Spaceheater

What's Going On In My New Orleans?

Maybe you saw this clip on the news.  All this is regarding the destruction of public housing units in the city.  That's right, public housing, otherwise known as "The Projects".  Usually the destruction of project housing isn't met with such vehemence.

Watch the clip carefully.  There is fear and anger on both sides.  What's going on?  Well, it's complicated, more complicated than what seems apparent.  As a new resident there's no way for me to really know or understand.   

But let's start with Katrina

"On September 15, 2005, President Bush pledged that our nation would "do what it takes, and stay as long as it takes," to rebuild the Gulf Coast. Yet over 60,000 people are still in "temporary" FEMA trailers, and houses, hospitals and schools across the region remain shuttered. For thousands of people, the Katrina recovery has failed." (Institute for Southern Studies, Aug/Sep 2007)

60,000 people in double-wide trailers -- for more than two years.  Remember, these 60,000 people lost everything in a lot of cases -- home, possessions, job, car, pets...family members.

Imagine that for a second.  You have nothing but the dirty shirt on your back.  You get stuck in a shoebox and promised help.  Two years later you're still in that box and the promised help has been more frustrating than helpful.  How's your mental health?

"the Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act, S. 1668, sponsored by Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) had the support of the entire state's delegation and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development -- until September, when HUD and Vitter suddenly withdrew their backing...The Congressional Quarterly Weekly offers partisan politics as one explanation for his actions"  (justiceforneworleans.org)

The Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act was one of those that was everyone's favorite to pass, and I mean it had no threats of veto by the President. H.R. 1227, which is essentially the same bill, passed the House back in March.  If it turned into S. 1668 when it got handed to the Senate, I don't know, but the bill had a lot of backers.  Then Vitter (R-La.) pulls his support apparently over politics? 

I'm not sure I buy that completely.  I think money, a lot of money, must also be part of Vitter's motivation.  But as a resident, how angry must that make you feel to hear that one man is holding up a potential law that would set in motion the means to rebuild destroyed communities because he's concerned that the passage of this bill would make his opponent look too good?  Feel a little powerless?

"Today's vote is a victory for the residents of New Orleans who deserve to live in a socially and economically integrated environment where their children can play safely and families can thrive. We recognize there is a tremendous need for affordable housing throughout the Crescent City and are deeply committed to ensuring that everyone who resided in public housing prior to Hurricane Katrina has the opportunity to return to something better than they left." (Statement from HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson regarding the New Orleans City Council's vote to remove the public housing, Dec 20, 2007)

Sounds nice, but ...

"Advocates announced Friday that they relocated 249 of New Orleans' homeless encamped in Duncan Plaza, steps from City Hall..." (Times-Picayune, Dec 22, 2007)

The key words here are "249" and "homeless".  Sure there were homeless people before Katrina, but their numbers have increased dramatically since.  And they've been camping across from City Hall for months.

Perhaps the City Council exhibited poor judgment and worse timing when they decided to have a vote on the removal of affordable housing while there were more than 250 homeless people camped outside across the street!

A show of good faith would have been to find those folks housing, permanent housing, first.

Mad yet? 

In general, I hate public housing.  I've known plenty of residents in projects who were upstanding citizens, but mostly I see public housing as dens for criminals and addicts.  The law abiding citizens are often working very hard to get out and wouldn't shed any tears over their destruction.

I think all the shouting and fence rattling is a direct result of our leadership's lack of compassion and their self-centered concern for politics, money and position.  No one wants to do the right thing for people because it would mean a sacrifice of one or more of those things.

Well, fuck 'em then.

If our leaders aren't going to show leadership then I think it's time that we, as citizens, shake off the depression brought on by two years of neglect and band together to take care of ourselves and our communities. And I don't mean banding together with megaphones to shout meaningless slogans at City Council.  We need to come together and do what we've been waiting for the government to do.

Who's with me?!

[crickets chirruping]

...Hello?...

...Anybody there?...

Rainy New Orleans Day

For You

Two Years Later

HP Methadone Program

The End Is Near!!

I suppose it is no secret to you, my friends, that I am a big Harry Potter geek.  Yes, I am, and I'm comfortable with that label.  While none of you is as geeked out on HP as I am, you've remained loyal and tolerant friends through my fixation.  And so, it is to you that I will turn, in less than three month's time, when my situation becomes dire!

You see, Book 7, the FINAL HP book, comes out on the Summer Solstice, July 21.  Finally, the long anticipated conclusion!  It's a bittersweet moment for me (and about a billion other people, too) because the fates of characters I've come to care about--Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Snape and Draco even--gosh, the fate of the whole of the Wizarding World will be revealed!

Deep breaths...Deeep breaths...

Sorry.  I geeked out for a minute there.

But see, once all is revealed, that's it!  This is the LAST book.  After this there will be no more!  No more Hogwarts.  No more adventures for Harry.  No more of the dreaded Dursleys.  No more Luna or Lupin lunacy. No more H/G vs H/H vs H/LG vs H/CC (yes, this is code only another geek will be able to decipher).  No more He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!  No more Death Eaters!  No more Expecto Patronum!!

