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Nov222009
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Po-Boy Fest |
Although I should have gone to church this rare morning not following a late night out, I ended up elsewhere. Today was the third annual New Orleans Po-Boy Preservation Festival. This event, a celebration of the locally invented sandwich, takes place on seven blocks of Oak Street from Carrollton to Monroe. Live music stages capped then ends and there were about 40 food vendors and an arts/crafts showcase in between. Several of the Oak Street businesses were open in spite of the crowds, which was nice. Camera in hand, I took a cab uptown and got there about noon. The cabbie dropped me off at Leonidas where the Artist Village was. I glanced at the crafts as I walked by and then up to the stage at Monroe Street to see the band that was playing before wandering around for a while.I’ll have to let my pictures document my wandering in any detail, but I will mention some highlights. At 1:30 there was an “ultimate French bread fight” at the Carrollton stage between a second generation representative of the Po-boy and a robed man representing the sub sandwich. There was verbal taunting and people getting hit with bread loaves… it was quite a spectacle.If I remember right, it was after this that I got something to eat. Every conceivable variety of Po-boy was represented including traditional varieties and some odd ones. No stranger to the local creation myself, I opted for something not found on Mandina’s menu. I had the “premium crabcake Po-boy” from the carnival brands booth. It was quite decent although I wished I had the appetite to sample a lot more. I also tried the “Fried Bread Pudding Po-boy” from Ye Olde College Inn.A while after this I stopped in Jacques-Imo’s to catch some of the Saints game. The New Orleans Saints were playing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Florida this afternoon. Even at this outdoor festival you could not avoid the ongoing game. Aside from all the attendees in Saints garb, you could hear the radio broadcast in places and it was visible on a handful of TV’s outside and in all the bars lining Oak Street. During my respite in Jacques-Imo’s the game was pretty much over as the Saints had a very comfortable lead in the third quarter. The Saints won today with a final score of 38-7.I had to be at work for five and by four o’clock I was a bit weary anyway so I walked up South Carrollton and got a cab to the station, arriving at about 4:45. It was a pretty uneventful evening overall with the Saints win and Po-Boy fest dominating the short newscast. I had very little to do until it came time for the news. Dannah was working today too so I had very little to deal with. She handled the printing tonight rather than contend with John Henry during Final Play.The newscast went well although as John was recapping highlights during the sports block of the news I completely lost my place as he was going through the plays. He was off camera and going from memory anyway but it was still a bit unsettling.I got another crack at it during the sports show, Final Play, and did a bit better. I can’t say the same for the rundown though. The show ran long again and a lot of material got cut. By the time the show close came around, there were only five seconds left to say goodbye.