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Dorid
ABQ, New Mexico, United States
godless liberal, often found hugging trees and small furry animals, I spend my days in museums, aquariums, zoos, or my small apartment in the foothills surrounded by my favorite books.
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Monday, August 28, 2006

Katrina Morning in Antlers

One year and one day ago I was sitting in a hotel in Antlers Oklahoma.  I had no idea where I was, or how exactly I got there.  When I left Baton Rouge the day before I had a plan. That plan when critically wrong in Shreveport, LA. But that's the end of this story. Let me start at the beginning.

The twins and I lived in a small apartment in a beach community of Pinellas County, FL.  We had made it through the 2004 hurricane season, and were pretty used to evacuations and keeping our valuables in water tight containers.  We had water stored, we had dried foods, and we were ready.   We learned that hurricanes were not predictable when we got no warning to evacuate for  Dennis, which was far out in the Gulf and supposedly no threat, but our little island was flooded.  We were lucky.  Houses to the north and south of us on the beach were flooded out, and tornados ripped the roofs off other homes.

Hurricanes weren't our problem though.  I'd just gotten news from my doctor. The CT scans revealed lesions on both kidneys.  The probable diagnosis: kidney cancer.  I knew I couldn't raise the girls alone and go though the tests and (God forbid) chemo, so I decided to move west to Long Beach, CA, where my daughter lived. That way, should worst come to worst, Girl_Scientist could raise her little sisters.

The plan was to leave September 1, 2005.  But the best laid plans... well, you know.

At some point I'll transcribe my hand written diary of the trip here.  For now it's in one of those afore mentioned waterproof containers in a pile in my closet.  But there's a lot that I remember very clearly.  When we heard about Katrina coming, I was concerned, and wanted to leave BEFORE  the storm hit.  The last thing I wanted was to "hunker down" and face gas shortages or hotels filled with evacuees.  I knew I was in a race against time at that point.

We packed up the car and went to bed, and awoke in the morning pretty confident that we had plenty of time to get out of the 'hot zone'. Since the TV and radio had been already packed, we had no idea where Katrina was or the storm track... Until we pulled out on the road, and found that Katrina had crossed over the FL peninsula further south than anticipated, and was in the Gulf.  I knew we had to hussle.  The prediction at the time was a Cat 2 or 3 to hit around Pensacola, FL... but I had my doubts.  I'd been tracking the winds and the Gulf temps, and was VERY AFRAID.  It didn't matter WHERE Katrina hit, I would be on Route 10, and in the danger zone along the Gulf, if I didn't move FAST.

By the time we hit the pan handle of Florida, we could see the utility trucks on Rt 10 driving eastwards.  They were getting out of the area and staging nearby to respond after the storm.  It was odd to see the trucks in long caravans driving down the quiet highways.  The further west we moved, the further west the track of the hurricane moved.  I wanted to be in Shreveport the first night. I knew it would be too long of a drive.




Along Rt10 just a bit north of New Orleans, we took a break at a quickstop type store and gas station atop a levee. We looked back over the long low bridge we had just crossed and had soda and doritos. At that point, I knew we would never make Shreveport. I was a little despondent... and, as I recall, the cat had peed in her carrier and I was cleaning it up.

Tay looked back at the bridge and told me how beautiful she thought it was. "Take a picture of it, mom" she said. "this is one of the things I want to remember forever."

Well, it's kinda hard to consider taking time to take yet ANOTHER picture of some (to my mind) unspectacular bridge when you're fleeing from a hurricane and cleaning up cat pee. "Let's just get going" I told her. "That bridge will be there forever. We'll come back some day and take a picture"

Those of you who are familiar with the term "foreshadowing" will understand that while it often happens in literature, it doesn't often happen in real life. I was convinced what I told my daughter was the absolute truth.

That night we only made it as far as Baton Rouge. I slept fairly well ( a surprise with all the stress I was under) Got up early, piled the kids in the car, and headed down to the gas station for a fill up. The gas station attendant looked at my license plates and laughed. "I guess you'll be heading back home now" he said. "Nah," I said, clueless as to why he'd say that. "I'm not stopping 'till I hit California." We both laughed. Me, because it was true, him because moving away from the hurricane susceptible areas was a common joke along the Gulf by then.

As I pulled away, people were starting to arrive. They were carrying gas cans as well as filling up. That's when I turned on my radio and found out we were now sitting on Ground Zero.

