Two interesting things relating to what is happening in Louisiana and Mississippi are, that although we were hit by Katrina Phase I, and many here are living without electricity; no one is complaining.
I work along the Broward-Dade border where Katrina made landfall. If I ask someone how they did, they say "Eh, got my windows blown out," or "Ah, it flooded the damn house." All said with a shrug.
No one's complaining.
And no one here is talking about what is happening up at Katrina Phase II. Not even me.
A foreign man saw me looking at a picture of people standing on a roof, waiting to be rescued, and said, "It's terrible." I was shocked to hear it spoken aloud.
I don't know how it is where all of you are, but there's some strange social phenomenon happening here that I don't understand.
Is it guilt or just knowing when you're well-off, relatively speaking?
Posted by floridacracker at September 1, 2005 07:22 PMPhase II is well-put. I tried to talk about it myself on my Neighborhood blog today...kept humming "Kansas City" and knowing I wished everyone in N.O. was somewhere safe...it's as though we can't look directly -- or rather, can't speak directly -- to the horror.
I commented on Sissy Willis about your matching funds. SHe's intrigued and says she'll be over.
Who needs diamond and sapphire earrings anyway?
Oh, right--she has some great animal photos over there, too. SHe's a very good photographer.
http://sisu.typepad.com/sisu/2005/09/baby_behind_a_k.html
Posted by: dymphna at September 1, 2005 09:35 PMI need diamond and sapphire earrings, Dymphna!!! I love them!!
Posted by: Donnah at September 1, 2005 09:37 PMCan you believe this is a photo taken in America? (assuming they don't change the page before you see it)
http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage
Posted by: Salt Lick at September 1, 2005 10:05 PMSalt, I've been having that thought a lot lately.
Posted by: Donnah at September 1, 2005 10:14 PMThe post-Katrina situation reminds me of the madness in Washington DC after the 1968 riots.
Posted by: erik at September 2, 2005 07:00 AMI guess its just were you are. All the MSM is tearing apart all the officials involved, from Bush down to the Cops. Here where I live, almost everyone thinks that NO and the state of LA have screwed up big time by not being prepared and not having good execution of (faulty) plans.
But the main thing discussed is the surprise of almost all of us flatlanders out here that NO is
below sea level. We didn't have that fact in school I guess. Being below sea level and right between the ocean and a huge lake is just something us practical West Texans just don't understand.
Its worse than living out in the middle of nowhere, where violent storms can blow you fifty miles before you can recover from the flash floods. We can understand having to have your car repaired and refinished from golf ball sized hail and all the paint being sandblasted off, but we don't see how anyone could build and live in LA.
But thats' just us.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA