In my time I have been to several parades, they are well orchestrated events with elaborately decorated floats, marching bands and local clubs. One of the biggest parades is the Calgary Stampede Parade. It is very much a celebration of the old frontier starring over 1000 horses and a fleet of street cleaning trucks (to clean up after the horses)!
It was with these preconceived notions that I went to the Slidell St Patricks Day Parade. Boy how wrong I was!
Jan’s uncle Roy had taken his motorhome down the night before and scoped out a great location, lots of room for people and parking. It seemed perfect, we had beer, we had lawn chairs and we had access to a bathroom.
“It is important to pay attention, otherwise you will get hit by a potato” was the strange advice I was given.
The advice actually was good. I have never seen anything like it in my life. There were strings of beads, soft toys, trinkets, Frisbees, hats, basically all the things that you might expect. But I have to admit that the sheer volume blew my mind. Why throw one string of beads when you can throw 10?
The strangest and even more prolific ‘throws’ were fruit and vegetables. The air was thick with Cabbages, Carrots, Onions, and Potatoes. There were also Apples, Oranges, Lemons and Bananas.
I have yet to open the trunk of the car to see what we were tossed, but I know we will not be going to buy vegetables for a while!
Unlike some other parade goers we were in no rush to leave, this was a rare opportunity for Jan to visit with family that she doesn’t see very often. What amazed me was the state of the road.
Beads and vegetables as far as the eye could see. Large Carrots make a unique crunching sound when run over!
It was a great outing, there is no doubt about it, the folks in Louisiana sure know how to have fun. Maybe the most memorable part of the day, is what didn’t happen. I saw no-one causing trouble, no fights, just a lot of people from very diverse ethnic and economic backgrounds having fun.
Now… I have to decide what to do with all of these cabbages.
1 user commented in " Vegetable Carnage – AKA the Slidell St Patricks Day Parade "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackI am so happy I finally got you to one of our parades. You have been hearing about them from me for years and now you can finally say how honest I was being when I described the experience of going to one. I am so proud that you enjoyed it!
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