Stay in New Orleans

Stay in New Orleans

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My first day in New Orleans (January 14, 2002) was a busy one. I visited four libraries, two I had found before I left on the internet and two I found driving by. I also visited three health clubs. I had called three and verified that they had reasonable rates. However, the only convenient one to where I hoped to work was the YMCA and it had a parking lot that cost a dollar (making them pretty expensive from $44 initially to $75). However, as I drove by the French Riviera Club by chance I recognized that it was a regular fitness club like Bally's. I had skipped them on the internet because of their name. Anyway, I joined them in the evening and showered. Whew! 36 hours without a shower. What a trial!
I had found about eight temporary placement agencies on the internet, but settled on Task Force Staffing when I saw how bad parking was at the 'Y'. Several others were all further into the downtown region and would have even worse parking. Others were well into the suburbs, but I was hoping to find Super Bowl and Mardi Gras work which would be closer in. Task Force was in a residential neighborhood (albeit somewhat run down and mostly black, it was still quite a reasonable working class neighborhood). I focussed my searches around the route between the Riviera Spa and Task Force (about a mile).
On January 14 and 15 I spent the night parked in the residential neighborhood within a few blocks of Task Force. I parked after dark and close to (or even between) other parked cars. No one seemed to notice, but I got to bed about 8:30PM and some folks were still up and around. It is a safer neighborhood and with more traffic than I expected as the police headquarters is only a couple of blocks away (so lots of police going on and off duty). I was at Task Force at 5AM when they opened.
Task Force has a staff of about five and they usually drive their workers to the jobs in a van and pick them up. A lot of people went in and out the 15th, but no work for me. I left about 11AM (having read a lot and enjoyed the quiet time quite nicely) and looked into other things. I applied at Great American Coaches (found on internet and they said they were hiring bus drivers) which is also Lousiana Coaches (above and this picutre). I filled out the application and spoke with Howard of Human Resources. He seemed nice enough, but they seem to maintain a list of regular people who they call on in crunches and I didn't fit the pattern. Oh well.
The most convenient library on my daily route is Xavier University Library (shown here). I noticed it as I was driving by. The only problem is that they charge their students a $150 fee for computer support and so don't permit anyone who isn't student/faculty to access e-mail. Drats. It looks like I will be mostly using the library at Tulane University as it has great hours and I can do most anything I need to there. For editting images, I need to go to Loyola next door. However, I don't have pictures of those libraries yet (on the 14th I visited during the day, but wasn't taking pictures).
As I left Xavier's library during dusk, the courtyard was really pretty so I took this picture. I visited their library again before I discovered that e-mail was thoroughly blocked. I parked in a shopping center's parking lot and noticed that the library (on left below) and another building look nice from that view as well. The parking lot has stores that close early, is dark at one end, and had overnight cars in that section. That may become my regular overnight sleeping accomodations. We shall see.
On the 16th I got work at about 9AM. However, we didn' t find the place, Big Fun Amusements, until about 10:30AM as it is on the far side of the airport (about half an hour away) and the directions we started with were wrong (had us on the right road but on the near side of the airport, the road didn't go through so we eventually went around). Myself and another person washed mud off one of those giant inflatable bouncy things for kids (in this case, a birthday party last Saturday when it rained and was muddy). However, the 16th was a gorgeous day, about 70 degrees and sunny, and great to be out in it. There was also a fair amount of serious exercise in moving, unrolling, rolling up, ... those big (and heavy) tent like things. Big Fun asked that I call them for possible direct placement, and I will if the Super Bowl and/or parade clean up doesn't pan out.
On the night of the 16th I parked in front of the van in the middle of this picture. The tree to the left blocked the street light that way and the van blocked the light of what little traffic there was on this one way street. It is also a side street and does not seem to be as 'owned' (with concerned neighbors) as most so I may stay there pretty regularly (until another location speaks to me).