Day 2 dawned miserable. Rainy and chilly. So we decided to get some indoor touristing out of the way. We hit the subway for the first time and rode the uptown C train from the 50 Street Station to the American Museum of Natural History. The subway stopped in the basement of the museum. In the lobby were probably 1,000 people in line for tickets. The museum probably loves cold and rainy weather. Also in the lobby was a super-tall skeleton of a barosaurus.

The coolest things in the museum, of course, are the dinosaur exhibits.

I told T. rex all about the front-pocket-wallet craze that’s sweeping America. He was impressed.

An allosaurus feeding on an apatosaurus.

Duckbilled dinos. Anyone who’s watched Dinosaur Train would recognize every dinosaur in the museum.

It took a couple of hours to make our way through the dinosaurs and the Hall of Mammals and Their Extinct Relatives and we were growing weary of the museum. The place is massive, like five Wal-Mart Supercenters stacked on top of each other. So we bolted.

We decided that despite the rain we didn’t want to undertake any more inside activities, so we went across the street into Central Park. The rain had slowed to a light drizzle as we wandered through the south end of the park. Gina stopped in a few places to model her beige rain jacket and baby blue backpack.

We made our way down to the section named Strawberry Fields in honor of John Lennon who was slain across the street at the Dakota apartments. The tan building in the background of the photo. From what I understand, the Imagine memorial is a big draw and is often covered with flowers and other hippie stuff. I guess the rain kept the crowds down the day we were there. Although enough people were around that I could never get a shot without people in it.

Just past the Imagine mosaic we spotted this hawk going to town on a bird he had killed. Several hawks call Central Park home and a lot of people follow their daily doings.

We wended our way down to the Mall and found it mostly deserted.

About halfway down the Mall this sax player blew romantic tunes to mostly no one. As we walked along it felt like the closing scene of a Sex And The City episode. We stopped at the Central Park souvenir store and got a couple things and then walked out the south end of the park onto Sixth Avenue.

New York is full of these electronics stores that sell everything from high-end digital cameras and lap-top computers to the cheesy I ♥ New York clothing items. They fill their windows with wonderful collages of color and texture … or something.

It turns out the iPhone is very handy in NYC. There are dozens of NYC specific apps, including ones where you put in where you are and where you want to go and it returns directions including what subway trains or buses to use. Little Rock has zero apps devoted to it. On our walk back from Central Park we were using the Starbucks app to find, you guessed it, a Starbucks. We’re standing on a street corner like a couple of rubes studying out iPhones and pointing up and down the street as we discuss which way we should go. We decided to head left and turned in that direction and Gina noticed a window full of people sitting and drinking from Starbucks cups. We looked up to see what this place was and it was the Starbucks we couldn’t figure out how to get to.

After getting a couple $4 coffees we headed down Sixth to Rockefeller Center where I failed to take one decent picture. It was getting close to dark so we headed back the hotel, which was three blocks away.

After such a long walk, we were hungry for some quality white-tablecloth-type dining. Gina got a us a reservation at Keen’s Steakhouse on West 36th Street, a 120-year-old restaurant with the largest churchwarden pipe collection in the world, they say. The ceilings and walls are lined with them. That’s where I got the Legendary Muttonchop™ you see above. It was very, very good. I ate the whole thing, which must have been about 2 lbs. Then I ate about a quarter of Gina’s filet mignon. The meat sweats hit me hard by the time I was done. We had a couple glasses of really good wine, too. I’m surprised I didn’t have a gout attack on the way out the door. We also set a new record in the Most Expensive Restaurant Visit category.

Entrance to Keen’s bar.

We took the subway to the restaurant but decided to walk back to the hotel, which was a little under a mile away. It gave us a chance to see Times Square yet again.

Abby, Aunt Jodie and I headed to my Mom and Dad’s place in southeast Kansas for a little Easter frivolity. Gina was on injured reserve with a bum shoulder and didn’t make the traveling squad this time. Abby and Jodie held a traditional Easter egg dying party on Saturday.

My Dad’s sister Barbara and her husband, Sherril, came to town to visit Grandma Dailey, who now resides in an assisted living center in Parsons, Kan. Jodie, who’s working on a genealogy and oral history project, spent Saturday plumbing the depths of Grandma’s memory. At 93, Grandma’s got a lot of stuff to remember.

