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Wherefore Art Thou Marching Bands?


        It's been a weird couple of weeks, y'all. "Official" Mardi Gras season kicked off here in Mobile, and it has been one of the funniest, strangest experiences of my life. The people of Mobile will never hesitate to let you know that Mardi Gras "started here." They're very insistent about this, and they are correct. The first recorded Mardi Gras celebration in the United States occurred in Mobile in 1703. I'm not going to debate historical fact. Among the questions I have asked and have not been given satisfactory answers to:

  • When does [name of parade] start tonight?
  • What is the most popular parade?
  • Which local high school has the best marching band?
    No one has a firm idea of when the parades actually start here. You can ask five people and get five different answers. Answers also vary wildly about the most popular parade. Fair enough. New Orleanians also have their personal favorites, but people in New Orleans also are so particular in their opinion that they will stake out spots on the route of their favorite days, if not weeks in advance. (What's up, Krewe of Chad!) Perhaps the most upsetting is that no one knows who the best local marching band is. Every time I ask this question, I get blank stares. "There's a best marching band?" they ask me.
    
    Yes. Yes there is. It is the St. Augustine Marching 100. And the best college band is Southern's Human Jukebox. To see either of those bands under the overpass on the parade route in New Orleans is a memory you will have for the rest of your life. 
    
    Mobile may have done Mardi Gras first. But New Orleans does it better.
        
    Behold the musings of the homesick. That longing for New Orleans was only compounded when my brother and sister-in-law welcomed my newest nephew into the world on Groundhog Day. Nephew #2 is a healthy little guy weighing 7 lbs. 3 oz. I can't wait to meet him in person, but it looks like that's not going to happen until after Mardi Gras has swept through the Gulf Coast, leaving everyone a bit weary and looking for a good Catholic school fish fry on lenten Fridays. I can't wait!


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