The server is down at Cox and I can’t get emails to go through. Jindal said they are opening up the city at 8PM this evening rather than midnight but my neighborhood still doesn’t have power and cell service is spotty. We’re going to look for battery operated fans today and plan to drive in Friday. I can work from uptown where there is electricity and we can sort out our half life even if…
On the way up Highway 59, one of our convoy partners said it felt like purgatory, but actually, Katrina was more like purgatory and this is just limbo. Everyone is trying to make the best of it by not succumbing to anxiety about getting back in but when you can’t send an email from your computer because your IP is backlogged and you can’t figure out how to change it, you get anxious no matter…
We’ve lost some of our peeps who have decided to brave going back – to no electricity, and at this point it is unknown whether they will be allowed in. We’ve heard no one is blocking but that the police and National Guard presence is intense. It appears that home is okay – there are limbs down in the neighborhood and no electricity and cell service is very spotty. Once again 504 is a tough…
While I was listing to AA who was with me in the convoy coming to her house, I saw a truck with three cages in back – one very large dog, one small small dog, and two ducks. I told my friend, the good news is we don’t have ducks! 2AM somewhere on Highway 59, guy drives off from gas station with gas nozzle still in the car – stops the car 25 feet away,…
As we were camped on the 59 trying to make our way to Hattiesburg and just blury and bleary – we got a text from a friend ahead of us who said there was an emergency – a man had passed out and needed care – T took my cell phone and ran on the other side of contra flow through the traffic to get to a State Trooper – meanwhile another neighbor had come…
We couldn’t take the I-10 east but instead were routed with every other citizen of New Orleans onto 59 – we heard the mayor of Mobile serendipitously shut down the highway because he said they couldn’t handle it. Asshole! He should be forced to wonder I-59 for the rest of his years.
Twenty hours to get to Atlanta – we went 42 miles in five and a half hours. It was different this time, but the same. The electricity is out and will be for a days. But the damage to trees and structures is minimal. Now it’s just a question of when and how to get back in.
Wiser – maybe – but last night’s hurricane party was unlike any other – it was solemn, sad, anxious – and I had to take an Atavan to sleep. This morning, everyone is heading out of town. We’re driving to Atlanta as soon as we board up the house and pack. The boys are going to try to get on their 4PM flight. We’re convoying with friends and animals headed to Alabama and Atlanta. Our…
As New Orleans denizens flocked to groceries buying water and canned food, my baby went looking for roses for me. A dozen yellowish orange long-stemmed roses, all perfect, sit on our counter because for now, for the present, for this moment, we enjoy.