Land Of A Million Stereotypes

Louisiana natives are very sensitive when it comes to that old stereotype of us being dumb, alligator-wrestling, dip spitting rednecks. People seem to think that we ride pirogues to work every day just to pay for the food to sustain our pet gators.

But, sometimes (most times) we perpetuate those same stereotypes. For instance, my Mom, a social worker, was at a conference for the day – at a casino. Yes, a work day at a casino/hotel. It just so happens to be one of the better hotels in the region, so they hold conferences there. God Bless Louisiana.

Mom wanted me to meet her there for lunch. I hadn’t visited this particular casino in a while and they had renovated part of it and opened a new hotel since my last trip home. The sliding glass doors zip open and I stroll right into a living, breathing stereotype. Right in the middle of the hotel lobby were about two dozen living alligators.

No wonder people think we worship the scaly-skinned reptiles. We have a gang of them planted right smack in the middle of the quintessential “nice” hotel in Central Louisiana. Their habitat is surrounded by the hotel shops and restaurants.

With that said, I couldn’t help but take these pictures and sit and stare at them for about 30 minutes. They aren’t a bad idea and they are surely buzz-worthy. They even have gator shows every Saturday – inside the hotel lobby. I’m serious, that’s no joke. A wrangler brings out raw chicken and feeds the beasts in front of hotel patrons.

Welcome to Louisiana – land of a million true-to-life stereotypes.

Home Town Glory

I stepped off my plane and was immediately met with the sounds of Jazz and the smell of Popeye’s in the air. That’s not some flowery metaphor for being home in Louisiana, that’s a literal account of my first seconds back in the Bayou State. It’s New Orleans and that’s how we do it down here.

Riding down I-49, I was surprised to see that weeks later, there is still a good deal of damage from Hurricane Gustav that has yet to be cleaned up. There are still tarps on buildings and downed trees crisscrossing the sides of the road. I counted no less than 12 electric company work vehicles on the Interstate between New Orleans and Alexandria before I fell asleep in the backseat of my patents’ car.

I haven’t been home in a year. When you’re away from something for an extended period of time, you tend to romanticize it. There are apparently a few things that I forgot about my home town.

It’s a small town and there isn’t much to do here. I’m not talking about being bored in Charleston. When you are bored in Charleston, you can always go for a stroll downtown. You can try one the 700 restaurants that you haven’t found the time to check out just yet. You can go people watching in Marion Square, shop at the Outlet mall or dodge the tourist at the Pineapple Fountain. And if all else fails you can see who is playing at Music Farm or Windjammer, there is a good chance that Edwin McCain is playing one of the two – he’s always playing one of the two.

People are inherently larger here. I am in a constant state of diet in the Lowcountry. I go through months at a time without eating carbs in an effort to blend in with the weightlifting, rock-hard-abbed world of Charlestonians. Here, I have a long list of places I want to eat lunch before leaving again. Each includes the best desserts on the planet and a smorgasbord of fried foods.

Because of the blazing heat of Louisiana throughout most of the year, paint fades here. I never noticed it before this week. From street signs and school buses to business fronts, the paint is dingy , dull and muted.

Why would you want to visit a place like this? Well, I guess you wouldn’t really. You have to be from here to understand why we love it so much. When you grow up in Central Louisiana, you can’t wait to flee for the fabled metropolis. You don’t miss it though, until you are miles away.

This is what we call home and I love this place in all its boring, fat, faded glory. It’s good to be home!

Gustav: Updates From Louisiana

Gustav is fading away – thankfully.

It looks like the worst is over for most parts of Central Louisiana. I just got off the phone with my parents, who would be mortified if they knew I was writing a blog with their accounts of the hurricane. My Mom tells me the wind has died down considerably and there is just a light rain lingering. There are no street lights so she can’t really assess any damage -- if there is any. She does know that a basketball goal from somewhere has blown into the front yard as they can see it from the bedroom window. There is a mandatory curfew tonight and a water conservation order, but all is well.

It’s about 10:30 in Louisiana and they are already going to bed. They have no power and they probably won’t for a while. They decided to not use the generator for now. During Hurricane Rita, some places didn’t get power back for a week. So, they’ll save the generator for just such an emergency.

My buddies, who also live in Alexandria, had some damage that they noticed early on.

I got this text message update:

Huge tree in the back yard just came down. Our shed is totally destroyed. We saved a lot of the contents. Front yard has a tree down too. We're very wet, but OK.

