happy thanksgiving

things i'm thankful for: 3...2...1

1. the ability to wake up to my alarm clock after only hitting the snooze button twice. really. it's a new thing for me. ask my roommates. jules could actually call out my name when my alarm was going off and not wake up herself. so now, i'm thankful that i can get up on time for things like the macy's thanksgiving day parade and work.

2. long distance friends. it's kinda cool talking to japan, st. louis, seattle, china, new york, providence, boston, ireland, and dc. and in those terribly lonely moments here, someone special always manages to say the right thing - whether they realize it or not. i'm incredibly blessed.

3. short distance friends. when no one else seems to "get it" i know that i'm not completely alone in my sentiments towards this place i call home.

4. finding the charger to my mp3 player. it ran out of juice back in july, so i haven't gotten to listen to it since then. all the same music from july was on there of course. you know how hearing a song will bring you back to a past time? the first song i heard was "foggy day in london town" hmm. classic. this brings me to...

5. the british home office. they're in charge of handing out the work permits to us foreigners. thank goodness they want to take care of their own citizens first, or else i'd be there drinking a whole lot of london pride and beefeaters at the red lion pub in crown's passage or the leather bottle in cobham - instead of here. are you hearing sarcasm? there's no sarcasm intended. (they haven't heard the last from me; by the time i apply for a work permit next, hopefully i'll have enough "relevant experience" for them. all in good time, my friends, all in good time.) y'all know how much i love my city. i missed new orleans for the last 4 years in providence. but now i can be part of the rebuilding, with people who love new orleans just as much. it's like being part of an edurance test. like someone said "i DARE you to stay and try to bring that city back." with the rest of america being ignorant and taking newstories like the one 60 minutes did as truth (oh because we ALL know how reliable the national media is), it might as well be a dare. well, america, you know how much i love a dare. so i'm thankful for that.

6. my green converse sneakers. no explanation needed.

7. our 10 inches of water and the remaining water mark on all of our surviving furniture. it could've been a hell of a lot worse. and once you lived without a kitchen or furniture and in the middle of sheetrock dust, you can pretty much live through anything.

8. diet coke. again, no explanation needed.

9. chris rose and spud mcconnell. their words are a lot better than mine, and its safe to say that reading chris rose online and hearing spud on the radio kept me sane during our stint in fairhope.

10. family. there really is no way to escape them, so i'm very thankful i enjoy their company.

11. faith. you can see the good Lord breathing life into this city every day. it's a wonderful gift being able to see that and put trust in a force greater than you. thankfully, faith leads to hope. and hope is what gives me the energy to keep myself occupied, and not thinking about things that get me down. crap, if i DIDN'T have my faith, i would've cleared out a long time ago and God knows where i'd be now. i know that today the first mass was celebrated at st. dominic church in lakeview since katrina. it was on the news briefly. the people looked peaceful being there. most have just lost everything and there they were. as my mother has always told me, there are 2 constants in life - God and family. when life's changing every day, it's good to have something constant.

Lord,
grant me the serenity to accept the things i cannot change
the courage to change the things i can
and the wisdom to know the difference.

second-lining.

"... and i'm jealous of your new orleans shenanigans." my friend zack told me midway through my weekend of fun. this has been such an incredible weekend. i really just want to remember everything about it. good times, good company, good food, good drinks. things clicked all the way around. very very much needed. again, i couldn't imagine being anywhere else but here.

thursday (aka the new friday) was one of those days that i just want to remember every detail. in new orleans these days, no one has a concept of time. hours, days, weeks just pass by. it's hard to think about a month from now or a year from now because no one knows what life and our surroundings are going to be like by then. it brings the cliche "take one day at a time" to a whole new level. since we're not going by "real world time" here, we have future events to keep us moving through our days and weeks. knowing that mardi gras is happening will get us to february 27th. knowing that christmas is happening will get us to december 25th. well knowing that rock n bowl and pat o's were opening on thursday, got me to thursday. it was something to look forward to, something to focus on. i was giddy at work as if i had a date. i definitely didn't, but i didn't feel like i was alone because i was with a good number of people who just wanted to see another familiar surrounding open up again. after a fabulous dinner at chez chuck, the group of us headed to the corner of tulane ave and carrollton for the opening of the midcity rock 'n' bowl along with half of new orleans. a place we've all grown up with. bowling birthday parties. bowling and kareoke for our 8th grade party. tuesday swing nights in high school with joey. the mixed nuts every time i came home from providence. last year for christmas, santa brought me a rock n bowl shirt. i was lucky enough to be with a group of people who felt the same way about such a classic place and could be giddy with me, could dance, bowl, second-line, as if there had never been a storm that changed our lives. i was also pretty lucky that they love pat o's as much as i do, so despite having work in the morning and the 2am curfew, we felt it was appropriate to head to the quarter - driving through a still, silent, and dark mid-city. carpe noctum. it was the other end of the spectrum in the quarter - no one was out, everything was clean. i swear, i've never seen the quarter so clean. we walked down th emiddle of the street without having to dodge trash or people. we had our one drink at pat o's to be able to say we did the night they reopened. i don't think any of us actually had a hurricane though. we took postcards and matchbooks since they weren't selling the souvenir hurricane glasses. jill and i talked to one of the managers - sid - who told us about eddy, the guy that "played the tray" at the piano bar. i had only been to the piano bar once - when joe came in from ft polk before he left for iraq - and i got to meet eddy. eddy was about to turn 94 and had been playing that tray at pat o's for 67 years. since the storm, no one has been able to find eddy. i'm still saying my prayers that they find him or at least find out what happen to him. but it's one of the many stories that i don't think we'll ever really know - the events from that blur in the days after the storm when the lucky ones were glued to the tv trying to find out what happened to our city. nevertheless, pat o's was open with people had stories to share.

