French Dip

The plan was to be at the airport at 9am for my 10:14 flight. But since I didn't do a very good job at getting packed and in bed at a decent hour, I found myself quite behind instead.

I got the girls to summer camp, and then headed to their mother's work to drop off their suitcase. On the way from there to the airport, my timeliness was further threatened by a serious accident. Fortunately I wasn't on I-40 itself to be stuck behind the mess, but I did get slowed down quite a bit going though the I-44/I-40 junction as they completely closed the ramp, so there was chaos instigated by the people who intended to take I-40 and didn't know how to react to a closed ramp.

Once I got to the airport I found that the vast construction going on at the OKC airport had worsened since I was last there. I think when all is said and done, they will have completely reconstructed the place. I wonder if anything original will be left.

Then there was my suitcase inspection. I don't really care about the ruffling through my clothing, but I really wish they would stop digging through toiletries so intently. I mean, if I was carrying a bomb, would I really put it in the tiny side-pouch of my toiletry bag? Wouldn't I have some kind of mock deoderant can (or something) instead? Did they even evaluate the authenticity of my deoderant? No, they just poke around all the tiny crevases looking for who knows what. And they need to turn their little privacy screens another direction, because everyone in the room could see what was going on in my suitcase, which was slightly disconcerting on principle alone. I think next time I'll just bring my stuff to the airport in a couple of garbage bags and I'll just pack right there in the presence of the TSA folks.

Once I got to New Orleans, I immediately had a rental car issue (my car wouldn't start) and so had to get another, which of course caused delay. Then I got lost twice on the way to my hotel. My first observation about this place is that they're not real good with signs. Seems ironic for such a hot tourist destination.

I'm on the 10th floor of the 27-story Riverside Hilton, but I'm facing the Missippi and the view is fantastic.



After registration at 4pm, we had a reception for conference attendees from 6pm-8pm, which was chock full of free food and drink. Afterwards I went up to my room on the tenth floor, which had an excellent direct view of the Mississipi. Before I headed up I had met up with a couple of like minded folks who said they were going to hit Bourbon Street later and would give me a call when they did.

As I didn't get much sleep the night before, I fell asleep in my room watching the news, so when the call came I was quite groggy. They told me the place they would be at (they were in a different hotel) on Bourbon Street, but I was so out of it when they called that when I made the walk several blocks down to Bourbon Street, I had forgotten the location by the time I got there. So instead I walked the entire length of Bourbon Street a couple of times, taking in all the sights, and also hoping my memory would be jogged (turns out I walked by them more than once).



So after my little excursion into the French Quarter, I headed back to the hotel with hopes of working out, getting my jogging in at least. Unfortunately the gym closed at 9pm. Terrible hours. Doesn't look like there will be much working out for me this week.

So it was back to the hotel for me. I'm having laptop trouble, though, so not sure how real-time my posts will be.