Hard Rock and a Soft Place

On October 12, the building site of the Hard Rock Hotel on the corner of Rampart and Canal partially collapsed.  It happened in the morning.  I was walking Rudy, when TFP came to find us and told me to come with him to the Greenway to see.  He had been running downtown.  When he got to Canal Street, the street was blocked and he was directed down another street.  He got directed down Rampart street, where he could see the it pretty close.  It happened on a Saturday morning, which was a better scenario than it could have been.  There were less workers on site, and there wasn't the weekday rush hour traffic.  It was still bad.  I mean, part of a huge building in a busy area collapsed.  And three people died, and many were injured.   

So, I don't have a great camera, and I never got really close to the building to get a great shot.  But if you want that, you can google "hard rock collapse" and find many better photos and videos of it.  Anyway, here are some chronological photos that I have taken of the structure.    

So there were two cranes at the site that had to be taken down.  There was a fear that they were going to topple over.  So the solution was to detonate them.  This was supposed to happen the week after the collapse.  There was a parade, Krewe of Boo, that was supposed to roll through the French quarter that night.  So, they rerouted the parade to avoid the Hard Rock collapse site.  Then, they decided to cancel the parade altogether.  Then the implosion was postponed until the next day, so the parade was back on.  This next photo is a couple hours before the cranes were set to detonate.

Here are some photos the night after the implosion.  I know it's not a close up, but it's so weird how you can't even tell anything is off if you don't really look closely.

I didn't know when it was scheduled for.  If I had known, I probably would have walked down there to watch.  But instead, I was in the house.  I had just come back from running errands, and I had sat down on the couch and was watching TV for a few minutes.  All of a sudden I heard and felt a loud boom, or a rumbling that felt like a jet plane was taking off in the next door neighbor's yard.  It shook the house.  And I knew right away exactly what it was.  Our house is less than a mile away from the site.  But there were even reports that people could hear it from Gentilly, which is at least four miles away from the site.  Crazy.

I wish I had photos from right after the implosion.  The crane on the Rampart side broke in pieces and  the longer arm or whatever you call it, went straight down and impaled the street.  So it was standing straight up, stuck in the street.  The long arm of the other crane bent like an arm with an elbow, and it was resting on the Canal Street side of the building.  According to all the officials that made statements or went on the news, it was a perfect execution.  Because they meant for the one part to be hanging off the side, and they knew the other one was going to stab the street.  In the next couple of days, they removed the debris from Rampart street, and they kind of moved the base of that crane.  Perfect execution, my ass.

These are photos of the weird and sad destruction against the beautiful sky during sunset.

And these are from today, from the Canal Street side.  Amazingly, the street was still open a block away from the site.  I guess they felt pretty confidant that nothing is going to fall into the street.

It's only been a little over two weeks since the collapse, but it feels like it's been a long time, and that this tragedy of a building is going to be a part of the cityscape for longer than it should be.  I hope that it implodes soon.  And I also hope I am able to watch it.  Sorry, but I really do.

More photos

So, this is Monday evening yoga on Lafitte Greenway.  While I do not attend, Rudy and I walk around them and soak in their peaceful vibes.  The Lafitte Greenway being two blocks from our house was one of the selling points.  

Here is the levee off of Severn Avenue in Metairie (Metry).  I was a dragon 🐉🐲Rudy around Metaire to go shoe shopping and making groceries.  After the shoe store, which I will tell you about later, I decided to take Rudy to the lake.  I realized that I could just go north from the mall and there it was.  We parked at the end of a residential street and just walked up.  It feels so otherworldly up on the levee.  The grass was so spongy.  And I also discovered that there were fire ants in the grass.  Luckily Rudy didn't step in them.  

So here are my new shoes.  I mainly needed them for our half mile walks.  

But, I did not get these at Dick's when I dragged Rudy out there.  So, what happened was, there were about two and a half minutes left during the Saints game when I decided to jump (Rudy doesn't jump really) into the car and make it over to the mall before the game was over.  I got there no problem.  But, there were still a few seconds left to the game when I walked into Dick's.  (Notice I am not going to make any phallic references because I'm so matour.). I walked around the two rows of shoes multiple times before I settled on a shoe I liked.  And I waited.  The game was over by then.  But I waited.  And I waited.  And I waited some more.  I watched a women pick up a shoe and wait.  And wait.  But then a guy came out of the back and helped her.  He walked right by me going into the back.  Then he walked kinda near me coming back out several minutes later.  And then I realized all these other customers had appeared in the shoe section right after the game had ended.  So I knew there was no hope.  

So here's the thing.  A long time ago, I was ignored when I went shopping.  No one bothered with little young me.  Then I got a little older, and salespeople came right to me when I walked in the door.  Not necessarily to help me, but to make sure I wasn't shoplifting,  And they would "discreetly" follow me.  I didn't really realize this at first.  Naive little me.  Then I got older, and I guess more invisible looking, less shopliftery looking. This also coincided with the financial crisis of 2008.  That was when all the stores cut salespeople.  And then no one would help me unless I tracked someone down and asked.  And it's mostly been that way ever since.  

So, the next day TFP and I went to the Nike outlet store which is like two miles from our house.  They have the display, and then they have the boxes of different sizes so you can help yourself.  I found some shoes I liked in a couple minutes.  Which is so fast for me.  And they had my size too, which was surprising.  And TFP, who usually can find shoes, didn't find anything he liked.  The bonus about these shoes was that they were $29.99.  The shoes that I wanted to get at Dick's were $74.99.  So, FU Dick's.  🖕🏼

And finally, here is an amusing sign at the Big Easy convenience store.  Personally, I don't think it's safe to run with a propane tank.  Also, when they are full, they are pretty heavy... just sayin.