27 Tuxes
There ain’t no rest for the wicked, or for the road weary traveler for that matter. I had the weekend at home after getting back from Arizona. But come o dark thirty, on Monday morning it was time to hit the road again. This time, work was taking me to central Texas, not far from Austin but not quite close enough to actually stay in Austin. But with a great crew and a short week (for me), it was a very pleasant week of work.
I wrapped up my assignment by mid-morning on Thursday and made the quick jaunt over to Austin. From there, I would catch a flight to my hometown of New Orleans where I would stand in the wedding of one of my best friends from high school. It took a little over an hour to make the drive from where I was working to Austin. Austin is known for horrendous traffic, but it was smooth sailing that day.
Austin is famous for food, booze, and music. In other words, it’s my kind of town. It was a bit too early to go boozing or for any decent musical act to be playing, but it’s never too early to eat. There are many fantastic restaurants in Austin, but I had my heart (and arteries) set on one little joint in particular, Juan in a Million. Because of light traffic, I had just enough to pop in for a bite. While definitely not the fanciest nor best restaurant in Austin, the food is good and the service is quick. My favorite item on the menu also happens be Juan in a Million’s most famous; the Don Juan. The Don Juan is essentially a greasy scramble of eggs, bacon, potatoes, served with flour tortillas, chips, and an excellent hot salsa. It’s a perfect food for a morning after night out on the town. In fact, this was the first time I’ve had a Don Juan not hungover. It was no less tasty or satisfying.
Austin-Bergstrom International Airport was just a 10 minute drive away from the restaurant. Just as I parked my car in the long term lot, I got a text notification from Southwest that my flight was delayed by an hour. Ugh, while an hour isn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things, it did throw a pretty big wrench in my plan, which admittedly depended on near perfect timing. I chose this particular flight as it was the last possible flight that would get me in time to make the wedding rehearsal, with an hour to spare, and maximize my time at work. Weather is usually fantastic in Texas in November, but strong storms blew through Houston and Dallas that day. The aircraft operating our flight was coming from Dallas, hence the delay. The bride had already warned me it would be my head on a silver platter if I was late for rehearsal.
One thing I’ve learned after standing in a number of weddings over the years is that you keep the bride happy. While getting to New Orleans on schedule was a bit out of my control, I spent a few a bucks to hopefully speed up my transit a bit. Southwest only offers a single of class of service and open seating. However, if someone has far too much cash to spare or is desperate, they could pony up a couple of hundred extra bucks to guaranty to be among the first fifteen passengers to board and sit in the same seat as the guy who bought a $59 Wanna Get Away fare. But hey, they throw in one free drink. I didn’t want to spare the cash nor was I desperate when I booked the ticket, so I ended up on the tail end of the middle or “B” boarding group. While not bad, I didn’t want to risk having going to all the way back to find a decent seat and possibly lose out on overhead space. Having to gate check my bag would really put me on a time crunch. So I splurged and paid $40 to “upgrade” to a better boarding position. While I’m sure she was joking (I think), it was a small price to pay to keep the bride happy.
With the delay, I had some extra time to kill at the airport. So I headed up to the nearby Admirals Club to take care of a few personal items I had been neglecting. The lounge was on the small side, but it was pretty nice. I packed up and headed to the gate a few minutes before boarding began.
Southwest Airlines 1796
Austin to New Orleans
Depart: 1:14 PM (Delayed)
Arrive: 2:23 PM
Aircraft: Boeing 737-700
Seat: 4A (Economy Class)
Thanks to my “upgrade”, I was able to snag window seat 4A. While many here on FlyerTalk loath Southwest, I actually quite like them. Sure, their boarding process is a bit of a “cattle call”, but their planes are clean, seats are relatively comfortable, and the employees are usually helpful and friendly. Southwest is also quite convenient at times, especially when it comes to nonstop service on routes legacy carrier would never consider flying, like from Austin to New Orleans. Throw in the lack of change and checked bag fees for everyone, and I think Southwest provides one of the best domestic economy class products in the United States.
We took off out of Austin a little over an hour late, as expected. It was rather choppy while climbing out, but the ride smoothed out once we leveled off.
One of the cool features Southwest added not to long ago, is the ability to stream live TV to your own device through the plane’s wifi system, for free. It worked really well, and I was able to watch the NFL Network without buffering.
