Riding the storm out

We're keeping a nervous eye on Hurricane Katrina. We've got family in New Orleans - K's birth mom, brother and sister and their spouses, and his sister's little boy, who's a little bit younger than J. They won't be riding the storm out there, as so many in south Louisiana tend to do when hurricanes threaten - everyone who can get out is getting out, since evacuation is now mandatory. But this is such a big storm, and such a powerful storm, that we're hoping they can get far enough away. His mom and her fiance headed to the Baton Rouge area, but his siblings and their spouses headed further into Mississippi. Did they not look at the weather reports and see that Mississippi isn't going to be much better off than south Louisiana?!?! So we're anxiously waiting to see what will happen with the hurricane, and to hear that family is safe. I personally think that if it were me living in New Orleans, I wouldn't want to rebuild my house even if I had a house left (and after this, a lot of people may not - K's birth mom said they would be surprised to have a house to come back to after the storm blows over). If there's as much flooding as is predicted, the pump system that keeps the city from flooding in regular weather will be underwater, too, so they'll have no way to get the water out. K said he heard somewhere that if the flooding is as bad as they think it will be, it could take six MONTHS to get the city dried out. I can't even imagine. And even with the cemeteries being above ground (since N.O. is below sea level, you can't bury people underground, too much water), with that kind of flooding, they could have coffins floating around, and God knows what other grot that's been building up in the French Quarter. Ewww.

So when I think my life sucks, I'll just think of those people in south Louisiana who may lose everything but their lives and the clothes on their backs. It could be worse. I can't even imagine being on I-10 right now, trying to get out of New Orleans, sitting absolutely still on the Ponchartrain Causeway, knowing what's coming up behind you. We'll feel better when K has heard that his family is safe.

The craziness isn't contained to K's family, oh, no. My bio family is just as nuts. My sister's landlord has been illegally dumping stuff from his septic system into the city's newly built sewer system - he's apparently too cheap to repair what's wrong with his system, so he's just taking a little of the "load" off of it, if you will - so she's got some serious issues with continuing to live there. She'll be moving somewhere nicer soon, which is good. And my mom has apparently picked up a stalker through her work. She works at a check cashing business, and this young guy came in, having just moved to where she is now from a town she used to live in for a few years some time back. So of course, being the outgoing person that she is and being that they'd lived in the same town, she was making friendly conversation with this guy. She told me he was acting kind of flirtatious toward her, and she thought that was odd, being that she's old enough to be his mother and then some (her words, not mine!). But he left and she didn't really think anything of it. Not too long after that, a call came in to her workplace on a day she was off, and it was a guy asking for her cell number, saying he was supposed to work on her floors. Her co-worker called her and asked about this, and of course my mom said, hell no, there's no one fixing my floors, and got a little freaked out. They figured out by looking at the phone number and looking at the guy's information from when he cashed a check that he was the one who made the call. My mom's car had problems that required it to be in the shop overnight while this was going on, and she got a rental car. She's the first one in of a morning, so she drove by work to let her co-workers see what she was driving, so they wouldn't be concerned to see an unfamiliar vehicle there. Well, she went in, and not two minutes later, in comes this guy who'd called for her cell number. By this time, my mom was already in the back, behind the bulletproof glass, and she did her best to stay out of his line of sight. But he kept looking around the woman who'd gone to help him to see my mom, and after he left, one of her co-workers said she didn't like the way he was looking at my mom, that it creeped her out. Great. Like we don't have enough drama already without a nut job following my mom around. So she's now equipped with industrial strength pepper spray (her friends on the police force were able to tell her what to buy) and she's going to get her concealed handgun license and a gun. My mother with a firearm, oy vey - this guy better seriously rethink his plans to bother her, God only knows where she might hit if she shot him.

Add to that the attitude that my son serves up daily (today he told me, out of the blue, that he wasn't my best friend - um, what brought that on, and I'm not supposed to be your best friend, I'm your mom), and there's never a dull moment. Nothin' but fun.