That seems to be the case all over Louisiana. The doom and gloom of Hurricane Gustav didn’t pan out and that’s a good thing. It’s better to be prepared. Expect the worst and hope for the best.

And what about our friends who rode out the storm in New Orleans? Well Craig says they made it through just fine.

….so New Orleans and its close ‘burbs were a bit oversold on this storm. Not that it was difficult to do, of course. The warnings were honest and, given the timing of them, based on very, very real concerns. And nearly everything worked this time around — from local government facilitating evacuation to the state sending in the Guard to the national folks having what was needed on the ground. Lessons learned and thank you.

As Craig reminds us, not everyone was as lucky as Central Louisiana and New Orleans Proper.

I can tell you the best story most of the nation will never see. It’s what is happening this evening to the folks in Lafitte and other small communities directly south of New Orleans and to the southwest. Some are heavily flooded for the second time in three years — with many just-rebuilt lives, homes and businesses again in tatters. The problem is they are too few in number for most folks to care. And they’re still assessing damage in Lafourche and Terrebonne Parishes. God bless those folks tonight, as well as others still facing what’s left of this weather system. Those of us who stayed in New Orleans know how creeply lucky we are this time around.

As Gustav weakens to a tropical storm and slowly moves from Central Louisiana and into Natchitoches and Texas, it continues to be a rainmaker... dumping upwards of 20 inches in some places. The threat now moves to flooding which is also very dangerous.

I will keep an eye out for damage reports, but this will likely be my last big update on Gustav as we here in South Carolina start watching our backs with Hanna.

Gustav: Update From Louisiana

I'm about to leave for work, but I wanted to give you guys a quick update from Louisiana.

I got an e-mail late last night at around 12:30 that the first feeder band was causing a bit of rain and the power had already started flickering in Downtown New Orleans. Looks to be the same case with Craig over at News Orleans Metblogs who is riding it out there.

I talked to my parents up in Alexandria and they are just getting a slight rain right now. My parents, being my parents, were more worried about me and less about the monster storm headed their way. They wanted to make sure that I was prepared for Tropical Storm Hanna which is inching toward the East Coast.

In the world of blogs, New Orleans Metblogs is the place for updates -- while they are able to keep updating. Here is the latest update that Craig filed a couple of hours ago.

Here is Tommy K.'s Weathercast from yesterday.

Gustav: Not Evacuating?

Ever wonder why people in New Orleans stay and ride out a hurricane? Here is an interesting blog from a Big Easy restaurant owner who will stay and ride out Gustav.

Even after Hurricane Katrina, there are people who are willing to face Gustav head-on. In the media, we are forced to stick around when everyone else is seeking shelter. One reason we don’t’ leave is that people who stay around need to remain informed and that’s what we do. You see reporters getting blown around in the wind, but beyond that spectacle, we also give vital information to those who remain in the viewing area.

I know you are wondering about that mandatory evacuation. How can they stay if there is a mandatory evac? Well, that simply means that it is no longer a voluntary evacuation. You are ordered and strongly encouraged to leave, but technically they can’t force you to leave your own property.

Craig explains:

This “mandatory” thing means, essentially, you’re on your own if you stay. No one is going to come drag you out of your house at gunpoint and throw you on a bus to Boise. What it means is, in the most serious parental tones, “don’t come crying to us when your walls collapse, your roof flies off to Alexandria and you’re climbing a phone pole to get away from the rapidly rising Gulf of Mexico. We warned you, you freaking idiot.” Some officials also back this up by telling people to leave the names of their next of kin with police so they can be contacted.

So why stay in the first place? Who knows really. I guess every individual has their own personal reasons. For some, what they encountered during and after Katrina is reason enough I guess.

Just ask Craig:

We have put too much into what we have (personally, professionally, physically) to simply sit in a motel room someplace and watch it all get washed away again. We wouldn’t be “in our own home.” I agree that to stay is a type of madness. But it’s preferable to the madness we felt in our Being Away the last time.

Schadenfreude

Schadenfreude is a German word that means "pleasure at the misfortune of others." You know, finding enjoyment when your rival team's quarterback gets injured or your ex gets dumped -- or apparently when a monster hurricane threatens thousands of lives. It's a laugh riot -- right?

Friday, I interviewed a group of women going to the GOP Convention in Minnesota. After we wrapped up, I asked them what they thought about Hurricane Gustav making landfall and postponing the convention. They said quickly that it wouldn't happen and then went on to laugh and joke about how people in Louisiana are a bunch of whiners. They kept going on and on about how Tropical Storm Fay hit Florida four times and Florida citizens didn't whine like people in New Orleans. They actually called them whiners. My photographer looked at me and shook his head. I swallowed my pride and remained professional and respectful.

