Greetings from old New Orleans! We hope you’re enjoying a restful and wonderful holiday season.
Not much has changed since last year. We still share our house with these two: Cinnamon and Charli. They’re sisters from the same litter, adopted from a local animal shelter. They have us trained pretty well. Cinnamon (the calico) has a super power: she can make herself invisible when it’s time to go to the vet or to get her flea medicine. She has also learned how to open all the cabinet and closet doors. She hasn’t mastered doorknobs yet, but give her time. Her sister, Charli, is silent and sneaky—turn your back for 3 seconds, and she’s on the table sampling your dinner. We’ve spoken to her about this several times, but it doesn’t seem to help.
Ray is still practicing law at Adams and Reese LLP, specializing in appellate advocacy. (His professional bio is here.) In 2024, he will hit full retirement age for Social Security. No plans to retire yet, but that will be something to think about next year and beyond. This past fall, he joined the COVID club, so he’s now immune from the current strain. Also this past year, he’s tried to get back into running after a layoff of a few years. That has been a start-and-stop deal, with little injuries popping up every so often. The goal isn’t racing, just getting back into shape. In his spare time, he plays guitar, and on Sundays he provides guitar accompaniment for the excellent choir at St. Joseph’s Church.
Suzanne has been retired for several years now. Part time, she leads yoga classes at Premier Fitness. She also got a side hustle as the sacristan for the 6 p.m. mass at Holy Name Church. What that pays is a little less than what we kick into the collection plate.
That’s it. Happy Christmas, and best wishes for a healthy, peaceful 2024.
Greetings! 2022 has flown by. No one tried to overthrow the U.S. government this year (yay!), which by itself makes 2022 an improvement over 2021. And after a couple of years living with COVID, we’re happy to get back to normal living and socializing. No hurricanes hit New Orleans this season, but just a week ago, we just dodged a tornado that cut through the West Bank, about a mile south of our house. The Saints are having a difficult season their first year without coach Sean Payton. But on the plus side, Tulane had a better-than-expected year, winning their conference, ranked ahead of LSU in a few polls, and headed to the Cotton Bowl to face USC. And our local NBA team, the Pelicans, has started their season well, helped by a finally healthy Zion Williamson.
We live in the same 120-year-old house that we’ve lived in since 1992, the day Bill Clinton was elected president. We share the house with these two: Cinnamon and Charli. (Click on the thumbnail for a better look at them.) You wouldn’t know it to look at them, but they’re sisters and litter-mates. We adopted them from a local rescue shelter a few years ago. They’re both very affectionate to us, but skittish whenever we have visitors, at which time they’d rather hide. Cinnamon, the calico, is not only good at hiding (see photo on right); she has a superpower, making herself invisible when it’s time to see the vet.
Suzanne has been retired for several years now. She’s a part-time yoga instructor at a local fitness center. This year, she picked up another part-time job at Holy Name of Jesus Church as sacristan for the 6 p.m. Sunday mass. Her hobby is making things with beads, such as hand-made jewelry.
Ray is now officially and old man. Turned 65, got his Medicare card, and now always asks for the senior discount at the coffee shop. He had a productive years practicing law at Adams and Reese, where he specializes in appellate advocacy. With COVID restrictions easing, he had two in-person oral arguments at the Louisiana Supreme Court this year to go with a handful of arguments in the Louisiana First and Fourth Circuit appellate courts. Despite the Medicare thing, he has no plans to retire, at least not yet.
Ray still plays guitar as a hobby, taking weekly lessons and playing at church. In May, he called it quits at Holy Name of Jesus (our parish for several years) and joined the music ministry at St. Joseph’s Church on Tulane Avenue. That's sort of a spiritual homecoming: St. Joseph’s is staffed by the Congregation of the Mission, popularly known as Vincentians after their founder, St. Vincent de Paul, and Ray is a former Vincentian seminarian (1970s).
Speaking of guitar, we’ll leave you with a little music video that Ray made a year ago. Enjoy. Merry Christmas, and best wishes for a wonder-filled 2023.
