Well, I'm embarrassed by how infrequently I've been updating. Life has been pretty full of other things, and I find myself having little time or energy to write. So, a brief list of random thoughts and happenings:
Autumn blew in the door this morning. The temperature was somewhere in the low 40s when we got ready for work, and promises to hover in the low 60s this afternoon. There might be frost on the ground tomorrow morning. I haven't quite capitulated yet - no coat for me - but I am wearing a sweater today.
This was my first week back in the office post-vacation. I think Tuesday was pretty tough, but the rest of the week went by pretty quickly. I'm very busy and have a couple of interesting projects on my plate at the moment, so all will be well, but I'm glad it's Friday.
I've been listening to the Stones' new album, A Bigger Bang, nearly non-stop in the car this week. I'm surprised by how very good it is, and I like it more every time I listen to it. There are one or two tracks on here that stand alongside any one of their earlier great tunes. I'm surprised at how good they sound given that they are collectively older than the universe. They were the first band I ever saw in concert; when I was growing up in the '60s and the British invasion was in full force, the question was always, "Beatles or Stones?" For me, it's always been the Stones, and it still is.
Autumn weather brings with it the need to cook (I made an astonishingly good dinner last night, in spite of it being Thursday - chicken marsala, pureed acorn squash and a wilted spinach salad with bacon) and the need to reclaim my social life. In addition, I have a powerful need to clean my studio again and get back to work. Study group happens in November, and I'd like to have something to show for myself. Hopefully I can turn all of these needs into realities. So many interests, so little time...
Well, Katrina has certainly brought out the worst in many of us. A couple of weeks ago, I volunteered to be the assistant editor of the Politics section over at Blogcritics. The Politics section long ago ceased to be a place I want to be, but the editor was in the process of a house move, and I hopped in to fill the void. Unfortunately, it means I need to read all the posts in the section, and this week they've been uglier than usual.
In the midst of the destruction of a beautiful and historic city, in the midst of thousands of Americans going without basic necessities for days and living amongst their own dead and dying, each post has become more vitriolic than the last. To add to the verbal carnage, a long string of commenters came along to call names.
There's plenty of blame to go around. Political leaders on the local, state and federal levels have all failed terribly. What we should all be wondering is how on earth, nearly four years afer 9/11, this could happen. What's really clear to me is the fact that we are woefully unprepared to deal with a catastrophe of this magnitude, whether it be a natural or man-made one. All of the bluster that Bush & Co. have produced about homeland security in the past four years has clearly been lip service - when push came to shove, our leadership has failed us miserably. We have only ourselves to blame - we let them get away with this. We have failed in our duty as citizens to hold our representative government accountable for its actions. New Orleans is the fault of all of us.
Most of us are still staring in disbelief at the images on our television screens. The toll Katrina has taken is high - we have virtually lost an entire city, and thousands upon thousands of people have lost everything they had. It is difficult for most of us to comprehend.
Please take the time to make a donation, even a small one, to the American Red Cross. Blogcritics has set up a donation page that will accept your money via Paypal and funnel 100% of it directly to the Red Cross Katrina relief effort. You can find the link here.
