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Chattanooga, my new home
August 31, 2008I left New Orleans Saturday night, my car packed full of all my most important belongings, but with some many of things I hold dear propped up throughout my apartment in Uptown New Orleans.
I left the city at around 10 p.m., hopeful that I'd be able to beat the evacuation traffic. The actual distance from downtown to Mississippi, which takes you across the infamous Lake Pontchartarain, is around 30 minutes. It took me three hours to make it about half way. I finally took what I would term a little farm-to-market road, if I was still in Texas. Yes, I was able to go a little faster, but then I ran into a draw bridge. No joke.
I made it to Hattiesburg, Miss., a 70-mile or so ride from New Orleans, in 6-1/2 hours. Luckily, though, traffic started thinning out as some folks headed west to Jackson, Miss., others headed north, and I headed northeast.
Aside from one small 30 minute nap at the Post Office in Fosters, Ala., around 9:30 a.m., I drove straight through to Chattanooga, Tenn. It took a grand total of 17 hours to travel the normal 7-1/2 hour drive to southern Tennessee.
I checked into my hotel and immediately turned on my computer and the TV. Right now, the Weather Channel is reporting that Gustav has actually weakened to a Category 3, but there's a chance it heads a little more easterly now, which would send the hurricane right up the Mississippi and, consequently, pouring into most of the city's neighborhoods.
I'm going to sleep now. It's been a long day. How long will I be in Chattanooga, only Gustav knows.
Posted by Lara Richards at 5:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Destination unknown
August 30, 2008I woke up this morning intending to go to Houston to bunk with my little sister who's in medical school there. We planned to have nice sister bonding time, with plenty of time to drink coffee, study, maybe catch a movie or two, even swim at her apartment complex's pool.
But now the Gustav forecast is varying, with a lot of movement westward. lNew Orleans will still get hit by hard wind and rain, it looks like, and depending on how hard the hurricane is, we could stil have substantial flooding. But Gus will send most of his wrath to woutheast Texas/wouthwest Louisiana, where he hits landfall.
Um, and where is Houston again? Oh, yeah, southern east Texas. The idea of fleeing New Orleans and going west, only to find Gustav there just doesn't make a lot of sense right now.
So, me and some friends are looking east instead. The problem, of course, is that every hotel/campground/etc... in Mississippi and Alabama is booked solid. I just read the latest Associated Press report that said around a million people on the coast are seeking higher ground.
So where am I headed Tennessee? Florida? South Carolina? Who knows where I'm going to end up?
Posted by Lara Richards at 8:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Prepping for the worst
My neighbor said that our houses got about 6 inches of water in them during Katrina. So, not only do I have to pack, but I also have to find a way to prop up anything important. My bed is stacked high with the stuff that usually is hidden under the bed.
I've emptied the bottom shelf of all my bookcases. Rugs are rolled up. I've tied knots in all the curtains to keep them from touching the floor.
Before I leave, I'll unplug all the plugged-in things, aside from the fridge. Since I just moved in last week, all it's got in it is Diet Mt. Dew, water and lots of jelly and salad dressing, so if the power goes out for a week, I think it'll be fine. No rotten chicken or fish to deal with.
Of course, if a tree falls and breaks a window and rain pours into my place, it doesn't matter that I've propped everything up 6 inches.
I'm trying to come to grips with the fact that everything might be destroyed when I finally make it back to New Orleans. Right now, Gustav HAS strengthened to a Category 4, and pushing Category 5, but he's trailing a bit more westward, more like southwestern Louisiana and southeastern Texas. If that's the case, then maybe we'll just get a week's worth of pounding rain, and all my stuff will be safe.
But right now - like everyone else who lives in this town - I'm preparing for the worst.
Posted by Lara Richards at 8:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Gun/booze update
Just spoke with my neighbor (the one who's staying) and she now has a gun. And a case of bourbon.
So any looter out there just better watch out if they come prowling on our block.
Posted by Lara Richards at 7:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The mad dash
What to pack and what not to pack?
I talked to numerous students/professors over the last few days looking for advice about how what to pack if I decided to leave town.
Their collective answer: Anything I cared about.
One student was here when Katrina hit three years ago. Expecting just the normal hurricane evacuation - leave, small hurricane/tropical storm hits, town returns to normal in a day or two - he packed one suitcase of clothes. It wasn't until two months later that he was allowed back in town.
The hard choice for me is deciding between actual monetarily valuable things and things that are just sentimentally valuable. "Take whatever can't be replaced," one friend advised, but that's almost everything in my apartment.