The next day was a blur. I knew I had to get north of Route 40 if I was ever going to get a hotel room. I had my route mapped out, and I had planned on driving AROUND Texas anyway (that's a whole OTHER tale)so this didn't cause a substantial change in plans. I was still leaving when evacuations were announced as voluntary... I figured I was driving about three hours ahead of the mandatory evacuation wave.

We had a number of problems along the way.First we stopped at a small store to get lunch and I was ill. When we came out the sky was black, and we hit the road to the sound of sirens. The radio blared out with the emergency tone. We were heading into a severe storm. The wind blew down trees and lightning struck. We were out in the boonies with no where to go. We just kept driving. Soon the sun came out, but our nerves were rattled. Then the headliner (that fabric on the ceiling of your car) came down in the middle of nowhere. It fell down over us like a collapsed tent. We had to pull off the side of the roof and rip it the rest of the way out.

Finally we made it to Shreveport. The car was now overheating, and I put in oil, and after it cooled down, coolant and water. My map made the turn to Route 71 look simple. I drove around Shreveport for 3 hours until I thought I found it. I didn't find it. But I had my compass and a map, and although I knew that even though I didn't know what road I was on, sooner or later I'd find a road I knew. "After all," I joked with the girls, "you can't overshoot Long Beach, California. You just drive west until you hit the ocean and stop."

I was still driving north, northwest, which is what I had planned, so I was fairly confident, but also was becoming more and more ill, and once I got a little ways into Arkansas, I knew I was in trouble. Around dinner time we were driving a two lane road that my map for some reason identified as a highway. Fine, we were still going the direction I wanted. Now and then a town hugged the road, and a rail track alongside. On the other side of the track was Texas, and I knew I didn't want to go THERE. I found a little critical care center that was just about to close along the side of the road. The doctor was surprised I found it, and was even more surprised when he looked at my labs. He gave me my prescription (Walmart was next door) and I headed out.

It took a lot of time to do a doctor's visit and fill a prescription, and it was getting dark. Once again I missed my turn, but was into Oklahoma, so I wasn't TOO worried. But the road we were on wound toward the south, and back, and soon I wasn't sure at ALL where I was. My plan to stay at Motel 6's all the way (because they allow pets) was shattered. I knew there was no Motel 6 anywhere around. There was, however, a small sign ahead announcing the Antler's Budget Inn. The word BUDGET at that point was just as welcome as INN.

Now I want to pause her from the story to give KUDOS to this little inn, out in a place where you'd expect cracked walls and stained comforters, but this little place, hunting themed, decorated with (yeah) ANTLERS, was a really comfortable place to stay.

The next morning we all woke up refreshed and turned on the TV. Katrina was hitting the coast. The girls and I watched the storm coverage, thankful that we had made it out safe. Suddenly Taylor pointed at the screen. "LOOK!" Sure enough, the announcer was standing at the very same levee we were on the day before. The bridge peeked out from the grey rain behind him. He was literally across the street from where we had stood and looked at that same bridge.

Then suddenly he turned. "Did you hear?" he said, obviously rattled. We looked on in horror as the far end of the bridge seemed to crumble into the river.

I felt horrible. I remembered the day before, and what I'd told my daughter. She remembered, too.

"You said it would last forever." she accused, tears in her eyes, "you said I could have a picture of it."

What could I say? She was right.

And now, I take pictures of everything. Nothing lasts forever.

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

CONGRATS, CHEWY!


Chewy has begun his quest for a degree in Japanese Language. He started classes yesterday at Long Beach City College. I was more than a little misty to see another one in college.

Two down, two to go!

Saturday, August 19, 2006

Long Beach Tiki Festival, 2006


We all went out to the Long Beach Tiki Festival today... the day was BEAUTIFUL to be down at the beach, and the beaches around the Granada St boat ramp are BEAUTIFUL... I am guessing they are importing the sand from the Gulf, because it's sparkling and white... a simply beautiful beach. You can almost ignore the Port of Los Angeles on the horizen to the north...


Anyway, I got to the festival and my first thought was "oh,no." There was a long line of booths, mostly things for sale and raffles, which are a lot of fun if you have money to throw away, but not as fun when you go to the festival broke.



It's not as fun going to a shopping based festival with no money, on the other hand there wasn't anything I really needed anyway, and if I'd come with a pocket full of cash I'd have probably left with one of the big carved Tikis.

