- Katrina Checkin: A place to connect people affected by Hurricane Katrina to their loved ones.
- While Bush continues to remain silent, Texas Governor Rick Perry pledges to open up the Astrodome, with evacuees arriving within the next 24 hours.
- Also from WWL blog, flights to New Orleans International could resume in two months.
- NOLA: Jefferson Parish Emergency Management Director Walter Maestri broke into tears, begging for necessities of life to be brought to workers. The phone number is 504-349-5360.
- No dignity for the dead.
- A list of what’s now gone from the Mississippi Coast. (via Storm Digest)
- Multiple Katrina maps.
- NOLA: Looters trying to break into children’s hospital.
- Paul at Wizbang, who is down to four pairs of underwear, is telling everyone to chill out.
Month / August 2005
Non-Katrina Roundup
- Earlier in the year, Jenny McCarthy, one of the finest anthropologists of our time, sold a book for $1 million called Marriage Laughs. It was a book offering marriage advice. Unfortunately, it appears that Ms. McCarthy has had to go back to the drawing board. You see, she couldn’t follow her own advice. She’s divorcing husband John Asher. Perhaps she can successfully retool her book. After all, how many self-help books are out there that offer a winning formula for short-term marriage. Here’s a potential title for Ms. McCarthy: Short-Attention Span Marriage: A Modern Woman’s Guide to Getting the Most Out of Your Man for a Few Years.
- Is Christopher Paolini the new J.K. Rowlng? He’s just 21 years old and Eldest, the sequel to Eragon, has sold more than 425,000 hardcover copies. If movies are involved, we only ask that Mr. Paolini hold out against offering the film rights to Chris Columbus.
- The Rake believes that John Updike’s review of Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar the Clown is a pot/kettle/black situation.
- And speaking of Rushdie, he’ll be part of a new History Channel series called The Write Stuff. Each episode will “reveal the trials and tribulations of these writers on their journey to literary success.” Why not a series dedicated to the struggling freelancer? Surely, the History Channel is interested in portraying a fair and accurate depiction of history (which does after all include losers), rather than recruiting big names to perpetuate the myth that one can actually make a living from writing, right?
- For now, despite an impending move and a sartorial dilemma, David Kipen’s still banging out a column for the Chronicle. This time, perhaps alluding to his forthcoming departure, he writes that San Francisco Noir is “the perfect sadistic gift for somebody getting ready to miss the Bay Area like crazy.”
- Like book reviews, scientific papers are about settling scores.
- The Bay Guardian chats with cartoonist Justin Hall.
- The Book Standard talks with newspaper editors about their bookloads. (via Haggis)
- And if you’re in San Francisco, please note that tickets are now on sale for this year’s San Francisco Fringe Festival. How can you go wrong with Cervis with a Smile performed at Original Joe’s?
Huzzahs to the Times-Picayune
The Times-Picayune must be commended for their remarkable journalism under the circumstances. Remarkable photos, first-hand accounts and solid information to draw conclusions from. These folks are still putting out a newspaper despite having to capitulate their building and despite a paper edition precluded by the rising waters. In today’s edition, there are the following details:
- Terry Ebert, director of New Orleans Homeland Security: “Truth to tell, we’re not too far from filling in the bowl.”
- The waters are rising at about 3 inches per hour.
- There are apparently gangs of armed men moving around the city, having obtained their weapons stock from a brand new Wal-Mart in the Lower Garden District.
- The silver lining of a slow surge is that the death toll is considerably lesser than what might have happened, had the eye passed directly over New Orleans.
- Plans are in place to stop the flooding through 800 tons of concrete. There are about 108 15,000 pound concrete barriers that the Army Corps of Engineers hopes to drop into place by air.
Katrina Headlines XIX
- Email from rescuer at BoingBoing.
- CNN says the people at the Superdome, who number between 12,000 and 15,000, could be there for a week. Apparently, plans to rescue these people are being made. But nothing has been revealed thus far. With rising floodwaters, it would seem to me that some action should be determined immediately.
- WDSU: Entire city will soon be underwater.
- A three-foot shark is cruising the streets.
- The word from Lieutenant Governor Landrieu: 3,000 rescued to date. Also, the helicopters that were planning to drop 3,000 pound sandbags and stop the levee never arrived. Mayor Ray Nagin extremely upset. Where were these helicopters? In Iraq, as other reports have noted?
- Amazingly, the NFL says the Saints will play at the Superdome on September 18.
- Storm Digest notes that the Gulf Coast News Missing Persons Database was hacked.
- Chris Martel observes that the same networks airing commercial-free tsunami coverage for days aren’t even covering Katrina.
- Electric Mist describes the refuge situation in Baton Rouge.
- This blog is devoted to the damage at Slidell.
- The LA Times on the prison riot.
- Bush 404 Error
- What stage is Katrina at right now? Let meterologist Jeff Masters tell you.
- Some places to donate.