Monday, August 31, 2015
Saturday, August 29, 2015
Finally, the Tenth Anniversary is Over
It's been a whirlwind of remembering ten years ago: TV, Radio, Internet, Books.
But people who lived through, witnessed the storm and the aftermath, don't feel happy about all of the hoopla. Only Chris Rose can described how we feel.
Taken from the website Vice, is a Chris Rose original:
August 29, and Hurricane Katrina has reached critical mass in New Orleans.
But when I tell you about a storm hitting south Louisiana right now, I am not talking about August 29, 2005, the day that wet, wide mess of a storm whipped across our coast and kicked our asses.
This is not a reenactment, a retrospective, nor a documentary. This is now. Right now, today, the howling, gale force winds are blowing hard down here and the flooding is catastrophic, again.
The flooding is of memories in this town, none of them good, some of them haunting people to the brink of collapse, like the levees. The hard winds of emotion are reducing some residents to fits of agony. The "remembrances" and "observations" and "celebrations" from that time and since are so intense that some residents have packed up and left town this weekend to get away from the media maelstrom and relentless sorrowful nostalgia that is now filed under the name: Katrina, Ten Years After.
Related: The Lower Ninth Ward,Ten Years After Katrina
OK, this is also a time of metaphors gone wild around here. Of total loss of perspective. Of holding on tight, to something or someone—anything or anyone. I am no less guilty of that than any other.
New Orleans is an all-Katrina, all-the-time carnival of excess right now. Every newspaper headline. Every talk show. Every art gallery, playhouse, even every nightclub because every band has a Katrina song. Some have entire albums.
All the famous people are here, from presidents to the pundits. The American fetishizing of anniversaries has hit this town like a Category 5. And although you can look around and see a city standing tall and tough, physically—with all our new hotels and hospitals and malls and even our new levees—the damage here now, at this most poignant date on the Gulf Coast calendar, is emotional, psychological, and just plain mental.
It's not to say that these are not better days in New Orleans—the Crescent City, the Big Easy that isn't so big and never was as easy as most folks think. Our economy is ripping. The recession of the past ten years was, for us, a windfall. We got so much federal, corporate, and charitable money that no one in the world has any idea exactly how much.
We have a lot to be thankful for. We have, for the most part, blossomed into that big, bright, beautiful, rebuilt, reborn, and re-imagined shining city on the hill. Except for the hill part. There are no hills here. But you get the point.
Numbers tell the story: In fiscal year 2014, the city collected over $46 million in revenue from hotel occupancy fees, and this year is on pace to be even higher. According to the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau (NOCVB), 9.52 million people laid their heads down to rest in our 39,000 hotel rooms last year—both of those the largest numbers on record.
And here's a fetcher for you: Prior to Hurricane Katrina, there were 809 restaurants in the city of New Orleans. Now, there are 1,408. Of course, since I started writing this story, two or three more probably hit the market.
I mean, everyone knows we love to eat down here. But 600 more restaurants than before? With 10 percent fewer residents?
This country is hungry for some New Orleans right now, to be sure.
According to Katrina 10, a Rockefeller Foundation think tank and the city's primary source for economic statistics and analysis, New Orleans is among the most vibrant small business environments in the country now.
"Entrepreneurial activity in New Orleans is 56 percent above the national average, painting a rosy picture for the business climate," reads one recent analysis. "Fueled by an engaged community, strong financial incentives, and an unmatched culture, one of the fastest growing startup hubs has grown out of the recovery of New Orleans."
The publisher of Forbes magazine described the city's economic growth since Katrina as "one of the great turnarounds in American history."
So, like I said, these are better days. We should be walking on sunshine, right?
And many are. Lots of folks—maybe even most—are feeling just fine around here about what this city has become. It's cleaner, smarter, and prettier—if that were possible.
But it's also still a dangerous place to walk around at night in some neighborhoods. And beyond the veneer of national coverage, we have more broken streetlights than some cities our size have streetlights, total. Our streets—paved upon a wet, sinking foundation—are in a constant state of upheaval (literally, not metaphorically).
And the truth is, for all the tax dollars this country has poured into rebuilding our levee system—the previous incarnation of which collapsed the first time it was ever tested and killed 1,600 of us—we have no idea if the new one works. There is no way to know if it will work until millions of pounds of water get hurled into the rock again like last time.