Hello everyone. The Christmas holidays are a time for reflecting on the year that’s almost done. And 2021 has been, uh, interesting in a Chinese-curse kind of way (“May you live in interesting times.”). The year started with the attempted coup d’etat on January 6 by a people who sought a violent overthrow of the 2020 election results. And of course, there was the ongoing COVID pandemic, which has been with us for nearly two years. But things have gotten better. Today we have a president who’s not openly threatening our 232-year-old democracy—that’s a big improvement! And with more people getting vaccinated against COVID, we’ve started resuming the normal things we took for granted before the pandemic.
Around here, things haven’t been bad. Unlike many work places, Ray’s office has been open since mid-2020. With everyone socially distanced and (until recently) a mandatory masking policy, it’s been as safe as any other public space. And Suzanne’s yoga classes have resumed at West Jefferson Medical Center and Premier Fitness. But COVID had its effect on large-scale gatherings: no Mardi Gras parades this year, no Jazz Fest. Still, those things are getting better. A local Halloween parade drew a crowd without causing a mid-November surge in COVID infections. And both of us have had three shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination. So we’re cautiously optimistic about more normality returning in 2022.
Aside from the January 6 coup attempt, the big event around here was Hurricane Ida. Ida was a Category 4 storm that passed west of New Orleans. Areas south and west of the city were hit hard. We rode it out here, and it was a scarier ride than we expected. As the storm neared New Orleans, it took a little jog to the east, so we got more wind than we expected. The photo at left shows some damage just a block and a half up the street from our house. That oak tree had termite damage and snapped at its base, taking down the power line and snapping two adjacent utility poles. Immediately after the hurricane, the city’s entire power grid was down. But thanks to linemen from all over the country, power was restored to most of the city within a week or two. Our neighborhood was without power for about 10 days, but fortunately we have a generator that kept us relatively comfortable: enough power to run a few air conditioners, along with the lights and the refrigerator. Still, we had to ration the electricity, so we were glad to have the power grid restored.
Other than that, things are much the same as last year. Ray still practices law at Adams and Reese LLP, where he specializes in appellate advocacy (translation: lots of reading and lots of persuasive writing). In his spare time, he enjoys playing guitar (some of his collection is at left). He takes weekly lessons and plays at the 6 p.m. mass on Sundays. During the pandemic, he learned to make and share videos on YouTube and Vimeo.
Suzanne has been retired for several years now. She still works part time leading yoga classes at West Jefferson Fitness Center and Premier Fitness. She also makes hand-made jewelry—no precious metals or gems, just interesting stones and beads and things.
Our cats, sisters Cinnamon and Charli, say hello and would like to know what you’re going to do to please them. Although they’re from the same litter, their personalities are as different as their looks. Cinnamon (on the left) is a jumper and a bit hyper; her motor idles high. Charli is more sedate. They’ll both get into trouble if you take your eyes off of them for five seconds.
We’ll close with a seasonal song, “In the Bleak Midwinter.” May your 2022 be full of blessings.
As 2020 draws to a close, we’re thinking the same thing as you are: “Let’s not do that again.”
We’ll remember 2020 as the year of COVID. When the going got tough and people were asked to make sacrifices for the common good, brave Americans responded by hoarding toilet paper.
Years from now, when someone asks, “What did you do during the pandemic?” we’ll say that we were lucky. As of this writing, neither of us has gotten sick. During the spring shutdown, Ray worked from home. Suzanne’s yoga classes were interrupted but resumed when things started reopening. We did our part by not traveling anywhere, so no travelogue in this newsletter (yay!).
Right now our lives are the same as usual for the past few years, except for more social distancing. Ray continues to practice law at Adams and Reese LLP, specializing in appellate advocacy. Suzanne leads yoga classes at West Jefferson Medical Center and Premier Fitness. We have our hobbies: Ray’s is guitar playing; Suzanne’s is making handmade jewelry. We share our New Orleans home with cats Cinnamon and Charli, sisters from the same litter and partners in crime. Here they are, daring us to put ornaments on the Christmas tree.
We’ll leave you with a seasonal homemade musical selection: “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming.” A merry Christmas to all and wishes for a happy and healthy 2021.
