Thank God our long national nightmare will soon be over. Game of Thrones, the tedious "swords and sandals" bore fest that has inflicted seven seasons of its insipidness on HBO viewers has now begun its eighth and final mind numbing season. I'm fairly certain that hell will involve either being required to sit through a production--ANY production--of Cats or offering up Game of Thrones on every TV channel. Of course, if there's an open bar...
To escape all the hype and faux Thrones excitement surrounding this cultural phenomenon I booked my annual trip to the land of red beans and pinball machines, New Orleans, for this past week. New Orleans is not only my favorite destination for food and adult beverage it is also home to the national treasure that is the World War II Museum. If you haven't yet been to what is now NOLA's number one tourist attraction ( and America's number 3) you need to rectify that pronto. The museum is the realized dream of historians Stephen Ambrose and Nick Mueller, both one time professors at the University of New Orleans, who, with the help of people like Tom Hanks, Steven Spielberg, Gary Sinise and others have created a spectacular multi building campus to honor the sacrifice of America's fighting men and women who answered the call to save the world from the horror that was Hitler's Germany and the Empire of Japan. World War II was by far the most devastating conflict the world has ever seen and with four-hundred thousand lost American lives among the seventy-three million who died world wide I for one am grateful that this enormous project was finished in time for many WW II vets to have visited beginning in 2000. We're down to very few of them now and often when they make it to the museum it is with the help of care givers and a wheel chair. I saw only one on this week's trip.
My youngest daughter and her family joined me this year at the museum and we were lucky enough to get my 9 year-old grandson into the collections vault where many items are catalogued and authenticated. Young Daniel got to hold a German Luger and a Japanese Samurai sword thanks to curator Larry Decuers. He also got to see many planes, tanks, and the Higgins landing crafts that were so instrumental to the Normandy Invasion. I know Dan is a long way from grasping the enormity of what his great grandfathers and grandmothers sacrificed to insure his freedom but when his school does get around to teaching the kids about the war perhaps this visit will have provided him a greater appreciation. Certainly I learn many new facts about the war with each visit. It takes about three days to see the multiple exhibits so, if you can visit, know that it is quite extensive but well worth the time invested.
Turn off the TV and make some New Orleans plans. The museum website is: nationalww2museum.org
Come for the history; stay for the oysters!
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| Dan had to glove up to handle weapons in the museum vault. |
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| Just a couple of the planes in the aviation pavilion. |
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| The kid shows real promise in the raw oyster department. |
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| This building houses the Road to Tokyo, an extensive look at the war in the Pacific. |
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| 1940's style "canteen" shows run daily. Smoke 'em if you've got 'em. |
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