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Wednesday, Mar. 06, 2002 - 10:43 p.m.

NOLA: D-Day

When we last left our intrepid travelers, they were fast asleep in a drunken slumber ... and I cared about this account. Well, I still do, but it already seems to have lost some lustre now that I'm back at work for the second day since returning. But, on the bright side, I'm upbeat about the next few weeks. I still want a new job, but until I get one, at least the one I have becomes tolerable again starting on or about March 18.

� � �

I woke up at 4:45 a.m. Sunday still on my back, having not moved an inch in three hours. I went to the bathroom and discovered a hideous headache and then drank some water. I repeated the process around 6 or 7 a.m. and also went to the kitchen to refill the water glass Casey and I shared. I fell back asleep until after 10 a.m., and by 11 the four of us were awake and drinking (coffee for the three of them, OJ for me) ourselves back to sobriety.

After some research and interviews, the choice for lunch was a sports bar serving buffalo wings, something for which Casey and I have been longing for some time now.

But there was something different about this day. It was 30 degrees out with a brutal winter wind. Our eyes began watering just on the walk from the car to the restaurant.

The dining room had five TVs lining the top of the walls and the bar (which we sat adjacent to, with windows separating us) included some big-screen TVs, which I could see from my seat. The music in the restaurant came with videos, which we watched while we ate. I also paid some attention to the college basketball games on TV, including BC-Syracuse (giving Notre Dame the second seed in the division for the Big East tournament) and the Kansas-Missouri game.

So with the weather as it was, we decided that it was too cold for outdoor adventures and chose the D-Day museum instead.

It is huge.

HUGE.

We got there two hours before closing and Casey and I just made it to the start of the Pacific Theater exhibit with 20 minutes to spare (and watched the light-up map that gives a six-minute overview). We had to gloss over some things to do it, too. Amy and James left us early to see the Pacific part themselves, having already been through most of the early parts of it.

The National D-Day Museum is in New Orleans because the Higgins corporation was based there. The Higgins boats were those landing craft used to get soldiers and equipment ashore at the Normandy beaches. It's those boats you see Tom Hanks and the other actors riding in at the start of Saving Private Ryan.

As Casey and I descended the stairs to meet Amy and James in the lobby (where replicas of WWII-era vehicles sit), my phone rang -- it was Will calling. He asked if I was at work. "No," I said, "I'm actually at the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans." "Get out!" he said. Guess I hadn't told him.

After the museum, we went back to the house where Casey and I changed into nicer clothes and took James' car back into the French Quarter. We parked in a garage on Chartres and went to dinner at Emeril's NOLA, enjoying some time alone on the day between my half-birthday and her birthday.

Back at the house, Amy and James were ready to go, and Casey called Mustafa, another Bucknell friend, and we arranged to meet at Two Jefes, a cigar bar that we were hoping wouldn't be too smoky. Mustafa hadn't arrived when we did, so we ordered drinks at the bar and watched the live jazz band in the corner of the tiny front room. The bar's in an old house, with a back room up the steps and an outdoor area out back -- but it was too cold for that, of course. An L-shaped bar sits in a corner of the front room with tables in the middle. The band took up space normally used by more tables, which were pushed into the corner. When Mustafa walked in, James and Amy saw him first and turned to Casey. "Is that your friend?" James asked. "Amy and I recognize him from campus." Amy's face showed her surprise at yet another "small world" Bucknell moment.

After talking with Mustafa for half an hour or so, we left the now crowded and considerably more smoky bar. He had to get back to first-year law school things and we went down the road to a pool hall in the ghetto. The bartender buzzed us in and served us drinks when we needed them, getting up from his spot on the stool in front of the TV tuned to Comedy Central. Only two of the 14 tables were in use when we walked in and took another one. Erica soon joined us and recognized workers from her restaurant and she and Casey talked while Amy, James and I played several games of pool.

Somehow I managed to tire myself out again because when we got home we sat down to watch tapes of The Simpsons James had and I barely made it through the second one. Casey again turned on The Princess Bride when we got to bed, but again I was quickly fast asleep.

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