so, what now?

It’s a tragedy, in the bleakest sense of the word, everything that is going on in New Orleans. I’ve wanted to blog about my vacation and my hurricane dodging trip to Miami last weekend. In light of recent events, I can’t really bring myself to do that just yet. The stories in the press over the past several days bogglemy mind. They read like something out of a Mad Max movie. It’s difficult to think of any city in the US as completely dead and submerged in complete anarchy.

But, it is real.

Appropriately, the blame game is in full effect. And yes, people likely did screw the pooch on this one. It's hard to throw stones at Mother Nature -- of course. People are angry and that anger is going to lock its cross hairs and focus itself, plain and simple. But right now, blame is a moot point. The hurricane came and went and left little behind save destruction. FEMA, the National Guard, and whoever-else has got to take control of that city. By shear virtue that I can hardly bear to watch, listen, read, hear about what is going on there.

I’m sensitive.

I’m currently reading the Difference Engine (William Gibson/Bruce Sterling). I’m around a point in the book where London, caught in the throes of a hot and stinking summer, has erupted into chaos. Riots, looting, fires, murder – the whole nine yards. There is definitely a new, graver realism to those chapters now.

It's news to no one that gas prices are rising steadily. I paid 3.49 a gallon to fill my tank yesterday. That stings a bit, considering I drive roughly 80 miles/day to and from work. I think the jump in gas prices just might be the first tickle of the economic effects of all of this. That scares me a little bit (or a lot). It's wait-and-see-time, I suppose.

It's hard to be too worried for one's self. People are starving, thirsty, and living in complete filth not all that far away. It's best, for now, to be thankful that I have a car to put expensive gas in so that I may drive to a job, that still exists. At the end of the day, I get to come home to a house, pets, and a beautiful fiance that loves me very much. Stop and think. Just like me, most of us have it really, really good. Thank God, Jebus, Buddah, Allah, Your Lucky Stars (or charms) or whoever.

And then focus your thoughts and prayers on those people less fortunate.