Greetings from our New Orleans home to wherever you are. And whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, Festivus, or the Solstice, or just the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020—happy holidays!
This year, we filled a void in our home by adopting these two from a local animal shelter: Cinnamon and Charli. They’re sisters and litter-mates who turned 1 year old this past October. They’re not good at obeying commands, such as “get off the counter.” But they are affectionate once they warm up to you. Last weekend, we put up the Christmas tree (without ornaments), and so far they haven’t destroyed it. Maybe next year we’ll take another gamble and put ornaments on it.
Other than the new kitties, not much has changed around here. We’re in the same house we’ve occupied since 1992 on Magazine Street near Audubon Park in New Orleans. It has all the charms and issues you’d expect in a 120-year-old house.
Suzanne stays busy following her retirement several years ago. She still teaches a few yoga classes per week at West Jefferson Medical Center, Premier Fitness, and Ville St. Marie. When she’s not doing that, she makes handmade jewelry.
Ray is still working for a living as an appellate lawyer at Adams and Reese LLP. He’s still taking guitar lessons and playing at 6 p.m. Sunday mass at Holy Name Church nearby. For non-liturgical music, he’s been working on blues slide guitar (open-G tuning) while dabbling from time to time in other blues modes.
Both of us post regularly on that face book thing, so if you happen to use that platform (we don’t encourage it), look us up and send us a friend request. If you’re old school, send us an email or a letter just to say hello. We’d enjoy hearing from you. Here are our coordinates:
Hello from New Orleans! Here’s our holiday newsletter. We enjoy reading the newsletters we receive, and we hope you enjoy reading ours. As the recently departed Billy Delle used to say: if you can take it, we can dish it out.
This year, our family grew in an unusual way: Ray now has a new sister, whom we met for the first time in June. How that happened is a long story, going back to 1969. How we managed to find each other in 2018: DNA and Ancestry.com. At left is a group selfie photo we took at our first meeting: from left to right, Suzanne, Ray, Angela (Ray’s new sister), and Kevin (Angela’s husband).
Suzanne, who retired from civil service a few years ago, has been busy leading yoga classes and making jewelry. She now has seven yoga classes and three different locations in the New Orleans area. Some of her jewelry designs have been featured in a video log by Silver Silk & More. She still does racewalking, competing in several trail races. This past year, she celebrated 10 years of participation in the Jazz Half Marathon.
Ray still practices law at Adams and Reese LLP, specializing in appellate advocacy. These days, his main extra-curricular activity is guitar. For several years now, he’s been taking lessons and playing at the Holy Name 6 p.m. mass. He also dabbles a bit with slide guitar (tuned to open G). At left is a resonator guitar that he added to his little collection this year. He hit a milestone of sorts earlier this year when a local coffee shop, without being asked, gave him a senior discount. In another concession to age, he’s given up alcohol. He’s also taking a hiatus from running after discovering that he really, really likes not running. (Doctor says to get some exercise, so that may change in 2019.)
At home, our feline population is down to one. We had to say goodbye to Jellyroll, our tubby tabby. She had 18 or 19 good years (sorry, lost count). We still have Wednesday, who is 17 and still causing mischief. (The picture at left is old, but she looks the same.)
We’ll leave you with a quotation by Anthony de Mello, S.J., something that’s good to remember in times like these: “You know, all mystics—Catholic, Christian, non-Christian, no matter what their theology, no matter what their religion, are unanimous on one thing: that all is well, all is well. Though everything is a mess, all is well. Strange paradox, to be sure.”
2017 seems to have flown by. It’s been an eventful year, with major hurricanes in Texas, Florida, and Puerto Rico, and as we write this, wildfires in southern California. With those events in mind, we are more than usually grateful for our home.
Speaking of which, it’s now been 25 years since we bought and moved into this old house on Magazine Street in New Orleans. We live here with our two cats: Wednesday and Jellyroll. Both are up in years—Wednesday is 16 and Jellyroll is 18. But they don’t act their age. Wednesday can still jump up on tables and knock stuff over. Jellyroll moves slower; she can still jump up on the bed or sofa, but she has to think about it for a minute or two before making the leap. Aside from that, they are both healthy and happy.
