Katrina and Serenity
I've been getting various e-mails, so I thought I'd give an update.
My family lives just north of Baton Rouge in a town called Baker. The extended family came through Katrina fine, only some very minor damage to the house. They only lost power for about 8 hours on Monday. Dad loaned the generator to a co-worker who has elderly family living with him - they don't have power and may not have it for a while yet. Dad has been back at work since Tuesday, but I got a call this morning that he was in a wreck on his way to work today. He's fine, but the car is totalled. I knew he was okay when Mom told me that he was angry about the fact that he lost his car's full tank of gas.
Dad thinks there's going to be a major gas shortage even though Bush has released some of the federal reserve. The lines funnelling crude to his plant are out, and they've pretty much run out of crude to process into gasoline. So they have the ability to work, but not the supplies. Until the federal reserve reaches B.R., there's not much they can do.
I got really worried yesterday when I read reports of civil unrest in Baton Rouge, but I managed to get through to Dad and he believes they are isolated incidents, mostly downtown near the River Center/Centroplex, where they have many refugees housed. Nevertheless, he and Mom and Micah are staying close to home right now. Mom and Dad were supposed to come to town this weekend to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary, but that's off now because of the car accident and the gas situation. We're worried about Papa's caretakers having the gas to continue coming out to the house.
My sister Kristen works for the United Way here in town and is swamped at the moment. The Chronicle published the UW phone number as a hotline to call and designated their office building as a drop-off point for donations, which is all fine and dandy, but the UW really wish they had been contacted about that before the phones started ringing off the hook and people began dropping off stuff at the office. They're more than willing to help, it's just they weren't prepared. Kristen's probably going to spend most of the weekend manning phones. Her office is helping coordinate women's crisis counselors and mental health professionals to help out at the Dome and other area shelters. She called late last night, and I could tell she was tired and just emotionally drained. She hasn't been able to get a line through to Mom and Dad the past few days (I've been serving as the phone tree for my sisters), so I told Mom this morning to please try to get in touch with her; she probably just needs to hear their voices. The all circuits are busy voice is getting really old.
My friends Allison and Jason evacuated from Ocean Springs, MS (next to Biloxi) to Tallahassee, and then took a long route up and around to get to Allison's parents' home in New Iberia, LA (south of Lafayette). They heard from friends that stayed that their house did survive, but they can't go back to assess the damage yet. They have a 2-month old baby. Jason's family lives in the New Orleans area, I'm not sure exactly where, but they got evacuated and are all fine, although they are fairly certain their home is flooded.
I have a co-worker whose parents live in Kenner, and they evacuated Saturday night to her house here in Houston. They'll be staying with her indefinitely.
So I and mine are fine, just a bit stressed out. We're very lucky.
In other news, kmousie and I went to a free press screening for Serenity last night. It was AWESOME. I noticed a few minor edits, and the final score is in place (I really like it). The crowd was a mix of newbies and die-hards. Coming back from the restroom before the movie started, a woman stopped me to ask what was the deal with all the hats and blue gloves. I missed her afterwards; I would have liked to ask her what she thought. Stay through the end credits and you'll get to hear the Firefly theme!
kmousie and I were talking afterwards. There was a lot discussed, but there is only one thing I'm going to mention here.
There is what I think is a character-defining moment for Jayne in the moments that follow Mal asking him if he wants to run the ship. He's asks where it's written that they have to give up their lives for this girl. Jayne stops for a moment to aside to Simon, whom he's never gotten along with and never really shown any respect for, telling him that he admires him for trying to help his sister. It turns Jayne into much more than the one-dimensional mercenary we came to know and love in the series. I really don't think he would have said that to Simon did he not mean it, because where in the past has he done anything that was not ultimately profitable or in his own best interests? It shows there's something going on in his head more than we've previously ever guessed.
My family lives just north of Baton Rouge in a town called Baker. The extended family came through Katrina fine, only some very minor damage to the house. They only lost power for about 8 hours on Monday. Dad loaned the generator to a co-worker who has elderly family living with him - they don't have power and may not have it for a while yet. Dad has been back at work since Tuesday, but I got a call this morning that he was in a wreck on his way to work today. He's fine, but the car is totalled. I knew he was okay when Mom told me that he was angry about the fact that he lost his car's full tank of gas.
Dad thinks there's going to be a major gas shortage even though Bush has released some of the federal reserve. The lines funnelling crude to his plant are out, and they've pretty much run out of crude to process into gasoline. So they have the ability to work, but not the supplies. Until the federal reserve reaches B.R., there's not much they can do.
I got really worried yesterday when I read reports of civil unrest in Baton Rouge, but I managed to get through to Dad and he believes they are isolated incidents, mostly downtown near the River Center/Centroplex, where they have many refugees housed. Nevertheless, he and Mom and Micah are staying close to home right now. Mom and Dad were supposed to come to town this weekend to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary, but that's off now because of the car accident and the gas situation. We're worried about Papa's caretakers having the gas to continue coming out to the house.
My sister Kristen works for the United Way here in town and is swamped at the moment. The Chronicle published the UW phone number as a hotline to call and designated their office building as a drop-off point for donations, which is all fine and dandy, but the UW really wish they had been contacted about that before the phones started ringing off the hook and people began dropping off stuff at the office. They're more than willing to help, it's just they weren't prepared. Kristen's probably going to spend most of the weekend manning phones. Her office is helping coordinate women's crisis counselors and mental health professionals to help out at the Dome and other area shelters. She called late last night, and I could tell she was tired and just emotionally drained. She hasn't been able to get a line through to Mom and Dad the past few days (I've been serving as the phone tree for my sisters), so I told Mom this morning to please try to get in touch with her; she probably just needs to hear their voices. The all circuits are busy voice is getting really old.
My friends Allison and Jason evacuated from Ocean Springs, MS (next to Biloxi) to Tallahassee, and then took a long route up and around to get to Allison's parents' home in New Iberia, LA (south of Lafayette). They heard from friends that stayed that their house did survive, but they can't go back to assess the damage yet. They have a 2-month old baby. Jason's family lives in the New Orleans area, I'm not sure exactly where, but they got evacuated and are all fine, although they are fairly certain their home is flooded.
I have a co-worker whose parents live in Kenner, and they evacuated Saturday night to her house here in Houston. They'll be staying with her indefinitely.
So I and mine are fine, just a bit stressed out. We're very lucky.
In other news, kmousie and I went to a free press screening for Serenity last night. It was AWESOME. I noticed a few minor edits, and the final score is in place (I really like it). The crowd was a mix of newbies and die-hards. Coming back from the restroom before the movie started, a woman stopped me to ask what was the deal with all the hats and blue gloves. I missed her afterwards; I would have liked to ask her what she thought. Stay through the end credits and you'll get to hear the Firefly theme!
kmousie and I were talking afterwards. There was a lot discussed, but there is only one thing I'm going to mention here.
There is what I think is a character-defining moment for Jayne in the moments that follow Mal asking him if he wants to run the ship. He's asks where it's written that they have to give up their lives for this girl. Jayne stops for a moment to aside to Simon, whom he's never gotten along with and never really shown any respect for, telling him that he admires him for trying to help his sister. It turns Jayne into much more than the one-dimensional mercenary we came to know and love in the series. I really don't think he would have said that to Simon did he not mean it, because where in the past has he done anything that was not ultimately profitable or in his own best interests? It shows there's something going on in his head more than we've previously ever guessed.