Benjamin and I - Callin' Baton Rouge

Tricia was out of town at her high school reunion.  I was a bachelor at home, taking care of the animals.  I got a call from my Mom Friday night and she and Dad offered us two tickets to the LSU - Auburn Football Game.  Unfortunately, Russ had to work on Saturday and wasn't able to join us, but Benjamin and I headed east for an hour and got on our way to watch the Tigers play.

We woke up and milked the cows and then got on our way.  It was a cloudy, chilly morning as we crossed the Mighty Mississippi River at around 9:30 am.  On the western side of the bridge, if you roll your windows down, you can smell coffee beans roasting at the Community Coffee Plant.

We arrived on campus and parked at perhaps the farthest parking spot that existed on the eastern side of campus and walked toward all the action.  We crossed the Parade Grounds with a great view of Memorial Tower or the Campanile with Old Glory flying.  The tower is 175 feet tall and was built in 1923 as a memorial to Louisiana soldiers that died in World War I.

We walked by the Pete Maravich Assembly Center to Mike the Tiger's habitat.  Mike was pacing back and forth...

What a beautiful cat!

We heard that SEC Nation was set up across Nicholson Drive, so we wanted to go see what that was all about.  The live broadcast had Tim Tebow, Paul Finebaum, Marcus Spears, and Laura Rutledge reporting and interacting with a large crowd.  Below you can see Tim Tebow tossing footballs to the crowd. 

Benjamin and I walked back toward Tiger Stadium, grabbed a bowl of chicken and sausage gumbo and sat down to watch the sights and sounds of game day.  If you look at the facade of Tiger Stadium, you'll see a number of windows.  Odd.  There's an interesting story behind that.  In 1931 LSU needed more dormitory rooms.  Huey P. Long, the governor of Louisiana wanted to enlarge the football stadium.  It seemed to be a stalemate until it was decided that BOTH could win.  They built the dorm rooms INSIDE the stadium.  The windows you see are part of 430 rooms for 1,500 students.  After football games, students would often return to their rooms with things knocked off the walls and dressers from the noise and vibration of the big game.  No students actually live in the dorms in the stadium anymore, however.

A rare 'selfie' of Benjamin and me under the stately oaks on North Stadium Drive.

The football team walked down Victory Hill and Benjamin was able to give QB Joe Burrow a high five!  Then the Golden Band from Tigerland marched down the hill and played those four notes that makes Mike the Tiger stand right up and roar!  The crowd roared too!

The team went through pregame drills, met on the eye of the tiger and got ready for action!

We sang Louisiana Saturday Night and Callin' Baton Rouge and then the band played the Alma Mater and the National Anthem and we got ready for kickoff.

LSU won the game and improved our record to 8 - 0.  Benjamin and I had a great day together at the game!  Geaux Tigers!

4-H Night With The Tigers

Each year we try to make it to 4-H Night with the Tigers.  It is an LSU football game where they honor 4-Hers.  Benjamin has been a long-time 4-H member and he's in his senior year, so this will be our last one!  They have a big tailgate party behind the Cow Palace with free jambalaya (it was delicious!) and ice cream from the LSU Dairy Store (always a favorite of ours!).  Here is my family in front of the Cow Palace.  "Pistol" Pete Maravich once played basketball in the Cow Palace.

What a nice looking bunch!

We walked down to see Mike the Tiger, but he was sleeping and had no time for pleasant conversation with us.  Too bad.

We watched the football team get off the bus and walk down Victory Hill and then we watched the Golden Band from Tigerland march down.

With 100,000 of our closest friends, yelled as the band played "Hold that Tiger" and got the crowd whipped up into a frenzy.  If you have claustrophobia, this is not the place for you.

As we walked up the ramp to our seats in the nosebleed section, I paused to get a few photos from a different vantage point.  Memorial Tower (the Campanile) is to the east and has scaffolding all around it as they are doing some work on it.

Looking southeast, you can see the copper roof of the Cow Palace in the distance, with the smoke stack at the old sugar mill in the foreground.

Looking due north you can see the Maravich Assembly Center with the Mississippi River Bridge on the horizon.

As the sun makes its home in the western sky, "It's Saturday Night in Death Valley!"  We enjoyed watching the sunset and seeing the mighty Mississippi River from our Upper East seats.  We were way up there!

LSU was playing Rice.  I felt sorry for Rice.  They were 1-10 and were not competitive.  A lot of people knew it wouldn't be much of a game and stayed home.  We still had a great time.

