One Day. - Part III

Darkness enveloped me as I walked into the abandoned hotel. Bursts of light from the sun outside shot through holes in the wall and randomly illuminated insignificant corners. But we moved into the building where the sun could not pierce the air. When the blackness was complete, I was able to see. Figures, ghosts they must have been, moved through the halls in the hotel with the glorious spirit of wealth that had diminished long ago. I gasped and reached for my camera, but Andey laughed at me.

"They will not be captured on film," he said softly, reaching for my hand and holding it. For hours, we sat in the ruined hotel and watched the spirits move about in bygone activity. At length, a figure approached us. He was holding a flashlight pointed directly at us, leaving his face annonymous.
"You do not belong here," the figure said. I nodded my head, but before I could speak, Andey grabbed my hand and ran. He burst through the window and dragged me down the fire escape of the hotel.

"What's wrong?" I asked.
"Didn't you hear the policeman?" he replied incredulously. I frowned and followed his haste, but silently considered the visitor who was not who Andey thought he was. He explained to me, as we ran, that he did not want me to get in trouble for trespassing. So, he hid me in a small building and said, "Meet me at the center of the world in one hour."

What is the "real world?"

If you haven't had a chance to look over the fabulous dicussions from my opinions on Ray Nagin, you should; it's interesting, to say the least. People have been arguing against my statements by saying that I do not have enough education, experience, or first hand knowledge to have a "valuable opinion." I will call it the "You haven't been in the 'real world'" argument. I'm curious, though, what is everyone's opinion of the "real world?" What is it? How do you become a part of it?

And this one, his name is Hurricane.

My uncle is stationed in Louisianna. I'm not exactly sure what his specific duties are. This is irrelevent to the story at hand. This dog starts following him around; that's what's relevent. My uncle digs dogs and is amused by him. At some point, someone comes up to him and asks if he knows the story behind the dog. My uncle says no and asks him to elaborate. Well, this guy explains that they had been doing rescue in a flooded area and found an old man, a woman, and this dog in a tree. They try to get the two people into the boat, but the old man stops them and says, "We need to get the dog." They tried to explain to him that they were trying to save people and there wasn't enough room for the dog, but the man would have none of it. He said if they didn't take the dog, they might as well move on, because he would not get into a boat. So, they resigned and broughtthe dog on the boat. Well, the old man did not survive, and the woman was completely unrelated, so they were stuck with the dog. They sort of just set him loose hoping that someone would take care of him. And that's how he found his way to my uncle. My aunt went down there for a while and when she returned, the dog came with her. Welcome to Oklahoma, Hurricane.

Faustas. His name is Faustas.

The orange cat returned, except this time he was wearing a collar. He has a name. He chilled on the couch with Andey and me last night while we watched "The Princess Bride."

I walked out of the mall last night and the sun was shining brightly. I walked out from the protection of mall canope to discover it was raining. I love the juxtaposition of the two.

There are two exits off of South Bound 1-35 to get onto Main St. There is a yield sign there to allow traffic getting on the highway to continue on. I hate the people who yield to the people who should be the ones doing the yielding. God will punish them some day. He'll probably punish me first for have written that sentence.

I think limes are fantastic.

I watched Meet the Press yesterday. The mayor of New Orleans was on. I sat with smug satisfaction as Tim Russert appropriately humiliated him. Something to the effect of:

Russert: We've all seen the pictures of hundreds of school busses just sitting in water. Why weren't these busses used for transporting people out of the city?
Mayor: We didn't have drivers.
Russert: But does it state in (quoting law) that you are supposed to provide drivers to transport people to safer areas?
Mayor: Well, um, uh, um, uh, hm.
((Jesi is taking liberties with this paraphrasing))
Russert: Why didn't you supply the Superdome before the storm hit?
Mayor: I told people to bring non-perishable food. I thought that'd be enough.
Russert: So, told people to come to that location and only provided running water because you thought people would bring their own supplies?
Mayor: Well, yes, sure, why not?
Russert: You said (then quotes mayor's radio address) about the President. Do you still hold this opinion?
Mayor: Well, I had a chance to talk to the President, and I see that's not the case at all.

::smirks:: Hehe.

