Today
Hi again! Well, while I'm waiting to find the time to share my own Katrina experience, I'll share some present tidbits. In recent news ....
Mail for New Orleans is no longer going to Houston and back! Oh joy!!!! So, if you mail a letter to the French Quarter from uptown, it goes 82 miles to Baton Rouge to be postmarked, then 68 miles to St. Rose to be sorted and finally another 22 miles to the French Quarter. Well, at least to whever they have the post office setup nowadays! Now, just so you know, it takes about ten to 15 minutes to drive from the French Quarter to uptown. I think I'd rather just drive to the quarter and stick it in their mailbox myself and run the risk of being caught in someone elses mailbox. Those of us in the 701 zipcodes are still not recieving magazines nor any of those annoying fliers or sales ads we all love to get every week! We also still get no TV focus in our newspapers. Due to a shortage of hospitals in the New Orleans area, there's now a hospital of sorts setup in the convention center. Cute little tent looking things. Very nice - I haven't been in but I'd hope they have air conditioning!
In my personal humble opinion, given that it seems every week to a month there seems to arise in the local newpapers and television airwaves a new theory on what caused the levies to give way, I'm not sure if it is really a mystery or someone just trying to find a valid reason that will satisfy evryone. First the water topped the levies, then the pilings weren't built deep enough, then the peat had been dug into for some reason or another. Does anyone really know? We are now about 114 days away from next season - will the levies be rebuilt by then? Well, there are about 9 women who are taking a hands on approach and have a campaign to make the levee board one group instead of several seperate groups. This is what most regular people want anyway.
A first this year was a Mardis Gras Marathon where the runners ran in front of the SuprDome among other things. Honestly, this is just my humble opinion ... I could do without mardis gras. I never really liked it anyway. But this just doesn't seem the time to think about and spend money on it. But who am I?
Todays paper was no different than most papers I've seen since I got back into town in mid September . Almost every paper is tainted with more pictures of ravaged houses or streets or something. Many areas are just deserted because there's just not enough time, people or money to get it all done. Not only that but many homeowners just have no idea what they're supposed to do, the city tells them don't demolish, FEMA says demolish, the insurance hassles them about their claim. It's just not as easy and clearcut as outsiders would think it is. To make matters worse, the squall line of thunderstorms that hit our area from Texas the other night spawned a numerous amount of Tornadoes which of course hit trailor parks, areas of lakeView which were already seriously damaged and redamaged the airport. Don't take those blue tarps off yet!
Life here is definitely different. However, I can't say we don't still have our share of crime again as two friends of mine live in an apartment complex where one of their neighbors homes got broken into and someone elses car got stolen. Maybe they didn't realize the time period for looting was over!
Traffic has certainly picked up. Take into account that people who have left the city have moved into other areas of Metro New Orleans like Jefferson Parish or Kenner, along with the multiplied workers who have come for the promise of some extra cash for being a part of the cleanup and rebuild process, streets that were once passable at almost any time of day are hardly as passable anymore.
On the subject of work BTW, I just learned recently that although many companies - with a big majority being fast food ones - may be hiring new employees with a nice fat bonus spread out over a year of up to about 6,000 dollars and a nice hourly rate like ten bucks and hour, but after that year is up, the wages go back down to preKatrina rates. Wow. Don't get too cushy of an apartment!!
If you happen to get one of the local papers online, look for a guy named Chris Rose. This guy is hysterical!!! He has kept many of us full of laughter and maintaned a nice level of healthy insanity. Here's to you and headless barbie dolls Chris!!! 9It's an "inside" thing.
Well, I must sign off for now. I'll be bringing more updates and things fomr your average everyday new Orlenian prospective as often as possible. Thanks for reading!!!
Mail for New Orleans is no longer going to Houston and back! Oh joy!!!! So, if you mail a letter to the French Quarter from uptown, it goes 82 miles to Baton Rouge to be postmarked, then 68 miles to St. Rose to be sorted and finally another 22 miles to the French Quarter. Well, at least to whever they have the post office setup nowadays! Now, just so you know, it takes about ten to 15 minutes to drive from the French Quarter to uptown. I think I'd rather just drive to the quarter and stick it in their mailbox myself and run the risk of being caught in someone elses mailbox. Those of us in the 701 zipcodes are still not recieving magazines nor any of those annoying fliers or sales ads we all love to get every week! We also still get no TV focus in our newspapers. Due to a shortage of hospitals in the New Orleans area, there's now a hospital of sorts setup in the convention center. Cute little tent looking things. Very nice - I haven't been in but I'd hope they have air conditioning!
In my personal humble opinion, given that it seems every week to a month there seems to arise in the local newpapers and television airwaves a new theory on what caused the levies to give way, I'm not sure if it is really a mystery or someone just trying to find a valid reason that will satisfy evryone. First the water topped the levies, then the pilings weren't built deep enough, then the peat had been dug into for some reason or another. Does anyone really know? We are now about 114 days away from next season - will the levies be rebuilt by then? Well, there are about 9 women who are taking a hands on approach and have a campaign to make the levee board one group instead of several seperate groups. This is what most regular people want anyway.
A first this year was a Mardis Gras Marathon where the runners ran in front of the SuprDome among other things. Honestly, this is just my humble opinion ... I could do without mardis gras. I never really liked it anyway. But this just doesn't seem the time to think about and spend money on it. But who am I?
Todays paper was no different than most papers I've seen since I got back into town in mid September . Almost every paper is tainted with more pictures of ravaged houses or streets or something. Many areas are just deserted because there's just not enough time, people or money to get it all done. Not only that but many homeowners just have no idea what they're supposed to do, the city tells them don't demolish, FEMA says demolish, the insurance hassles them about their claim. It's just not as easy and clearcut as outsiders would think it is. To make matters worse, the squall line of thunderstorms that hit our area from Texas the other night spawned a numerous amount of Tornadoes which of course hit trailor parks, areas of lakeView which were already seriously damaged and redamaged the airport. Don't take those blue tarps off yet!
Life here is definitely different. However, I can't say we don't still have our share of crime again as two friends of mine live in an apartment complex where one of their neighbors homes got broken into and someone elses car got stolen. Maybe they didn't realize the time period for looting was over!
Traffic has certainly picked up. Take into account that people who have left the city have moved into other areas of Metro New Orleans like Jefferson Parish or Kenner, along with the multiplied workers who have come for the promise of some extra cash for being a part of the cleanup and rebuild process, streets that were once passable at almost any time of day are hardly as passable anymore.
On the subject of work BTW, I just learned recently that although many companies - with a big majority being fast food ones - may be hiring new employees with a nice fat bonus spread out over a year of up to about 6,000 dollars and a nice hourly rate like ten bucks and hour, but after that year is up, the wages go back down to preKatrina rates. Wow. Don't get too cushy of an apartment!!
If you happen to get one of the local papers online, look for a guy named Chris Rose. This guy is hysterical!!! He has kept many of us full of laughter and maintaned a nice level of healthy insanity. Here's to you and headless barbie dolls Chris!!! 9It's an "inside" thing.
Well, I must sign off for now. I'll be bringing more updates and things fomr your average everyday new Orlenian prospective as often as possible. Thanks for reading!!!
posted by Rhema @ 2/07/2006 12:00:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home