Barbara and Sherril, along with Rex the dog, held a rendezvous under the Keebler Elves’ tree in the front yard.

For the second year in a row, the weather on Easter Sunday precluded hunting eggs outside, so the Easter Bunny hid them in the living room.

All the eggs were at ground level, so Gramps and Abby got down low to find them.

On the way home, we found this giant Easter Bunny monument on the highway outside of Joplin, Mo. Abby didn’t like it. She told Aunt Jodie not to get too close.

The drive between Nashville and Little Rock goes through Memphis, and Memphis is home to some great barbecue joints, and since I’m a barbecue lover it was only right to stop off for lunch on our way home. Gina is generally not big on barbecue, but she loves Rendezvous and the dry-rub heaven they serve, so that was the ticket. (Our waiter took the group shot of us above.)

The restaurant is located in an alley in downtown Memphis and when we turned the corner we saw a big table loaded down with merchandise advertising the University of North Carolina. I thought “now that’s odd.” And then i remembered the NCAA basketball tournament was in town. Because Rendezvous is world famous, I braced for a long wait for a table even though it was 2 p.m.

A 15-minute wait, the hostess said. No problem. We just went upstairs to the auxiliary bar. We’ve waited much longer in the past. We waited almost 2 hours one time when we were in town with some friends to see the PGA golf tournament the city hosts. It’s worth the wait.

The scene from our table.

Gina had the small order of ribs: 4-5 bones. Gina always gets ribs. She said it wasn’t as good as usual. A little dry.

I always get pork shoulder (which I did this time) or loin chops. I like ribs, but I really like pulled pork better. I had to agree with Gina. The meat was little dry. Like it had been sitting in a warmer for a while. We chalked it up to the big crowds from the basketball tourney causing the pit master to have to prepare a lot of meat ahead of time to meet demand.

Rendezvous is very good but I can’t declare it hands down the best barbecue I’ve ever had. It’s hard to beat Whole Hog Cafe in Little Rock and Fayetteville.

I love me some Dukes of Hazzard, so you can imagine my delight to see this Cooter’s outlet just down the street from our hotel. Abby did not share my excitement at getting my picture taken with the General Lee.

Touristing in Nashville pretty much means you’re going to see a lot of sights related to country music. First stop was the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. It mostly consists of glass cases filled with old musical instruments and hideous besequined costumes.

It took Abby about 18 seconds to become bored. She held out longer than I thought she would.

The museum also is home to some other hideous examples of country showbiz excess. Like this 1962 Bonneville once owned by Webb Pierce. It features saddle-leather upholstery and an actual horse saddle for a center console. The door handles are made of old-time revolvers. And silver dollars cover most of the inside surfaces.

This Cadillac limo (said to be a favorite of Elvis’) sports gold-plated door handles and the exterior paint included diamond dust and fish scales to give it that shine.

A long time ago, I was a country music devotee. (I recently blogged of my love for the musical stylings of Waylon Jennings.) So I was familiar with a lot of the history and artifacts housed in the museum. I had all my radio presets on country stations. For a time I refused to even listen to other types of music. That all ended one night in 1991 when I realized country radio and the mainstream country music industry had changed and was strictly intended for 40-year-old women and teenage girls. I couldn’t take any more songs about how dudes loved their wives and how proud they were of the American flag. It got boring. So I branched out into other music and discovered the country music I liked had become alt-country or Americana music. Remember, this was 1991 and I lived in rural Kansas, so there weren’t any radio stations playing alt-country or Americana. I started listening to a rock station out of Joplin, Mo., that bragged they only played music from CDs.

I used to watch Hee-Haw, so I enjoyed this display of the korn field set where the TV rubes would tell corny jokes and the guest stars would stand and shout out the names and population of their hometowns.

The museum set aside one big room as a tribute to the various Hank Williamses. This case was in the Hank Williams III area. All my Northwest Arkansas homies should note the Pea Ridge Mule Jump ball cap. Hank III named his rock band Assjack in tribute to somebody’s mule jumping prowess.

I did mention my regard for the musical stylings of the late Waylon Jennings, didn’t I?