So, what did we learn today? The cat's name is Faustas. Rain and sunshine at the same time is good. Yielding when you aren't supposed to be yielding is bad. Limes are fantastic. And, finally, if you are local government, don't cuss out the President when Tim Russert can put you on national television and point out everything you did wrong.

One Day. - Part II

We drove for miles and at length it came. We pulled into the small town and he began walking me decisively towards the Franklin Hotel. He explained that one time the industry in the area made this hotel a fine central meeting point for businessmen. When the industry collapsed, so did the hotel's business. It still stands, but only as a faded memory of it's greatness.



We walked around together and I tried to take a few pictures from the outside, but the was only so much to see. He lead me into a door on the side of the building.

One Day. - Part I

I was walking down an endless road one day. I carried only my camera. I had no destination. There was no where to go, no means to get there, and no reason to go.

This day, though, was different than the others. A gray Volvo stopped beside me. The young driver rolled down his window.
"Hi," he said. I smiled a returned the greeting. He was not the first to stop on my journey. Everytime they asked if I needed help. Every time I asked them, "How can you help me?" They would offer me rides home, food, money, water, but I always responded, "How does that help me?" Frustrated, they would drive on, and I kept walking. But Andey did not say this. He responded, "I can give you beauty." I was silent, so he continued, "You need to see Mangum, Oklahoma."

Ma Mère et Katrina.

If you have not yet taken the time to read my mother's blog, do so. It's a beautiful and thoughtful blog. She wrote a wonderful couple of posts about Katrina and the situation in Lousianna:

Link to the full blog: Wine, Travel and Musings
Link to post about Katrina: Questions

Leave a comment or two. She's a newbie and deserves a little encouragement.

Emperorship of Penguins!

I almost don't want to write anything else. That is the coolest frickin' term I've heard all week.

Okay, okay, I tell you the story behind it. I'm taking one of the most boring course on the face of the Earth and I spend most of my concentration focusing on staying awake rather than the content of the professor's lectures. And suddenly, in the midst of his lecture, he stated, "Emperorship of Penguins." It had something to do with what defines a state, and how Antartica doesn't have a state unless you count animals. Maybe an "Emperorship of Penguins." But that's not important. It makes me happy. I have it written in bold letters on the front of my notebook. Just try saying it sometime this week when things seem to be a little to serious and dull. I hope it makes you as happy as it makes me.

_________

What the water wants is hurricanes
And sailboats to ride on it's back
What the water wants is sunkiss
And land to run into and back

Burns a hole in my chest!

I'm someone who believes that sympathy needs to be balanced with reason. I'm horrified and saddened about the tragedy from Hurricane Katrina. However, I'm blazingly angry about the way the media and some officials are behaving at this point. Did you hear the Mayor of New Orleans? What a flippin' moron! Most people believe that this Hurricane will be considerably more damaging in the long run as compared to Andrew. He starts cussing on a radio address and saying how "G*damned pissed" he is at the Bush administration. What the hell does he expect? Does he really believe that the federal government should stop all bus systems in the entire US to come to Louisianna? Why not stop the entire economy for them! He has the gall to explain it as his frustration about the looters saying that instead dealing with the looters, we're rescuing people. ::pauses for effect:: Uh, yeah! Somehow, I'm thinking let's save the people first and if things get stolen, things get stolen. And here's CNN posting this as the first thing on the page and right under it saying that Bush states, "Not acceptable." Well, of course he's going to say more needs to be done! What is he going to say? "Oh, no, we're happy that millions of people are without electricity, that people are wading through dead bodies, and people are standing up to their chins in water in their attics." Sorry, but I would like to remind New Orleans that they chose to live in a bowl on the side of the ocean. If you live in an area that can get hurricanes, don't you dare get pissed off at the rest of the world about it! My God, selfish little... ::sighs heatedly::

In contrast, I was so happy yesterday when I learned how America was responding. Public schools around the nation are opening their doors to children from affected areas so they can go to school. Houston opened the Astrodome to help house the people who are going to be without their homes for an indefininate period of time. Both my uncle and my cousin have been deployed. Europe has already stood up and said, "How much do you need?" This is the world that I choose to live in. It is a world with disasters and that is imperfect, but where people genuinely want to help other people. It saddens me to think how many people do not live in this world. They live in a world where politics is always more important than cooperation. I hope at some point in their life, they learn the foolishness of their decision.