One thing I saw that I really DID like was this mask, and it looks like Tay liked it a lot, too.



and of course there were leis of every kind... I didn't get leied, but Girl_Scientist did!



Of course there was music and dancing, which is what we like best at the festivals.



There was also a Starbucks van there and they were giving out free samples of the Frappuccino Juice blends. Tay tried the pomegranate flavored first:



I'm guessing Starbucks wont be contacting us for any endorsement deals in the near future...


We only ended up staying a couple hours before we pretty much ran out of things to do. A lot of the photos I took today were of the beach and of the stunt kites which dotted the sky above the beach to the south of us... it was BEAUTIFUL. Of course, as always, you can find all my photos from the day on my Yahoo Photos, in the folder Tiki Fest 2006.

Monday, August 14, 2006

Big Bear Renni Fair

732b

Well, the day got to be a lot more eventful than I thought it would... in addition to the renni fair, we saw a lot of great scenery. Since 330 is closed, we took Rt 18 up into the mountains to Big Bear, which is a mountain resort town. I was a little skeptical about driving something referred to as "the Rim of the World" and spent most of the drive battling sheer terror as we curved along the mountain side with walls of crumbling rock on one side and sheer drops to the other. We stopped along the way to snap a few photos.

We got to the Renni Fair in time for the first knights' battle. We were disappointed when we saw the battle grounds, because it became IMMEDIATELY obvious that there would be no joust. As it turned out, the battles were very entertaining anyway, except that they decided to end each tourney the same way, with all the knights dead and the youngest squire claiming the championship. It was cute, but a little lame. We sat in the Blue section, first because there were no seats in the other sections, the second time to get photos we had missed the first time, and the third time because at that point the girls wanted nothing so much as to get close to the blue knight. Los_Cat and I sat in the back and laughed at how heartily the girls (and Chewy!) cheered the blue knight on.


I can TOTALLY see the attraction...

One of the pleasures (and hazards) of the renni fair is the shopping. Usually that isn't so much of a problem for Girl_Scientist and myself, since there are seldom clothiers who carry our size, however, this fair we walked out in totally new outfits. Hearts Delight Clothiers had some AMAZING renni garb in ALL sizes, from kids to plus size adults in men's and women's styles. Thank you, Girl_Scientist and Los_Cat for the loan that allowed me to by my own renni-wear! BTW, the outfit Girl_Scientist is wearing in the top photo is NOT the one she came in, it's the one she got at Heart's Delight.

Of course there were singers...
singers

dancers...
dancer

animals...
animal

a queen and her court...
queen

and fabulous and exotic costumes...
costume

On the way home, I just couldn't get up the courage to tackle Rim of the World again, so we took Rt 38 out through the San Bernadino National Forrest. It was a BEAUTIFUL drive through mountains covered in blue green pines that dropped pine cones the size of a man's forearm. Very impressive!During the drive home, we reached our highest elevation on the trip: 8449 feet!

When we got to the bottom of the mountains, we drove past an arroyo leading out of the hills. The sun was setting, the mountains were fading into the distance, and it was beautiful and peaceful.


arroyo

Of course, by the time I got home I could barely crawl into bed, but it was well worth it.

Enjoy a piece of the fair with me! What follows is a video clip of the Blue Knight (Sir Tony of New Jersey) vanquishing the Red Knight.





Sunday, August 06, 2006

La Brea Tar Pits


Yesterday we took another trip out to La Brea. We all wanted to see the excavation of pit 91, which is going on this month. It's kinda interesting to see everything they have to go through when they find a little bone the size of a nickel... or the care they take in removing the larger specimens.

We didn't spend a LOT of time in the Page today, since we've been there so many times, and there is really nothing NEW there, but I took a lot of pictures, because I have the better camera now, and I did get some much better shots.




of course, as always, you can view all my photos from the trip on my Yahoo Photos I recommend you click on SLIDESHOW to view them ;) For some reason I can no longer link directly into the slideshow.

I also have a video of a find at Pit 91 on Kat Cam

Friday, August 04, 2006

Blue Whale Watch

Today was the greatest experience! We went on a blue whale watch out of Port of Long Beach. We saw some interesting sights along the way, including the Queen Mary and The Black Pearl. The Pearl must have been taken out because it had been turned around. There were now sails on the aft mast.



Of course the best parts involved spotting the whales:






Although the cruise was only 2 1/2 hours long, it took it's toll on the kids, who had a great time!