Our seats were only a few rows from the very top!  As the night progressed, it got colder and colder as the winds blew.  I did not bring a jacket or a blanket, even at the urging of my wise wife.

We enjoyed the game, the band, the atmosphere, we sang "Callin' Baton Rouge" and "Louisiana Saturday Night"...

But after halftime,we decided to sneak down and watch the game in the lower section.  We stayed for the third and fourth quarters in the southeast endzone level.  It was much warmer there!

I drove home listening to the post-game show as the rest of the family slept.  It was a good day.  Geaux Tigers!

Saturday In Baton Rouge

Saturday was our 28th Anniversary.  Benjamin and my nephew had tickets to the LSU vs. Mississippi State game and so Tricia wanted to drive them to Baton Rouge and have a picnic on campus near the lakes.  We arrived in Baton Rouge, dropped off Benjamin and Brooks, got a parking spot and began to walk around. 

Since it was Homecoming, we walked to Sorority/Fraternity Row and watched the Homecoming Parade.  The theme of Homecoming was Purple Reign.  The decorations were elaborate and pomping has really evolved from when we did it 30 years ago.  Pomping is when you take sheets of different colored tissue paper and poke into chicken wire.  The detail of pomping in 2018 is leaps and bounds ahead of what we did in the 80's.  Just check this out:

It is really amazing to look at. 

Here is another impressive one.  I wish I had walked over and taken some close-ups.

While there we saw a bunch of white pelicans flying.  The State bird of Louisiana is the Brown Pelican.  These white ones are different.  They come by the thousands each year to the lakes.  They are huge birds and quite a spectacle to see.

They weren't the only "birds" flying on Saturday.  We watched as US Navy F-18's practiced for the flyover a little later prior to the National Anthem in Tiger Stadium.  The fighter jets were really, really loud and they thundered over-head.

It started raining and so Tricia and I took shelter under the Lod Cook Hotel and Conference Center canopy.  Cole Tracy, LSU's kicker, came walking right by.  He ended up being 4 for 4 in field goals and 1/1 in extra points.  He was the leading scorer for the evening and led the Tigers to victory over 22 ranked Mississippi State.

The team buses arrived to pick up the players while we were having our picnic.  Tricia bought a "little red-riding hood picnic basket" and we filled it with cheese and crackers, bagels, cream cheese, smoked salmon and capers, olives and chocolate.  We relaxed by the side of the lake and exchanged anniversary cards (and a kiss or two)! 

We walked across and got a chance to talk to Coach O and told him we were proud of him and "Geaux Tigers!"

We also saw LSU QB Joe Burrow (AKA Jeaux Burreaux) as he was getting his "game face" on.

All in all it was a relaxing day.  We drove home later that night.  Tricia and I have been married for 28 years and it was a nice day to celebrate a very happy marriage.

The Best Part of Waking Up

The best part of waking up... (sorry Folgers), is Community Coffee in your cup.  Tricia and I switched from Dark Roast to Coffee and Chicory a while back.  We like the extra "bite" of the coffee.  Each night before bed, we get the coffee all prepared and the water ready and in the morning on the way out the door to milk the cows, I'll turn the coffee maker on.  When I come back inside, the aroma in the kitchen is wonderful!

We have a regular "Mr. Coffee" type coffee maker, but on weekends and special occasions, we will brew the coffee in a french press.  Coffee in a french press always tastes richer.  I've been told that it's because in a regular drip coffee maker, flavorful oils get trapped in the paper coffee filter, but I'm not sure if that is true or not.  Away from home, I'll drink it black, but at home, I'll add some fresh cream from our cows and a teaspoon of honey from our friend's bees and it is delicious.

This morning I fixed a big thermos of coffee as I headed out the door.  I was driving to Baton Rouge for work today.  Baton Rouge is about an hour and a half away and is due east on I-10.  I sipped on my coffee as I drove and observed night gradually becoming day.  On the Atchafalaya Freeway the rising sun glimmered on the water in Henderson Swamp.  It was a chilly morning (53 degrees) and water vapor was rising off the water, shrouding the cypress trees - a beautiful sight.

The Atchafalaya Basin Bridge is almost 19 miles long and is the third longest bridge in the United States.  As I exited the Atchafalaya Basin Bridge, I finished my thermos of coffee and could see the Louisiana State Capital building due east, perfectly framed in the eastern sky with the trees on either side of the Interstate.  It wasn't long before I was on the Mississippi River Bridge heading into Baton Rouge.

