Blue Dog Nights

So I woke up the other morning, made some French Press coffee and grabbed my mug of joe ready to head out the door to take the Blue dog of his morning jaunt around the Rec Center. Now when I opened the door I was greeted with a blast of hot air. Upon checking the weather channel, I learned that it was already 86 degrees with a “feels like” temperature of 99. This should just not happen at 8:30 in the morning. Can we start a petition or something to get this kind of thing stopped? I mean really people, this is not funny. It’s only the middle of June. What am I going to do when August rolls around?

Needless to say, I decided it would perhaps be a good day in lay low in the AC and watch that stack of educational DVDs about the wetlands that have been sitting on my counter for a while. A few hours later after eating some dipping dots to chill my core, it was time to brave the heat and let the Blue dog take another trip around the Rec Center. When we got back, I noticed that I had a voicemail from Wendy Billiot, legendary Bayou Woman extraordinaire. The message went something like this. “I’m launching my boat unexpectedly and I need you to come with me on an adventure. So as soon as you…” I have no idea what the rest of the message was because I promptly began dialing Wendy back while simultaneously grabbing my camera bag and keys and heading for the door.

My first attempt at reaching Wendy, whom we shall henceforward refer to as BW, landed me at her voicemail. Now I thought, she couldn’t have gone already. According to my phone, she just called me like 5 minutes ago. So I left a message and continued for the car hoping I wasn’t too late. Within moments I rejoiced at the sound of Hail to the Victors (seriously I must be the only person in the state of Louisiana with that ring tone.)

When I answered, BW told me to get a few provisions together and book it on over to Dularge and call her when I hit the pontoon bridge. So I promptly headed for the gym, grabbed the closest cooler, filled it will ice and headed off to the Pig for some beverages. The cooler secured, I headed down the bayou toward the crossroad.

As I hit the pontoon bridge, I was ecstatic that I didn’t get get caught waiting for one of the hundreds of barges or tugs or shrimp boats that travel through each day. I gave BW a call and let her know I was about four and half minutes out from the marina. Literally fifteen seconds after hanging up, I rounded the corner and saw this.

With a heavy sigh I inched up to the guy who had just flagged me down, rolled down the window, and said “Hey buddy, how long you think?” To which he replies, “Shouldn’t be too long. We just got to strap down that crane. You should have been here earlier while we were loading her up. It was a real sight.” Now here’s the dilemma. When someone on the bayou says “it shouldn’t be too long” you really have no idea what that actually means. When a Yankee says it, you instinctively know that it basically means any where between 3 and 5 minutes. But when a Bayou Person says it, well, let’s just say it could be 5 minutes or 45 minutes. Kind of like when a Bayou Person tells you something is just down the road and 15 miles later you’ve arrived at your destination.

Knowing that the only alternative route to span what should be a 4 minute and 15 second drive to my awaiting adventure will actually be 20 miles out of my way, I decide to take my chances and sit tight. I hit BW on speed dial and informed her of my plight, then learned that the flag guy was actually from Kentucky and that while it certainly gets hot in Kentucky, it usually doesn’t get this hot. But you know it’s not really the heat, it’s the humidity that really gets to you. And no, he really isn’t exactly sure what they’re doing. They had to do some drilling and work on a pipeline and he thinks it has something to do with some levee they’re building, and hey look, you can head on your way now.

So a short while later, I was back on track and decided that “shouldn’t be too long” translates to about 10 minutes in Kentucky time. I think it just keeps getting longer the farther south you go. Four minutes and fifteen seconds later, I pulled into the marina, grabbed my camera and the cooler and met BW at the boat launch.

Tune in tomorrow for Part 2 of my adventure with the swamp dwellers. I’d keep going, but the only way I can get a signal this evening is sitting outside and I just checked weather.com and it’s currently 88 degrees with a “feels like” temperature of 100! Yep, 100 degrees my friends. It’s 6:45 PM and it feels like 100 degrees. What the what? I keep hearing this do do ta do diddily do music. Am I hallucinating? No! It’s the ice cream man! See ya later gator!