Hey hey!! For the first time in my entire life, I've moved away from home. I don't count the year I spent at Mankato State as being away from home (mainly because I was home every stinkin weekend), so this is quite the jump. I had a dream of moving to the Big Apple and instead I'm in the Big Easy. I will still get to Manhattan, but for now, I'm good here. I'll share the chronicles of the drive down, and everything leading up to it in future posts, but I'll give my first impressions of the city that's below sea level today. Once my computer arrives in a couple of weeks, I'll have more of an opportunity to be a regular poster and contributer.
My first night here was Wednesday. I checked into my new hotel and had dinner in the bar. After talking to Sam for a while, I decided to check out this thing called Bourbon Street. You may have heard of it. I certainly had, and it was everything I expected and more. I only walked a few blocks down, past a bunch of gentlemen's clubs, and found a bar with a live band and 3-for-1's! Seriously? Granted my Red Bull/Vodka was $16, but still....it was huge! And I'm not normally a size queen. The band was pretty good too. I made friends with an older couple (George and Susie, you're absolutely adorable!!), and a few guys that were in town doing some contracting work of some sort. We found an Irish pub (I'm a complete sucker for a good Irish pub) and played pool and then I headed back home.
Thursday I slept in, ordered room service, and met my new co-workers. They seemed really nice and I think I'm going to fit in just wonderfully. A friend of a friend picked me up and toured me around the city a bit. I really like the Uptown area. This weekend I'll do more driving around as I don't generally like sleeping while I work (or having the pen dipped in the company ink). Just makes me too accessible.
Friday I had some loose ends to tie up in Minneapolis so I went back for the weekend. Yesterday marked the first day on the job - touring around the building, meeting some of my new colleagues, an all afternoon meeting and a quick reception. I'd been hearing nothing but wonderful things about the Cuban sandwich at Cajun Mikes, and since I was unable to get one on Sunday (stupid wonderful crawfish boil!), I went back Monday. And it was wonderful. So were the people I was sitting next to. So wonderful, in fact, that I ended up staying way past my bedtime (completely missing my date with Jack Bauer), and laughed and laughed and laughed. Also, I will be back on Wednesday to try said Cuban sandwich with bacon. Bacon makes everything better, I say.
All in all, the first few days have been wonderful, and I'm excited to discover all this city has to offer in the coming years. That's right, I plan on being here at least three years. C'mon, I want to be at a Super Bowl dammit!! And hopefully the Vikings will be in it. There are a lot of things I will adopt about this city - po' boys, crawfish, jambalya, gumbo, Mardi Gras, Jazzfest, all the other Fests - but the Saints are NOT one of them. This girl is a Viking fan for life. Please don't beat me up because of it.
Lastly, I don't care what anyone says, Minnesota Nice is a farce. I was born and raised there, and it's a load of crap. It's more like Minnesota Passive-Agressive. Southern Hospitality is where it's at. Thanks for being so welcoming so far. I truly cannot wait to fall in love with this city and the people here.
No comments:
Post a Comment