We are living now, as we lived before all this, on blind faith.
So for all the good and bad, we flutter back and forth about what terminology is appropriate for this occasion that looms over us. Is it an anniversary? A remembrance? Mourning? Observation? Celebration? Eulogy? Commemoration? You tell me: What are you calling it?
Truth is, they're all appropriate. In a larger communal sense, this is a time to raise a toast to the triumph of the human spirit and a recognition of the resilience of the people of New Orleans. But there is a strong undercurrent bubbling up this weekend, flushed out by the endless stream of imagery and remembrance and observation and celebration and media lights shining down on us, which has some folks running for cover.
And not the metaphorical kind. Wounds have been re-opened here. Scabs ripped away. Memories a lot of people had managed to escape for ten years have come flooding back like, well... a flood. (I warned you!)
Like I said, it is the anniversary of metaphors, ten years since Katrina, the glorification of which we have managed to avoid for, well, ten years.
There are many here wishing hard and fast for this to go away, for the date to pass, for the attention to wane, for the conversations to switch to the weather, the Saints, the elections, anything but this.
Jesus, even Donald Trump would be a welcome distraction.
We here are stuck in an endless cycle of Katrina—a name many here still refuse to speak. And despite the profound, inescapable and triumphant leaps of recovery and rebirth we have experienced, there's no two ways about it: This is tough as shit to go through again, to relive on a local level the exposure of our national nightmare and disgrace.
To see how far we have come yet how far we still need to go. It's a national discussion being played out in a city of lore that looms large in the American imagination but is actually, truthfully, a pretty small town. Considering.
Nevertheless, New Orleans is shouldering once again the burden of our unfinished—and in some cases unstarted—national conversations. Race. Poverty. Income Inequality. Energy. Rising seas. Loss of the wetlands.
And that's fine. We love conversation down here. We love talking as much as we love eating. In fact, all we talk about when we're eating is what we're going to eat next.
But I stray. Everyone here has a story to tell. And over this weekend, unless you unplug, disconnect, and go off the grid, you just might hear every one of them. But we're OK. We're gonna make it. And we're gonna stay here and keep making our way through this wild ride, trying to find our way back home.
There is nowhere else for us to go—even though many in the media, clergy and Congress told us we should find another place ten years ago. But maybe they have learned, at long last, at this most painful and triumphant juncture, what we here have always known: The longer you live in New Orleans, the more unfit you become to live anywhere else.
That's the one true crazy thing about all this. Here, at the nation's first geographical front against disaster, subsidence, evaporation and extinction: We're still here, ya bastards.
Chris Rose is a New Orleans-based freelance writer, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and author of the New York Times bestseller 1 Dead in Attic.some aspects.
But people who lived through, witnessed the storm and the aftermath, don't feel happy about all of the hoopla. Only Chris Rose can described how we feel.
Taken from the website Vice, is a Chris Rose original:
August 29, and Hurricane Katrina has reached critical mass in New Orleans.
But when I tell you about a storm hitting south Louisiana right now, I am not talking about August 29, 2005, the day that wet, wide mess of a storm whipped across our coast and kicked our asses.
This is not a reenactment, a retrospective, nor a documentary. This is now. Right now, today, the howling, gale force winds are blowing hard down here and the flooding is catastrophic, again.
The flooding is of memories in this town, none of them good, some of them haunting people to the brink of collapse, like the levees. The hard winds of emotion are reducing some residents to fits of agony. The "remembrances" and "observations" and "celebrations" from that time and since are so intense that some residents have packed up and left town this weekend to get away from the media maelstrom and relentless sorrowful nostalgia that is now filed under the name: Katrina, Ten Years After.
Related: The Lower Ninth Ward,Ten Years After Katrina
OK, this is also a time of metaphors gone wild around here. Of total loss of perspective. Of holding on tight, to something or someone—anything or anyone. I am no less guilty of that than any other.
New Orleans is an all-Katrina, all-the-time carnival of excess right now. Every newspaper headline. Every talk show. Every art gallery, playhouse, even every nightclub because every band has a Katrina song. Some have entire albums.
All the famous people are here, from presidents to the pundits. The American fetishizing of anniversaries has hit this town like a Category 5. And although you can look around and see a city standing tall and tough, physically—with all our new hotels and hospitals and malls and even our new levees—the damage here now, at this most poignant date on the Gulf Coast calendar, is emotional, psychological, and just plain mental.
