Sleep Deprivation and Tiny Guitars

I don't know that I am going to write everyday on this hitch, but I feel a bit like writing so here we are...I got almost no sleep last night.  It was sort of a busy production night anyway; we are in the process of drilling down through some setbacks and getting decisions made concerning how to move forward right now, so everyone out here has been working in high-gear.  I finished up right at 4am and headed back to my room, and luckily (it turns out) chose to go right to bed...fast forward to 7am and the housekeeping guy bursts into the room waking me up.  I fell back asleep...15 minutes later and here comes the laundry guy...15 minutes after that and here is the housekeeper again...then my neighbor who is a member of our security forces returned from a trip somewhere and decided to chat with someone in his room (the walls are paper-thin).  In any case, by 9am I was pretty sure that sleep wasn't going to return, but I stayed in the sack until 11am just to be sure, then went ahead and got up.  It was just a miserable way to start the day.

As a consolation, I did have some work that I could be doing to prepare for this landmark client meeting tonight, and I am getting on a blog post far earlier than usual, and I got to write in my journal, so the day certainly isn't a total wash.  Also, I was able to go and speak with the Administrative Officer regarding the room and sleeping situation, and he was able to find me a new room in the night shift trailer which will become vacant tomorrow morning, so I am moving into a quiet trailer away from the hubbub.  I also was able to get one of my Arabic-speaking crew members to write me a sign asking to please not disturb me during the day.  So, today is showing itself to be productive, if nothing else.

So, I bought a little travel guitar to bring out here, as I am really trying to finally gain some proficiency with this instrument that I have been messing around with for almost fifteen years.  It is a pretty cool little guitar, I must say. For being so small it has a pretty decent tone and a full scale length (well, ALMOST a full scale length - 24"). We will do almost anything to stay busy out here...

Where a break comes to an end and I post about it...

After a very long hiatus, I am back...I know that you have missed me.

Okay, let's hop right in, I had a pretty decent break.  I did much of what I had wanted to do, but missed some things as well...added some things too, so maybe it balances out somewhat.  I figured that today I would post a sort of photo journal of my break since five weeks is perhaps a lot to write about in a single post, and then maybe I will elaborate on individual experiences from time to time while I am out on this hitch.

Having said that, I would like to start off and talk about one trip on break in particular which was both great and also played host to the most bizarre illness of my life.  As I believe I had mentioned before I headed home, I had planned a trip with friends to New Orleans in celebration of my friend Caroline's birthday and for the two girls going to run in the Mardi Gras Marathon Relay...simple enough, right?!  The trip started off great with the four of us enjoying the company, tunes, and an open road between Houston and NOLA.  I forced everyone to stop for the traditional (only my tradition, sadly) boudin and andouille lunch at Best Stop in Scott, Louisiana.  If you have never had boudin before, but like pork (mmmm...swine!) and rice and heaven in an intestinal casing, then you MUST give it a go!  And if you are going to give it a go, you would be hard-pressed to top Best Stop for both their regular boudin and the smoked boudin (I swear it is profound).  If boudin just isn't your thing, the andouille there is also to die for, seriously, I am pretty positive that you won't find better andouille anywhere...no joke, it is THAT good.

So, we made it to New Orleans and checked into our hotel, which was nice (I almost always stay at the same hotel there)...allow me here to plug the Holiday Inn Westbank...it is clean, affordable, and literally minutes from Uptown or the French Quarter. In any case, night one took us via streetcar (followed by RTA bus as the line is being worked on) to one of my favorite restaurants in the city, Brigtsen's in the charming Riverbend area.  As expected the food was stellar, the service casual but professional, and the atmosphere and company wonderful.  Following dinner we enjoyed a couple of drinks and then headed back to the hotel for some well-deserved rest.  The next day opened with us a man down (damn you wine and beer and vodka and who knows what else) and a bit of rain.  We visited my favorite coffee shop (Tout de Suite on Algiers Pointe), went to see my family for a bit, and then over the river to walk around in the Quarter a bit.  We walked, we drank, we ate...it was great!  Eventually we were joined again by our fourth and the festivities began again...drinking, eating, looking at art, voodoo...all the good stuff that can be had in New Orleans on a Saturday afternoon. We had gotten a Groupon for a French Quarter Ghost Tour for the night (interestingly I had never been on one of these tours before even though it is my hometown), and it turned out to be pretty interesting.  I had fun, at least.

Okay, so this brings me to the strange part of the story...about the time we were fixing to head off on the ghost tour I began to develop a bit of a sore throat which became progressively worse as the night wore on. By the time we finished the tour I was genuinely in pain and NOT having a great time anymore...because the girls needed to run early in the morning anyway, we headed back to the hotel...we hadn't eaten, so when we got there the rest of the kids went to the hotel restaurant and I went straight to bed.  Well, I was freezing, so I decided to take a bath, which was super hot and awesome...Erin came in and made me move to the bed, which was about the last that I remember.  I came to in the hospital emergency room where I had been taken due to ridiculously high fever and the fact that I was hallucinating.  I don't remember anything.  I lost almost two weeks of my vacation to the lingering effects of what the doctor diagnosed as acute tonsillitis (I know that I butchered the spelling there).  WEIRDEST...THING...EVER!

So,  you didn't ask, but that was my first trip to New Orleans during my break...I went back again to help my dad sort his wine cellar for a few days, which was also great!  Perhaps I will talk more about this second trip in a future post...

Well, without further adieu, a photo journal from the break...

Final Beard Check...showered and on my way to airport!

The only 7-Star Hotel in the World...Burj Arab

Atlantis - The Palm - Amazing resort located on man-made Palm Island.

That's me...and behind me in the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world!

Huge Aquarium in Atlantis

Poseidon - God of the Sea or at least a guy sitting on his throne.

NOLA and the crew

No, seriously, alleys are totally the safest routes, particularly when named after pirates

St Louis Cathedral (center), the Cabildo (left), and the Presbytere (right) seen across Jackson Square at dusk

Seriously, this quartet started playing and guy proposed right in front of us...well-done to him!

Cafe du Monde for some beignets and cafe au lait...saxophone in the background...does it get any better?!

Haunted...seriously.

Creepy Christ shadow on the back of St Louis Cathedral

Baby Gator...the kids kept trying to get it to bite their hands to the dismay of the poor guy holding it

Brazos Bend State Park...was sort of freezing the day we went looking for alligators

Success! Alligator Number 1!

Alligator Number 2!  Sadly we didn't get a good picture of alligator number 3...but the kids sure had fun looking for them!

I think that it is a point of pride that this was the FIRST longhorn that my kids ever saw...they hated it just like their dad does...Geaux LSU!

Not sure why this is sideways, but I swear Hardie was actually enjoying himself!

I went mountain biking a couple of times

We went to the Zoo

I got cheese at the Houston Dairymaids...and got a private tour of their new storage room!!

Well, that is probably more than you needed to see or hear about, though perhaps you have missed me...I will try to write more now that I am back in Iraq where sadly nothing exciting ever happens.  Until next time...keep it classy!