no more Katrina

So the campus did not do too well. In fact all of Coral Gables didn’t do so well in Katrina. Trees downed everywhere. Including some of the really BIG ones. The ones that have been there forever. A huge lightpole crashed down on the bricks but conveniently is kind of out of the way of everything. Small trees and parts of trees are everywhere on campus. It looked like three guys with one chainsaw were responsible for all the clean up (well, I only saw three guys. I’m sure there were others—I just found it odd that this campus has a maintenance staff the size of a small African country’s army and I only saw three of them today whereas usually you can’t walk 20 feet without running into a battalion of them doing some kind of fixup work). When I drove to campus this morning I had to zig zag all over the place because roads in Coral Gables were blocked by fallen trees.

Meanwhile, let me ask you this? Where were you at 6 p.m. Thursday night when the brunt of Katrina was smacking us in the gut? I was at home. Most people in South Florida were at home. But apparently there were people here in class until 5:30 p.m. because the school wasn’t shutting down until 6 p.m. Good planning! Last time they closed for two days for a couple drops of rain and for a couple days on a weekend for absolutely nothing. So this time they figure they’ll err on the other side. It was bad at 5:30 on Thursday night. I’m glad I wasn’t here because my last class was over at 12:20. Yes I realize hurricanes are erratic and this one was supposed to hit 30 miles to the north but someone dropped the ball on this one.

And fortunately, the folks who run the law library have their priorities straight. Posted on the door today is a sign what I’m pretty sure wasn’t there before the storm reminding us not to eat in the library and that they’re cracking down on people eating and drinking except from sealed containers. Jesus. Give it a rest already.

***
Oh yeah...approaching the 48-hour mark without power. It seems like it's been a lot longer. Unfortunately my neighbor bought a generator. It's loud. Damn loud. Incredibly loud. Jerk. (yeah, I'm jealous. Of course. I wish I had a generator).