No time, no time

[womzilla]

Got back yesterday from New Orleans and the National Popular Culture Association and American Culture Association Conference, with nellorat. I don't have time to do more than hit the most important points, but:

1. The PCA/ACA is HUGE--at least by the standards I'm used to; I'm sure it's tiny compared to MLA. But there were something like 2500 separate presenters; there were at least 25 tracks of presentations in every time slot, programs from 8 AM until 10:30 PM Thursday and Friday and slightly shorter programs on Wednesday and Saturday. So much to absorb! And such nice and smart people, every one of them! Especially nellorat, who didn't kill me even once. The only foul note was the elevators, which (especially in the taller tower) were completely overwhelmed at high-traffic times like "just before lunch"--and by "completely overwhelmed", I mean "we waited 25 minutes for an elevator before giving up and eating in our hotel room" on Saturday lunchtime.

2. It was a tremendous blast finally meeting ratmmjess, whom I've known online for a few a dozen years, and Marc "I Am Not the Beastmaster Nor Am I on LJ" Singer, whom I've known online for a few more than that.... Both gave great presentions, Jess on some of the research which went into his forthcoming encyclopedia of pulp heroes, and Marc on faces and heads in Morrison and Case's Doom Patrol, still worthy of attention two decades later.*

*I left Chapel Hill three months before the final Morrison/Case Doom Patrol was published. It has been almost seventeen years since I left Chapel Hill. One might think I was getting old.

3. Because of the dense schedule, we didn't get to do much visiting of the city. I did walk to the intersection of Camp and Lafayette on Tuesday. (Alas, the corner building is now a Federal Courthouse. Part of the coverup, no doubt.) And thence uphill to the river. On Saturday, I walked into the Vieux Carré to visit, briefly, the William Faulkner Bookstore and then to Cafe du Monde to get beignets and coffee. I have to say the take-out window at the Cafe du Monde has among the worst ergonomics of any restaurant I've ever seen--the servers end up squeezing past each other, dozens of other workers, and presumably hot kitchen equipment over and over and over again, to the point where the simplest possible order--a coffee and a bag of beignets--takes six minutes to fill. Shameful.

4. nellorat and I ended up eating twice at Mother's, because it was relatively fast and both somewhat cheaper than and much, much better than the restaurants closer to the hotel. This was the restaurant with the meat in the turnip greens and the red beans and rice, though--definitely not vegetarian-friendly. I think they might have put tallow in the iced tea. But oh my so good. As I dug into a bowl of jambalaya on our second trip there, I sighed and said, "We're never leaving." nellorat said, "New Orleans?" "No, this restaurant." The jambalaya wasn't even the best thing we had there--the Famous Ferdie Special Po'Boy* was rapture on a baguette.

*That's how they spell it on the menu, though "po-boy" is more common.

5. Despite docbrite's amazing timing in laundering her cell phone on the very day we arrived--thus leaving us with no way to coordinate dinner or other activities that day--we did finally get to dine with her and with chefcbd on Saturday, at Cuvée, only a few blocks from our hotel. Dear me. I'm not sure if that's the best meal I've ever had, but I'm hard-pressed to think of one better. There was no single item quite as good as the lamb shank at L'Express in Manhattan (the best single restaurant dish I can remember ever having), but the cumulative effect was amazing. I can't judge the relative quality of the seared foie gras appetizer, since I've never had foie gras before, but it was also extremely good, and served with a delightful savory reinvention of tiramisu. Then there were the amuse-bouche peppadew peppers wrapped in serrano ham and filled with goat cheese; mint/jalapeño sorbet; the chicken and waffles entrée; and the platonic ideal of carrot cake on four-barreled desert platter for closing; all were simply (or complexly) superb.

Oh, and chefcbd is wonderful. Technically, I did meet him once previously, back when I was living in Chapel Hill, but it wasn't a long meeting. Despite that, by the end of the meal I felt like I'd known him for all the decades in-between.

We must return. However, our flight home was unpleasant enough (high turbulence, two-part flight) that I suspect it's going to be a little while before I can get nellorat onto a plane again.... But we must return.

Oh, and I finally read King Lear. Yay me!

Comments

[esmeraldus-neo.livejournal.com]

Lear is AWESOME. Saw it at the Globe last summer in preference to several other plays.

Greens, Red beans and rice? [whine]

There *probably* wasn't tallow in the iced tea. Probably.

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

I found the plot of King Lear vastly more interesting than any Shakespeare I can remember reading. In some ways, Lear is a Shakespeare comedy turned on its head--an intricate plot formed of overlapping deceptions, romantic triangles, intercepted and forged letters, and faked identities. There's even a clown--though, unlike the clowns in the comedies, Lear's Fool is actually funny.

