Tuesday, August 31, 2010. A Bad Place For A Flat Tire. Chaine Des Rotisseurs. I am a lucky man. I have my problems, but they've only been small, manageable dilemmas, never disasters. Today, just as I passed the last crossover on the Causeway heading south, my right front tire went flat. I'll never know the cause. By the time I got off the bridge, the tire was sliced to ribbons. Because of the lack of shoulders on the bridge, you can't change a tire on the Causeway. I drove three and a half miles on the blowout while wondering how much other damage it was doing to the rim and the rest of the car.
At the end, the Causeway's motorist aid vehicle appeared. Its driver jumped out, changed my tire, and refused to accept my repeated offers of a fairly large tip. He said it was included in the price of the toll.
Took the car to Goodyear a half-mile away. The manager knew me from an Eat Club dinner. He dispatched a new tire from somewhere else. He looked over the rim, which was a little beat up around the edge, but not in the parts where the tire would connect.
I was very late for my radio show. They ran ESPN over the first hour, while engineer Dominic Mitchum ran out with a remote unit. We had no problem persuading Chef Andrea--whose restaurant is across the highway from Goodyear--to let us give him a free remote broadcast so I could get back on the air.
I discovered that it is currently impossible for a pedestrian to cross Causeway Boulevard anywhere near that spot. A traffic light interrupts the southbound flow long enough to get as far as the neutral ground. But northbound traffic is a constant stream coming straight off the I-10, with nothing to gap it. I stood there for five minutes and never saw even a marginal break. You used to be able to walk a block south and under the overpass, but with the construction going on now that's impossible. In the other direction, it's West Esplanade before you reach a traffic light. I had get a ride from Dominic to travel less than a block.
The show signed on at five, and Chef Andrea stopped by for a couple of lengthy discussions of his favorite subject. Fair enough. I made my way across the highway (possible after seven) and learned that my CV joint might have been damaged, and the rim might be a little warped, but that the car was safe. Only problem: one of the lug nuts was so goobered up it couldn't be screwed back on. They said riding on a wheel with four lug nuts instead of five was not a problem, short term.
I returned to Andrea's for dinner. It was a good night for that. The Chaine Des Rotisseurs--one of the oldest gourmet societies in the world, and also long-running in New Orleans--filled the dining room with a loosely-organized event. They were all eating off Andrea's regular menu, but bringing in their own spectacular wines and playing Can You Top This? I know most of these people, and they were nice enough to share so much of their wine with me that I couldn't get to all of it.
Carol Lise Rosen--for a long time the bailli of the Chaine, and maybe still--was the first to say hello. She was so effusive with praise for Hungry Town that I thought at first she was pulling my leg. She said, "It made me cry. Really." She's the third person to tell me that in the last week. I don't know what to say, but Mary Ann is glad I don't say, "You thought it was that bad, eh?"
Carol Lise and her husband Irv had a full table, so I spent most of the evening with retired judge Jacob Karno. I've known Jake for thirty years, since his wife Vicky and I collaborated on a series of tourism publications in the late 1970s. Jake now is a nursing-home mogul, and his two top management guys were having dinner with him. We talked only a little about that, and a lot about food, wine, New York City, and Louis Armstrong. Jake's grandfather bought Satchmo his first cornet. As a result, Armstrong often wore a Star of David around his neck, in honor of Mr. Karnofsky's faith. (I'm reading "Pops," a new biography of Armstrong, which confirms that story.)
Rufus and Yvette Cressend--more Chaine members--had were also there and sharing big Cabernets. The shoved someone off their table so I could join them for a few minutes. The mascot of Archbishop Rummel High School--from which I graduated after Jesuit banned me from senior year--is named for Rufus. A fellow Blue Jay was at yet another table: Dr. Bill Coleman, who was two years ahead of me at Jesuit, and with whom I tasted many wines at the Martin Wine Cellar tastings. He and I sang the Jesuit alma mater together, to prove we could still remember it.
I finally ate. Vitello tonnato, made with eye of veal round and a mayonnaise-based sauce with tuna and capers, was the starter. The sauce was not rich enough, and a bit gritty. The fettuccine Alfredo for the entree. Sauce was good, pasta was too thick. But how could I complain?
I was nervous about the drive home. I wouldn't want to have another flat on the Causeway in the dark. Nor did I want a wheel to fall off completely as a result of the first one. But I couldn't tell any difference at all in the way my seven-year-old car drove. . So, once again, I escaped real disaster.
Andrea's. Metairie: 3100 19th St. 504-834-8583. Italian.