It's not to say that these are not better days in New Orleans—the Crescent City, the Big Easy that isn't so big and never was as easy as most folks think. Our economy is ripping. The recession of the past ten years was, for us, a windfall. We got so much federal, corporate, and charitable money that no one in the world has any idea exactly how much.
We have a lot to be thankful for. We have, for the most part, blossomed into that big, bright, beautiful, rebuilt, reborn, and re-imagined shining city on the hill. Except for the hill part. There are no hills here. But you get the point.
Numbers tell the story: In fiscal year 2014, the city collected over $46 million in revenue from hotel occupancy fees, and this year is on pace to be even higher. According to the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau (NOCVB), 9.52 million people laid their heads down to rest in our 39,000 hotel rooms last year—both of those the largest numbers on record.
And here's a fetcher for you: Prior to Hurricane Katrina, there were 809 restaurants in the city of New Orleans. Now, there are 1,408. Of course, since I started writing this story, two or three more probably hit the market.
I mean, everyone knows we love to eat down here. But 600 more restaurants than before? With 10 percent fewer residents?
This country is hungry for some New Orleans right now, to be sure.
According to Katrina 10, a Rockefeller Foundation think tank and the city's primary source for economic statistics and analysis, New Orleans is among the most vibrant small business environments in the country now.
"Entrepreneurial activity in New Orleans is 56 percent above the national average, painting a rosy picture for the business climate," reads one recent analysis. "Fueled by an engaged community, strong financial incentives, and an unmatched culture, one of the fastest growing startup hubs has grown out of the recovery of New Orleans."
The publisher of Forbes magazine described the city's economic growth since Katrina as "one of the great turnarounds in American history."
So, like I said, these are better days. We should be walking on sunshine, right?
And many are. Lots of folks—maybe even most—are feeling just fine around here about what this city has become. It's cleaner, smarter, and prettier—if that were possible.
But it's also still a dangerous place to walk around at night in some neighborhoods. And beyond the veneer of national coverage, we have more broken streetlights than some cities our size have streetlights, total. Our streets—paved upon a wet, sinking foundation—are in a constant state of upheaval (literally, not metaphorically).
And the truth is, for all the tax dollars this country has poured into rebuilding our levee system—the previous incarnation of which collapsed the first time it was ever tested and killed 1,600 of us—we have no idea if the new one works. There is no way to know if it will work until millions of pounds of water get hurled into the rock again like last time.
We are living now, as we lived before all this, on blind faith.
So for all the good and bad, we flutter back and forth about what terminology is appropriate for this occasion that looms over us. Is it an anniversary? A remembrance? Mourning? Observation? Celebration? Eulogy? Commemoration? You tell me: What are you calling it?
Truth is, they're all appropriate. In a larger communal sense, this is a time to raise a toast to the triumph of the human spirit and a recognition of the resilience of the people of New Orleans. But there is a strong undercurrent bubbling up this weekend, flushed out by the endless stream of imagery and remembrance and observation and celebration and media lights shining down on us, which has some folks running for cover.
And not the metaphorical kind. Wounds have been re-opened here. Scabs ripped away. Memories a lot of people had managed to escape for ten years have come flooding back like, well... a flood. (I warned you!)
Like I said, it is the anniversary of metaphors, ten years since Katrina, the glorification of which we have managed to avoid for, well, ten years.
There are many here wishing hard and fast for this to go away, for the date to pass, for the attention to wane, for the conversations to switch to the weather, the Saints, the elections, anything but this.
Jesus, even Donald Trump would be a welcome distraction.
We here are stuck in an endless cycle of Katrina—a name many here still refuse to speak. And despite the profound, inescapable and triumphant leaps of recovery and rebirth we have experienced, there's no two ways about it: This is tough as shit to go through again, to relive on a local level the exposure of our national nightmare and disgrace.
To see how far we have come yet how far we still need to go. It's a national discussion being played out in a city of lore that looms large in the American imagination but is actually, truthfully, a pretty small town. Considering.
Nevertheless, New Orleans is shouldering once again the burden of our unfinished—and in some cases unstarted—national conversations. Race. Poverty. Income Inequality. Energy. Rising seas. Loss of the wetlands.
And that's fine. We love conversation down here. We love talking as much as we love eating. In fact, all we talk about when we're eating is what we're going to eat next.
