A forgotten town, and my mixed thoughts....

As most of you know, I've spent a considerable amount of time in Louisiana, mostly around New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Recently I spent time in a small unknown town called Venice. Venice is as far south as you can get, down at the very tip of Louisiana. The main 'commerce' here is the gas plant. Natural gas is harvested so-to-speak, from the Gulf, then processed and sold. Other businesses there include commercial fishing. I was told that some of the best fishing around was in Venice. However, the once prosper town seemed to be almost abandoned.

All along the side of the only road leading in to Venice were concrete pad where houses once stood. Near those pads ( a few, anyway) were FEMA trailers, and some even had single-wide mobile homes. Scattered throughout were remnants of buildings. Some were houses, some businesses. Boats scattered around dry land, and debris from trees and mud. Let me explain....

When Hurricane Katrina made landfall, Venice is the first place it hit. The storm-surge broke through the levees, and all of the back-pressure poored it into this town. As one man described it, it was like being on the bottom end of a waterfall. "It looked like someone took their hand and just wiped everything inland" ......I asked what Venice was like before the storm....booming town was the description I received. However, after Katrina, it looks like a ghost town. The few buildings that survived are boarded up or just completely abandoned. It was a truly sad scene.

But did any of us hear about Venice? No. All we heard about was New Orleans, and all of the people who chose to stay behind, living in the Super Dome.

This is where my mixed thoughts come into play......

You choose to live in an area that is basically below sea level; a bowl. You know the hurricane is coming, and you choose not to leave. The storm arrives and you are trapped either in your home, or in a shelter with thousands of other people who made the same decision as you did. Then you beg, plead, and play the sympathy card, making the whole world believe that you are genuinely stricken with a huge problem. "Katrina took out everything!" as you stand in front of the shell of your house. The government gives you housing, money, and the rest of the US comes to your aid. You still beg and plead, saying nobody helped you. Habitat for Humanity comes in and builds you new housing, and you still say you were shorted.

Not one time did you hear the people of Venice complain, beg, or scream. They evacuated as they were told to do. The storm wiped them out...COMPLETELY. Their houses weren't just flooded, they were torn from the foundation and pounded to pieces. Nothing was left for them but the cement foundation. NOTHING. Again I ask, did we hear about these people? No. The few that came back, the ones who still had work to do with the gas plant, put their families in the few trailers that FEMA was able to spare, and went right back to work. They have been busting their ass trying to get their town back. Some of them live several hours away, working 7 days on, then 7 days off. But they are working, and not begging from the government or crying 'poor me' to the rest of the country demanding a hand out.

Don't get me wrong....I loved visiting the French Quarter, and will be back in New Orleans in a week or so. I will be playing tourist again, going to the beautiful cemeteries, and other museums and places of interest. I guess now I look at it in a different light. I say to everyone out there, there was more to the devistation of Katrina than just New Orleans. Get out your map and look south....way south. Look past New Orleans, and all of the drama it produced. Look at the small towns and ask yourself "Did I hear about these places in the media?"

As for me, I don't feel sorry for the people of New Orleans. And the people of Venice don't want me to feel sorry for them, either. They just want to get on with their lives and put the storm behind them.

Pictures to follow....sometime

So, before I'm off to dreamland, I thought I'd drop a note about my fun Memorial Day weekend.  

DH had the awsome forethought to book a cabin out in the country for Saturday through Monday.  It was soooo relaxing, being out in the 'semi-quiet' (more in a bit on that) area, with a dog or 2, a nice porch to sit on, a grill, and just nature.  Almost.

See, at this place there are 3 cabins and a loft (above the main house).  We stayed in the loft, which at first we thought was a not-so-good thing that ended up being a great thing.  Anyway, in the Treehouse (pic later) were some school teachers....4 women...who were letting off steam from the just ended school year.  Boy, did they have a lot of steam!  They stayed drunk for a majority of the time, singing, yelling about things (hard to decypher), and screaming at the resident dog.  Red, the dog, stayed wet most of the time because she loved swimming in the 2 ponds on the property.  Red is also very friendly, and the teachers evidently were NOT dog lovers.  No matter, her and I were buds the whole weekend (go figure).  

As I was saying, the cabins....well, they were nothing special on  the inside.  A couple of bunk beds, an outhouse style bathroom (although they did have showers, some inside, some outside), and pretty much no room to even change your mind in.  The loft, however, was much different.  It was like a studio apartment.  Full kitchen, living room, nice bathroom, and a seperate bedroom.  So we were pleasantly surprised once we realized what we had.  