Speaking of getting up in years, Ray turned 60 this past October. You know what that means: lots of junk mail from AARP. But he is no where near retirement. He continues to practice law at Adams and Reese LLP, where he specializes in appellate advocacy. That means lots of brief writing and the occasional oral argument before a panel of usually three judges. He still does a bit of running, although that is sometimes hit and miss. A few years ago, he picked up the guitar again after a few decades of not playing. He’s been taking lessons from a local musician, Vincent Marini. He regularly plays at the 6:00 p.m. Sunday mass at Holy Name Church.
Suzanne has been retired for a few years now. She continues to teach yoga classes part time at West Jefferson Fitness Center, Premier Fitness, and Ville St. Marie. And she still does a lot of race walking, competing in several distance races. The highlights include the Louisiana Half Marathon (January), the Guinness Challenge (March), the Hotter Than Hell Marathon (July), the Jazz Half Marathon (October), and the Q50 Relay (December), in which her team placed first. Lately, she’s taken up beading (making home-made jewelry). And even more lately, she decided to try her hand at art, beginning with drawing and working up from there. She too is active at Holy Name Church, serving as a lector, eucharistic minister, and hospitality minister.
As we enjoy the holiday season, let’s not forget those who’ve lost homes this year because of hurricanes or fires and the homeless in our own communities. God bless, and merry Christmas.
The end of the year is a natural time to reflect on what happened during the year. The recent presidential election dominated the headlines and social-media discussions. We’ll leave that topic aside and look back some other things that happened around here in 2016.
In April, we had our house fumigated. Since we bought the house, it’s been under a termite contract and has been regularly treated for subterranean termites. In the past couple of years, we've learned about drywood termites, another species making itself at home in New Orleans (and more recently, in our house). Unlike other species of termites, they don’t need contact with the ground, so the chemical barrier around our foundation doesn’t work for them. To get rid of them, we tried spot treatment, only to have them pop up on other spots. So like many of our neighbors, this spring we went with the nuclear option. The fumigation itself wasn’t so bad; we spent only one night at a nearby B&B. But the preparation was a chore. Anything you can eat, drink, or rub on your skin had to be out of the house. But the job was done, and it seems to have worked. We hope it’s at least a few years before we have to do this again.
After the fumigation, we made a few improvements to infrastructure. We replaced the water heater and, in the process, brought our gas plumbing up to code. (The house is over 100 years old.) And in early summer, we had a backup power generator installed. As the photo shows, it’t not much to look at. But it’s reassuring to know that, when the next tropical storm knocks out the power grid, we’ll be able to keep the lights on and the air conditioners running — at least as long as the natural gas holds out.
In the spring, Ray took his annual stay-cation to attend all seven days of Jazz Fest. The highlight was Rhiannon Giddens, who blew the roof off the Blues Tent. Other highlights: Mason Ruffner, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Johnny Sansone, Anders Osborne, John Hammond, Henry Butler, Corey Ledet, Beau Soleil, Los Lobos, Bonerama, and Marcia Ball—just to name a few.
In May, Ray ran the Tchoupitoulas Barathon again. Six miles, six bars, six beers. No event for old men! He finished so far back in the pack that a funny thing happened after: he decided to start training again for competitive running. Fitness running is great, but it just wasn’t working: too easy to stay in bed an extra hour and blow off the morning run. He spent the summer slowly getting back into shape, and this fall, he jumped into a few races. The results have been encouraging: a 23:11 5K, a 41:11 5-miler, and a 2:06:21 half-marathon (done as a training run).
In June, Ray traveled west to Ventura, California, for the wedding of his niece Marissa. Like many weddings, it was a family reunion of sorts: the first time in 11 years that Ray, his sisters Patricia and Gabrielle, and his brother, Michael, were all in the same place at the same time.
Professionally, Ray applied for certification as an appellate specialist with the Louisiana Board of Legal Specialization. In August, he took the exam—and passed! So come January, he will have a new certificate to frame and hang on the office wall. He continues to practice law at Adams and Reese LLP as part of the firm’s appellate team. His law blog, Louisiana Civil Appeals, has a small but enthusiastic following.
