Over the last several years, I have been able to visit my traveling husband in many different areas of the United States. Because he does environmental work, including emergency response and hazardous waste removal work, I never know where he's going to end up -- sometimes for months at a time -- working.

When I can step away from my tendency to complain about him being gone so much, I occasionally feel grateful for the opportunities I have had, because of his work, to see some areas of this country that I probably wouldn't have seen otherwise.

In the past, before I became a serious, hard news-reporting writer -- focusing, as Sgt. Sadie, on columns about police work, food, dogs, food, exercise, food, and other very serious topics -- I actually had time to visit him.

Trips are few and far between these days, and I hadn't seen my husband in over a month, so I decided last weekend to get a babysitter for my dog, hop on a plane, and visit Jack in Louisiana. I was beginning, after all, to forget about how annoying his morning singing and dancing rituals are, so I knew it was time for a visit.

After sleeping in last Saturday in our hotel room in Lake Charles (he got up and worked), I decided to rent a car and take a leisurely drive down the coast to Cameron Parish, La., where hundreds of folks, including him, are working toward cleaning up the destruction on the coast for the second time in four years.

While I was driving along the coast, I almost forgot why I was there. The sky was blue, it smelled like ocean and, with my windows down, I could feel the warm, fresh breeze on my skin. If I weren't driving, and could have closed my eyes while driving down the damaged coast, I would have thought I was on vacation.

I had seen the sad sight a few years ago, when he was there working after Hurricane Rita rocked Cameron Parish and Holly Beach. This time, it didn't seem nearly as bad -- there actually were a few houses still standing -- but it was pretty barren.

I arrived at the site, delivered lunch to Jack, and watched for about an hour as crews looked for more drums and tanks to add to the nearly 6,000 they've already removed from the gulf. Then my husband sent me on my way. We would do something fun Saturday night, he said.

As I drove back to the hotel, singing lyrics of one of my favorite country songs, "Well, you get down the fiddle and you get down the bow, kick off your shoes and you throw 'em on the floor. Dance in the kitchen 'til the morning light: Louisiana Saturday night," I prepared myself for a fun night.

As it turned out, my desires for a Louisiana Saturday night were not fulfilled, because Jack was too tired, but we did get to eat some great food. I had some crab Saturday night that was so fresh and delicious it made me consider moving to Cameron Parish. Hey, I could live without a house if I could eat that kind of crab everyday.

The next day, I told Jack I wanted some real Cajun food, which, according to the locals, is flavorful, but not spicy. If you've read my columns before, you know I have no problem eating, and Sunday was no exception. We tried everything ... catfish, gumbo, jambalaya and étouffée, frogs legs and alligator -- and it was all delicious.

But the winner of the weekend -- a food I'd never even heard of before Sunday -- is called a pistolet.

Oh my, the pistolet -- a hot, buttery French roll carved out and stuffed with crawfish, seasonings and creamy, Cajun wonderment -- is my new favorite comfort food.

The only thing about the weekend, other than seeing Jack dance again, that came even remotely close to topping the pistolets, happened Monday morning in Houston.

For whatever reason, I was the lucky lady who got picked up by the man in the golf cart at Houston airport to be driven, for no apparent reason, across the airport to my connecting gate.

As much as I enjoyed the completely unexpected cruise, I probably could have used the long walk to burn off the five pistolets from the day before.

-- Sadie Fowler is a staff writer for the Times-Gazette. She can be reached at (931) 684-1200, ext. 214, or by e-mail at sfowler@t-g.com. This column is scheduled to print every Thursday.