Beyond that, there were 2 ponds, and plenty of ground to walk.  We also found a place to go tubing.  For those of you that aren't real sure what I am talking about, I'll explain.  Basically, we paid our money at one spot, and the owner loaded us up (with our cooler) in a van and drove us 5 miles up river.  He then handed us off to another guy who handed us 2 vinyl tubes, along with a square float to place our cooler in.  We tied the 3 together, hopped on, and floated the 5 miles back to where we started.  It was great!  We stopped a few times at some nice beaches to have a sandwich and bottle of water, then moved on.  There were a few spots were we had to really work to  keep out of the protruding trees, as well as a few times where we got hung up and had to really work to get out of it....but it was so fun!  Of course, today there are muscles that hurt that I'd forgotten I had, but it waws so worth it!  By the time we were 100 yards from the start point, it had begun to rain.  Our timing couldn't have been better, once we got into the car to leave it began pouring!  It didn't let up for about 3 hours, long enough for us to grill some chicken.  It started soon after supper and rained all night, and most of the day today.  In between showers we managed to get the car packed up and then headed here, La Place, Louisiana.  No, its not as its spelled.  The 'a' in Place is said like the 'o' in 'dog'.  

I've been told on more than one ocassion  "Nothing in Louisiana is as it appears".....I'm starting to realize that.  

Anyway, that was my weekend!  Tomorrow and Wednesday will be hectic...0430-0830, 1000-1600; Wed is 0830-1200, 1330-1930.  Long days for me!  Hopefully things will go smoothly.  So until I get through this week, the pics will probably have to wait. :p

Its a good thing....

Its a good thing I chose to wait on typing hate mail to my ex-husband.  Its a good thing I waited for him to call me and both of us figure out the miscommunication concerning our son, before I blew up.  Whew.  Evidently, words got mixed up in translation, assumptions were made on both sides, and everyone was pissed all the way around.  Note to self:  Don't trust a 10 year old to pass on a message.  

In other news, I finally broke down and told DH that we needed another laptop out here on the road.  In the evenings, if one of us is on this one, the other is hovering around, or impatiently waiting for their turn.  Or, if one is on, the other is saying "hey, look this up for me"...ggrrr, so aggravating.  So today we purchased a 'netbook' through our cellphone company, Verizon.  Oh the relief!  I'm keeping the 'big' laptop, as it has all of my stuff on it, to include music which he never uses, as well as my phone info for music, pictures, etc.  Currently, he is busy setting it up, and getting all of his settings arranged.  Peaceful bliss has arrived, LOL.  

I've also decided to actually WRITE (blog) about things here in Louisiana, instead of copping out with pictures alone.  So, here goes.....

We are currently residing in Hammond, LA.  Its about an hour from New Orleans, as well as an hour from Baton Rouge.  The road in between offers a glimpse of what it was like after Katrina.  The trees in some of the swamps, or mainly around Lake Ponchitrain, are dead.  New growth has started, but it looks like a bunch of sticks stuck in the mud.  As for the businesses, the ones in the French Quarter are pretty well back to normal, but the ones around the lake that got hit hard, well, its hard to describe.  Some have re-opened, some have opened as other things, some have just called it quits.  So you have strip malls with 1 or 2 shops, car dealerships that don't exist, and it all depends on the location as to whether the street leading there is open or not.  

As for housing, some houses in the subdivisions are boarded up, some are being gutted, some are being lived in (which is scary), and others that are just being demolished.  After 4 years, many of the houses still have blue tarps over their roofs.  If you look down the streets of these housing areas, you see many roll-away trash dumpsters, most of them full.  So it seems there is still a ton of work to be done here.  I want to tour the 9th Ward, but at the same time, I don't want to make these people feel like they are some kind of freak show attraction.  So, I'll take what pictures I can, without being too invasive, and post them here.  But the best is going to be my description.  

I can tell you that the area around the Super Dome, where everyone evacuated to, still shows many signs of the damage.  You can still see the water line on many buildings, and even more are still boarded up and completely abandoned.  It amazes me that the French Quarter is so active, and really shows no signs of a hurricane even coming close.  Geographic location helps, as its on the way south side of the lake, and with all of the buildings between that and the lake, it was fairly well protected.  Many of the people are gone, too.  DH was telling me that 'pre-Katrina', the main thoroughfare out of New Orleans (not the interstate ) was packed with people all the time.  When he would have to drive his rig down through town, men would climb onto the truck and offer to guide him to his destination, and if he accepted, they would ride on the steps of the rig, holding onto the mirror, giving directions......I had to laugh!  This all would occur, of course, for a fee...$5.  I think that's pretty ingenious, LOL.  Hell, there was a guy down on Bourbon St that saw us taking pictures, he was holding a sign that said "Big Ass Beer To Go", advertising for the business he was sitting in front of.  So, this gentleman runs over to us, "You 2 hold my sign, I'll take YOUR picture!"  At first I thought, "ok, what can it hurt?" then I looked at him and said "You better not run off with my camera, I'll chase you down."....he laughed and said "I can't take your camera, I would lose my job!"  He then proceeded to say "I'll take 2 pictures of you holding the sign, for $5." to which I replied "$5?  Its my damn camera!"  and he replied "Your holding MY damn sign!"  Of course, I laughed, as he had a point...so for the hell of it, we paid the man and went on our way, lol.  I'll find that pic and post later.....