But I stray. Everyone here has a story to tell. And over this weekend, unless you unplug, disconnect, and go off the grid, you just might hear every one of them. But we're OK. We're gonna make it. And we're gonna stay here and keep making our way through this wild ride, trying to find our way back home.
There is nowhere else for us to go—even though many in the media, clergy and Congress told us we should find another place ten years ago. But maybe they have learned, at long last, at this most painful and triumphant juncture, what we here have always known: The longer you live in New Orleans, the more unfit you become to live anywhere else.
That's the one true crazy thing about all this. Here, at the nation's first geographical front against disaster, subsidence, evaporation and extinction: We're still here, ya bastards.
Chris Rose is a New Orleans-based freelance writer, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and author of the New York Times bestseller 1 Dead in Attic.some aspects.
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Swan Hug
From the Green Renaissance Facebook page:
While rescuing injured birds, the swan wrapped his neck around the rescuer's neck.
Usually swans are very territorial and don't like human company, but Richard Wiese experiences a moving and wonderful moment during a rescue operation executed with several of his friends from a foundation aiding and rescuing injured birds in England. This is how he describes this moment:
"I lifted him, gently pressed on his chest so that he felt confident and safe. After a few moments the swan stopped resisting and literally wrapped himself around my neck. I could feel his heart beating besides mine. I wanted to shut my eyes in order to enjoy this moment completely. It's really a wonderful feeling when you sense a true connection and mutual trust- when an animal realizes you mean him no harm".
—via Ross Bishop — with Sarit Yehezkel.
While rescuing injured birds, the swan wrapped his neck around the rescuer's neck.
Usually swans are very territorial and don't like human company, but Richard Wiese experiences a moving and wonderful moment during a rescue operation executed with several of his friends from a foundation aiding and rescuing injured birds in England. This is how he describes this moment:
"I lifted him, gently pressed on his chest so that he felt confident and safe. After a few moments the swan stopped resisting and literally wrapped himself around my neck. I could feel his heart beating besides mine. I wanted to shut my eyes in order to enjoy this moment completely. It's really a wonderful feeling when you sense a true connection and mutual trust- when an animal realizes you mean him no harm".
—via Ross Bishop — with Sarit Yehezkel.
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Monday, August 24, 2015
Sunday, August 23, 2015
Crazy Quotes
They're EVERYWHERE!!!!
From the great state (?) of Texas,
Governor Gregg Abbot vetoed a bill that would have allowed hospitals to detain mentally unstable patients for four hours, if the doctors considered the patient a danger to himself or others.
But what makes this case even more disturbing is the lobbying group which convinced him to veto the bill- it was allegedly the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a group of paranoid Scientologists who are convinced that modern psychiatric medicine is a conspiracy to sell drugs and control people.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
publican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma argued on Monday that he had the right to lecture women about whether or not they should get abortions because he had impregnated his wife and “had something to do with the birth.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That Bush fucker Jeb must go. Here's one of his wacko quotes: we spend too much on “women’s health issues”. Apparently $3.15 in federal spending per woman isn't worth it...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rand Paul thinks Anerica's hungry seniors should turn to charity.
From the great state (?) of Texas,
Governor Gregg Abbot vetoed a bill that would have allowed hospitals to detain mentally unstable patients for four hours, if the doctors considered the patient a danger to himself or others.
But what makes this case even more disturbing is the lobbying group which convinced him to veto the bill- it was allegedly the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a group of paranoid Scientologists who are convinced that modern psychiatric medicine is a conspiracy to sell drugs and control people.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
publican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma argued on Monday that he had the right to lecture women about whether or not they should get abortions because he had impregnated his wife and “had something to do with the birth.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That Bush fucker Jeb must go. Here's one of his wacko quotes: we spend too much on “women’s health issues”. Apparently $3.15 in federal spending per woman isn't worth it...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rand Paul thinks Anerica's hungry seniors should turn to charity.
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Katrina - A Decade Later
Nine years ago I created a website that shared our experiences related to the impact of Hurricane Katrina.
I started this site because all I was seeing on the news was what happened to New Orleans. While New Orleans experienced horrific damage and flooding, my little corner north of the city was virtually ignored by the mainstream media, as well as the Gulf Coast of Mississippi, which took a direct hit from the storm.
