When I bring it. I bring it.
Category: Uncategorized
Gone Fishin’
Greetings from Grand Isle, Louisiana. Down here with Mama and dem for a few days of fishing, sun and tar-ball dodging. What I hadn’t counted on was that Louisiana is turning into some sort of weird desert region. Despite all the worries about flooding from the swollen Mississippi, they haven’t had any damn rain for months. The land is baked and a hot south wind blows constantly.
I’m reading Game of Thrones at the moment, so I’m seeing all weird weather as a sign of prophecy. A sign of something coming. Me!
Take that as you will. But it did start raining yesterday. And again this morning. They’re pop-up showers and the wind hasn’t subsided, but this morning’s storm was so rough it actually stopped us from fishing. But no complaints. The wind keeps it relatively cool and keeps Grand Isle’s legendary mosquitoes away. The company’s good and the food is excellent. The only things I ate yesterday that wasn’t fried: boudin, Twix and a grilled ribeye (over charcoal, like the gods intended) the size of my not inconsiderable head.
The War Has Begun
In the mornings, before leaving for work, I peak out my back door to see how my plants are doing. This morning, I busted two squirrels trying to sneak up on my tomatoes and kill them in their infancy.
And so the battle begins.
These tomatoes are green and about the size of a marble at the moment, but they’ve got a fine coating of black and red pepper. I wonder what squirrel sneezes sound like.
Wanted: Your Money; Why? To Fight Cancer
I’ve signed up for my second year of running the Lymphoma & Leukemia Society’s Team in Training. Why? To raise money to cure cancer. To hang out with the friends I made last year. Because if I don’t sign up for these things, I start to grow as wide as I am tall. When I do sign up for these things I can eat ice cream and cake.
But before I blather on about me some more, a thing or two about LLS. Since it’s inception in 1949, it’s raised over $750 million to fight blood cancers. That’s a — what’s the scientific term? That’s an assload of money. What do they do with this money? Here’s a quick peak. And it’s made a difference. The easiest way to see this is to join TNT and notice the number of survivors actually training with groups. One gentleman who’ll be training with Brooklyn this summer spoke to us yesterday. He was diagnosed at the end of 2009. LESS THAN TWO YEARS AGO. He was headed for a painful future of bone-marrow transplants when his doctors told him about a study in its fourth year that had discovered that people with his specific type of cancer responded to chemo just as well as they did bone-marrow transplants. This past March he ran a half marathon. Now he’s training for New York.
Guess who funded the study? Go on. Guess. LLS. And people like you who helped me raise money last year.
Another stat they dropped on us. A kid diagnosed with blood cancer in the 1960s had a 4% chance of survival. A kid today has a 90% chance. But before we go patting ourselves on the back, I’ll tell you what the coordinator told us. As amazing as that is, imagine putting 10 parents in a room and telling one set of them that their child is going to die.
So that’s why we do this.
Up next? Will I run the Hampton Half Marathon or the Hampton Full Marathon?
Putting the Servant Back in Public Servant
EPIGRAPH: “His life is no sinecure; and a methodical arrangement of his time will be necessary, in order to perform his many duties with any satisfaction to himself or his master.”– from “The Book of Household Management” by Mrs. Isabella Beeton
My friends, it occurs to me that when it comes to our so-called public servants, we’ve got the master-servant relationship exactly backwards.
After yet another spate of ethical scandals among our political class, we must admit that the sort of philandering and corruption rampant in their ranks reflects poorly on our ability to act as proper masters and certainly does not speak well to our ability to judge character and hire acceptable help. If the butler, stable-hand or charwoman in your own home behaved in such a manner, you would have sent him or her packing immediately.
What kind of servants are these, after all, who come and go as they please, who respond to neither phone calls nor letters, who hire their own family and friends and then exempt themselves from the very laws they’d have us observe? This is to say nothing of the awkward fact that they live in homes more lavish than our own and are ferried about in government vehicles as if they were to the manor born.
Continue reading “Putting the Servant Back in Public Servant”
Watch Morganza Opening Live
Army Corps of Engineers has set up a Ustream channel to watch opening of the Morganza Control Structure when they actually go forward with the decision. Anyone who watched the opening of the Bonnet Carre can tell you it’s not exactly the most compelling video in the world. If you live downstream, this is probably horrifying, depressing or both. From a dramatic perspective, a camera set up in Butte La Rose would probably be better. And it would be more interesting for historians and possibly the people about to lose their stuff. Of course, that’s assuming there aren’t one or two folks who decided to stay behind and last it out somehow. (Here’s a link if the embed goes out. It’s going to be dark until they actually do open it)
MRC President Directs Corps to Open Morganza Floodway
Floodway will be open within 24 hours. After that, water will hit Butte La Rose within 30 hours, creep into Krotz Springs area within 35. Check out the map below.
From the Army Corps of Engineers Operation Watershed Facebook Page:
May 13 – The President of the Mississippi River Commission Maj. Gen. Michael J. Walsh has directed the New Orleans District Commander Col. Ed Fleming to be prepared to operate the Morganza Floodway within 24 hours. The operation will include the deliberate and slow opening of the structure. The inundation will spread slowly over several days as attached map shows.
Continue reading “MRC President Directs Corps to Open Morganza Floodway”
If You’re Gonna Break a Man …
… always do it sexually. This real-life parks & recreation guy needs his own show. Or to be locked up.
Regarding Novel-Writing Software
You just fucking need to write. That’s how I replied to someone asking me my opinion on the subject of novel-writing computer apps.
Continue reading “Regarding Novel-Writing Software”
Just What IS This Morganza Spillway?
Check out the map below. See Morganza? Just north of that a bit, there’s something called the Morganza Control Structure. If (when) they open it, gabillions of gallons of Mississippi River floodwater will roll through and out into the “spillway.”
Look at that green sward that juts to the west, toward the Atchafalaya River, then turns south. Click on the link (or the map) for a clearer picture. Scroll down. You’ll see Krotz Springs on the other bank of the Atchafalaya. (Don’t worry about them. Yet). Keep scrolling.
Continue reading “Just What IS This Morganza Spillway?”
KEN WHEATON 