This is too wacky not to share with the internet, given that it was the internet that caused it. A few hours ago, I received an email from a woman who lives in Abu Dhabi (that’s in the Middle East, for you geographically-challenged).  Sifting through the Kuwait forums on orkut (which I haven’t touched in ages thanks to work, New Orleans-related work, and MySpace), she came across my profile and remembered me as the girl who acted in a middle school play alongside her little sister back in 1987.

“Did you act in Othello with Seema?”

It was the Taming of the Shrew, but … nineteen years later, someone who watched me in her kid sister’s school play, all of us in full costume and makeup, remembers me enough to ask if I was the Maitri who lived in Kuwait and attended school in the same area.

Now for the true punch: Seema and I loved Wham! in middle school. Listening to an old George Michael song a few days ago, I thought of her, smiled and wondered what she is up to. Spooky.

The phrase “small world” is misused and abused in this country. If you meet someone who knows someone who knows your brother and all of you live in Greater Metro New Orleans, it’s not a small world, it’s a small city. When you live in New Orleans and your bartender’s best friend went to school with one of your best friends in Illinois, it’s a small country, not a small world.

An email from a woman in Abu Dhabi who stumbles across you online and informs you that your old friend, her sister, now lives and works in Kerala (southern India) … that constitutes a small world.

And, now, to annoy one and all (because the stupid song is stuck in my head and you must suffer with me), I give you:

It’s a world of laughter
A world of tears
It’s a world of hopes
And a world of fears
There’s so much that we share
That it’s time we’re aware
It’s a small world after all

A large, dark thunderhead looms over New Orleans and the city resembles Batman’s Gotham or, more aptly, Sin City. Seriously, it looks like the Dragon of Revelation is about to reach out from the heavens at any minute now. With parts of Metairie flooding yesterday and the juicier bits of hurricane season on the way, I welcome you to Louisiana and revive some old seasonal tips.

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To: ex-Louisianans, present Louisianans, future Louisianans, and those who know a Louisianan.

We’re about to enter the peak of the hurricane season.  Any day now, you’re going to turn on the TV and see a weather person pointing to some radar blob out in the Gulf of Mexico and making two basic meteorological points:

1. There is no need to panic
2. We are all going to die

Yes, hurricane season is an exciting time to be in Louisiana. If you’re new to the area, you’re probably wondering what you need to do to prepare for the possibility that we’ll get hit by “the big one again.” Based on our experiences, we recommend that you follow this simple three-step hurricane preparedness plan:

STEP 1. Buy enough food and bottled water to last your family for at least three days.
STEP 2. Put these supplies into your car.
STEP 3. Drive to Nebraska and remain there until Thanksgiving.

Unfortunately, statistics show that most people will not follow this sensible plan. Most people will foolishly stay here in Louisiana. We’ll start with one of the most important hurricane preparedness items:

HOMEOWNERS’ INSURANCE:
If you own a home, you must have hurricane insurance. Fortunately, this insurance is cheap and easy to get, as long as your home meets two basic requirements: (1) It is reasonably well-built, and (2) It is located in Nebraska.

Unfortunately, if your home is located in Louisiana, or any other area that might actually be hit by a hurricane, most insurance companies would prefer not to sell you hurricane insurance, because then they might be required to pay YOU money, and that is certainly not why they got into the insurance business in the first place. So you’ll have to scrounge around for an insurance company, which will charge you an annual premium roughly equal to the replacement value of your house. At any moment, this company can drop you like tobacco in a spit cup. Unfortunately, if your home is located in Louisiana, or any other area that might actually be hit by a hurricane, most insurance companies would prefer not to sell you hurricane insurance, because then they might be required to pay YOU money, and that is certainly not why they got into the insurance business in the first place. So you’ll have to scrounge around for an insurance company, which will charge you an annual premium roughly equal to the replacement value of your house. At any moment, this company can drop you like tobacco in a spit cup. [Since Hurricane Katrina, I have had an estimated 27 different home-insurance companies. This week, I’m covered by the Thibodaux and Boudreaux Insurance Company, under a policy which states that, in addition to my premium, Thibodaux and Boudreaux are entitled, on demand, to my kidneys.]

SHUTTERS:
Your house should have hurricane shutters on all the windows, all the doors, and — if it’s a major hurricane — all the toilets. There are several types of shutters, with advantages and disadvantages.

Plywood shutters: The advantage is that, because you make them yourself, they’re cheap. The disadvantage is that, because you make them yourself, they will fall off.

Sheet-metal shutters: The advantage is that these work well, once you get them all up. The disadvantage is that once you get them all up, your hands will be useless bleeding stumps, and it will be December.

Roll-down shutters: The advantages are that they’re very easy to use, and will definitely protect your house. The disadvantage is that you will have to sell your house to pay for them.

“Hurricane-proof” windows: These are the newest wrinkle in hurricane protection: They look like ordinary windows, but they can withstand hurricane winds! You can be sure of this, because the salesman says so. He lives in Nebraska.

“Hurricane Proofing” Your Property: As the hurricane approaches, check your yard for movable objects like barbecue grills, planters, patio furniture, visiting relatives, etc.; you should, as a precaution, throw these items into your swimming pool (if you don’t have a swimming pool, you should have one built immediately). Otherwise, the hurricane winds will turn these objects into deadly missiles.

