New Orleans: Last Afternoon

We came back from out lunch and just hung out here at the Inn with Glenn and Darell. This is such a wonderfully relaxing spot. Huge hot tub in the back that is kept sort of cool, there was a nice breeze today, bright beautiful blue sky, just me and banana trees!
Glenn asked did we want to see any of the parts of the city that were hit so hard by the flood. At first I said no, but then thinking about it more, we decided to go. If you had no idea what was ever there, it would just look like fields. There are a few houses pot marked around , but for the most part, just an open area.
New Orleans is a very small place in area, as well as being a very flat place. So here , at the very heart of the worst of the worst, the skyline of the city is in constant view. For those of you in Atlanta, just imagine if Midtown were just wiped of the face of the earth. Nothing left but the open area, and brick steps. That is what it is like. We were not there long at all, it was just too eerie, not in a spooky way, just in a sort of rude way, like we were there gawking. It is hard to explain. Brad Pitt came to town and started building these very cool houses in the area, but there are still just a few of them.
We then went to the Winn Dixie, to get some wine for tonight. It is quite a way from The French Quarter or The Marigny but it is the closest one to here. There was a nice one here, but it didn't make it back post Katrina. So, so much of the city is like that. If you were just here as a tourist (which we so were/are) but if you never left the big downtown hotels and the French Quarter, you would never even know that there was a disaster. But its things like not having a local market, or dry cleaners or what ever that have left a permanent scar. Its been three years and things are not back to "normal". Looks like they are going to have to just get a new definition for that word down here