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.