Departure to Mardi Gras!!!

My mom, Grams, came to Tampa to watch Morgan so that Mike and I could go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. GRAMS ROCKS! Thanks again Grams.

Of course, the first morning as we are getting ready, Grams goes to help Morgan get her lunch ready while I am upstairs. Morgan, who usually takes a very full lunch, tells Grams that she usually only takes 2 things. So, the morning starts out with Grams saying that she is worried that Morgan doesn't eat enough. I wish Grams could see her normal lunch. Oh well. :)

Grams takes me to work, and it is a pretty good day. We review a few last minute directions, and I think Grams has her lists completed. :) Linda takes me to the airport on her way home. Thanks Linda! Of course, in typical Amy fashion, my flight is delayed by 2 hours or so. I read my book for the several hours at the airport (Water for Elephants is the book). I read some on the plane, and then I collapse into a very deep sleep. I even miss drink service. I had been up pretty late most nights trying to get our release ready for shipping. Mike met me at the airport, and we take a cab to the Holiday Inn Express on Carondelet (much more about this later). The cab driver was a student at Xavier, and he was very cool. A parade is going on, so the traffic is pretty heavy near the hotel. We get in the long line to get checked in. Mike had called the hotel prior to our arrival and was told that we had a room with a good view (501 I think). So, after waiting in the long line to get checked in, we are given room 222. Mike says that we were supposed to be in 501, and she says someone else is already in there. When we walk into the room, it is the smallest hotel room I have ever seen. It has ONE DOUBLE bed in it. The view is of an alley wall and a dumpster if you look really hard to see the street in between the hotel and the wall. We don't so much care about the view because we don't plan to be in the room much, but the King size bed is something we care about. So, Mike calls down, and they say that the bed we have is a queen (hmmm....last time I checked a queen wasn't a double). We laugh because the headboard is much longer than the actual bed. Maybe they don't even know what they have in there. Anyway, the lady at the desk, Ms. Sharice, says that when you book on hotels.com, you get a "queen." Of course, Mike used his frequent stay points to book the room through Holiday Inn (supposedly a thank you for staying with them so much). If this is how they treat loyal customers, we are scared to see how they treat non-regulars. Anyway, Ms. Sharice says that they will probably have openings the next day, and she tells us to check with her in the morning to see if we can move. So, we are careful about really unpacking so that we can move in the morning easily. It is after midnight now central time, but we decide that we have to go look around a little bit. So, we walk down Bourbon Street for a bit, have a few hurricanes (which I found help more with kidney stones than ANY pain medicine I have ever had). It is not as crowded as I remember it from my last Mardi Gras (in 94), but it is getting close. There are girls showing their cleavage for beads, but Mike and I are just in the wander mode. We head back to the hotel and go to bed. Wow, I am so glad that we have a Queen bed at home. A double bed is really not very large. Mike is like a heating pad in bed, so I have no room to escape the heat. :)