Have you been watching the aftermath of Katrina? The Devastation is astounding. 80% of New Orleans is still underwater and people are still stranded on their roofs. All of MrZ’s family lives in Slidell which is across lake Ponchartrain from New Orleans. One uncle weathered the storm and last we heard, he’s fine, but it is impossible to get ahold of anyone on landlines or cell phones in that area, so MrZ’s grandparents have been unable to touch base with anyone to see if there is any damage, or WHAT damage there is, to their homes. I doubt anyone escaped at least a little damage.

Here in Huntsville? There is debris all down the streets and in the yards, the winds were up all night along with the rain, and LilZ slept on the floor of our room (he started in the bed, just TOO crowded with my big belly and snoogle pillow) because it was a wee bit scary. When MrZ got up to take a shower he hollered at me becuase everything LilZ had been sleeping on was soaking wet. At first? We thought he had an accident (which he finds very funny) but it turns out we just had a breach in the roof valley of our home because there is no flashing on our roof. There’s soaked carpet in several corners of our home. But that is NOTHING compared to what the people along the gulf are dealing with - so we’ll consider ourselves blessed.

Because the majority of the families left behind during Katrina were poor already (hence, why they couldn’t afford to evacuate) they are the type of families that don’t have savings or maybe even insurance to help them recover. This is the type of disaster that hits those who have no protection financially. We have insurance, we have savings, if our homes were destroyed, we’d make a recovery - eventually. But for many of those who lived through the hurricane, are not as fortunate. Keep them in your thoughts and your prayers. Our community usually has water drives and such things after these type of disasters. If your community has the same - please help. They will have major food and water shortages.

If your community doesn’t have anything like that going on? Try to find one to donate too. At this point? There is not guarantee where your cash will go, the best programs are the ones that take busloads of food and water to the hardhit areas. These people have contaminated water sources now, you have no idea how much they need just the four dollar cases of water you buy every week. If I find anyway to donate money to those type of efforts, I will post a link (you could always default to The Red Cross). This one hit close to home, MrZ has several members of his family directly affected by Katrina. Please keep everyone in your thoughts.

Here is my entry from when I went to Slidell, LA. You’ll see a picture of Lake Ponchartrain and New Orleans across the way. I doubt the picture looks the same today.

This is one of the pictures I got developed for the wall of photos. It is from a visit my brother made to Huntsville in November, 2002. Almost three years ago.

I just wanted to upload it because A) LilZoot looks SO young and B) I look SO skinny. I miss that girl. I mean, look! Her hair! It’s blonde AND long (this is before that girl decided she was sick of the cost of upkeep of blonde hair and she chopped it all off and started from scratch). Of course, she wasn’t yet married to MrZoot, so she couldn’t have been as happy as she is now. But she also wasn’t yet diagnosed as a “repeat aborter” since, at that point, she had only had one miscarriage. The good AND the bad has happened since that photo was taken, I guess. And hopefully, something so wonderful will happen in October that I’ll never look back and miss that girl.

But she’s just so damn SKINNY.

Let us bow our heads and all mourn the body that was.

LilZ moved up an age group in soccer this season. He is now part of the U12 (under 12) age group and we have been welcomed into that group with a new policy implemented by the coach that he is issuing yellow and red cards at practice for bad attitudes. Those are usually issued by refs in games (yellow: warning, red: out of the game), not coaches during practice. Mainly because, who tries to rough up or smack talk their own team? Evidently U12 boys do, as the first yellow card was given out last week to a kid that said the F-word in practice.

THE F-WORD. EEK. He also responded to the question: “What does defense mean?” with “Screwed your mom.” Which, not really that funny or creative, but still effective as a device to make the other boys go, “Oooohhh.”

Also? We get sex-ed in school this year. LilZ says the boys are already talking about it and the rumor is they give out free condoms, which, I had to alert him was JUST A RUMOR. Either way - it’s a sign he’s getting older and about to enter puberty and MY GOD PLEASE MAKE IT STOP. I’ve already had the “Please don’t be scared to talk to me about sex, drugs, or rock-n-roll” talk as well as the “Crushing on Lindsay Lohan is not allowed in this house” talk. What othe’s are really necessary?

Guess what I did yesterday? Come on…guess!

No.
Nope.
Not that.
Come on…of course I didn’t do THAT!
I wish.
Nope.

Okay, you give up? I’ll tell you. I sat down, went through the last 9 months of digital photos on the computer, uploaded 61 of them to a photo album at Walmart.com, and then went to pick up the prints an hour later. And I only paid 19 cents/print. CAN YOU BELIEVE THE EASE? First of all - I am not a fan of photo printers. In reality? Unless you spend, like 500 dollars? I have NEVER EVER EVER been as please with the output of a photo printer as I have been with the Target photo lab. I also think ink is WAY too expensive for me to print up as many pictures as I would like to. So you see? Economically AND aesthetically it has always been better to take the digital images to a photolab, rather than try to do it from home.

BUT - it’s never been really convenient UNTIL NOW. I mean, I uploaded the photos and then picked them up AN HOUR LATER. It was brilliant and I was SO excited. Now? My photo wall will be even MORE complete, if I can just find some more frames. And maybe take another 60 or so pictures in to be developed. Just for the hell of it. Because ITS SO DAMN EASY.

When businesses come up with ways to sponsor my laziness? Everyone wins.

Preface: I had to make a new design in order to work with the new upgrade. Some of the old skins will be brought back eventually, but not right now. If you have HAD an old skin setup at one point in time, things will probably look like shit on your computer. You’ll need to click HERE to get things working again. I HOPE. If you missed the chaos of the weekend on this site? Consider yourself lucky. I wish I had missed it.

It was a VERY long weekend. We got a lot accomplished, which is a nice feeling. MrZ finally got LilZ’s ceiling fan installed in his room, which, after realizing how screwed up things were ABOVE the celing? That was quite a chore. We’re realizing (this is the second bizarro situation we’ve found with light fixtures in this house) that the people who owned the house before us, were on crack. Quite possibly.

Tonight is our second childbirth class. I never posted about the last one because of the bullshit that errupted Monday night last week. What you need to know for now? We have a “that guy and his wife” in the class who skipped an entire excercise because “He already knows how I like my back rubbed, I should rent him out.” So they VERY blatantly sat there ignoring the whole excercise where the mom massages the coaches back the way she would like it if she were in pain so he’ll know what to do when she’s in labor. It was actually a good excercise and MrZ got to be the teacher’s guinea pig as she demonstrated pressure points on the hands to the class.

(Of course, “That Guy” had to ask her about the pressure points on the backs of the shoulders and tell her those were good ones to use, and she should talk about those too.)

We are the second furthest along in the pregnancy which was reassuring when I realized I was a GIANT compared to all the women walking into the classroom. I was cursing at MrZ as I was analyzing each couple: “She’s not even wearing MATERNITY jeans for chrissakes.” And becoming more and more irritated with each cute and pregnant woman that walked in.”She had better be in her first trimester, if she’s not? I’m kicking her ass.”

I’m so mature.

The teacher is really cool and this class is a lot different than the one I had with LilZ (which was ALSO cool) so I’ve been really fortunate so far. Hopefully, we’ll get a lot out of it. If nothing else, at least some good blog material. I could use it since my brain is officially fried from the weekend.

Please keep our family in Slidell, LA in your thoughts today. It looks like they’re having a worse Monday than any of us.