I don't have anything that would qualify as a family heirloom, but there is the 1950s orange couch and chair that was my grandmother's, which everyone else in the family thinks is hideous but I love, which is why it's become technically mine. But my orange couch won't fit into my Honda Accord.
My dad told me to pack my brand new TV, but I'd rather pack the old Singer sewing machine cabinet that I use for my TV stand. Sadly, neither item will be making my evacuation trip.
And so, I'm trying to just pack necessities, and yet my car is going to be busting full with stuff. All my clothes and shoes, all my important papers. Pictures, photos, my favorite books. (And yes, technically, the books can be replaced, but I've written in their margins, so they're coming.)
What can I not live without? It's going to be a long couple of hours.
Posted by Lara Richards at 7:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The long haul
The streets are getting emptier by the minute. The streetcars stopped running at noon. Coffee shops, restaurants and other businesses have shuttered their windows and locked the doors. The National Guard has set up camp at the Winn-Dixie supermarket just a few blocks from my apartment.
But many New Orleanians are determined to stay. The lines at one of the only open grocery stores were packed with people buying case after case of beer and bottles of liquor. And another neighbor at this ritzy swanky house has a port-a-potty sitting in his driveway, I'm assuming for use if all the utilities and water are cut off.
There's literally no place to buy gas anymore in the city. The pumps all have bags on them. Luckily, I filled my tank up two days ago, in preparation for potentially leaving.
Two of my neighbors have declared they're in it for the long haul. The guy across the street lives in a two story house and has two generators, so he thinks he'll be fine. My next door neighbor also says she's not going anywhere unless it reaches Katrina-like proportions. She stayed up until the very last minute three years ago, so she knows exactly what to do if she has to quickly evacuate.
I asked her if she had a gun. It's not normally a question I'd ask someone I'd only known through two very brief "howdy, neighbor" conversations since I moved in a week ago.
No gun, she said, but her football-playing high school senior son has a baseball bat.
"I just hate to leave because that'd mean no one was left on our block," she said, telling me about all the other neighbors that had packed and left town. "Someone's gotta watch out for us."
There is an eerie sense that a wave of lawlessness is about to wash over the city in addition to Gustav. News reports say that the city has amped up police presence in anticipation for any looting that may take place before and after the hurricane hits. And of course, there's the National Guard here as well. But already there's just so many vacant houses just begging to be broken into.
Which brings me to my decision. I think I'm leaving. And I don't feel like a chicken one bit for doing it. I just realized that it's not just the hurricane that could cause damage here.
And, as my Papa pointed out on the phone just a little while ago, I left my gun in Texas.
Posted by Lara Richards at 6:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
A ghost town
The French Quarter is usually the happeningest (I know that's not a word, but there's a hurricane coming and my mind's not quite right, so give me a little leeway.)
Anyway, the Quarter, for those of you unfamiliar with New Orleans, is what many people think of when they think of this city. It's only a few blocks wide and about 10-12 long, filled with every kind of shop and business imaginable. During peak tourist season, you can hardly walk down many of the streets because of the crowds. Oh, yeah, and there's this street called Bourbon Street, which contains every debauchery under the sun. (Not that I know from personal experience, of course. A friend of a friend of a friend told me.)
I went down to the Quarter last night (Friday) with a friend for dinner, and it was a ghost town. Most of the streets were empty, save for the policemen guarding already boarded up businesses. ATMs had signs on them letting any potential looter know that all of the money had already been removed. One parking garage had warned customers that if - and at this point, mostly likely when - the governor issues a mandatory evacuation order, that people will have exactly five hours to remove their cars. At five hours and one minute, the garage will be locked.
Even the few businesses that were open Friday had signs posted, saying they would be closing Saturday. Until further notice. On the signs, there was no certainty about when life in the city would return to normal. People learned from Katrina that it could months, if not years, before normalcy took hold.
Word on the street last night was that hotels had also already gently nudged their guests out or let everyone know that they would be closing as well. Everyone learned their lesson from Katrina. Prepare for the worst.
The bartenders, waitresses, parking attendants and other people who are the motor that keeps the Quarter afloat all had worried looks. I ended up last night at Pat O'Brien's, a notorious New Orleans bar known as the home of the hurricane drink, which is extremely strong and potent. (A friend of a friend of a friend told me.)
I talked with the bathroom attendant who kept checking her phone. She and some of her friends planned to leave the city later Friday night. She planned to get off work sometime between midnight and 2ish, depending on when her bosses let her go. She was going to go home, take a quick power nap, and then hit the road, headed for Mississippi.
