Back to Tulane: Eating after dark—it's no picnic
I am happy to be back here in New Orleans. I feel the city is making a strong and efficient recovery. But I am going to digress from all this for a second. While New Orleans is still New Orleans, and thus a vibrant and unique city, there are many complications you run into in everyday life when you live in a semirebuilt city that has just been hit with a catastrophic natural disaster. Some things you once took for granted have become problematic.
Today I want to talk about one of the essentials of life—food. The other night, a few of my suitemates were hungry for dinner. It seemed like a simple enough desire, but our crazy demands did not end there. We had become tired of the three basic food groups: pizza, Chinese food, and "the Bubble," a tennis-bubble-type structure that houses our on-campus Taco Bell and bagelry.
We needed something new, so we racked our brains and combed the Internet in search of an appropriate dining choice. The time was 6:05 p.m. I had a fraternity meeting at 7, so I would not be involved in the actual ordering of the food. Eventually, it came to us.
Wings. That's what we needed, a hundred chicken wings in various sauces. We had heard of an open wingery down on Magazine Street. The only problem was that they didn't deliver. So, since none of us were successful in bringing a car down to school, our first task was to acquire wheels from another student.
With that accomplished, there was then a heated battle over which three sauce flavors we should get and how many wings of each flavor we wanted. Eventually it was settled on a very BBQ-heavy ratio, and the deal was done. Now we just had to go get them. But by now it was 6:50 and I left my comrades to attend my meeting.
It was a short meeting but still long enough to be rudely interrupted by my cellphone ringing. I soon learned, via the more socially appropriate communication method of the text message, that the wingery was closed on Sundays.
Now why in the name of Jerry Rice would a place that deals predominantly in chicken wings be closed on the Lord's day of football? This was a question for another time, as we had more pressing matters at hand. Now it was 8:15 and I was back in my room. The suitemates had found an alternative already, a place that had a solid BBQ menu. Most of us opted for brisket. We called the place: no brisket. We conferred and switched our orders to pulled pork. We called the place: no pork. To heck with this place. We had already returned the SUV so we found a different student with a similar SUV and went off in search of our dinner.
We were ready to just settle for fast food, but as we cruised down St. Charles we noticed that one of our favorite BBQ places was lit up and somewhat crowded. BBQ of sorts had been the goal all night so we stopped the car and joyously bounded to the door. There was a sign that said they closed at 9 that night. It was 8:35. The door was locked. They wouldn't unlock it for us. We were all sad now. We wandered defeated down the street. Wendy's. Popeye's. Closed. Back to the car.
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