Baja Hurricane

New Orleans wasn’t hit as badly as it could have been, but it was hit badly — the weather service says it is suffering from fresh water flooding, and there was extensive wind damage. Already the police are being swamped with calls to rescue people from roofs in the city and surrouding area. And New Orleans wasn’t even the hardest hit community. I can’t even imagine what Gulfport will look like. Or Mobile.

We’ll get some of the effects of the storm, but in a minor sense — some wind, some rain. Arkansas is under high wind alert, and several states are at real risk for some significant flooding.

Just because New Orleans wasn’t hit directly, and smashed to smithereens with a category 5 hurricane, don’t discount the effects of this storm. I think it’s going to have a lot more flood and storm damage than Camille, so if you were planning on giving to the Red Cross, don’t decide to spend that money on something else. Lot’s of folks will need help for some time to come, and the Red Cross is always there.

In fact, if everyone skipped one dinner out and one movie, or one music CD, or book this week, and donated that money to the Red Cross, I bet the organization would have enough to make it through the rest of the hurricane season. We’re not even past peak hurricane season yet, and the organizations that help need help, themselves. You can, of course, just give without skipping anything, but I don’t think this is the same thing. Consider it equivalent to spilling a few drops of wine as libation to the gods. Or God, if that’s your thing.

I don’t have any spare cash, and until I get paid for some jobs, am living on kindness and roast cat*. But I do have blood so am off to donate blood this week. And I hate donating blood. I’d rather give money. Sigh.

My server is getting a little bit swamped by Google search requests for Hurricane Katarina, Katrina before I caught my typo.

Though not in a storm, it is warm and humid and uncomfortable at home, today. The french doors leading off from the kitchen developed dry rot, and the management is currently replacing them. In the meantime, I caught a screenshot of this doppler image that I bet the folks in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and so on would rather be the truth.

I call the image, “Wow, that prayer stuff really works!”

*Just kidding on the kindness.