Traffic soon came to a standstill on the western side of the bridge in Port Allen and I could see light smoke wafting across the bridge.  At first I thought there was an accident and then I remembered!  I quickly unrolled my window and breathed in deeply.  Sounds weird, right?  Let me explain.  Community Coffee has a roasting plant on the western side of the Mississippi River in Port Allen, right near I-10 where they roast coffee beans.  At certain times from your car as you ride over the bridge, you can smell the great aroma of roasting coffee beans.  Looking on the bright side, being in stalled traffic on the bridge, I could at least enjoy the soothing aroma of roasting coffee right from my vehicle.  Aroma therapy, you might say! 

The Battle of Baton Rouge

Benjamin is very interested in all things about the Civil War.  We've read Michael Shaara's, "The Killer Angels," which is a great book, by the way.  We were going to travel to the Chattanooga area for the 150th anniversary of The Battle of Chickamauga in which 5,000 people were reenacting the battle on Sep 19 -22, but the 10 hour drive with home school, a new baby calf and other duties at home and on the farm discouraged us.

We did, however, find a reenactment near our home that we attended that was a little more convenient to travel to.  There were some other activities involved that I'll tell you about at a later date.  In Baton Rouge, Louisiana, a group of reenactors that had just returned from Chickamauga reenacted a skirmish that occurred in the Battle of Baton Rouge on August 5, 1862.

Here is Benjamin holding a rifle and is being recruited to go fight for the Union forces.  Don't do it, Benjamin!

"Join up, man.  Sign your name on the line."

The Union soldiers marched through while the Confederates jeered at them.

I took some pictures of the reenactment that I'll share below and I'm paraphrasing the events in the battle from this informative website: Battle of Baton Rouge  In the Battle, the Confederate forces tried to retake the capital city.  Union warships had steamed up the Mississippi River. Everyone evacuated Baton Rouge and there were not enough Confederate soldiers to defend the city. Taking New Orleans and Baton Rouge enabled the North to advance to Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Confederate General Earl Van Dorn got 5,000 men to go to Louisiana under Major General John Breckenridge's command.  They arrived in the area on the night of August 4th, but were spotted by Union sentries.  Breckenridge moved on the Union soldiers and the battle ensued toward the eastern part of downtown Baton Rouge.  The heaviest fighting occurred from Greenwell Springs road to Magnolia Cemetery.

Confederate horsemen with the Stars & Bars

By the time the Southern troops arrived in Baton Rouge, however, heat and exhaustion had cut almost cut Breckenridge's number in half, but even with reduced number, they pushed the Union soldiers deeper into town.  As they pushed the Union further downtown (and closer to the River), the Union warships sitting on the Mississippi were able to shell the Confederate infantry.  The Union Commander, General Williams, was killed in the Battle.

Union Infantry with cannons in background

Union soldiers firing on the on-coming Confederates. 

Pow!  Pow!

Union soldiers taking cover behind tombstones in 'Magnolia Cemetery.'

Dying in the Cemetery

The cannon thundered as the two forces clashed on that August day of 1862, showing the superiority of the Union's artillery.  Could Baton Rouge be re-taken by the rebels?

Sadly, no.  A plan for the CSS Arkansas to attack the Union warships was doomed when the ironclad's engines failed and eventually was burned in the River.  The Battle was ferociously fought for six hours until General Breckenridge realized that without naval support, retaking Baton Rouge would be too costly.  He ordered his men off the field of battle.

Let's head out fellas and live to fight another day.

Once the battle ended, they began to assess the damage.

• The Union had 84 killed, 266 wounded and 33 captured or missing.
• Confederates had 84 killed, 315 wounded and 57 captured or missing.

An interesting note was that among the Southern dead was Lieutenant Alexander H. Todd, the brother-in-law of President Abraham Lincoln.  

A monument to the Battle and graves of Confederate soldiers can be found at Magnolia Cemetery.  The graves of Union dead are at Baton Rouge National Cemetery.  Both cemeteries are open to the public daily.

The reenactors paid tribute to those Confederate and Union soldiers who lost their lives that day by firing their rifles in the air in a salute.  It was very loud but at the same time was a solemn remembrance of the lives sacrificed on that day in 1862 not far from where we were.  

Respect for the Dead

Benjamin and I enjoyed the day.  We learned a lot talking to the soldiers individually.  They were students of history who shared with us what it was like to be a Confederate soldier during those times.  Times were hard.  That was a tough, tough time in our nation's history.