If you had told either Phil or Emily 6 years ago that the best meal they would find in 7,000 miles of travel would be 1) a sandwich and one that featured 2) battered shrimp, 3) cabbage, 4) mayonnaise and 5) pickles, we would have said that you were crazy on all counts. Nevertheless, that's what happened at Mother's in New Orleans where the above Po Boy was split in half and devoured. Neither of us had been to New Orleans before the hurricane last year, so it's difficult to say how what we experienced there compares to the city of old. The activities of the French Quarter on a Friday night do seem to take on a slightly spoiled quality when the streets are uncrowded and many of the stores keep hours between noon and six. The most touristy locations were open, however, and we poked through a few schlocky voodoo shops and and a constantly rotating stock of beads, t-shirts (several clever variations on sticking it to FEMA), hot sauce or cajun seasoning, and alligator toys. The next morning we waited for a table at the Café du Monde for beignets (good, but nothing that county fairs in upstate New York haven’t been doing for years as well) and a drive-though tour through the Garden District. It was only as we were driving out of town east on the 10 that we saw the most staggering effects of Katrina. We passed miles of neighborhoods that were clearly uninhabited and homes with sections of roof and siding missing, and piles of rubble everywhere. White FEMA trailers dotted the landscape and a few hotels and restaurants on the outskirts of the city flaunted “Now Open” signs. There’s clearly nothing to say about the situation that Keith Olbermann and Spike Lee haven’t expressed more effectively, but it was impactful to see firsthand.