In the link above - my labor of love - I have collected pictures, videos and first person experiences from the storm.
We stayed for the storm ten years ago. With the help of alcohol. Damn, the results where something we could NEVER imagine.
The song ""It's The End of the World As We Know it" echoed in my head for two weeks.
The memories may fade. That's why I created my Katrina webpage:
If you have some time, please go thru it, it's full of links and pictures and videos, as well as links to NOLA bloggers telling their own stories.
Thanks for visiting.
I started this site because all I was seeing on the news was what happened to New Orleans. While New Orleans experienced horrific damage and flooding, my little corner north of the city was virtually ignored by the mainstream media, as well as the Gulf Coast of Mississippi, which took a direct hit from the storm.
In the link above - my labor of love - I have collected pictures, videos and first person experiences from the storm.
We stayed for the storm ten years ago. With the help of alcohol. Damn, the results where something we could NEVER imagine.
The song ""It's The End of the World As We Know it" echoed in my head for two weeks.
The memories may fade. That's why I created my Katrina webpage:
If you have some time, please go thru it, it's full of links and pictures and videos, as well as links to NOLA bloggers telling their own stories.
Thanks for visiting.
Monday, August 17, 2015
Sunday, August 16, 2015
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
National Elephant Day Request
The Bronx Zoo has been given the shameful title of the 5th worst zoo for elephants in the country. The New York Times calls Happy the Bronx Zoo’s loneliest elephant. That’s because this highly intelligent and social being is one of the only zoo elephants in the entire United States who is being held alone. And it looks like her living conditions won’t change anytime soon unless we do something about it.
From Change dot org:
I am asking you, my fellow animal lovers, to encourage the Bronx Zoo Director James J. Breheny to release Happy to a sanctuary where she can be in a more natural setting and live the rest of her life in peace.
New standards regarding the keeping of elephants were recently passed by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA), the accrediting organization for American wildlife institutions. Among their recommendations was that elephants be held in groups of three or more, as they are highly social creatures. Now, zoos around the country are scrambling to comply with the regulations by AZA’s 2016 deadline. Yet, the Bronx Zoo seems steadfast in its opinion that Happy is “happy” with her solitary life. This goes against all scientific data about elephant behavior.
Happy and 6 other elephant calves were captured in the wild from Thailand and brought to the States in 1977. For 25 years, she and her companion, Grumpy, were kept as a pair in the Bronx Zoo. When Grumpy passed away, she was paired with Sammy, who sadly died in 2006. It was then that the zoo decided to end its elephant program, but it didn’t relocate the elephants it currently had.
For 10 years, Happy has been in a sort of solitary confinement, unable to truly interact with the other elephants held at the zoo. This is a social being like a monkey or a dolphin. Elephants thrive in the company of their own kind, where they form multi-generational family groups that remain loyal to one another for life, and the elders pass wisdom down to the younger ones to help them navigate their world.
Happy is likely not at all happy. She has endured a decade of loneliness and deserves the chance to be with others of her kind in a sanctuary. Please join me in telling the Bronx Zoo to release Happy to a sanctuary and let her really have a chance at happiness.
sign the petition here PLEASE!! Or
communicate:
Director of the Bronx Zoo James J. Breheny twitter: @JimBreheny or on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bronxzoo?fref=ts
Director, Communications, Bronx Zoo Max Pulsinelli twitter and phone number: mpulsinelli@wcs.org or (718) 220-5182
Here is what I emailed/facebooked them:
You are a member of the Wildlife Conservation Society. Yet, your Bronx Zoo keeps Happy the Elephant in captivity alone? Sir, please think about this. There ARE sanctuaries for elephants. Elephants are highly social animals. Please get with your group of WCS people and agree to make Happy and all of the other Zoo’s elephants happy, by giving them a place to spend the rest of their lives with other of their kind. Thank you.
From Change dot org:
I am asking you, my fellow animal lovers, to encourage the Bronx Zoo Director James J. Breheny to release Happy to a sanctuary where she can be in a more natural setting and live the rest of her life in peace.
New standards regarding the keeping of elephants were recently passed by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA), the accrediting organization for American wildlife institutions. Among their recommendations was that elephants be held in groups of three or more, as they are highly social creatures. Now, zoos around the country are scrambling to comply with the regulations by AZA’s 2016 deadline. Yet, the Bronx Zoo seems steadfast in its opinion that Happy is “happy” with her solitary life. This goes against all scientific data about elephant behavior.
