Thanks Update

This week, I need to thank Ewa Barczyk, St. Robert's Catholic School, and Scott Temperly, again. If I was a better person, I'd get that letter of to the Slinger School District, they have adopted us, in a way.

Other information: I spoke today with a friend who has a comparable job to mine with the New Orleans School District. His house was underwater to the ceiling and now the mold is thick. When he got in, he was smart enough to take down the drapes to make sure the mold didn't grow into his second story. He said it was eerie to go to the second floor after seeing the first floor destruction. The 2nd is virtually unscathed and looks the same as when you return from a long weekend. The first floor, however, is something else. Besides the mold, everything was turned upsided down by the water's current. The refrigerator was on its side. As you may have heard, the School District laid off more people and he is among them. In the interim, he is trying to find work as videographer. As you can imagine, there isn't a lot of work for video people in New Orleans these days! Sadly, the projects he will be working on is documenting the demise and rebuilding of the city.

I asked him about the politics in the city. He said that things have gotten worse instead of better. In a time when you'd think everyone would come together, it seems as though everyone is clamoring for their own piece of the pie. Trust me, it was that way when I was there, so I can't imagine how much worse it could be. I suppose instead of being selective who council members exclude, now they must be excluding everyone. I wouldn't want Mayor Nagin's job, for certain. An interesting aside is that he is worried he won't get elected if the African-Americans don't get back in the city. There is some interesting speculation about his re-election to be sure. I can almost guarantee that Gov Blanco is out of there. She projected a really ineffective response, regardless of the reason. And my guy, Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish (aka the "crier" from Meet the Press), is supposedly in hiding because he told the staff of the pumping stations to evacuate, and, therefore, didn't have employees to turn on the pumps to get the water out.

Lots of brilliance and blame to go around.