GONE AGAIN

Well, L is off to LA again to attend her Aunt's funeral, and since we have such a following, it is my responsibility to continue the story.

Travel has become one of the ways we have learned to cope with stress and everyday living, so it didn't surprise me when L announced that we needed to go to Memphis and New Orleans in the spring of 2007. My job is simply to make the trips happen. L gets the idea and I get the travel agent. Fortunately, Collette, our fabulous agent, has learned, over the course of time, not to question, just arrange. She is truly a special spirit!

June 2007 we are off to Memphis armed with our newly obtained Crown Room Card, vital necessities like hand sanitizer, toilet seat covers and a wine bottle opener. That's all you need, right?

L had done her homework and we had a list of all the hot spots: Beale Street, Sun Records, The Civil Rights Museum, and of course Elvis. Beale Street was our first stop.

BB King's club was amazing. Preston Shannon was so gifted with the tongue playing guitar that we spent two nights there. Get a visual here, ladies, it is something you have to see to believe. He was so good, we hardly noticed the two shooting victims just outside the club. Back at the room, we also didn't notice the fired alarm going off in the hotel. Fortunately, neither incident was fatal. Based on what we saw, it was just business as usual in downtown Memphis.

As with all of our adventures, Bill seems to attract friends. Coming back from the Sun Records tour, a random man started walking with us. Before we knew it, he and Bill were talking and smoking together. Bill is a kind man and I believe gave him some money and some smokes. Next morning, the same man was waiting outside the hotel to personally guide us to the Civil Rights Museum, smoking and talking all the way, broken up intermittently with a song or two,

Now, I will give some tips here. For those of you that want to go to Memphis, do see the Museum, go to Beale Street, do the Sun Records tour and sample all the fine dining. The Elvis thing....Well, being the "King" and all, he sure didn't have very good taste in much of anything. No offence to his fans, but, for real, the man had no aesthetic vision. My mother, who wore brown every day could put together a house better than he did. Wait, she did decorate like Elvis, that's probably why I am so judgemental.

I'm going to leave you with our little departure trip from Memphis and then L will fill you in on New Orleans. You've heard the song "The City of New Orleans". Well, it is a train that goes from Chicago to LA. It seemed romantic at the time to book four tickets on said train and travel from Memphis to New Orleans. Not so much. Departure time 6:00 AM. Arrival time 6:00 PM. In between time, a whole lot of bad smells, gut sucking toilets, horrific food, no smoking and uncomfortable seats. Up side, yes there is one, they had really bad wine, but it was better than no wine. Take it away L.