Okay... deeep calming breaths...

Another geek colleague of mine is fretting over how to combat her HP withdrawal, too, but she's got her post HP plan all worked out.

She's starting with Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which is a good post HP read sincce it is in keeping with the whole magic theme...

moving on to The Thirteenth Tale, which is not about magic, but which will appeal to fans of Jane Austen--of whom my geek friend is. 

I hipped her to The Golden Compass trilogy, which any HP geek should find satisfying.  And, hopefully, the movie will also be a balm to jangling, HP withdrawing nerves.

I would just add to her list  pretty much anything by Neil Gaiman.

The problem I have is, I've already read all these books!

What's left for me?  How am I going to cope?  Find a new genre?  Try something other than reading??

Breathe!  Breathe!!  Deep breaths...deeeep breaths....

Help me out, dear friends.  I'm going to need an intervention soon!

Meet Eamon my Daemon

Is my Daemon a match for me?

Okay, I suppose it would help if you knew what a Daemon was.

Click below to find out...

What's a Trilogy called when there's four?

Yes, It has been more than a couple of months since I've posted anything, but nothing much has changed.  I'm still sitting here watching movies and reading about them on-line (there's a lot of buzz about Indiana Jones IV, mostly it's curiosity of the what the hell is this movie going to be about? variety.  And I ran into a piece hinting that--please, God, no!--the idea is being floated around for a Jurassic Park IV)

So I'm watching and I'm reading and I wonder, why aren't there any movies about park rangers?  Sure, there are movies with park rangers in them (and they're always dweeby, little rule enforcers), but there's never been a movie about park rangers.  And why not?  Because the job isn't really all that exciting or cinematic?  A cop's reality isn't all that exciting either.  I mean, on a day-to-day basis cops don't blast through the plate glass windows of high rises sending bad guys plummeting to their deaths, do they?  I'm just guessing.  Still, there are plenty of movies about cops.  So why not park rangers?  What could a park ranger movie be about?

Dig, if you will...[cue dream sequence music]

The Seasonal.  Plucky young park ranger is hired into her first seasonal position at Devil's Gaping Maw National Monument.  Everything starts out fine as she acclimates to ranger life and the duties expected of her, but then things start to go horribly wrong!  She notices some strange things going on around the Gaping Maw.  What's going on?  Some Descent-like sub-humans living in the Maw are driven to the surface due to the increasing effects of global warming.  They come out at night looking for food and discover that there's nothing tastier than park visitors.  It is up to our ranger and, I don't know, the park hydrologist maybe, to rescue the Superintendent and save the park and pretty much all of above-ground humanity from the Maw creatures.  Director: Kathryn Bigelow of Near Dark fame.  I play the role of the kidnapped Superintendent.

The Seasonal II: Backcountry Ranger (alternate title--Seasonals)  Our plucky young ranger scores a coveted backcountry position at Grand Hillocks National Park, and she is looking forward to a quiet season patrolling alone on horseback.  Just as she starts to relish the quiet and solitude things start to go horribly wrong!  First, a group of backpacking hippies goes missing, then she runs into a couple of Deliverance-type "thru hikers" that are obviously "up to something."  She innocently stumbles onto their scam--a plot of Cannabis grown in a remote part of the park.  It is up to our ranger to protect park resources from the non-native and highly invasive Cannabis sativa plants.  Her horse goes missing, but is found later--partially eaten.  And those missing hippies turn up as zombies used to guard the budding buds.  Without radio reception and no horse, our ranger is left alone to fight the zombies, capture the bad guys and save the park's fragile natural habitat from a potentially dangerous invasive.  Director: Amy Heckerling of Fast Times at Ridgemont High fame.  I cameo as the Regional Director.

The Seasonal III: Permanent Status.  Our plucky young park ranger finally gets hired for full-time, permanent work at Wide Plateau National Park and Memorial Battlefield, but the position, however, is humiliating--she's been hired to conduct "living history" presentations, and so spends her days in costume emulating the daily life of a frontier woman on the Wide Plateau.  She feels the job is beneath her but is told time and again that first permanent jobs usually are demeaning.  She misses the excitement of the past seasons, so when things start to go horribly wrong, she welcomes the challenge!  What goes horribly wrong?  Well, the park is piss-poor and, in an unprecedented and controversial move, considers selling some of the battlefield to a wealthy, famous movie director.  It is believed by most that the section of the battlefield offered up for sale holds the least amount of historical significance (no one famous died there) as compared to the rest of the battlefield, but the park archaeologist disagrees.  Then on one foggy morning the archaeologist is found dead on the battlefield.  Most people don't think much of it, but our ranger, in classic Nancy Drew fashion, puts two and two together and uncovers a plot by the movie director and the greedy Chief of Maintenance to cover up the deep national significance of the battlefield so that the land deal could go through.  How does she do it?  She gets a little help from the spirit of the real frontier woman she emulates in her living history program.  Director: Lisa Cholodenko of Laurel Canyon fame.  I cameo as the Park Service Director.

