Southern Hospitality... Huh?

Hello my lovelies,

We had a fabulous time in New Orleans.  We gorged ourselves on the amazing food, imbibed on a variety of adult beverages, perhaps a few too many of them, (I'm looking at you Beasley) and enjoyed the general sites and sounds, but not necessarily the smells, of the city.  Saturday took us on a bus tour of the city, an afternoon at the WWII museum and a evening of food, fun and piano bar silliness.  Sunday, Joie and I decided to get steppy and enter a 5K, sadly, they were sold out and wouldn't let us enter the actual race, so we just bought the shirts (they have a cute little sugar skulls on them) and created our own 5K course along the river, which included a stop for beignets.  (FWIW I'm pretty sure our 5K course was way better than the one those fools paid $35 for.)  The weather Saturday morning was beautiful, but an afternoon deluge made for a very hot, very humid Sunday.  Meh, whatever, bitching about it won't change the weather.  

An interesting observation about New Orleans relates to that whole concept of Southern hospitality.  Interesting thing about said hospitality is that it isn't actually very hospitable....  Our first day in NOLA we were waiting in line to go to Felix's for Oysters (Acme is across the street, but several people told us Felix was better, cheaper and less crowded) when some southern twang spewing assclown made a wisecrack that he bet I could eat 3-dozen oysters.  Huh?  Did this mother-Fer just make a fat joke about me?   In New Orleans?  I realize that I am not a petite little wallflower, but have you seen the size of the women in New Orleans?  We saw a woman in a very tight dress that was so huge I thought she had three asses and this dickwad is making a fat joke about me?  I didn't punch him in the throat, but the thought did cross my mind.  

There were a few other less than hospitable events, but rather than rant about each individual discretion I will categorize them according to the nature of the crime.  

Hospitality indiscretion # 1 -- use your words!

The WWII Museum is a really amazing museum.  Ray and I visited there on our previous trip to NOLA in 2011, but we were fortunate enough to visit the museum during the middle of the week.  On Saturday, while (likely because) it was pouring rain outside the museum was very busy.  Several of the exhibits were wall to wall people and strollers and wheelchairs and texting jackasses and facebooking hipsters and foreigners with no concept of personal space and selfies taking shitbags and......  ok you get the picture, it was a lot of people, many of them behaving badly.  In this mass of humanity, somehow rather than politely tapping someone on the shoulder and saying excuse me, this crowd employed a strategy that I will call the "bump and grunt."  In the ole b&g you just invade someone's personal space and rather than being polite and courteous you just sigh loudly or utter a guttural grunt until the offending body in front of you moves, or, you just push your way through.  On top of that, there were a number of stroller welding mommies that try to play it off that the baby is the offending party. They run into your legs then in a ridiculous baby talk voice say "oh, tell the nice lady you're sorry."  Bitch please!  That kid is just sitting in the stroller and you've just managed to confirm that your stroller pushing skills are as bad or worse than your driving skills. Do not blame that on the baby!  In a nutshell what I'm saying is Use your words, people!  EXCUSE ME is NOT actually a difficult phrase to say.

Hospitality indiscretion #2 -- we can see you.... tooooooo much of you!

This is a bit of a rant about fashion in general because, seriously, short shorts are really a very bad idea for almost everyone.  In my not so humble opinion there is about 7% of the female population that has legs conducive to actually wearing short shorts.  Sadly the percentage of the population that wears them is much, much higher.  Worse yet, there appears to be an even greater percentage of women who, when visiting another time zone mistakenly, VERY mistakenly, are under the illusion that air travel miraculously makes you appear significantly taller, thinner and generally more attractive.  (OK, so I don't have any proof that these women actually think this I just hope that they have enough decency, and access to mirrors, to refrain from wearing these clothes around people they actually know.)  There are far too many horrific tales to detail here, but just know that we saw butt cheeks, cellulite, oh, so much cellulite, tattoos, lumps, bumps and bulges (see three asses reference above) that sadly, cannot be unseen.  I wish they could, but alas they cannot.   Now before you get all judgy and begin reminding me that the sight of my unclothed flesh could precipitate another ice age as my nakedness would frighten the sun into a permanent eclipse, please know that my cellulite, lumps, bumps and bulges (still 100% tattoo free) were all adequately covered as to camouflage the horror that exists at the site of too much Ronda.  I would appreciate if the women in New Orleans (and frankly every other city on the planet) would afford me and my incredibly terrified eyeballs the same courtesy.  

To help the women in New Orleans and frankly everywhere, I thought I'd help out by breaking this down into a few bite-sized fashion rules:  

• One size does NOT fit all!  Do not try it, the public at large does not want, nor do they deserve to see that.
• Spandex is stretchy, but even it has it's limitations - For the comfort and consideration of those around you DO NOT test those limitations.  
• White and stretchy are a VERY bad combination, ALWAYS!
• Kate Hudson looks HOT in those Fabletics pants - Sorry to be the one to break it to you sweetheart, but YOU are NOT Kate Hudson!  Furthermore, if you are not on your way to yoga, please put on some damn pants, real pants the kind made of denim or cotton, hell I'll even allow a cotton, spandex blend for added stretch and comfort provided that they have a waistband with a closure, but can we please stop with the damn yoga pants everywhere.  AND don't even get me started about wordy-ass pants.  
• DO NOT wear any type of pant that has words on the ass, EVER!!!!  No one wants to read your ass!  
• Wife-beater shirts should be banned, always, EVERYWHERE!
• Tank tops on men are reserved for meatheads with gigantic muscles only and even those typically look douchy, so remember to check your DBag quotient before you leave the store.  

Hospitality indiscretion #3 -- service, schmervice

The service we received in NOLA was pretty much abysmal.  My traveling companions and I were talking about this just prior to heading to the airport and came to the consensus that the lack of service and etiquette is a direct result of the deplorable, asshat tourists that these people have to deal with on a regular basis.  My theory is that if the visitors to New Orleans would observe the suggestion posed in #1 and refrain from the hideous, ill-fitting, grotesque looking clothing discussed in #2 a group a three, fun, friendly visitors from Colorado would receive a level of service commensurate to that of their local communities.  Long story short, don't act like a tourist when you are visiting a different city.  Engage some locals, ask where they like to eat and what they like to do, but most of all just BE NICE!  If you act like an asshole, the world is going to treat you like the asshole you are!

Indiscretion #4 -- Just because you can, doesn't mean you should!

Finally, this one isn't necessarily related to the hospitality, rather it's a statement about the law in New Orleans.  The allowance of drinks on the street, while a fun idea in concept, rarely ends well.  Watching drunk bimbos teeter around on high heels, clutching a fishbowl of some sugary, boozy concoction is a really vile thing.  Furthermore, bars being open 24-hours is actually pretty deplorable.  Observing cute, young girls in party dresses stumbling out of bars at 6:30AM made me sad.  You may be asking what exactly I was doing that I was out to observe this act of indiscretion.  I am happy to report that after 7-hours of sleep Joie and I were out because we were heading to the park for the 5K noted above.

I realize the Nawlins tourism board is probably not gonna be knocking down my door to write a piece for them anytime soon.  

Until next time....

XOXO

PS - here's the photo of us enjoying a breakfast cocktail before embarking on our Nawlins Adventure