Spirit of N'awlins

Matt Cauthron

Grab a handful of beads, don a mask and get yourself down to the Blue Dome District for the rowdiest street party in Tulsa. It's Mardi Gras, and while downtown Tulsa won't get anywhere near as crazy as Bourbon Street, who really wants to be anywhere as crazy as Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras? Give me a manageable crowd having good old fashioned Tulsa fun over a jampacked scrum of overstimulated drunks any day.

Similar to the way I used to feel while walking through the streets of downtown Tulsa during Dfest (before its untimely demise), every time I attend the Blue Dome's Mardi Gras parade I fall a little bit deeper in love with Tulsa. It's the perfect Mardi Gras party. Local groups decorate clever and colorful floats, great local bands set up their gear and play original tunes on trailer beds, high school drum lines pound out traditional marches on their snares, everyone tosses beads around with jubilant abandon. Basically, it's Mardi Gras for the rest of us -- not so wild that you can't bring your family, but not so tame that you can't crack a cold beer with your friends and have a grand old time.

The parade will begin at 7 p.m. on Tuesday (Feb. 21) at 1st Street between Elgin Ave. and Detroit Ave. The route will run from Detroit in between 1st and 3rd Street, 3rd between Detroit Ave. and Elgin Ave. and 2nd between Detroit Ave. and Frankfort Ave. The parade ends at 2nd Street between Detroit and Frankfort and the route is closed to traffic from 6:30-8 p.m.

Go grab a table for an early dinner at one of the many Blue Dome eateries, then bundle up and grab some beads as the festivities begin. Laissez les bons temps rouler! (For the uninitiated, that's "Let the good times roll!")