Chapter 11
Strawberries, Tortugas, and Crawfish
Tuesday
1:30 PM
"Shotgun!" said Dee
"Damn." said Charlie, walking towards the car with a turtle in his arms
"Hahaha, bi—tche eessssssss" said Dee, finally getting to ride shotgun in besides when its just her and Dennis
"Oh man, dude, that was awesome." said Mac
"I know, right" said Dennis, finally in a good mood for once, as he starts the car and pulls out of the gravel parking lot, pealing out carelessly as a small rock almost hits another tourist walking nearby
"Ok, well, whats next. Crawfish? I heard that they were real good. Mudbugs I believe the locals call them." said Charlie
"Really. That doesn't sound so tasty" retorted Dee, slightly disgusted at the visual of actually eating a crawfish
"Oh man whatever, you sound like a typical tourist man. I am telling you man, you have to try it." said Charlie
"I don't know. Dude, you would eat anything. You would even eat a rat." said Dennis
"Come on, back me up on this Mac." said Charlie
"Well, to be fair Charlie, not that I am disagreeing with you about the crawfish; but dude, coming from you doesn't exactly mean much." said Mac
"Besides, actually, aren't we supposed to be heading to the strawberry festival. Looking at the map and based on what people here told me, its supposed to be in a place called 'the North Shore, not far from where we'll be getting our crawfish" added Mac
"Sounds like a plan, but first we need to fill up since we're running out of gas" said Dennis, as he drove to the nearest town nearby looking for a station.
"Hey man, check this out, there's like a whole bunch of hiking trails we can take at the end of town." said Charlie, as he had a map app opened on his phone on satellite mode, pointing to varies dead end streets, offshooting out of suburban subdivisions.
"Dude, we're not doing that." said Dennis calmly
"Come on, back me up on this Mac. Its like an authentic adventure like the one we just had, only even better because its like without a tour guide. Besides, we're like totally in a real town thats not like overrun by tourists man" said Charlie
"He's got a point." said Mac
"We're behind schedule. Besides, we're in the middle of the suburbs. There's probably like a Walmart and a bank and thats about it here." said Dennis, and he pulled into a gas station he found.
Busy traffic zoomed by at 45 mph. On a nearby 20-mph street on the other side of the station, a guy was riding around town on a golf cart for pleasure down a bike path, waving at Dennis as he passed them up. Dennis waved back and he was finishing up tanking. 'That's weird' thought Dennis, looking out as the guy on the golf cart rode off, apparently with no golf clubs, 'Driving around on a golf cart, that's actually a thing people do?'
Charlie continued pleading his case unsuccessfully until his turtle took a dump, which fell all over Charlie's shirt and fell to the car's floor. Charlie quickly and covertly scooped it up and threw the droppings out the window before Dennis would get the chance to catch him. As soon as Dennis finished, he got into the car and they drove off. Dennis got back onto the I10, and soon after onto old 51 and off to a small town called Ponchatoula on the North Shore.
On their way there, the gang could see the pristine swamps surrounding them. Even Dennis, tasked with driving, would sneak peaks and rubber neck at the scenery. The ride took some 25 to 30 minutes until they arrived at their destination. A small, pristine town, that even the gang would appreciate. As they found a parking spot, they decided to tour the town for some 15 minutes before and toured the town before heading to their next destination- A large strawberry farm, where they let you pick your own strawberries. Nothing terribly exciting, but just the type of mundane task Dennis needed to unwind and take the edge off.
Some 30 minutes passed as the gang just picking strawberries, lost in their thoughts. No pointless arguing or getting agitated at each others stupidity for at least half an hour. Charlie took several strawberries, without washing or taking the stem off, and ate them on the spot. Frank took frequent breaks, as his age wouldn't allow too many consecutive minutes of manual labor. Dennis looked ahead lost in his thoughts, ogling several high school girls who appeared to be on a field trip. Mac, enjoying the workout of the activity, held multiple green strawberry baskets filled to the brim, moreso than the rest of the gang combined.
"I wonder if turtles eat strawberries." said Charlie, ruining the moment
"I don't know dude. I think they eat fish or something." said Mac
"Oh shit, I forgot, we should have cranked the windows open. The car is going to get hot and my turtle could die." said Charlie
"Dude, its like not even hot. Besides, I am pretty sure turtles can survive hot weather dude." said Mac
"I am pretty sure cars can get hot even in this weather. I've heard people say that its like a common thing in the South that happens all the time." retorted Charlie
The gang continued pointless arguing over car heat for another 5 minutes until it was time to go. The gang, satisfied with their picks, came back down to the farm office and made their way out. Touring the small city some more as they left, and even taking a few pictures; eventually made their way back to their car and headed to their next destination; a crawfish festival several miles away. As they found their parking spot and walked to their destination, they've found the perfect location, wooden picnic table right near an oak tree; right before more tourists got there.