Happy and 6 other elephant calves were captured in the wild from Thailand and brought to the States in 1977. For 25 years, she and her companion, Grumpy, were kept as a pair in the Bronx Zoo. When Grumpy passed away, she was paired with Sammy, who sadly died in 2006. It was then that the zoo decided to end its elephant program, but it didn’t relocate the elephants it currently had.
For 10 years, Happy has been in a sort of solitary confinement, unable to truly interact with the other elephants held at the zoo. This is a social being like a monkey or a dolphin. Elephants thrive in the company of their own kind, where they form multi-generational family groups that remain loyal to one another for life, and the elders pass wisdom down to the younger ones to help them navigate their world.
Happy is likely not at all happy. She has endured a decade of loneliness and deserves the chance to be with others of her kind in a sanctuary. Please join me in telling the Bronx Zoo to release Happy to a sanctuary and let her really have a chance at happiness.
sign the petition here PLEASE!! Or
communicate:
Director of the Bronx Zoo James J. Breheny twitter: @JimBreheny or on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bronxzoo?fref=ts
Director, Communications, Bronx Zoo Max Pulsinelli twitter and phone number: mpulsinelli@wcs.org or (718) 220-5182
Here is what I emailed/facebooked them:
You are a member of the Wildlife Conservation Society. Yet, your Bronx Zoo keeps Happy the Elephant in captivity alone? Sir, please think about this. There ARE sanctuaries for elephants. Elephants are highly social animals. Please get with your group of WCS people and agree to make Happy and all of the other Zoo’s elephants happy, by giving them a place to spend the rest of their lives with other of their kind. Thank you.
Monday, August 10, 2015
Wednesday, August 05, 2015
45 LIFE LESSONS, WRITTEN BY A 90 YEAR OLD
Awesome Quotes: 45 LIFE LESSONS, WRITTEN BY A 90 YEAR OLD: 1. Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good. 2. When in doubt, just take the next small step. 3. Life is too short not to enjoy it. 4...
Tuesday, August 04, 2015
Listen and Learn
One of the few intelligent Senators from my home state of Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren. Listen and learn
Monday, August 03, 2015
Sweet Home.......
a lovely piece about why coastal Southeast Louisiana is my home: Great tourist info at this link.
excerpt:
Written by Kimberly Lovato
All week I’ve been trying to pinpoint what it is about this place that intrigues me. I finally recognize it’s not one single thing. It’s the harmony and counterbalance of all of it — the history, tradition, culture and wetlands — that are by turns resilient and endangered, and held together by deep yet fragile roots.
It’s difficult to see, even harder to explain, but I feel it everywhere.
It’s a little lagniappe I’ll take with me when I go, one I hope still exists when I return.
Katrina's aftermath - Gulf Coast
With the ten year anniversary of Katrina coming up on later this month, I'll be sharing videos of her destruction.
Thanks to Alex North, Mississippi Gulf Coast photographer for this beautiful picture
Katrina hit the Gulf Coast head on. Here's a look at the aftermath
Katrina hit the Gulf Coast head on. Here's a look at the aftermath
Saturday, August 01, 2015
Mesmerizing
People who know less always ask why we're spending "so much money" in Space exploration.
Let the money go to homeless, etc.
While I agree in spending more money in domestic issues, I think the system has to change wherein the money GOES to the less fortunate instead of "administrative costs".
But I digress.
Check out this video presented my my ex-employer, NASA (actually, I worked for a NASA subcontractor).
From Youtube user MadHatter: We've all seen images of extreme weather from space. But none of those could prepare us for this video just released by NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio. Using real data, this simulation's volume-rendered clouds depict seven days in 2005 when a category-4 typhoon developed off the coast of China.
Enjoy:
Let the money go to homeless, etc.
While I agree in spending more money in domestic issues, I think the system has to change wherein the money GOES to the less fortunate instead of "administrative costs".
But I digress.
Check out this video presented my my ex-employer, NASA (actually, I worked for a NASA subcontractor).
From Youtube user MadHatter: We've all seen images of extreme weather from space. But none of those could prepare us for this video just released by NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio. Using real data, this simulation's volume-rendered clouds depict seven days in 2005 when a category-4 typhoon developed off the coast of China.
Enjoy:
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