Sailor Soldier of Love and Justice

Things I want to do on my next trip to New Orleans:

- Take some sort of Mississippi River cruise (Curse you, Mark Twain!)
- Visit the Insectarium
- Visit the WWII Museum
- Eat at The Green Goddess
- Eat beignets

King Cake must be baked this weekend.

A year ago today was when the hysteria started to really set in. All sorts of crazy reports of death and destruction. At this point, I can't remember which stories were true and which ones were not.

It was when authorities started to tell people they couldn't go home. :(

( A year ago today )

Ben did that studying thing again last night. I occupied myself with more sewing. I finished the skirt I was working on, I think. I'm still not satisfied with it completely, but ben says it looks cute. It's a little circle skirt (think magical girl, but a bit longer) with lace along the edges and lacey fabric over the whole thing like a curtain to there's an upside down "V" in the front. (Wow, I am terrible at describing things.)

Now I'm working on a wrap skirt from absolutely horrible fabric. I may end up trying to sell that skirt. I'm sure it'll fit someone's taste.

After this skirt is done, I think I'm going to switch to shirts for a bit. I want to reduce my gigantic mountain of fabric. I feel overwhelmed by the piles and piles of it. If I can just get it all to fit in one box, I'll be one step closer to a clean sewing room and then I can get some real stuff done.

So, now the giant elephant in the room...What were you doing a year ago today? I was glued to a tv, worrying about all my friends. Of course, at this point I had no clue what was going to happen. I was reasonably confident things would be fine, as they always were. It wouldn't be until the next morning that I found out the bad news about the levees.

( Naive hope? )

Not much at work. But it's friday so that's good. I can't wait to go home. I want to be on weekend forever.

Here's a trip down memory lane. The Utena Slut Chart. j_buns and I made it one day at work when we were very VERY bored. I used it today to explain relationships in the show.

The weather is warming up, which helps my mood a lot. I really hate walking around and seeing nothing but death. Things are coming back to life and the air is starting to smell good again.

That reminds me. I want to look up the flowers I used to love in New Orleans. They'd be on, I guess bushes or vines or something, since I always saw them climbing over the edges of fences. Little white flowers that smelled really good. I should learn what they are. Before I forget again.

[EDIT] Brilliance

Michael Brown: "Are you proud of me? Can I quit now? Can I go home?"

Looks like they're going to open up some parts of new orleans next week. The french quarter at the beginning of the week, and uptown sometime around wednesday. I hope my friends can get it and get their stuff.

In other news, the pope hates gay people. Ok, so that's not really news.... But now he's seeking to find priests and those in seminaries. His own mini-inquisition. I wonder if he's going to complain about a priest shortage after this....
Oh, he's also looking for those who "who dissent from church teaching," whatever that means. You know, for a religion that claims to encourage its members to love and embrace others, there sure is a lot of hatred going on.

[EDIT] Oh, and people are saving lives by ignoring FEMA.

I'm the only one at work right now. And there isn't really anything for me to do. Well, that's good I guess. I can work on my knitting. I learned how to decrease the other day, so now I'm closing up the top of the hat. Then I can add the little touches to it and send it off! Yay! :) It's my first time attempting a hat, reading a pattern, knitting in the round, and decreasing. I hope it comes out nice enough that amanda will like it.

I feel better than I did yesterday evening. I was all stressed out because I had to stay late at work. A guy wanted to enter a contest with a friday deadline. He didn't send all the pictures until yesterday afternoon, and then we needed to clean them up, format them, and print them. Printing alone took an hour.

When I got home and ben wouldn't wake up, I eventually poke him in the face. Then he gave me much needed hugs and made me feel better.

I'm sorry I haven't been posting much nola news anymore. It's gotten so political. I deal with facts and numbers and accounts to force myself to focus and not freak out. But when the political finger pointing starts, it no longer calms me.

There are some accounts I sorta do want to post, but I'm afraid if I do, everyone I know will lose faith in all humanity. Like reports of women told they needed to lift their shirts if they wanted to be rescued. When they refused, their rescuers left them there.

There are fires all over the place. But no one will say how they are starting.

And then there is Barbara Bush's "Let them eat cake" comment. *sigh*

Ok, knitting. Knitting is happy and good and helpful.