To make it easy on my out-of-city readers, here’s a list of things that currently have New Orleanian heads a-buzzing.
1. Carnival Season: The Krewe du Vieux parade is less than a month away and I have not a shred of my costume ready. Holy. Crap.
2. New Orleans Sliding Into The Gulf: Coastal wetlands are not just hurricane speedbumps, they also act as the outer limits of the continental shelf and absorb gravity slumps and growth faults characteristic of a passive continental margin. In other words, when the wetlands go, we’re next. Don’t worry, Houston suffers from this problem, too, but they’re farther inland than we are. Their great-grandkids can worry about it.
3. New Orleans May Not Be Adequately Protected From Flooding Until 2010: Considering 2 above and the hottest year ahead, even sub-standard levees will not be ready for another four years. Oh boy.
4. Allstate Pulls Back from Insuring Coastal Homes: Insurance for those who don’t need it. Don’t you just love government-mandated daylight robbery?
5. Murderers Coloring Outside The Lines More: It’s no longer about teenage Gangster A killing pre-teen Gangster B after which B’s peeps take out A in a gun battle across the neutral zone, leaving the NOPD and DA’s office with paperwork and not much in the way of real policing and crime management. Only here does the thought “How soon before we’re next?” seem absolutely ludicrous and perfectly valid at the same time.
Here’s an idea: Have a great Mardi Gras season. I like to tell myself that the beauty of life right now is my still being alive.