The flight was pretty short, and we began descent into New Orleans just over an hour after take off. The active runway that afternoon was Runway 9 which meant a virtually straight in approach for us. We had left the overcast skies in Texas which made for nice views of the cypress tree dotted swamps on final approach. It was a sight I grew very fond of as kid, flying in and out of the then John Moisant International Airport for family vacations. The airport was renamed Louis Armstrong International Airport in 2002, after one New Orleans’ most iconic and most influential musicians.
We actually made up a good bit of time en route and landed just over 30 minutes late. Southwest uses the furthest possible terminal from the rental car center in New Orleans. Fortunately, the airport isn’t all that big, but it was still a bit of a hike. The National location in New Orleans has got to be one of the worst in the system. It doesn’t matter what time of day nor day of the week, the Emerald Aisle and Executive selection is threadbare at best every time I've rented from here. I couldn’t help but chuckle when arrives to find both aisles completely empty. I mean zilch. Didily squat. Nothing. I waited nearly 10 minutes before a car was finally brought up to the aisle. While I didn’t care for the vehicle, which was a Chrysler 300, I just needed a set of wheels so I took it. I know New Orleans like the back of my hand. Couple that with light traffic and a lead foot, I made it to rehearsal in Mid City less than 15 minutes after leaving the airport. I was still a couple of minutes late, which drew the (playful) ire of the lovely bride and the rest of the wedding party.
One of the running jokes between my friends and I is I am the “27 Tuxes” of our little group, as this would be the seventh wedding I have stood in. This would be my first outdoor wedding. November is usually the perfect time to have an outdoor wedding, even in New Orleans. However, it was unseasonably warm and humid, and the outdoors wasn’t most pleasant place to be. All of us were sweating bullets before long.
Finally, the wedding coordinator was satisfied, and we were free to go. I made a quick dash to my hotel to check in and drop off my bag, before meeting everyone for dinner. One of the things I miss the most about living in New Orleans is the family atmosphere. Of course, I’m not referring to anything in or around the French Quarter. What I mean is, when you get to know someone in New Orleans, you don’t just become friends with that person. You’re friends with their entire family. As my friend’s family moved away from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, I haven’t seen them years. It was great to see and catch up with them.
After dinner, it was time for the bachelor’s party. Ideally, we would have done the bachelor’s party weeks earlier. But all of the groomsmen were scattered all over the country, and we couldn’t find a weekend when all of us were available. At least we had a day to recover before the wedding. For obvious reasons, New Orleans is one of the best places in the country to have a bachelor’s party. We started out the evening with cigars and Glenlivet 18 year. The night evolved (or devolved) from there. In the interest of keeping this trip report PG-13 and protecting the not so innocent, I’ll leave it at that.
To make the lives of my friend and his fiancé easier during this hectic time, I offered to take some of the out of town guests around the city on the day before the wedding. While I enjoy showing off my hometown, I regretted offering to do this the instant I opened my eyes that morning. I was a little under the weather from the night before, but I managed to get myself together for a 9AM breakfast. I brought everyone to one of my favorite breakfast spots in the city, Camellia Grill.
One of coolest places to visit for tourists and locals alike is Blaine Kern’s Mardi Gras World, located just upriver from the Morial Convention Center. It’s where floats for Mardi Gras parades are made and stored. The tour does cost $20 per head, but worth it.
We then headed toward Jackson Square, and took a stroll around the French Quarter.
Afterwards, most of the folks were pretty beat and decided head back to the hotel. I had no issue with that as I was pretty tired myself. After a quick nap, I met my buddy up for the last dinner of his single life. We hit up Shogun in the suburb of Metairie, which I maintain is one of the best Japanese restaurants I’ve ever been too. The sushi was excellent as usual and the Asahi Black smooth.
Everyone turned in pretty early, as the next day would be a long one. While it was nice and sunny the previous two days, rain was in the forecast for the wedding day. We awoke to heavy overcast clouds the next morning. By the time we boarded the limo bus, a steady drizzle was coming down. Alas, the show must go on. And go on it did. The drizzle had stopped by the time we arrived at the wedding venue. The ceremony and pictures went on without the hitch and nary a drop of rain. In fact, the rain held off until we were all safely inside the restaurant where the reception was held.