"Charlie, go save us a spot in line while I go look for where we can get a few beers." said Dennis as he sat down.
"And get me an Abita, they're real good. And get yourself one as well." said Frank, handing Dennis some cash
Dee joined Charlie as they briefly stood in line as they beat the crowd by a good 30 minutes. They ordered all the crawfish for five people, carrying it all by themselves. Dennis and Mac bought an entire six pack as they came back to the table, as Frank was sitting waiting on them by himself.
"Oh sweet.." said Mac, and they opened the bag. Nothing but crawfish, mixed in with boiled potatoes dipped in spices, with several beers to go with them.
"These potatoes are kinda spicy. I think they put too much spice on them." said Dennis
"Yeah, totally" said Mac, as he slowly pealed the crawfish, "but at least the crawfish are good." trying to figure out how to do it, until a random stranger approached them and showed them how its done.
"Man Charlie, I got to hand it to you. You were right for once. Crawfish are amazing." said Dennis
They spend the next 30 minutes or so enjoying themselves, slowly eating the crawfish until they got full. They then each put their leftovers back in the bag, leaving their leftover crawfish heads and empty beer bottles on the picnic table out of laziness as the trashcan was at least some 100 feet away.
"Shotgun." said Charlie, as he entered the car, with crawfish juice spilling out of the plastic bag onto the car's floor.
"Um, aren't you forgetting something." said Dee
"Um, what. I called shotgun fair and square. You're my witness Frank." said Charlie
"Dude, your turtle is still in the back seat." said Mac, handing him the turtle
"Opps." said Charlie, apologizing to the turtle "my precious, I didn't mean to leave you in the backseat. Hey buddy, want some crawfish." continued Charlie, feeding his turtle leftover crawfish
"So what are you going to name him." asked Mac
"Um, um. Tortuga." said Charlie
"Thats a dumb name." said Frank
"Dude, why Tortuga." asked Dennis puzzled
"Well, you know, cause its like turtle in Spanish and stuff." retorted Charlie
"Yeah, but do you see any Spanish people here. Its like Beaucoup this and Beaucoup that. At least name him for something French." said Dennis
"Well, you say tomato, I say toMatOh" said Charlie
"Whatever dude. So whats next." asked Dennis
"Well, we still plan on going to visit a Plantation and then an authentic Cajun restaurant." said Mac, as They drove off and got back on the highway, making their way to a plantation in a city called Destrehan, some one hour away.
"Dude, wouldn't it be cool if we had a pet alligator. That would totally be bad ass." said Charlie
"What they hell are you going to do with an alligator." asked Dennis
"Well dude, it would be cool to show it off at the bar for one." said Mac
"What, thats insane. I mean, other than how the hell are you going to sneak it through the airport, I don't think our insurance will be pleased with a live litigator roaming around the bar" said Dennis
"Dennis is right." said Frank
"Thank you" said Dennis
"We're gonna have to kill it. We can put a trophy on the backwall." said Frank
"What, no!" said Dennis, slightly annoyed
"I agree with Dennis." said Charlie
"Yes, exact..." said Dennis, interrupted mid-sentence
"It would make like way much more sense to put in on the side where the entrance is." said Charlie
"Well, no dude, you want the customers to see it as the first think when they walk in so they can be like 'whoa, thats so cool, we must go in there'" said Mac
"oh god dam.." said Dennis, again, interrupted
"Yeah, and besides, alligators are green, so they match Paddy Pub's colors." said Charlie
"What! What! God damn it, no. No. No alligators." said Dennis, highly agitated, slowly losing it
"I wonder if we can teach an alligator tricks. Dude, we can teach him to spot underage drinkers and be like 'dude, our gator bouncer say's you're not old enough'. That would be totally badass dude. All those young punks who think they're so tough would like pee themselves." said Charlie
"Dude, I don't think alligators are smart enough, their brains are like super small dude. But that would be bad ass though." said Mac
"SHUT UP, SHUT UP. EVERYONE SHUT UP." said Dennis, as everyone looked around uncomfortably for another 5 minutes.
"Um, Dennis, I think you're going too fast." said Dee, breaking the silence
"You know what. Fine. Whatever." said Dennis, slamming on the brakes, slowing from 80 all the way down to 65, as they lurched forward; as their car made a slight turn where the I-10 bends near the St Charles Parish line.
Everyone got uncomfortably quiet again.
"What crawled up his ass." whispered Mac to Dee.
"Beats me." said Dee, as the gang's small talk crawled to a minimum for the next 40 minutes or so as they drove to their next destination.