N.O. Road Trip: Lakeview (III)

I wasn't particularly keen on driving to New Orleans East or the Gulf Coast, but since Lakeview was on the way out to Metairie, I decided to skip I-10 and take Canal Blvd. I also wanted to see the first house I lived in as a child over in Bucktown. I drove down Fleur de Lis, since I used to know someone who lived on that street. Alas, it was impossible to recognize anything from pre-Storm. Lots of vacant lots, a few wrecked houses and a fair amount of rebuilding. Of course, these folks are relatively prosperous and this is probably as good as it gets, although they probably got the worst of the flooding.

What also surprised me crossing the 17th street canal was the number of FEMA trailers in Metairie. There hasn't been much talk of this. But the old neighborhood where I grew up still had many, including one in the yard of the house I grew up in. As far as the old house in Bucktown, it has been bulldozed down to the slab. They seem to have had some flooding, but there were also many newer looking houses. Perhaps that neighborhood was slowly changing before the Storm.

It was well past lunch, so we went to Drago's in Fat City (does anyone still use that name?), which was doing a thriving business, even in the mid-afternoon. And no wonder, the grilled oysters and the soft shell crab lunch special made for one of the best meals I've had in a long time. Rumor was that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie had been by for dinner recently.