[esmeraldus-neo.livejournal.com]

I find the Fool in Lear interesting because he's arguably one of the wisest characters in Shakespeare, along with Romeo. (People often think Romeo's young, romantic, and foolish, when he's only two of those things--have a look at Romeo as a diplomat and peacemaker sometime. He fails, but it's a tragedy.)

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

Yes, I noticed how fast the Fool was at figuring things out and making jokes about them. A Fool that good you don't eat all at once.

[drelmo.livejournal.com]

You might now enjoy Christopher Moore's Fool, which retells Lear's tale from the perspective of the Fool, with whimsical alterations.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Hey, I like Feste in Twelfth Night, particularly the scene where he proves that Olivia, not him, is the fool.

[washa-way.livejournal.com]

Good call, calimac.

The fact that Mr. T pities her is also good evidence.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

One of the interesting things about the play is, iirc, Shakespeare changed the ending to make it more tragic.

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

The Signet Classic edition that I read had a very good apparatus and supplemental materials, and included both Hollingshed's version of the tale of Lir and the portion of Sidney's Arcadia from which Shakespeare drew the Gloucester/Edmund/Edgar plotline. According to the Wikipedia, versions of the play where Cordelia marries Edgar were common in the 18th and 19th centuries.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

Yes. This confused the heck out of me, because Cordelia was already married to the King of France.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Marjorie Garber's Shakespeare in Modern Culture (excellent book, by the way) says that Lear has replaced Hamlet as the #1 Shakespeare play.

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

A further food reminder: The key to the chicken and waffles is the tarragon in the chicken sauce and the rosemary in the sweet syrup. They combined wonderfully.

[drelmo.livejournal.com]

I would one day like to meet Marc. I've met Jess for about ten minutes, once. Perhaps this year at San Diego.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

The casserole jambalaya at Mother's is the best jambalaya I have ever had, anywhere. I was delighted to find a place around here that cooks jambalaya in the same style. Even not nearly as good is heavenly.

[sarah-ovenall.livejournal.com]

I have very fond memories of Mother's from my solo trip to New Orleans. One night I had intended to go to a nice restaurant recommended by docbrite, but I spent all day walking in the heat (only limited bus service at the time) and when my hot, tired, bedraggled self got to the front door, I looked in and saw the tablecloths and nicely-dressed waiters, and I couldn't bring myself to go inside. I walked away feeling dejected and wondering where to go, and the next food establishment I saw was Mother's. I sat there for about an hour relaxing, enjoying my sandwich, drinking tea and listening in on conversations. It was one of the highlights of the trip.

[washa-way.livejournal.com]

We seem to be *almost* in the same place at the same time a lot these days, zilla. I took my first trip to N.O. last month, and probably contributed somehow to the lingering crowd at Cafe du Monde in the process. And my craving for chicory coffee is now back in full-blown mode, thank you very much.

I'll always think of the city fondly, if only because that's where a) I saw my first Monk Parakeet (down on the riverfront), and b) Thing Two and I took in the midnight (premiere) showing of Watchmen.

[nellorat.livejournal.com]

My reason for going back to Mother's was similar: I felt better about taking out my own tofu when the place wasn't posh.

[docbrite.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, all versions of red beans and rice contain meat -- usually pickled pork as well as sausage. You could certainly invent a vegetarian version, but the seasoning meat is essential to the traditional flavor of the dish.

It was fabulous to see y'all. Do come back soon.

[(Anonymous)]

Sounds like I should have asked you for restaurant recommendations, Kevin. We did our usual tour of the Brennan restaurants, but either I've outgrown them or they've lost the capacity to surprise me. Ahh, that's not fair--I just ordered poorly at Red Fish; Christy's blackened redfish was amazing and the Brennan desserts are still top shelf. Would have liked to try some different places, though, and it looks like we were even closer to Mother's and Cuvee than you were.

The other places we chose for their ambiance as much as anything. Napoleon House is completely worth the average (but cheap!) food for the tranquil courtyard, and my favorite meal of the trip might have been at the Cafe Pontalba on Jackson Square, a place that by all logic should be a tourist trap yet somehow managed to remind me of Spain and serve a decent plate of pasta to boot.

Anyway, it was a pleasure to meet you in person and I appreciated your presence at the panels. You had some great questions and comments.

Greg, if you're ever in DC...

Marc

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

Well, on the restaurants we have the advantage of advice from Poppy and Chris, who are deeply, deeply embedded in the New Orleans restaurant scene. That said, we discovered Mother's almost by accident.

It really was great to finally meet you in meatspace. And as I mentioned to nellorat, I like that someone remembers Richard Case's work with respect. He was a close enough friend that I've always slightly mistrusted my own admiration for his work, so having independent confirmation of his skills is very nice.

(You do know that the first volume of Showcase: Doom Patrol came out this week?)