Katrina

The weather looks pretty nice today -- or so it seems when I look out my back window. It's kind of a lazy day. I'm doing laundry, catching up on episodes of "Weeds," organizing piles of clutter into more piles, and worrying my way to an ulcer with predictions like the one below of Hurricane Katrina's path.



I heard a news anchor say something like, "Well, it looks like we can relax because Katrina is headed toward New Orleans." Yes, I'm glad she isn't preparing to slam into an already-ravaged panhandle coastline, but New Orleans can't take a storm like this.

I was just surfing around the Internet and found the following photos. The first is St. Louis Cathedral on any typical day, like the one when I sang Christmas carols in front of it with my friends and a few hundred other New Orleanians, and I kept dripping candle wax on my brand new coat; or the day that Harry Connick Jr married inside; or the day Sonja got her palm read in front of the Pontalba Apartments with Scott and me; or the day I attended midnight mass on Christmas Eve and heard the choir sing a song that Jeff Buckley covered; or the day I walked in with my family, and my Grandma lit a candle for Aunt Marge, or maybe for Joey.


This is the "simulated" photo of the same place where I have so many memories -- including a powdered sugar fight with Darren at Cafe du monde right across the street -- if a category 4 storm hit.


New Orleans is six feet under water. I can remember looking out of a window in in one of the downtown hotels right on the Mississippi River, and from that vantage point, it's easy to see that the river is higher than the city. CNN just interviewed some expert in my hometown parish of Jefferson, and he said a massive storm could produce 12-15 feet of standing water in the city. It would take six months to pump all the water out, and then every building would have to be reconstructed because of the water damage. There would be no drinking water. It's incomprehensible. He said about 44,000 people could die because they couldn't or wouldn't evacuate in time.

My parents already evacuated, thank goodness. But the rest of my family are still there, and so is the house I grew up, the schools I attended, the beignet place where I had my first kiss -- Hell, even the bar where I danced next to Brad Pitt.

So, say a little prayer, okay?