LA 2/6/09 TouchDown

Woke up 3am. Got cleaned up, finished packing, told Nelda to hold down the fort, growl at strangers, and headed to the airport. The drive to the city was quiet – although a little hard to see once traffic picked up – reminder I need to get my eyes checked when I return to Texas.

The flight was FABULOUS! Really short, getting in Baton Rouge about 20 minutes early! Yay!! T picked me up at the airport, and the adventure began.

We started the tour in the State Capital. The State buildings are beautiful. Ornate, amazing decoration. It is much more like PA where I grew up, and less like Texas. As we got out of the car, I grabbed my camera, and T grabbed his. Holy camera, Batman! I quickly realized I was out-photo’d. T said to me, “You’re going to get to know me pretty good in the next few days, and my obsession with photography.” o O (Sweet, I thought, I won’t be taking another picture. He’ll do a much better job of capturing the events.) O o

Along with the capital building, we also visited the Pentagon, minus one “side”, removed for a street. Pretty cool! The weather was gorgeous, skyline visible for miles and miles. Amazing how much history was captured over time in each building’s construction, yet they managed to keep it from looking “added onto”.
With my SPA appointment coming, we left the city and headed for lunch. We went to a Cajun seafood barbeque place, Sammy’s. I decided then I was going to be adventurous and try new foods. And I did! I ate fried alligator (YUM), some shrimp and catfish that were nothing like anything in texas, fried oysters (yuck), and seafood gumbo (YUM). After a few bites of the fried shrimp, I looked at T and said “oh, my, God! That’s amazing good!” I repeated that many times in the meal, and afterwards, said to him, “We should have taken a picture. That was so good! WOW!”

With lunch accomplished, I was delivered to my SPA appointment, at Paris Parker. What an afternoon….. hmmmmm….. snooooooze. I had a full body massage (of which I slept through both arms, waking up realizing I’d fallen asleep somewhere after my neck was worked, but after my second arm went under the blankets. Darnit! J I wanted to be awake for that!! The rest of the massage was awesome, very relaxing. I finished up the afternoon with a manicure (with paraffin wax treatment –oooooh) and pedicure (happy feet). When my afternoon was completed, I was entirely relaxed, and slid deep into the passenger’s seat of the car.

Came back to T’s house, cleaned up, and headed for supper. We met up with another friend P for dinner. The evening began at a wine bar called “The Grape”. Our bartender, Robert, was a great help. I don’t have much wine experience, so I was incredibly unsure what to get. He offered up a Riesling that was very sweet and very smoooooth. We enjoyed a glass each with great conversation, and headed for dinner. Dinner was at a place called Kona Grill. There, I enjoyed Macadamia Nut Chicken – very good, indeed. Considering I’d been up since 3am, the guys indulged my wish to go home early and get to bed. We were at T’s house, and I was fast asleep around 10pm.