They had no idea that I'm from Louisiana -- with friends who lost their homes to Katrina. But, that should make absolutely no difference. The one-two punch of Katrina and Rita is a little different than a tropical storm hitting four times. But, I chose to let that go.

Then today a video surfaces with former Democratic party chair Don Fowler and who the poster of the video identifies as Congressman John Spratt from here in South Carolina. They're sitting on a plane coming back from the DNC in Denver and Fowler starts joking about Hurricane Gustav forcing the postponement of the Republican Convention.

Schadenfreude?

A lot of people, including myself, are reliving a nightmare. I just got off the phone with a friend from home who is now living in Tennessee and, like me, he can't stand not being there. We are worried about our families and our home-state. We covered Katrina together and Gustav has filled us both with a sense of dread. He's watching The Weather Channel non-stop. I can't bring myself to watch it just yet. But, that will change the closer Gustav gets.

Mayor Ray Nagin just ordered the 100% mandatory evacuation of my old neighborhood, Algiers, in New Orleans. All I can think is "here we go again."

Here is just a taste of the messages my friends in Louisiana are leaving on their Facebook accounts.

"Joni N. has on her gameface. Ready for Gustav coverage."

"Lance W.: Gustav has got to go...somewhere else!"

"Alisa M. is hoping and praying Gustav weakens and heads another direction."

"Catherine K. is evacuating today. Please pray for New Orleans."

Those are neither funny nor whining.

That Damn Gustav

The latest models for Hurricane Gustav have literally formed knots in my stomach. The National Hurrricane Center has moved the path further west and right over my home town. That thin purple line is running right through the place where my parents, 95% of my family and most of my friends live.

We had a lengthy discussion about Hurricane Katrina today because of the anniversary. I don’t usually talk about those days – it’s all still a little raw even three years later.

I learned things in those days that I never wanted to know and never needed to know… that the smell of death sticks in your nostrils long after you’ve walked away and even the happiest people have their breaking points in tragedy. I learned that last lesson when my old Public Information Officer committed suicide after he lost hope – stuck and forgotten down there.

I learned that two things happen to people when they are faced with such dire situations. Some people rise to the occasion and band together while others revert to savagery and desperation. Both are instincts of survival and given the situation, I can’t really blame anyone for choosing either. Maybe the circumstance chooses for you.

I’d lie if I said I’m not worried about all those I left behind in Louisiana. If it hits the coast as a nasty category 4 monster, by the time it reaches my family, it could still be a vengeful category 2 storm. I wish I was there, just to not feel so powerless.

To my friends and former co-workers in New Orleans – my heart is with you. And to my family and closest friends in Central Louisiana – you know I would be there if I could.

Gustav Eyes New Orleans

I called my parents up for our nightly conversation. I’m a momma’s boy – sue me. They were busy making a list of what they needed in their hurricane kit, because Hurricane Gustav is on the way.

My dad was getting ready to make sure there was enough gas in the emergency generator and my mom was taking inventory of the non-perishable food in the pantry. That’s just what you do in Louisiana when a storm is coming.

Here we are on the eve of Hurricane Katrina’s anniversary and Louisiana is in a state of emergency with the National Guard activated for another storm. Mayor Ray Nagin and Sen. Mary Landrieu planned on leaving the Democratic Convention early to head home. It’s eerie – it stirs up a bit of sadness.

My hometown is further inland and usually hurricanes drop to a Cat 1 or so by the time they reach us, but that's still a major storm. The hotel rooms there are already booked in advance from people getting ready to evacuate from the southern Parishes. It brings back memories that I’m not interested in recalling.

In the days to follow, I’ll blog more about my experiences living through and covering Katrina, but my prayers are with my friends and family in Louisiana as Gustav continues growing. I honestly get a sick feeling in my stomach every time I walk by the Weather Center and see the projected track going right to the mouth of the Mississippi.

Those of us who covered Katrina have an unspoken bond. When we meet each other, even today, we know that we share something special – something tragic. You didn’t walk into New Orleans those first few days and not walk away changed.

It’s hard for me being all the way over here in Charleston while plywood is going on windows and families are making evacuation plans back at home. When that storm finally hits, I will undoubtedly want to be in the mouth of the madness with those I love who are hunkered down riding it out. Though there is nothing I could do to help there… I feel helpless here.