The Conservative Cave
The Bar => The Lounge => Topic started by: asdf2231 on August 29, 2008, 09:14:22 PM
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The folks who are Mods here know already but I am flying out tomorrow at o-dark-thirty for New Orleans, LA for 15-20 days working the recovery effort for Hurricane Gustav. (Or at least I will be once he mosies ashore.)
I am going to be working as a supervisor in security down there, so it should be pretty interesting.
They are sticking us in evac shelters till the hurricane is done making merry and when the storms lift we go to work.
I am hoping that it will not be as bad as Katrina was 3 years ago, because I spent three weeks down there after that and I can tell you it was pretty damn bad for all concerned. It looks as if Gus is swinging wide of NOLA for right now but there are still 4 or 5 days till landfall. Before that landfall there will be recovery personnel stationed in TX, LA, MS and AL to cover bases no matter WHERE it goes. I have the honor of being in the first few thousand people being deployed into LA. A man I have worked with the last three years arrived yesterday and he was national volunteer worker #12. Which delighted him to no end. :-) He's in his late 60's and has been out on almost every major national disaster that I can think of in the last 5 years or so.
I would ask that you set the politics that resulted in the Katrina mess aside in this thread and say a prayer for the people about to be hit with this and the REAL heroes in the military, police and fire agencies who will be out there risking life and limb to keep people from harm and the doctors and nurses who will be riding the edge of the storm caring for those affected.
Also I would ask that if you are in any way able to do so that you donate something (anything) to the American Red Cross disaster relief fund. There will be fellow Americans in the weeks and months to come that would be grateful for any help that can be offered.
I will check in when and if I am able and post some pictures.
Thanks.
:cheersmate:
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Good luck! :cheersmate:
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Thanks for your work, ASDF. Don't get your feet wet.
Prayers for the victims and their helpers!
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God Bless! and good luck.
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Prayers will be said, for sure. I have a seventh sense about these things. I don't think this hurricane will effect New Orleans. I have the thought that it is going a lot farther west than any model currently reflects. We'll see.
Stay safe anywho!
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Good luck and stay safe. I am also keeping an eye on Gustav too.
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Good luck, and stay safe. :cheersmate:
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Stay safe and away from the gators (Not the CU kind either)
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Good luck and stay safe.
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It looks like New Orleans will get some rain and wind, but the full force will be off to the west.
(http://icons-pe.wunderground.com/data/images/at200807_model.gif)
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We all appreciate all you do for the people that need it the most. Prayers of safe travel and well being are being sent your way as well as many blessings.
I would ask that you set the politics that resulted in the Katrina mess aside in this thread and say a prayer for the people about to be hit with this and the REAL heroes in the military, police and fire agencies who will be out there risking life and limb to keep people from harm and the doctors and nurses who will be riding the edge of the storm caring for those affected.
You are included within these people.
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My prayers for you and all the other volunteers asdf. As well as to anyone that may be effected by Gustav.
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Prayers for you and all affected.
Let's hope it turns more westward and hits less populated environs.
Stay safe!!!
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Of course we'll pray (just like we did the first time.) If it gets bad, look for the Southern Baptist kitchen...I've heard the food "we" provide is pretty good. Blessings!
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Be safe!
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Yes, PLEASE stay safe. It's a Cat 4 now......
You have all my admiration for doing what you're doing!
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God Bless you...Prayers for those affected and those that give of themselves to help.Saty safe
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Watching the weather channel this morning and thinking about asdf and others like him and the people who live in the area. Nasty looking storm and I'm going to pray hard for everyone in the path and coordinating recovery efforts. Expected to make landfall in 36 hours. I believe Librarylady from tos is out that way too. Even though I've had my differences with her, that doesn't matter in these types of things and I hope she and hers are safe and am saying a prayer for them too.
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It's their own fault for living there./CU Mode
:tongue:
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Prayers out asdf.....stay safe <<<<hugs>>>>
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Came through okay. Our shelter building in Baton Rouge got wanged around a bit and it was lively for a while.
Will update later.
Miss you guys.
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Came through okay. Our shelter building in Baton Rouge got wanged around a bit and it was lively for a while.
Will update later.
Miss you guys.
Good to hear from you asdf!
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Look forward to your update, asdf. Stay safe!
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good news. I was wondering if you'd get to come home early. :cheersmate:
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pansy.
Emotions are for girls.
:tongue:
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I have to ride herd on the phones tonight from the HQ but they are forwarded to my cell and I actually got a for real day off tomorrow.
Flew in Saturday last and touched base in NOLA at the Metarie chapter headquarters before heading up to Baton rouge. Took me 6 & 1/2 hours to go the 65 odd miles from there to here. The evacuation traffic was pretty intense. Sunday was spent doing surveys on the staff shelters that we were housing folks in through the hurricane. They locked down travel for everybody from Sunday night till Tuesday morning 8 am.
Rain started whacking the roof early Monday morning. Our building had two sides that were very well sheltered and we spent most of the day sitting on benches smoking and drinking coffee and watching junk blow by, transformers blow up and trees blow down.
The baptist church where we are staying lost the steeple and we had the ac ducting torn off the side of the building and various and sundry junk tossed about. Water started flowing in the vents where the ducting tore off and luckily the only thing that got soaked was MY sleeping bag and suitcase. :p After about an hour it stopped being particularly scary.
Power went out at 2 that afternoon and was just restored at 5am yesterday morning. It was 4 days before I managed to scrounge up a coke and a gas station microwave hamburger, lol. We were eating MREs and canned fruit for a few days as everything was closed down flat with the power knocked out.
