This October, Bourbon Street was crowded with happy neuroscientists attending the Society for Neuroscience's Annual Meeting. They were celebrating successful talks and poster sessions, meeting up with old friends and colleagues, and getting reacquainted with a city that SfN had not visited since 2003. It was a scientific meeting punctuated by visits to the jazz and barbecue festival, alligator tours by swamp-boat, sips of sazerac and beignets by the bagful overlooking the meandering Mississippi. At the end of the conference, many celebrated what seemed like a fresh start to the relationship between the Society and the Big Easy. Unfortunately, this visit may have been a last farewell instead.