I Hate Mardi Gras

It is officially Carnival season, and we are here for it all! If you are looking for ways to enjoy Mardi Gras around Baton Rouge, we have you covered. 

You can enjoy all the feels of Mardi Gras without having to travel to New Orleans. Maybe you are planning to throw a Mardi Gras party this year and want to enjoy king cake? Looking for Mardi Gras Camps? Check out our Guide to Baton Rouge Mardi Gras Events and Camps. Don’t forget to check out all the things to do in Baton Rouge with kids!

I Hate Mardi Gras.

According to my birth certificate, I was, in fact, born in Louisiana. You’d never know this from my personal preferences, though. I don’t like seafood – eww, it tastes like the water it came from. I can’t get behind red beans and rice – it’s literally a starch on top of another starch. I don’t understand the hype around king cakes – they’re just cinnamon rolls, people! And I hate Mardi Gras.

Bring on your pitchforks. I’m not budging on this.

When people find out I don’t like Mardi Gras, they have the same reaction as when they find out I don’t like watermelon (“Oh, you have to get a sweet one!” “You have to put sugar on it!” “You have to put salt on it!”) — “Oh, you have to go uptown!” “You have to go to Spanishtown!” “You have to go to Lafayette!”

Listen, I have experience with all sorts of parades. From our humble, local parade to the larger truck parades in Metairie. However, none of them ever really appealed to me. One time a grown woman lifted me by the arm so she could grab some white beads that had fallen at my feet. And that was probably when my hatred for Mardi Gras was born. I remember vividly thinking how ridiculous it was that an adult was willing to act like that for some beer-soaked plastic trash.

I don’t understand the bead thing. They’re plastic and cheap and usually tangled and broken and I just. don’t. get it. I can maaaaybe get behind people who want to keep beads knowing that they’re going to be riding in a parade soon, but other than that? Nope. I have a rule when my family and I go to parades that none of it goes in the vehicle. We have done that stupid thing where the beads make it to the van and sit in the trunk for days … weeks … months … for what?! To eventually go in the trash?! Cut out the middle man and toss ’em. Buh-bye.

And “yes, Annelle, I pray!”

I do my civic duty and take my kids to parades. And as far as they can tell, I LOVE Mardi Gras! I am a party animal at these parades! I dance to the cacophony of too-loud float music! (Side note: all parade music is stuck in the 90s, and I ain’t complainin’! Hello, Jock Jams and Salt-N-Pepa!) We even get the most out of our Halloween costumes and wear them to Southdowns in the true feeling of Carnival Time! I put on a brave face for them, but the truth is I’m dying inside.

I’m not much of a drinker. It’s not some religious or moral choice – I’ve just been pregnant or nursing for, like, half my life – so the debauchery is lost on me. You know that part in Mean Girls where Cady envisions everyone acting like animal versions of themselves? Yeah, that’s pretty much how Mardi Gras looks to this sober dissenter.

It’s not bad enough that there are too many people around – but so many of them are druuuuuunk. Dial my Mommy Anxiety up about 27 notches. Yikes. Also, can we talk about how these drunken float-riders throw beads for a sec? I have had to stand protectively in front of my kids when they were little because DAMN! They’re likely to get meleed by the overzealous riders. We don’t have those ladder seats, and I honestly can’t imagine the logistics behind planning for the ladder and naps and access to a potty and parking and food … ! It’s this OCD mom’s nightmare.

We’ll still go to a few tame, local parades because (ugh!) it’s my duty as a mother and a wife, but I go against my will. Because Mardi Gras is exhausting, and I hate it.