Cappy and Mr. Ed in the French Market in New Orleans.  

Mr. Ed and Jean Come to Louisiana

So, Cappy is back out on 'da boat', as of yesterday.
The friends we had in from NYS were dragged from blues bar to blues bar in New Orleans Monday night, then happily dragged home and chunked into bed around 2 a.m. They only had a couple of days here so we wanted to show them how to 'pass a good time', Louisiana-style.
The next day was spent under the carport 'chillin', sipping cool drinks, watching Cappy at 'da bbq pit', just generally recuperating and enjoying warm weather for a change. That night, "Mr. Ed" dragged out an old guitar he had brought along with them on the airplane. He said he brought the old one, cuz he didn't want any of his good ones damaged enroute. Even if the one he had brought had been sent ahead via "Oops" (as we tooth-grindingly refer to UPS) and it been delivered with the usual boot holes, it wouldn't have hurt Mr. Ed's feelings, he would have just added more duct tape to the rest of the silver-grey adornment already stuck on it, and merrily strummed on in gusto. Since I had moved down from NYS four years ago, I had forgotten what a crazy-nutzy guy Mr. Ed is. He plays the wackiest, most fun songs accompanied by facial expressions and if need be, a kazoo, which somehow had gotten broken on the way down. Maybe he shoulda sent it by Oops. Dang! I shoulda offered him some duct tape. Well, anyway, he sang for about two or three hours, with some of the worst harmony he's prolly heard, as we all sang along. (A couple of times we all landed on notes together that sounded pretty darn nice. ("Dang! we GOOD!" somebody hollared as the waves of tortured accompaniment rushed back in, washing our temporary success.) Tawk about fun!
The next day Cappy was back at the helm, hovering over the bbq pit again. This day it was bbq catfish appetizers, sausage (for it's da ' law' here in Louisiana, ya gotta have sausage on 'da pit' whenever ya cook anything on it) and smoked pork ribs. More folks stopped by to visit and chow down. Mr. Ed played on one of the neighbor's 12-string guitars. Another fun day.
Yesterday they all went away. Cappy to da boat for two weeks. Our guest back to NYS, complaining that their clothes had 'shrunk', no doubt. And I slept for twelve hours.
I can't wait to do this again.

After the yard work was done we put the blues blaring on the out door speakers and fired up the pit. We smoked some chicken and the manditory cajun sausage. All in all a great sunday afternoon. 

Our Neighbors

Let me start by saying our yard looked like a jungle; the riding mower was in the shop for a month waiting on repair parts. When ya live in south lousiana it dont take long for ya yard to get outa control. We have been mowing since mid february (no joke).
Well the mower showed up yesturday finally and pegody and i went to work. She rode the mower while I weed eated and the dawgs frolicked in the cut grass. Our bratty bichons love to eat the hunks of pulverized grass that comes from under the mower. Pegody calls it grass jerky. We have to be very careful they dont take it inside. Talk bout a mess ya aughta see when they shred a chunk of "grass jerky" in the living room.
We worked hard in the yard yesturday pulling weeds and mucking out from behind the Grape arbor and from between the banana palms. Generally getting the place back into shape from 3 weeks of neglect. We have company coming over monday and want the yard to look nice.
I went back out this morning to spray round up along the fence and continue with yard work when here come the neighbors. Peg had told em we have company coming. "S.", our cross the street neighbor lady with husband "J." came over and took over our yard. S. trimmed our drive with their gas powered edger while J. rode around the yard on his big riding mower with the grass vac attachment and vacuumed up the dead grass. Three weeks of neglact made almost enough dead grass to bale for hay. I followed S. with a flat hoe scraping up all the ST. Augustine runners that had vined out onto our drive. I pitched the grass into the yard and J. passed by and vacumed them up. Normally we like to mulch the dead grass back into the yard but there was just too much this time. In no time at all we had the yard looking great thanks to Good neighbors. Of course they will be well payed in cucumbers and maters from our square foot garden.
These are the kind of neighbors that most people dream about. We are truely blessed to have them. We constantly visit back and forth across the street, trade dishes back and forth when cooking etc. It's hard to express what a comfort it is to me when I'm on the boat to know they are here watching out for Peg. Storys of their help, advice, and just friendly concern are much too numerous to put in print, but I often thank God for them in my prayers.

Fishing

Here's a pic of a bass I caught last month. For more pictures of that trip look at this link to our family web site: http://cajuncousins.photosite.com/fish5apr05/

We went fishing the other day and I took this picture of pegody. Notice the big ole gator over her right shoulder. 

This is a little cajun band we caught in Lafayette Louisiana last month. The little side bar they were playing in was so small they climbed on top of a pool table and let it rip. They played for tips almost all day and were really good. I asked the acordian guy if his base player ever stopped smiling? He said "shucks dat gal was born smilin".

Here is a picture of our oldest Bichon Frize in bad need of his spring hair cut. Sparky is a very smart dog but i refer to him as the Bart Simpson of Bichons.  

This is a picture I took at work last week of the sun rising on the Mississippi River. The bridge in the shot is the "sunshine bridge" seriously. It was named for Louisiana's singing Govenor Jimmie Davis.

Opening cappy comments

Greetings ciber land. I am the male part of this team and always type in brown for distinction purposes. Pegody my partner in life types in an asortment of "cute colors" usually pink or green.
I drive a tug boat for a living pushing barges through the bayous, rivers, bays, and back waters of South Louisiana; hence the cappy. While at work I cary a digital camera with me so I'll be sharing some of the pictures I take with yall.
I work a schedule of 14 days on the boat and 7 days home. Thank God for cell phones thats how pegody and I stay in touch. It makes the time pass by much easier.
When I'm home we enjoy a variety of activities and usually take pictures of our life together. So expect to see lots of those as well. We are just learning this blog business so it may take us a while to get into it.
So sit back and we hope you will enjoy the rantings of a couple chubby cajuns.

This is a pic of us cooking for Family and Friends