The Seasonal IV: Space Ranger?  Seasonals Gone Wild?  'Tis the Seasonal?  I don't know, but I can imagine myself as "special guest star" in a scene in which I'm reluctantly being coaxed out of retirement and I say something like "I'm too old for this shit." Director: Rob Zombie.

Who would pay to see these?  I would!  Well, I'd see the first three, but I'd probably think that the filmmakers were "jumping the shark" with number four and give that a pass.  But with Pirates of the Caribbean type special effects no one would care that the stories are ridiculous.  It worked for Pirates!

Now Hollywood, don't go stealing my billion dollar franchise idea.  I know you want to, but don't, or else I'll sue you and make more money off you than you make off the movies...actually, Hollywood, never mind.  Steal away!  I dare you!

Opinion: I'm not a Communist but...

I just read that O.J. Simpson received an $880,000 advance for the tell-all book he never wrote.

So let me get this straight: this man murders his wife and  is acquitted because he is wealthy (god knows if he were poor he would have gotten a lethal injection long ago), then not only does he pander to our society's lowest common denominator by offering to write a book explaining exactly how he killed his wife but he is given close to 1 million dollars in advance for it, the publishers (now extinct) anticipating, I'm sure, that the public would eat the book up and it would probably earn back more than ten times the publishing and advance costs.  Okay, a little human decency prevails and the book isn't written, but Simpson keeps the advance!

In the meantime, it's been more than ten years and "the real killers" have yet to be caught while the brutal murders of two people become footnotes in a tabloid melodrama that's become entertainment.

I'm sorry, but what about justice?

I'm not a Socialist or a Communist, but I have to wonder about an economic system that allows and encourages  this kind of pandering to the basest of human desires, and supports the drive to attain money, whatever the cost, over humanity, human decency, compassion and the right thing to do.

And what's worse is we don't bat an eye about it!  We shrug our shoulders and sigh and lament that we don't get $880,000 in advance of work we haven't done yet and end up not doing anyway.  What a great system, hu?

It makes me sick because it says to me that my life is only as valuable as its potential dollar amount-- how much can someone else make off me? This applies to YOUR life too.  So in that case I guess we can consider Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman (remember them, the actual victims?) blood sacrifices to our Great Economic System.  They were butchered for our entertainment and the Entertainment Industry's contribution to our economy and, ultimately, to our way of life.

This is just one example.

Garbage can, conveniently located for your use...just don't put any garbage in it!

So this notice

was recently posted above the trashcan in the laundry room of my building.

Hmmm...

So I wonder, if garbage or "unwanted items" (i.e. garbage) doesn't go in the garbage can, then what does?

"There's more to life than books you know..."

"...but not much more."

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

I admit it, openly and freely, this book reduced me to tears.  It did. I sat silently weeping through the last four chapters, tears streaming down my face dripping on my shirt.  But that was the dam bursting.  I should have expected it.  The waters were rising dangerously with the threat of spillage at the end of every other chapter or so.

So what was this book about that it could reduce me to a sodden emotional heap?  It was about grief and loss and loving someone.  It was about family and families and the feeling you have as a child, the sudden realization that your birth wasn't a beginning but a middle, a plot point in someone else's story, and that your parents had whole lives before you ever came along.  It's about that secret history you sense only because of the things your parents don't say.

I think this book touched me so deeply because it wasn't that long ago that I sat by my own mother's bedside and held her hand while she breathed her last.  I know that grief first hand--and loss because when someone you love is gone it suddenly strikes you: there goes an entire lifetime--and everything that that implies.  Whatever stories you missed, you won't hear them now.

But I don't mean to make the book sound like a maudlin story about death and dying and grief.  It is also a love story to books and reading and storytelling.

So what's it about?  It's about an old woman and a young woman, and the old woman is dying.  She's commissioned the young woman to come to her house to be her biographer: to listen to her story, her true and final story.  The old woman was a prolific and famous writer.  Her stories entranced millions for more than a half a century.  In all that time all her stories were fiction, even the ones she told to past biographers.  But now, this time, because she will tell no more stories after it, she's decided to tell this young woman the true story of her life.

So it is about the old woman's life and all her subplots, but it's about the young woman too because she has a story, one she's only looked at sideways till now.  In writing down the old woman's story she is forced to tell her own.

What does the Thirteenth Tale refer to?  Ah!  You have to read the book to find out.  But if you read it be prepared with a box of tissue!  Whether or not you've experienced the death of a family member, you know loss and grief, you know heartsick and loneliness, and you know the joy of being loved.  There's something in this book that will reach in and touch some part of you.  You can't deny it.  There's something there that will reach out and connect to your story.  You don't think you have a story?  Don't be so sure.  As the old writer tells us, "everyone has a story, whether they know it or not."