A short walk through downtown brought us to the Ryman Auditorium, a great 100-year-old-plus performance hall that was home to the Grand Ole Opry until 1974.

Still bored from the the Hall of Fame, Abby didn’t alter her perspective at the Ryman.

The old box office now serves as a recording studio. As you can see, there was someone recording during our visit.

Due to my aforementioned previous country music fandom, I know that a lot of ghosts haunt this alley on the side of the Ryman. Performers used to cross the alley to Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge to smoke and swap stories and pick a little. Apparently a lot them used drink and take pills and have some extramarital fun there, also. The Ryman museum displays don’t mention that stuff though. I’m sure there’s something inside Tootsie’s that explains its place in Opry history. I didn’t get to go in because Abby’s still underage and I didn’t want to split up the group. Tootsie’s is also famous as the place to see musicians before they become big stars. There are many such places in Nashville, but they were off-limits to us on this trip due to the Abby factor.

Later we headed to the Loveless Cafe outside Nashville on the recommendation of my sister Katie. The place is famous so it was naturally packed. I shot a lot of photos because we had plenty of time to kill.

I set my sights on the daily special: prime rib. Yum.

Several buildings housing craft-selling shops surround the restaurant proper. These weird cutout figures are all over the property.

The Loveless is one of those places with autographed photos of celebrities all over the walls. Even TV’s Punky Brewster.

Gina and I ended up splitting a two cheeseburger extra value meal at McDonald’s. Abby had a chicken McNugget Happy Meal. See what I did there? Pulled the ol’ switcharoo. Didn’t see it coming did you? Our initial 30 minute wait at the Loveless turned into 50 minutes with the assurance that it would only be 20 minutes more. Too much for Abby, who had been bored for about 10 hours without relief. So we booked it back to the McDonald’s across the street from our hotel.

Abby and I spent the day in Nashville while Gina worked. We hit the zoo and then we drove around downtown. Here are some snapshots. Gina’s off work today so we’re going to do the tourist thing. First stop: Cooter’s. A Dukes of Hazzard museum/giftshop.

Abby fleeing an aggressive goat in the petting zoo.

Abby enthralled by the giant bamboo stands found throughout the zoo.

We’re staying at a motel next the colossal and soul-free Opryland complex, which includes the biggest mall I hope to ever see. We ate supper in the mall at the Aquarium, a seafood place that features a 200,000 gallon saltwater fish tank in the middle of the restaurant. The restaurant also has an entertainment venue next door with a giant vat of stingrays. Our meal included a free cup of shrimp to feed the stingrays.

The stingray room also held a merry-go-round.

It turns out late March is a horrible time to hold a jonquil festival in Arkansas.

We went down to the Historic Washington State Park Jonquil fest with our friends Jim and Brayden. It’s your average Arkansas town festival complete with corn dogs, kid activities and vendors selling useless tackiness at barely justified prices. The little town of Washington is covered up in daffodils of all kinds, but they were all but finished blooming. It put a pall over their namesake festival. I guess the organizers were trying to avoid competing with at least three other such celebrations that I know of across the state in March.

Strangely, no one was in line at the magnetic therapy booth.

I’ve been to lots of these kind of festivals – Bikes, Blues and BBQ in Fayetteville, Toad Suck Daze in Conway, Hoo Rah Days in DeQueen, to name a few – but these pet visor/sunglasses deals are the oddest item I’ve seen for sale at any of them. Rocky didn’t want to pose for me, but I eventually got a shot of him.

This woman and her dog were shopping at a different pet apparel booth. No visors there, just the usual shirts and sweaters.

I caught this woman out in the parking area stealing the last of the viable flowers.

It took some coaxing, but we finally got Abby into the bouncy apparatus.

I always enjoy the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s giant aquarium on wheels.

The family posing on the back porch of one of the restored homes from the 1800s. I like this one because Brayden poked his head into the frame. (Photo by Jimmie Wayne Gross, Brayden’s dad.)

Gina almost stroked out from the heat in that sweater. She told me to go buy her a T-shirt, preferably white. This is what I came back with:

I got it from a vendor specializing in shirts celebrating the Redneck/Southern Woman. Gina put the shirt on and hilarity ensued.