Beyond all of this, I'd say Louisiana is recovering well.  Slowly, but doing ok.  

more pics from Louisiana

fishing shack
me being a dork

gator on the river

The French Quarter, New Orleans, Louisiana

Toured around a bit today....it rained a bit, but I tell ya, that doesn't stop a single thing in New Orleans! LOL

If any of you have read The Vampire Chronicles by Ann Rice, or her Mayfair Witches novels, then you KNOW how much fun I had in the French Quarter!  I could finally see what she was writing about....the architecture, the streets, the people (even though they were modern and not from the 18th century, lol)  My imagination ran wild, thinking of her books.  I was also enthralled with the history, and plan on visiting more (playing tourist, of course).  So hopefully the pics I'm about to post will show up correctly!

I swear, one day I will get this shit figured out....some days I hate putting pics on here when I can't move them around llike I want!  I'll post more pics later, lol

Louisiana

Thats where we'll be for the next 3 weeks.  I'm actually really excited about the prospect!  I want to totally play tourist....Garden District, French Quarter, cemetaries, voodoo queens, etc.  I was thinking....which could I learn in 3 weeks, Voodoo, or how to speak Cajun? LOL  

Seriously, I think I'll have a good time and I'll make sure and get some good pics to post.  

The Original Oyster House in Mobile, AL

Whenever we stop in a town to work, we ask the locals.."Where do YOU eat?"  I can get Ruby Tuesdays, Applebee's, and Red Lobster anywhere.  I want to go to the hometown spots, where the food is not from a frozen bag.  

This trip yielded several people giving the same answer...The Original Oyster House.  Obviously, if 2 or more people recommend it, and you drive by to see the parking lot packed, you must believe its a good spot to eat.  Today, after touring the USS Alabama battleship (which was really fun, by the way), we decided to stop and have lunch at this 'infamous' place.  Bad, bad choice.  

Let me start by reprimanding people......stop eating shit fried!!  For the sake of all that should have flavor, stop masking it with breading and oil.  I know, I am guilty of eating fried food...but that was before the DH had his heart attack.  Since then, it has become a job, literally, to find a seafood (or any other, for that matter) restaurant than has more than just fried food on the menu.  

Anyway, I ordered the Steamed Luncheon Platter, which was supposed to consist of : steamed crab claws, steamed oysters, and steamed shrimp (unpeeled, head-on).  Ok, no problem, right?  HA!  WRONG.  The slop that arrived may have been steamed at some point in the last week, but certainly not when I ordered it.  It was all so dry and rubbery, not to mention it had some sort of crust on it (from being dried out, I suppose).  DH ordered a Grilled Mahi Sandwich.  If it was 'grilled' I'll kiss your ass.  More like pan heated.  And taste?  NONE.  I am not remotely exagerating.  He made it about 3/4 of the way through the sandwich, I got through one dry oyster, a few shrimp, and about 6 of the tiniest crab claws I'd ever seen.  

Now before you say "Why didn't you send it back?"  I will tell you why.  Our server was a dazed and confused nimrod who had his mind on other things besides his job.  He wasn't even the one to deliver the food to our table, however once it was dropped, he slid by long enough to say "Have everything?" and then we never saw him again.  Not until it was time for the check.  We paid, but just before leaving I scribbled on a napkin for whomever to see...."NOT IMPRESSED".

Needless to say, as we were leaving, we vowed to never return to that awful place.  Now for the topper to the whole ordeal.......I believe I recieved a mild case of food poisoning from the place.  Yep, we ate at around 1pm, and by 4pm I wasn't feeling well.  By 630pm I was camped on the comode, and I'll spare you the gorry details from there.  However, I've been visiting the potty about every 7 minutes.  I've had worse cases, mind you, and no, its NOT SWINE FLU. LOL  But that doesn't help matters.  It just ruins the evening, and really sucks.

So to all of my faithful readers, and all who may stumble upon this blog I offer this warning:

STAY AWAY FROM THE ORIGINAL OYSTER HOUSE IN MOBILE, ALABAMA!!!!

I'll blog later about our tour of the battleship....time to make my potty trip.