EVACUATION ROUTE:
If you live in a low-lying area, you should have an evacuation route planned out. (To determine whether you live in a low-lying area, look at your driver’s license; if it says “Louisiana” you live in a low-lying area.) The purpose of having an evacuation route is to avoid being trapped in your home when a major storm hits. Instead, you will be trapped in a gigantic traffic jam several miles from your home, along with two hundred thousand other evacuees. So, as a bonus, you will not be lonely.

HURRICANE SUPPLIES:
If you don’t evacuate, you will need a mess of supplies. Do not buy them now! Gulf Coast tradition requires that you wait until the last possible minute, then go to the supermarket, and get into vicious fights with strangers over who gets the last can of SPAM. In addition to food and water, you will need the following supplies:

– 23 flashlights
– At least $167 worth of batteries that turn out, when the power goes out, to be the wrong size for the flashlights
– Bleach (No, I don’t know what the bleach is for. NOBODY knows what the bleach is for. But it’s traditional, so GET some!)
– A 55-gallon drum of underarm deodorant
– A big knife that you can strap to your leg. This will be useless in a hurricane, but it looks cool.
– A large quantity of raw chicken, to placate the alligators. (Ask Everybody who went through Katrina; after the hurricane, there WILL be irate alligators.)
– $35,000 in cash or diamonds so that, after the hurricane passes, you can buy a generator from a man with no discernible teeth

Of course these are just basic precautions. As the hurricane draws near, it is vitally important that you keep abreast of the situation by turning on your television and watching TV reporters in rain slickers stand right next to the ocean and tell you over and over how vitally important it is for everybody to stay away from the ocean.

Good luck and remember: it’s great living in Fishing Paradise! Those of you who aren’t here yet, you should come. Really!

… and I don’t want to swim.

CNN.com: Study finds rapid pre-Katrina sinking in New Orleans Certain parts of New Orleans subsided more rapidly than predicted, i.e. more than one inch per year, over the last four years, contributing to localized levee failure after last year’s Hurricane Katrina.

“What we found is that some of the levee failure in New Orleans were places where subsidence was highest,” University of Miami professor Tim Dixon* said in a news release from the school. “These levees were built over 40 years ago, and in some cases, the ground had subsided a minimum of 3 feet which probably put them lower than their design level.”

Scientists made the measurements by studying more than 100,000 images taken by a Canadian satellite monitoring the wetlands around New Orleans … [they] did not know about the images until after Katrina.

No one predicted levee failure of this magnitude before the storm and assumed they would hold despite increasing subsidence rates. Do these scientists now care to tell us where else levees are at risk, or should we just assume that all New Orleanian canal levees are unfit for human reliance?

… some places, including the Lakeview and Kenner areas, would continue to sink about an inch per year over the next 10 years but that the average would be a fraction of that.

“We need to think long term, think of what will happen in the city in 50 or 100 years,” [study co-author Shimon Wdowinski] said. “Some areas will continue to subside, the sea level will continue to rise. Places like the Lower Ninth Ward will be 10 feet below sea level.”

“Pervasively flawed” levees built on the accelerating subsidence of organic-rich sediment.  Crumbling wafers on melting icecream. Hark, what news through yonder window bleats? Why, flood barriers are mostly back to strength, say the Army Corps of Engineers. And what more?

“If another Katrina hit, the levees aren’t magic,” said Col. Lewis Setliff III, commander of Task Force Guardian, the corps team making the repairs. “They are built to a certain height, and if you have a storm surge that exceeds that, you would have overtopping and you would have flooding in traditional low-lying areas in New Orleans. But what we are going to do is prevent the catastrophic failure of these levees and floodwalls.”

You hear that? The levees are not held up by binding spells, but the corps will magically prevent the catastrophic failure of our levees and floodwalls. Recall these words come the end of hurricane season.

*who, incidentally, performs research close to my heart

The only person I wanted to be with when Katrina swooped down on the Gulf coast was my mother. The unwavering trust and, in the case of my mother, the knowledge that she has never ever sweetened the truth for me. If that isn’t a lifetime of consistency, I don’t know what is.

Happy mother’s day to the lady who bore me, and continues to bear with me three decades running. If it weren’t for you and your strong beliefs, ma, I’d be on the floor in a million pieces now. Keep it together – a great lesson from a woman who lost her own home of 27 years to cruel fate and kept going.

Happy mother’s day to my grandmothers. One turns 90 this weekend and thinks I still look and sound like the four-year-old version of me. From her I’ve learned to respect youth at heart. The other reads, reads, reads, educates herself, and makes artwork of beauty, right as her eyes completely fail her. It is because of this woman that I will always indulge in that most wonderful of activities – reading – even in the darkest of light and with subpar vision.

How our grandmothers did it while responsible for generations of family and a flock of children, and how my mother did it with two impossible children and the most demanding of jobs, is beyond me. I’m a remorseless ball of whine when all I have to take care of is myself.

Lastly, happy mother’s day to every single maternal figure who made it through Katrina to tell the tale. Your strength is our future.

Respect.