We wrapped our adventures in Natchez by dining at the Castle restaurant on the grounds of Dunleith. For some reason we were expecting an exceptional dining experience, but all we got was average for a nice restaurant. We got off to a bad start when the waitress informed us the kitchen was out of filet mignon, which is both Gina’s and my go-to dish when we want to put on the fancy.

I was able to recover by ordering the ribeye with port wine demi glace and the requisite fancy mashed potatoes and shitake risotto. I got a glass of pinot noir that was decent. Demoralized by the lack of a filet, Gina lost control and got a crabcake appetizer and a salad main course. She ordered a glass of Ravenswood zinfandel and it was better than my pinot. My steak was excellent and the creme brulee desert was even better.

The restaurant itself is very cool. It’s in the plantation’s old stable building, which was built in the 1790s. It survived a fire that burned the main house in the 1850s. The owners rebuilt the main house in 1859.

As for the accommodations, I couldn’t have asked for more. Apparently, recessions are a good time to travel. This place was throwing rooms at people. We stayed two nights at a rate less than half the normal rate. The room was huge and appropriately furnished with a canopy bed and other antique furniture. Aside from a loud music incident last night, we enjoyed every minute. I probably should have taken some photos of our room.

This is another angle on the unknown Confederate soldier memorial at the Natchez City Cemetery. I aimed Photoshop at it and pulled the trigger.

The road to Natchez goes through Transylvania, La. Transylvania is tiny. All that’s there is a garage/filling station with a “for sale” sign hanging in the window. We’ve gone through there a few times in the past on our way to Vicksburg and the Redneck Riviera, and I always say we ought to stop and take a picture of the water tower. Well, this time I finally got around to it. Do you think the thing is full of blood?

We woke up Saturday to cool temperatures, something we hadn’t expected just two days ago when the forecast called for springlike weather in Natchez. The forecast had taken a turn for the cold by the time we left Friday evening, so we packed coats, scarves and long underwear. I’m a hater of the cold, but I decided not to bitch about it like I normally would. This trip is for Gina’s 40th birthday and I didn’t want to ruin things like I normally would.

First stop was the visitor’s center for guidebooks and such. The center has an awesome display devoted to kudzu. First stop was Longwood, a giant antebellum home built in the style of an Oriental villa. It is billed as the largest octagonal house in the United States. A super rich plantation owner named Haller Nutt began building it in the late 1850s. He planned a six-story structure with 30,000 square feet of living space, but the war intervened and construction stopped with just the outside walls completed and only the basement finished.

Looking up at the unfinished upper stories of Longwood.

The family lived in the basement, which is much bigger than any home I’m likely to ever own. Nutt died in 1864 and construction never resumed. Nutt family members lived in the basement until the late 1960s when some kind of local garden club took the place over. The tour guide said she remembers playing in the unfinished upper floors as a kid. She also said Houston Nutt, the former Arkansas Razorbacks coach is a descendent of Haller Nutt.

After a lunch of fried-shrimp po’ boys at a cool little bar downtown (their cocktail sauce passed the Uncle Slappy test), we drove around lost for awhile looking for Melrose, a mansion owned by the National Park Service. The place was built by another super-rich dude who owned several plantations in Louisiana and Mississippi worked by 300 or so slaves. Dudes in Natchez were big into the slave scene. The city was home to the second largest slave market in the country. The original owner lost the place and all its furnishings to yet another super-rich guy during the war to pay debts. In part due to a stingy family descendant, Melrose is adorned with 95 percent original furniture, books, floor coverings and other accouterments. The grounds contain the original slave quarters and outbuildings. It was a bed and breakfast in the ’70s and ’80s until the Park Service bought it for $5 million.

Spring was well underway in Natchez. It seemed odd to be wearing coats and scarves while the camelias and azaleas bloomed all around.

We wrapped up the sight-seeing with a trip to the city cemetery, which has this memorial to unknown confederate soldiers killed in the war. I don’t know if the graves are real. I couldn’t find anything on the memorial that said so and there was no fighting in Natchez. The city was taken by the Union without a fight.

After a pretty long drive through deepest darkest Arkansas and Louisiana, we arrived at Dunleith, our antebellum home in Natchez, Miss., for the next 36 hours.