Athene Numphe

On Friday lordaerith, noeticist, Bouncy, and I drove to New Orleans to visit family and more importantly, go to Jazz Fest. The drive was a lot of fun, except when I took over for the last section it started raining and there was this HUGE slowdown because of an accident that affected both sides of the highway.

When we got to Mom's house, we found out that my cousin Editor and his friend were in town too. Yay for family.

The huge group of us (lordaerith, noeticist, msfrizz, queencimmy, nola_poet, Bouncy, Editor, his friend, and I) went out to dinner at Franky and Johny's where we proceeded to demolish 4lbs of crawfish and had lots of other yummy yummy food. Then we all headed to Brocato's for italian ice cream. In the middle of eating, we found out that dad's plane had landed. One of us would call him to tell him that we were at Brocato's and then when that person said goodbye, another one of us would call him to tell him the same thing. It was so funny!

Saturday we got up and I brought lordaerith, noeticist, and Bouncy to PJ's for breakfast and randomly ran into Mom there with some of her friends.

We headed out to the fair grounds for Jazz Fest. While the rain from the morning had cleared up, the grounds were still really really muddy. We got very muddy shoes and lower legs. lordaerith and I split off from noeticist and Bouncy after dragging them to see a bit of Ms. Charmaine Neville perform. lordaerith and I had a lot of fun just wandering around (avoiding the mud if possible), listening to music, and eating good food. I had crawfish bread (warm bread with melted cheese, crawfish, and spices) and a Plum St. SnoBall and other foods. We spent a good deal of the time by the Tree of Love and Happiness listening to a mix of music from the Fa-Do-Do stage and the Gentily Stage. At the end of the day we met up with queencimmy, Dad, and Step-Mom and headed across the fair grounds to hear Jimmy Buffett. He was soo much fun. We were really far back, but that didn't stop us from dancing and singing and being generally silly. noeticist and Bouncy were able to find us with good triangulation directions that I texted them. :)

After the day was over, we headed back to Mom's place. We all got reading to go out. noeticist and Bouncy hit the quarter. My whole family (lordaerith, queencimmy, nola_poet, Mom, Dad, Step-Mom, Cuz, and I) went to smancy dinner at Cuvee. Smancy dinner was pretty good, but not great. Had a yummy fois gras and the fillet. Converstaion was fun, especially when the whole table broke out into train puns.

Sunday saw us back at Jazz Fest for more music, food, and fun. I really enjoyed Chris Ardoin & NuStep and Rebirth Brass Band. I think the best times were watching the Second Lines to the Preservation Hall Jazz Band with lordaerith and dancing to the Radiators with lordaerith, queencimmy, nola_poet, dad, step-mom, Editor, and his friend. We always dance to the Radiators at the end of the day.

Sunday night Mom had a BBQ for all of us and we pretty much fell over.

Monday the four of us drove back to Austin and we all collapsed.

All in all it was an amazing weekend. I'm so glad that I took the time to go home and that I was able to share the experience with friends and loved ones. Only downside was that I got a little bit sunburned on Saturday because my purse pulled my shirt further away from my neck than then area that I had covered with sunscreen.

Here are lots of pictures from the weekend. The ones at the end I took to submit to FesTees