Sunken treasure -- gutting another house

After the exciting first Big Easy Roller Girls bout, a bunch of us bloggers headed over to the Kingpin to celebrate Loki's big 4-0. Lisa and Renard showed up -- Lisa toting some unusual treats -- including a tin of amazing butter cookies for Loki and me (I having celebrated a nice birthday earlier this month). The cookies instantly dissolved on the tongue in an essence of butter and powdered sugar. Lisa also brought along some other fond treats from her childhood she's been finding are still available, like Adam's Sour Apple gum, and (help me here, Lisa) that striped fruit gum.

So it was late to bed, and early to rise for both New Orleans blogger and Arabi Wrecking Krewe volunteers who set out Sunday morning to help gut another house. I'm learning that every house is different -- some go quickly; others take more time. Some people lived more obviously organized lives before their possessions were claimed by floodwaters. Others lived more cluttered lives where possessions left out in the open drifted around in that murky soup for weeks, turning into a soggy, decaying detritus expressing former lives in detailed minutia.



Wanna know what it feels like? You can't really, until you see all of your possessions covered in mud and mold. But let's just say you're sitting at a desk in your home reading this post. Think of filthy water rising to a level just above your head. Now, everything from from your head on down is ruined and lost forever. What do you have hanging on your walls? What's in your drawers? What's on your bookshelves? What of irreplaceable sentimental value will you have to throw on a debris pile in the street -- lost forever?

Some houses were flooded all the way into the attics.

I had to leave at noon, but I suspect that there will be another weekend of work before Morwen's house is completely gutted.

The Times-Picayune reported yesterday that with 200,000 flooded houses in New Orleans, and a downtrend in the numbers of volunteers, non-profit groups are really struggling to meet the need.

Please find a weekend or two that you can volunteer ... and please spread the word that the work here is far from complete.

Related:

VatulBlog -- Day 385: Dog Day Afternoon

Maitri's photos

Ray in New Orleans -- Blogger wrecking

Community Gumbo -- The Arabi Wrecking Krewe (audio)

Tags: Hurricane Katrina | Katrina | New Orleans | Louisiana | America's Wetland | We Are Not OK | Rebuild New Orleans | Katrina Dissidents | Failure Is Not An Option | Ray Nagin | Recall Ray Nagin | Hurricane Katrina One Year Anniversary