headed to their favorite oyster dive bar out west of Metarie to throw back a few dozen on the half-shell while enjoying some serious football bowl action. Since Arnaud's was scarcely three blocks from our beloved Hotel St. Marie, I opted to walk. That was my second mistake.

Anybody familiar with The French Quarter knows the sidewalks in this vintage section of town aren't always the easiest to navigate -with or without excess beverage consumption. And, I'll readily admit it wasn't my usual habit to teeter around these cobbled, historic streets in stilettos, preferring to leave that to the "girls" who work at certain Bourbon Street establishments.

I made it across the hotel courtyard, through the lobby and out onto the sidewalk before I realized I was in some more serious trouble. The sensible thing at that moment would've been to turn right around, hobble back to the room and change into the black flats stored in my luggage. But, this was one of those times when determination (read "stubborness") won out over common sense and I haltingly trudged on, thinking if I passed a shoe store along the way, I might just look for a more suitable substitute.

Shuffling down the street at a pace similar to Tim Conway's Mr. Tudball character on the old Carol Burnett shows, panic set in when I realized I was going to have to do something fast, lest I pitch face-first into some mystery puddle in my path. I actually did pass a shoe store and bolted inside, scouring the inventory for rescue relief. To my amazement, the selection they offered made my hooker heels look like frumpy flats!

Back out on the streets, I was faced with a choice.. I was too far from the hotel to turn back now. I couldn't possibly show up at the restaurant in this predicament and where-in-the-French-Quarter was I going to find a real shoe store? Canal Place Shoppes hadn't opened yet, and besides, short of a cab ride, I knew I'd never make it that far. Whipping out my trusty cell phone, I activated the GPS and performed a shoe-store search,  and voila! A teeny-tiny, oh-so-exclusive little shoe boutique could be found on Chartres Street, just a few short blocks from where I was stuck. Getting there would prove to be another challenge.

Because time was running short, I had to resort to the unthinkable which was to doff the spikes and carry them, trotting through the thankfully deserted mid-morning streets until I got close enough to the shoe store to shove them back on and teeter my way in. Within seconds, I spotted a gorgeous pair of t-strap pumps with a SENSIBLE (but still stylish) heel in you-guessed-it, the exact same copper metallic. There was no doubt about it - the Lord just meant this to be! For the first time in my life, I didn't even look at the price (but being a brand I'd worn before, I figured they would surely be in my price-range). I just asked for my size and the clerk quickly fetched them and rang them up. A mild jolt of sticker-shock shot through me when I saw that my reprieve from tootsie-torture would set me back a cool C-note, but hey desperate times call for desperate purchases. I felt pretty sure that "no shoes, no service" would be the prevailing policy at Arnauds.

Not wanting to appear so redneck that I would actually wear my new purchase out of the chi-chi boutique, I hobbled across the street to a Community Coffee House. There, I quickly changed shoes and not wanting to show up at the luncheon hauling a large sack of shoebox, I placed the hooker heels in the box and left them on the ladies room counter for some fortunate soul to find later.

And,  I've looked for those shoes every time I've passed those certain clubs on Bourbon ever since!