She prayed that this time wouldn't be like that other time. It was the wish of everyone in the Quarter last night.
Posted by Lara Richards at 5:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Friday at Wal-Mart
August 29, 2008I can't begin to describe the odd aura floating around New Orleans, my home for the last 7 days.
This morning, as I walked to class at Tulane Law School, I felt like I was in one of those nuclear disaster/zombie movies, where the Earth around me has been destroyed and I"m the only one still alive (and not zombie.)
The streets were quiet. There were no cars parked around. The campus closed at noon, so there was little activity. It was -- literally -- the calm before the storm, I guess. Apparently, many of the residents around me simply decided to go ahead and hit the road early Thursday night to beat the traffic and Gustav, I presume.
But then I went to Wal-Mart this afternoon, which is always a bustle of activity( obviously, it's Wal-Mart). But this was a bustle with a purpose: prepare for the storm. Cases of water were stacked everywhere. The manager came across the intercom to announce that there was a fresh supply of flashlights, gas cans, generators and other storm-preparedness gear up at the front.
Customers exchanged knowing glances with each other. Others talked about "the last time we went through this," a nod to Katrina, of course.
The check out lanes weren't particularly long, but customers were stacked 20-deep in front of both the ATM and the pharmacy. They'd learned their lesson, one woman told me. During Katrina, most of the banks were closed and the ATMs ran out of money. Even when a few businesses and stores were able to reopen, they could only accept cash because their computerized cash registers were down. And the same for prescriptions. People couldn't get their much-needed drugs because their accounts were locked up in computer land.
I struck up a conversation with my cashier, asking her how her day had been. She said that, surprisingly, Friday had been a lot calmer than Thursday. She said most of her family had already left town. "This time, we wanted to PICK where we ended up," she said pointedly, in reference to the fact that so many evacuees landed in random states across the south, stranded for months until they were allowed back into New Orleans.
After I left Wal-Mart, I drove by a nearby gas station/oil change place. Cars were piled up 7-8 deep. People getting ready to leave and flee Gustav.
The storm, by latest accounts, isn't supposed to hit town until Monday or maybe even Tuesday. But the people here who've decided to stay, at least for now, are prepared.
And hopeful.
Posted by Lara Richards at 10:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
STAY!
So I've been debating all day long about either packing up and fleeing the area -- like most of my Gulf Coast brethren -- or just putting down hurricane roots and staying in New Orleans, regardless of what kind of horrid weather comes this way.
I know it's kind of unsafe and irrational to think of staying, especially since as of tonight the meteorologists are saying, more definitively, that Gustav is on its way, strengthening as he comes. But part of me -- the curious, adventurous journalist -- just wants to wade this thing out.
And so what do you do when you want to do something, and everyone tells you you shouldn't? Well, you contact the one person in your life who'll tell you to be crazy and follow your foolish gut.
For me, that was my mentor -- and former Times Record News editor -- Carroll Wilson.
So I e-mailed Wilson Thursday night, telling him of my dilemma, seeking advice. The first line of his e-mail back to me:
STAY! (Yep, it was in all capital letters, too.)
His reasoning was quite simple. He wrote, "This is the chance of a lifetime. . . Stay low, keep your butt down and be prepared to seek higher ground."
Of course, I haven't OFFICIALLY decided to stay and wade out the storm. Forecasts right now predict Gustav will hit land sometime Monday late or early Tuesday morning, so I've still got plenty of time to get out. But at least I know one person won't think i'm insane for wanting to see Gustav up close.
Posted by Lara Richards at 7:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Should I stay or should I go?
August 28, 2008Long story short, I'm no longer a reporter for the Times Record News, although I'm still a freelancer for the paper as well as a blogger. (And I'm still on very good terms with the lovely TRN, which was my home for 7 productive and worthwhile years.)
Anyway, I decided to go to law school in the lovely town of New Orleans. Yep, THAT New Orleans. The one with hurricane Gustav on a beeline for. Right now, Gus-Gus is slated to hit landfall sometime Monday/Tuesday.
Tulane Law School (where I attend) has cancelled classes already for Friday afternoon and won't resume until next Thursday, assuming that Gustav is somewhat nice to the my new hometown. But if this turns into another you know who (Katrina), then who knows what my life will be like in a few days.
For the meantime, I'm staying put. The rational, future lawyer in me sees the benefit in packing up my important belongings and cherished family photos and heading to higher -- and more importantly, inland -- ground this weekend.
But the journalist in me . . . Well, i've never been through a hurricane before.
I'll keep you posted.
Posted by Lara Richards at 9:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