Suzanne, for her part, has continued hitting the roads and trails race-walking. She is a frequent competitor at the Q50 Trail Races. In August, the good folks at Q50 (that is, Cesar Torres) named her Trail Header of the Month. So far, the highlight has been the victory of her co-ed team, Dia de los Muertos, in the Q50 40-mile relay, winning the memento pictured at right: a decorative bamboo relay baton. On December 17, she was the first-place female race walker in the Ole Man River Half Marathon. She continues to hold yoga classes at West Jefferson Fitness Center, Premier Fitness, and Ville St. Marie.
We still do the church thing at Holy Name of Jesus Parish, where we are regulars at the Sunday 6 p.m. mass. Both of us serve as lectors. Suzanne is also a eucharistic minister and usher coordinatory. Ray plays guitar with the 6 p.m. mass ensemble.
We started this newsletter mentioning about the election. We’re not going to say much about it because enough has been said already. We’ll just leave you with a picture of our yard sign. Please join us in praying for peace and justice in our country. Thanks. Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year.
Time passes, and things happen. Sometimes we look around and see little change from day to day. But at the end of the year, we reflect and realize that a lot has happened.
Looking back, we are reminded of some of the famous people who died this year: Leonard Nimoy, Kenny Stabler, Paul Prudhomme, and Allen Toussaint. Our extended family lost a member with the passing of Dean McFall, husband of our cousin Jacqueline McFall. On a more joyful note, our extended family also grew by two with the addition of Mason Ward (son of our nephew Matthew) and Nathan Shearn (husband of our niece Taylor Artel).
Here in Louisiana, we had an exciting election for governor that ended with a surprise: the winner was a Democrat! Our new governor, John Bel Edwards, will take office in early 2016. Our state faces many problems, but we are optimistic that our new governor will work with our still mostly Republican legislature to begin solving them.
Locally, this year saw the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the ensuing flood caused by multiple levee failures. Those were harrowing days. This year, we were thankful that the hurricanes stayed away from our part of the country. Nevertheless, our thoughts and prayers were with those in other parts of the world who were not so lucky, especially those hit by storms in the Pacific.
Suzanne has been retired from her job with the State of Louisiana for a few years now. She has taken up a second career as a yoga instructor, conducting regular classes at West Jefferson Fitness Center, Premier Fitness, and Ville St. Marie. She also does a lot of racewalking, training for and competing in several races, including the Larry Fuselier 25K (1st female racewalker), the Big Heart + Big Easy 5K (another 1st-place finish), and most recently, the Baton Rouge Beach Half Marathon (3rd in her age group). She also maintained strings of appearances in the Louisiana Half Marathon, the Rock-N-Roll Half Marathon, the Jazz Half Marathon, and several Q50 trail races.
Ray practices appellate law at Adams and Reese LLP, where he’s been for over 13 years now. In his spare time, he’s continued to work on improving his guitar playing, alternating between liturgical music and blues. For the umpteenth year in a row, he attended all seven days of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, dragging his 57-year-old body all over the Fair Grounds to see (deep breath here) Steve Winwood, Anders Osborne, the Meters, Aaron Neville, Marcia Ball, Corey Ledet, the Royal Southern Brotherhood, Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu (more on him below), Rev. John Wilkins, Jarekus Singleton, Shooter Jennings (son of Waylon), Bonerama, Alison Krauss & Union Station, Spencer Bohren, The Who, The Word, Kenny Brown, Carolyn Wonderland, Delbert McClinton, Little Freddie King, John Mooney, the Zion Harmonizers, Vieux Farka Toure, Sonny Landreth, Johnny Sansone, Mia Borders, Wayne Toups, the Tedeschi-Trucks Band (Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks), and many others.
On the running side, Ray had a bit of a setback. Somehow, he damaged the peroneal nerve in his right leg, giving him a foot drop. The orthopedist prescribed a break from running, which Ray did for a little while. Today the nerve damage seems to be mostly healed, so now the struggle is to resume regular running. Despite this setback, Ray still competed in the annual Tchoupitoulas Barathon (6 miles, 6 bars, 6 beers). He also competed (sort of) in the Guinness Challenge at the Shamrock Run (8K plus four 4-0z. Guinnesses along the way) and most recently, the 105th annual Turkey Day 5-miler in New Orleans.