It really was a really nice wedding. As I mentioned earlier, I have been friends with the groom since freshman year of high school. I have known the bride since my friend began dating her during of our senior year of high school. Though it was more or less in evitable that they would eventually get married, it was still a very exciting day and I was honored to play a small part in it.
After the reception, we headed back to the hotel together. With the weather outside downright nasty, we didn’t want to do a big dinner, so we just headed to the Morning Call for beignets and Irish coffee.
After that, I called it a night as I had a somewhat early departure the next morning, when I would be embarking an accidental mileage run of sorts. It was the result of my canceled trip to Asia with my parents. Originally, I had planned to fly from New Orleans to Florida to meet my dad. We would then head to Asia from there. With that trip postponed, I needed to head back to Texas instead. As it turns out, it was cheaper for me to buy another ticket from Florida to Austin than to change my original ticket. So I figured, why not. Because… ya know… Miles. After buying that extra ticket, I was slated to fly from New Orleans to Dallas to Fort Lauderdale and then Miami to Austin. I spent about $250 for both of those tickets, which isn’t mileage run material, but still not a horrible deal.
Since I wasn’t staying terribly far from the airport, I woke up about 90 minutes before departure. With Sunday morning traffic, it took less than 10 minutes to reach the airport.
It would quite accurate call Armstrong International Airport in its current state a dump. A new terminal building is scheduled to be completed by 2018, but there’s a snowball’s chance in hell of that terminal being built on time. You see, late and over budget are as synonymous to Louisiana as alligators and gumbo. On the safe side, add a least a few years to estimated date of completion and tens of millions of dollars in budget overruns after all of the politicians get their cut.
In the mean time, the current outdated terminal is still hard at work. Parts of the terminal feel like a time capsule. For example, check these nifty American Airlines posters.
I arrived at the gate of my Dallas bound flight just a few minutes before boarding was scheduled to begin. Did I say Dallas bound? Oops, that might have been a bit premature. After the boarding complete announcement, the captain came on the horn a couple of minutes later to announce “a small issue” maintenance is looking at it. I professed my love for the Mad Dog earlier in this trip report, but it seems like these “small issues” a cropping up more often these days. To be fair though, I had a brand spanking new legacy American A319 go mechanical on me recently. So these things do happen irrespective to the age of the aircraft.
Anyhow, the delay began to creep in 15 minute increments. I hopped on Expert Flyer to try to find alternatives in case this does go completely pear shaped. Looks like everything was sold out to Fort Lauderdale that day, but there was a one seat on the late morning departure to Miami. Just in case, I decided to try to get myself protected on that flight just in case. The announcement the flight was going to be canceled was made just as I made the call to American’s reservations. By the time I deplaned, I was rebooked on that flight to Miami. With a couple hours to go before that flight departed at 11AM, I decided to call up a friend to have breakfast with near the airport. While she wasn’t the happiest camper being woken up before 10AM on Sunday morning, she was quite happy to see me when we met at a nearby restaurant a little while later.
My friend gave me a lift back to the airport afterwards. I was shocked to find passengers from my originally canceled flight still waiting in line to be rebooked when I reached the gates American uses. Apparently, none of them had thought to call American while waiting in line. I struck up a conversation with one family trying to go home to Orange County, California. They were flying on confirmed First Class tickets, but they were rebooked in coach for the next day because that was the only option available. I confirmed that via Expert Flyer, but I did stumble onto three First Class seats on United’s nonstop to Los Angeles that evening. After calling American reservations, they were rebooked on that United flight.
Anyhow, my own flight to Miami was uneventful and comfortable as my upgrade cleared at the gate. My dad drove down to Miami from Jupiter to meet me, and we spent the afternoon hanging out at the beach.
I was dropped back off at Miami International Airport in the late evening, and hopped on my flight to Austin, which was also uneventful. We arrived in Austin nearly 40 minutes ahead of schedule, thanks to very favorable winds. Thought I was dead tired, I decided to head back home anyways as I don’t get very many nights at home. There was a hair-raising moment or two, but I eventually made it home safe and sound.
Last edited by dat4life; Jun 7, 2016 at 9:50 pm