Soooo, It's The Anniversary...

...of Katrina. How'd that work out for ya? In some ways I feel sorry for the residents. But the constant bitching and moaning about how the government is taking too long to rebuild New Orleans befuddles my ass. Did these folks not have insurance? And if not, why is it the governments job to rebuild your house? But here's my rub about the whole thing, and it applies not just to New Orleans, but all places that are prone to these types of situations. At some point in time you bought a house on or near a place of water that might damned well come and turn that place into toothpicks. But you decided to do it anyways. And when it happens you seem surprised. How could something like this happen? If you aren't aware of the ramifications of your decision, then why is it the job of the government to rectify it? Or anyones, for that matter.

On a side note, to throw light on the situation, I used to work on a golf course. For 25 years. We had a rather large creek that ran through the two courses we had. It would flood, sometimes badly. But as the years went by it would flood excessively and no one seemed to be able to figure it out. At times it flooded surrounding homes and the owners demanded immediate retribution for their damages and a quick fix. So the BOD spent thousands upon thousands rip-rapping the bank, dredging, reshaping, etc. And the floods kept happening. OH, there were some highly pissed off people. I was in charge of all the physical stuff out on the course. Things like pump stations, electricity, irrigation and the like. And the floods would fuck my stuff up hugely. But we dealt. Hell, it's only money. Raise the dues. So one day at a meeting I brought up the point that the floods aren't the result of bad maintenance practices, as were being claimed. It's because of all the asphalt and concrete they've installed upstream at the mouth of the creek. What used to fall harmlessly into the ground now was going into culverts and storm drains. And right into the creek. DUH!!

They had never once considered that. NEVER. And there wasn't a damn thing they could do about it except to re-route the creek, which the city wasn't going to do. I left shortly after the last flood, after a tropical storm came through and dropped 12 inches of rain. It flooded the lower level of the clubhouse and did about $250,000 worth of damage. And the clubhouse was a 1/4 of a mile from the creek. I even had to climb into an elevator shaft to pump out 8' of water, with live electricy in it. Decisions, decisions. Make them wisely, kiddies.