i think all of us could have stayed out all night. we tried to go to cafe du monde and morning call. we only went home when there was nothing left open

yesterday we had a wedding double header. both were beautiful weddings. both are beautiful couples. it's a true testament to the sacrament to see these couples who have thrown together a wedding since the storm. they realize what's important. at courtney's wedding, i ended up running into people i hadn't seen since grammar school. there were a lot of "wow, what the heck are you up to these days?" exchanged. we left that wedding reception to come home, see the end of the LSU game, change clothes, and head uptown for becky's wedding. for the record, fr. mcgin can do a mass with the rite of marriage in less than 30 minutes. it was impressive. when joey jokingly told me earlier in the day not to be late, he really wasn't joking. i guess that only meant more dancing at the reception! and by God, there was dancing. i ended up at the carousel bar in the monteleone with most of the ellises, and about 4 and a half revolutions later, we moved the party back to metairie, where there is no curfew.

it's almost november 15th, and at providence college, it's JRW sunday. junior year, in 204, we made a compromise that stated we could start listening to n'sync christmast november 1. but all other christmas music had to wait until after JRW (hence november 15th). i can't wait for "christmas cheer 2001" again.

"whenever i get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow airport..."

the city of new orleans is looking for money.

the red cross has money. lots and lots and lots of money. over a billion dollars, i believe, has been privately donated to the red cross since pictures of hurricane katrina's devastation reached the mainstream media. and that's fantastic. a true testament to the human spirit, once again. people may not have any kind of connection to new orleans or the gulf coast, but they will take the time to give to the relief effort.

and enter: the red cross. a true american institution. opening shelters across the state to house the displaced persons. they offered meals, clothing, debit cards. even a month's supply of medication for those that needed it.

here we are. 2 months later. lives still a-shambles. politicians yelling at each other over the best plan for the city of new orleans.

my thoughts on the matter started this morning. when the sheetrock people came over the weekend, they covered everything in plastic and taped it down. including our kitchen table (now in our den), the little dorm refrigerator we've been using, our one remaining countertop (the bar between the kitchen and den - the site of many many many sandwiches and margaritas and cheese and crackers), and our coffepot, with coffee and chickory still dripping in it. needless to say, this monday morning, i left the house for work without coffee. sure, that's ok, i think to myself, i'll get to go the little coffeshop i love in the quarter. (contribute a little to the local economy AND get my caffeine? PERFECT!) so i'm driving down royal street, and of course i can't find parking. i just needed a little spot - even illegal - just to pull into so that i could run into la boucherie, get my coffee and leave. the curbsides were filled with FEMA pickup trucks. about my third time going around the block, i started yelling to no one "why are you heeeere? why are you here in the french quarter? the french quarter is FINE! it's the highest freakin' point in the city! why are you taking up space RIGHT HERE. why aren't you in the 9th ward, why aren't you in chalmette, why aren't you lakeview????"

ok, maybe FEMA IS in all those places. the places that really need the help. but it still seems like there is A LOT of FEMA money being spent in an area that doesn't necessarily need all of it. after all, 280 years ago, bienville and iberville knew what they were doing when they founded a city where they did.

right. i digress. i'm not really mad at FEMA. give me a few days. back to me being pissed off at the red cross.

i hear about this load of money that the red cross has accumulated. huh. interesting. i have YET to see a red cross truck in new orleans. i saw a few in fairhope, but then i was told that it was actually some local volunteers that got together to help, and the red cross came and put their sticker on the side of their truck and their sign outside of their civic center. they are STILL waiting for their funding from the red cross. (i don't lie, people)

now i did know that we were able to get $350 from the red cross. 350 dollar bills. sure, i can use $350 dollars. it's not going to help rebuild a house, but that's ok, i can use it. i guess that's what they call "emergency financial assistance" according to the red cross website. well, also according to the redcross website, they are giving 1.34 BILLION dollars to "emergency financial assistance"

i'm going to do some quick math. there might have been 1 million in people in the metro new orleans area before the hurricane. if each of those people claimed their $350, that's $350 million dollars to directly assist citizens. that's 684 million dollars that is unaccounted for.

i haven't heard of the red cross giving some of that money to schools. i KNOW that mt. carmel isn't seeing a penny of it. and on top of that, i know foundations have declined giving mt. carmel money BECAUSE they have already given a good amount of money to the red cross. again, interesting, the money is nowhere to be found.

oh. and that 1.34 billion dollars? doesn't include the 11 million dollars that is supposed to be going towards "physical and mental health services" don't get me started on the need for a mental health task force right now. that's a story for another day. you have no idea how many prescriptions for xanax and paxil i see during an 8 hour day. i talked to krentel - his whole job revolves around improving statewide mental health services - and he doesn't even know what has been set up to provide citizens with access to a mental health professional.

again, TELL ME WHERE YOUR MONEY IS REALLY GOING, red cross.

so the moral of my story: don't give money to the red cross. because we're not going to see it again. i don't know where it goes, but it is not here in new orleans. where it is needed. i have seen the salvation army around - giving out meals when lakeview opened to residents, collecting clothes, cleaning up the neutral ground on esplanade ave. down the street from where i work, at the corner of frenchmen and royal, i see a sign that says free hot meals every day for lunch. obviously, i see FEMA and the national guard. oh, but no red cross.

just food for thought. and i recommend the dark roast coffee at la boucherie.

when i was going through a cd of pictures the other night, i found some new orleans shots and i just thought i'd share.

i think my favorite is the lucky dog man.