Both of us remain active in Holy Name of Jesus Parish. Each of us serves as a lector at the Sunday 6 p.m. mass. Suzanne is also a eucharistic minister and an usher (oops, hospitality minister), and she has a weekly one-hour shift in the Adoration Chapel. Ray plays guitar with the Sunday 6 p.m. music ensemble.
We share our home with two cats, both of whom were rescued from the street: Jelly Roll (the tabby) and Wednesday (black). They’re both getting up in years. Wednesday likes to lick our faces when she thinks it’s time for her breakfast. Jelly Roll, for her part, prefers to yowl the song of her people at inopportune times such as 3 a.m.
Looking forward to 2016, we’re excited about the upcoming presidential election, which seems to have many people across the country more engaged than usual. We look forward to doing our own little bit for our candidate, Bernie Sanders.
Greetings from New Orleans, and welcome to our on-line, multi-media, environmentally friendly Christmas newsletter. We’ve been doing this for 10 years now; at right, under “Christmas Past,” we have links to prior editions going back to 2004 and, before then, some old photos and reconstructed memories.
Suzanne continues to enjoy an active retirement. She conducts yoga classes at Premier Fitness, West Jefferson Fitness Center, Manhattan Athletic Club, and Ville St. Marie. She also continues to enjoy success in race-walking. Lately she has focused on trail runs and longer distances, including seven half-marathons and two ultra-marathons. In the process, she has collected several awards, the most unusual of which was a machete for a trail run through a sugarcane field. (This award reminds Ray not to piss her off.)
This past June was Ray’s 12th anniversary at Adams and Reese LLP in New Orleans. That means that he has now spent half his legal career there—last October was the 24th anniversary of his bar admission. Ray practices appellate advocacy, meaning that he is called upon when things go sour in the trial court. This year a bit of professional recognition came his way. He was rated AV by Martindale-Hubbell and, for the second year in a row, was listed in Louisiana Super Lawyers for appellate advocacy. Two of his briefs were featured in the third edition of Bryan Garner’s The Winning Brief. At left is a photo from the book’s index, listing him just ahead of Earl Warren and Elizabeth Warren (alphabetically).
In his spare time, he has continued his guitar lessons with the masteful Vincent Marini. He is trying to learn the blues slide style with the guitar tuned to open G. For the umpteenth year in a row, he attended all seven days of the New Orleans Jazz Fest and, two weeks later, participated in the Tchoupitoulas Barathon (6 miles, 6 bars, 6 beers). Said Ray after both: “I’m getting too old for this shit!” But he’ll probably do it again in 2015. Asked about the number-one lesson learned in 2014, he replied, “After a root canal, take the rest of the day off. Do not attempt to return to work.”
This year we had a bit of work done on our 114-year-old house (portrait at left by our friend Charles Harrison). On the inside, we (meaning Suzanne) converted the back room into a guest room with its own bathroom. So now our overnight guests no longer have to camp out in the living room. We (again meaning Suzanne) also converted our former, little-used dining room into a music room for Ray. The latter has the advantage of collecting all the guitar-related stuff into one space, thus uncluttering several other rooms. On the outside, we had the house painted for the first time since Katrina, and in the process got some much-needed exterior repair work done. As a result, the old house looks better than ever. It has its quirks, as you’d expect in a house so old. But the neighborhood is outstanding: a walkable mix of commercial and residential, with Audubon Park just a block and a half away.
Both of us remain active parishioners of Holy Name of Jesus Church, regulars at the Sunday 6 p.m. mass. Suzanne is a eucharistic minister and lector, and she coordinates the offertory collection. Ray is also a lector, and he plays guitar with the 6 p.m. music group.
We leave you with some seasonal music. This is Aaron Neville performing “Ave Maria” at the 2012 New Orleans Jazz Fest. Best wishes to everyone for a Merry Christmas or whatever other winter holiday you may be celebrating, and for a happy 2015.