Some NOLA hotel tips: The Melpomene Suite @ the Pontchartrain Hotel is great for impressing people - it has a piano in it (once played by Stevie Wonder), you can get it for amazingly low rates sometimes. Would cost $1,000's in other cities. Has two bedrooms, so 4 people can stay. The suites at the Pere Marquette are also astonishingly great value, huge amounts of room, one has a corner bathtub that's pretty great.

OK, here's my favourite NOLA hotel story, and one of my favourite stories about the city. It's long but worth the pay-off and us Brits come out of it badly. It's 1957, and world famous British conductor Sir Thomas Beecham is in town to conduct the Louisiana Philharmonic… He is an enormous star. Like, Elton John famous. He books into the boutique hotel Maison de Ville...

I was half living here in 2009 when the Saints won the Superbowl. That particular day is a blur of messy decisions but the day they won the divisional title is such a great memory. Cars stopped, people came out of bars and were hugging in the streets. Pure elation. How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love American Football

A favorite whacky NOLA hotel incident before I work for a bit and get lunch: In 1935 at Le Pavillon, Huey P Long had one of his goons hang out of a high-storey window with a microphone attached to a long pole to record the conversations of his political opponents. This is the most cartoonish thing I can imagine. Kind of backfired as Huey P was assassinated soon after, for presumably just this kind of hi-jinx.

The Audubon Cottages are swanky now, but in the late 1800s they were shacks. One of them was home to Red Light Liz and her beau, Joe the Whipper. Imagine partying with this couple. Before that, John James Audubon lived there for a while (hence the name), starting on his bird painting project.

Quick update because I know you're all VERY INVESTED in my personal life: still Not From Here, though I'm more from here than I was, having got my green card (I'm a filthy Brit invader) two years ago. In 2016, I got married to a Cajun and I've put down pretty strong roots here. Been coming to New Orleans for work and fun since 2001, moved here (when it became too expensive to visit seven times a year) in 2011.

I talked a lot about the good things about living here yesterday, but it’s certainly far from perfect. Pay is much lower here. It’s improved a bit because the value of the pound has increased since I moved here, but it’s still lower than the US. Living in London is not cheap. I have a 2 bed apartment which is about 800 sqft and it costs me $2900 per month. Far more than I paid for my 4 bed 2200 sqft house in the Irish Channel.

This is without a doubt the coolest picture I’ve taken while traveling here. It’s from Loch Lomond in Scotland. The English coastline is an underrated place to visit. Here’s one from a hiking trip I went on a few weeks ago.

The New Orleans brand is pretty strong abroad, I find New Orleans themed things all the time here and throughout Europe. Here’s a shirt that was at the local H&M: KFC had this menu item for a while:

As @champsuperstar pointed out, tonight is the final of the Eurovision Song Contest. If you haven’t heard of this, think of an American Idol-ish pageant where each European country enters one artist/song each year. The most famous winners are ABBA who won with “Waterloo” in 1974. Most of the contestants are not famous and don’t go on to be too famous outside the contest.

This is the 65th year of it, and they are bringing it to America next year where the states will compete with each other: forbes.com/sites/robertha…

One of the best things about living in London pre-covid is the cheap flights to Europe. You’ll find traveling around Europe that Louisiana/Cajun/New Orleans have all become synonymous with “American food that isn’t burgers and hotdogs.” Much like the recent BBQ rankings, we tend to get credit for things that don’t really belong to us. Sometimes they get it, though. There’s a bar here called “American Bar” that plays jazz music and serves Sazeracs and French 75s.

My kids go to what they call "state school" here. There's 3 tiers:

State school - Similar to what we'd call a public school

Public school - Similar to what we'd call a private school but it's "public" because anyone can go there if they pay

https://twitter.com/9MSJ9/status/1396156550281060356

Then there's private school - This is like a private school that's invite only. The British elite go to these types of schools.

So, as I mentioned before, I went to LSU for undergrad and UNO for grad school. Unfortunately, #lalege has continuously chipped away at these institutions, most notably since Jindal took office. They need to be fought for! Louisiana needs quality education. It doesn't have to be this way! If you look at GDP per state on a per capita basis, meaning how much money does the state create per person, Louisiana is NOT at the bottom, it's in the middle. 20-30% better than states like MS and AL.

Pay your taxes, and then literally nothing else. I had shoulder surgery in 2019. I showed up, they put me under, did the job, I went home on the same day. I did 6 months of PT. It all cost £0.

https://twitter.com/fofalex/status/1396147671115632644

I'm glad @fofalex brought this up, because let me tell you, the right-wing talking points you hear about social medicine are all COMPLETELY FALSE. Going to the doctor is so much simpler here.

So what’s with the 2 accounts? I had joined and quit Twitter a few times, but after I moved from Austin (where I’d moved after graduating from LSU) back to New Orleans I created the anonymous account @ok__awesome It was mostly just snarky comments about local news at first, but shortly after I started doing a master’s degree at UNO. I was doing part-time MBA courses after work and as part of my studies I was getting into writing and statistics, eventually created a blog as well.

So.. I’m Larry. You may know me as @LarryLarmeu or @ok__awesome. You might not know me at all. I think I was one of the last few @BeingNOLA’s back in October 2016. I wasn’t NOLA for very long after that. Those of you who do know me know that I moved from NOLA to London in early 2017. It has been quite an experience living abroad.