The mall across the street opened up today and I ran over and got carry out chinese and new sneakers because my hiking shoes have been killing me. Happiness is. :cheersmate:
I have been alternating between going out in the areas around us and doing safety and security surveys at evac shelters and helping out with the physical security and safety issues here at the headquarters building.
It's the same damn empty WalMart that they used during Katrina and it was a damn creepy feeling walking back in here after three years. Some of the ghosts seem to have been chased out though. There were about 50 people here the first day. There are better than a thousand working the area now.
I love doing this. Everyone you run into is a family member. You are all cousins sisters and brothers in the same big disfunctional family. :-) I am sharing a staff shelter in a church gym with about 150 other folks and have met a lot of old friends again and made quite a few new ones. There are three people from my home chapter who deployed down here that are working with me. My boss from the flooding in Rockford Illinois showed up one day and I have run into people who were running things down here during Katrina and Rita that I still remembered fondly. I had a crappy day a couple back and my shelter bud Lauri let me vent out for an hour and provided a hug and made me laugh. I've done that for a couple people as well.
The local folks have been superb lending help and for the most part it has been a joy working with our clients.
I am tired, sunburned and worn out and I have lost 10 pounds or so in the last week. I've been schlepping in from work around 9 or 10 each night and getting up at 5. Having the power back boosted morale quite a bit. Cold showers in an unventilated bathroom with palmetto leaves and mud on the floor and walls running with condensation are not conducive to making the happy. :) There is a baptist Federation shower unit and laundry point at our shelter so we have enough stalls for everyone and those lovely folks did my laundry and folded it for me while I was working in my last pair of clean socks yesterday.
Keeping fingers crossed that Ike does not come here to play when it comes ashore next week.
Tomorrow I will be half done with my deployment. I flew out on my son's 7th birthday at o-dark-thirty and have missed the first two weeks of school for them. It's been a little rough on my wife and I actually asked her if she needed me to declare a family emergency and get home, but she told me that the last week has been the worst and things are getting better. My eldest is the greatest. She has stepped up and is cooking and babysitting for the mancub to help cover while my wife had business obligations this last week.
I have a whole glorious day off tomorrow and am going to sleep in and then see about finding an open steak house somewhere nearby. Or some eggs. Cripes I would kill someone for eggs right now, lol.
Miss hanging with you guys and the absense of any source of news down here. I heard palin talk a few times on the radio and I fricking LOVE her.
The headquarters building is emptying out around me here and I am going to hit the road soon.
Hope everyone is well in their own pursuits and will drop back as I can.
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Great reporting, asdf! Sounds like everything worked out well! :II:
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Thanks for the report, asdf! Keep keeping yourself safe and enjoy your well-earned day off.
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<<<<hugs>>>> and stay safe!!!
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God Bless you...Prayers for those affected and those that give of themselves to help.Saty safe
Well said & people that work in disasters have my utmost admiration
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oh boy. Ike is heading right for Texas/Louisiana
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/storm_graphics/AT09/refresh/AL0908W5+gif/144313W_sm.gif
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Thank you for your work asdf.
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Just a tad of an update.
I had a day off yesterday and got 14 hours of sleep and found an open waffle house and got the first milk and eggs I had seen in a week. :-)
This morning they assigned me to work out of New Orleans, St. Rose specifically.
The place is in better shape than Baton Rouge was. Power is on and everything is working fine. I am being lodged in the Renaissance Hotel in downtown NOLA with my boss as a roomie.
I hit the pool tonight and soaked for an hour and then got a steak dinner at the hotel restaurant while listening to piped in jazz. I think I may be in heaven. :p
I did a bunch of investigation reports today and inspected a mobile feeding kitchen south of here. Freaking HOT and humid. A blackhawk touched down in the field next to the kitchen unit and I got some cool pics but it will be a bit before I can upload them someplace. (I'm using the lobby 'puter right now.)
If Ike tracks into LA we are going to be bugging our people out north in the next two days.
I am halfway through this and ready to go home. Saving grace is that things seem to be going relitivly well all around. There are some troubled bits, but it is better than I expected.
have to see what the week brings but for the next two nights at least I seem to have fallen into the roses rather than the cow paddock for a change here. :-)
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Just a tad of an update.
I had a day off yesterday and got 14 hours of sleep and found an open waffle house and got the first milk and eggs I had seen in a week. :-)
This morning they assigned me to work out of New Orleans, St. Rose specifically.
The place is in better shape than Baton Rouge was. Power is on and everything is working fine. I am being lodged in the Renaissance Hotel in downtown NOLA with my boss as a roomie.
I hit the pool tonight and soaked for an hour and then got a steak dinner at the hotel restaurant while listening to piped in jazz. I think I may be in heaven. :p
I did a bunch of investigation reports today and inspected a mobile feeding kitchen south of here. Freaking HOT and humid. A blackhawk touched down in the field next to the kitchen unit and I got some cool pics but it will be a bit before I can upload them someplace. (I'm using the lobby 'puter right now.)
If Ike tracks into LA we are going to be bugging our people out north in the next two days.
I am halfway through this and ready to go home. Saving grace is that things seem to be going relitivly well all around. There are some troubled bits, but it is better than I expected.
have to see what the week brings but for the next two nights at least I seem to have fallen into the roses rather than the cow paddock for a change here. :-)
Thanks for the update!
Ike looks like what Gustav wasn't. But who knows...
STAY SAFE and enjoy what luxuries you can while you can, amigo!
I am glad you had a chance to feed the needs.