the city, the stench, and the nice people with the automatic weapons...

Well, for anyone interested, I returned to the City yesterday to retrieve computers/clothes and secure my apartment uptown.

We managed to get a pass for Jefferson Parish and took Airline from Laplace up into Jefferson to Shrewsbury, then to River Road and to the city. There was a National Guard check point at the parish line at the tracks on Oak Street, but they gave us no trouble when we told them that we were there to get in and our.

My friend from Baton Rouge brought myself and the professor that I brought with me when we evacuated.

They dropped me off at my apartment to get my stuff, and then my friend and the professor proceeded to retrieve his car, which he had parked on the 3rd level of the Hiatt parking garage.

I was in and out of my apartment pretty quick, about an hour, and was sitting on the front porch of the main house with my stuff by 8AM.

While I waited for their return, the National Guard walked down Chestnut in front of my place approximately every 15 minutes, armed with M-16s. They did ask for my ID to confirm that I should be there, and were are EXTREMELY hospitable.

One note is that my cell phone worked perfectly down there now, BUT, my service is with Cingular, and when in Orleans Parish the screen read T-Mobile, and when making a call, it would pause a moment and flash no the screen that the call was being re-routed, then beeped, then went through perfectly.

We did get some pictures, and I'll get those developed today and will scan and post on ebo.net at my earliest convenience.

Now, I stayed Uptown, so I can't comment on the Canal area directly, but my friend and the professor said that it was pretty nasty. Around my place it looked no different than a bad storm.

It's going to be a while before Streetcar service can begin I'm assuming as the lines are down in a number of places. Over all, the Live Oaks faired better than I would have imagined.

There was a slight stench on Chestnut, but in other places it was HORRIBLE. I swung by to check the house of a friend over on Nashville, and though the vehicle they had left behind was unharmed, the roof had some damage, but it appeared that nothing structural. Shingles missing from a great deal of the highest ridge of the roof, and a few scattered shingles missing.

Unfortunately, after my initial observation that the house faired well, I walked into the back yard and that was where I got a freaking nose full.

His back yard, each blade of foot tall grass, was coated with a nasty black coating, which I soon realized was sewage deposits....YUCK...

Around the back of the house, I used a file folder to measure the water line. The line was about 1/4 inch less than two lengths of the folder, so I'm afraid that the entire downstairs of his home is due for a steam cleaning.

I should also note that when we turned the water on in my apartment, and my friend told me the same experience at the apartment of the professor, the water ran clear for a moment then began to darken. I turned it off at that point.

Pray god we will be able to inhabit our city before 2006....shit, don't we have a Mardi Gras to put on in Feb. and Jazz Fest in April/May!!!