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the indignity of it all
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the indignity of it all |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738
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Nope. I'm not here to talk about being a refugee, or mold, flu shots or lack of them, or even to debate which over-the-counter medicine works best when the flu shots (or lack of them) fail me. I won't mention The New Orleans Taints, or mean old Tom Benson. I know I don't have to mention that one of the nation's finest medical schools/research facilities is crumbling in the aftermath of what is now obviously one of the worst natural disasters in recorded history (okay, since that is my husband's prolly former employer, I'll give that a nod, since LSU Medical Center announced it's minimum necessity of 90 million dollars by March to remain operating. That might be slightly more important. So here. Nod.) Perhaps I'll mention that the Times Picayune's headline today has taken to begging people to write their senators and congressmen on behalf of the citizens of Louisiana to support Federal funding for levee protection. Shrugging, write 'em if you want, folks, tell 'em how you feel either way. Serenity has finally had it. So what pray tell, you might be wondering has finally broken the spirit of my sometimes questionably spirited heroine, that spunky, happy go lucky self proclaimed miscreant I christened "serenity blaze"? (Note to self: Karen you write sloppy when you are ticked.) I'm here to tell ya.  When a certain product came on the market for incontinence, I thought I took it well. I really did. I was the first one to crack the serenity pad jokes. <--see what I mean? But I have been here for five years writing that my life is a freaking horror movie and now what do "they" do? THIS: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9516965/ "the creaky, rambling, serenity"??? Has anybody seen my alter ego? Unbelievable. They should at least grant me some royalties. I'd glady donate my portion to a Katrina fund or even pay LSU to just keep my husband busy for awhile because I need a break. Somewhere, there is a graphic especially made for me, too, with a tombstone with "serenity" on it, my d.o.b. and a hand coming out of the grave before it, which happens to be shooting the finger. Yep. If they stole that, somebody send lawyers. (The guns I have.) We'll get the money!  gleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee *glare* The gods love to laugh at me, I tell ya... Well don't just sit there. Make some popcorn!  "rambling and rickety" indeed... (serenity exits, muttering to herself...) |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Coincidence? Oh yeah? Just check this out! http://www.brimstone.org/horrormovies.php?mode=show_movie_info&movie_id=1511 Somebody call my sister!  Paranoid, eh? (serenity stomps off to watch sixty minutes...) yeah, I need some "light" entertainment.  |
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Poet deVine
Administrator
Member Seraphic
since 1999-05-26
Posts 22612Hurricane Alley |
quote: And the fact that the movie is refashioned from a defunct TV shows that there is life in the old girl again...so have hope! |
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Nightshade 
since 2001-08-31
Posts 13962just out of reach |
'butt-kicking brawls, of witty banter and well-drawn characters' Well...ummm....it does sound kinda like the life that you have written about. |
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Martie
Moderator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-09-21
Posts 28049California |
And what was 60 minutes about...one segment on New Orleans. Did you see it?  |
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Mysteria
since 2001-03-07
Posts 18328British Columbia, Canada |
Well they do say, "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Hey ladies! Thanks for joining what I had hoped would distract me from watching the show--it didn't work though. Did it upset me. Sure it did. Did it inform me of anything new? No it did not. New Orleans is sinking. Agreed--at an obviously alarming rate too. Our levee system failed. yawp. Sure did. But so did the agencies that were supposed to prevent that from happening. Funny, sixty minutes didn't mention reports of standing water in the backyards of homes near the levee system, complaints from homeowners being met with "It's not my job" from the Sewerage & Water Board--it ain't a plumbing problem. So they shift the responsibility over to the Corps of Engineers, who promptly told the Sewerage & Water Board that they would like the water tested first, to prove that it was Lake Ponchartrain seeping through and not some faulty water line. So ya'll know how that goes. I was civil servant once, and that little ploy was called "paper ping pong" by the clerks. But no, I didn't see that mentioned. Nor did they mention that Louisiana has lost 1900 square miles of wetlands since 1932. That's a lot of acreage. I gleaned that info from a book recently published on the phenomenon, written pre-Katrina, which is eerie with omniscience, asking us to imagine what we'd just lived through...I'll get the title in a minute, but there was something interesting I noted which I read in the review today. The author noted that "seeminly overnight" seagulls were in our market parking lots. I remember this--noticing it, and asking my Dad about it. "Where did they come from?" "The Sea." He looked distracted at the time. and ya'll know me, I persisted, but why now? They weren't here before. But he still seemed distracted. "Oh well, I think they are pretty." Then he looked annoyed. "They are a pretty bad sign if you ask me." He never did explain, but my Dad was an old son of a farmer--he knew to watch the environment for changes. Smart man. I wish he were here now to tell me what to do. I read these discussions, these debates--regarding my future--my culture. I told a friend in one season's time I became a cultural anachronism. I told another that same thing, but added only that it hurt too. The second friend I confided my feelings to, because well, I never heard him question rebuilding, or why. So I dunno folks. My son announced that he would rather live in Compton than in Arkansas. He told me he will run away. I told him if he stops minding me, he will force me to emancipate him to protect myself from his bad decisions. I realized he never had much protection from mine though. My mother won't leave, so that means my sister won't either. So while I dream of owning some acreage and "a safe house" I'm also seeing that I may well be the only one game for the journey. "Just MOVE." Well yes, we might do that, or we won't. Either way we are looking at the distasteful reality of dissolving all of our resources. And then there is just something people don't understand about Acadian culture. We do still remember the slap of exile from Nova Scotia, and we are a proud and clannish people who managed to hold onto our language as well our heritage. We joined forces with one of the most racially diverse populations this nation boasts. We were the ultimate gumbo--the true "melting pot" idealized by our forefathers. Now we are not exactly feeling the love, folks. I can sit and listen to sixty minutes promotion of one scientist on one channel, and flip it over to National Geographic on the Megastructures series and see that the Saudi's are building islands in the shape of palm trees of their coasts. But we can't have a properly engineered and maintained levee system? Too much money. Oh. Well how about amending that convenient law that forbids Louisiana from profiting off of their natural gas resources. We'll give ya'll a real good price too. I'm betting we can beat the Feds on that one, and pull ourselves up by our own white shrimp boot straps. Or maybe we can just cede from the Union if we are such a pain in the ass. Give us back to France. Apparently their peasants are revolting too. My Dad, that real smart man that I love to quote once told me that charity wasn't just good for the soul, but commonsense and self-preservation. "Turn your back on the poor and you will end up with a bullet in it." What he meant was desperate people do desperate things. I see them happening everyday, and yet they still don't overshadow the small miracles I witness here daily. A bar in Mid City opened their doors last week--they still do not have power. So they took advantage of a full moon, hired an acoustic band, and opened up the courtyard. Lotsa candles, lotsa ice, and there you have it--that is the essence of a people that everyone is urging to "Just Move." What other people deem as "stubborn" we call "resilience". It takes that to make a place such as New Orleans not just a home, but a vibrant artist culture that can produce our only original contribution to the arts--Jazz music. I have been obsessed with limbo lately. Naturally I would be...but I was discussing those spaces inbetween with yet another Pip friend, who pointed out that sick people experience them quite a lot. Stuck between life and death, and feeling distanced from both. I agreed with him, and promptly got sick. So when I finally decided to try some good old fashioned Robitussin today, I asked my sister for a ride to the drug store. My sister, "twisted" is reliable and prompt and so much stronger than me. But anyhow, she got here pretty fast--and I just tossed some clothes on for what I hoped was a quick jog into a local Rite Aid. I was wrong yet again. Then I realized something rather funny while standing in line for the store. I'd forgotten to put on underwear under that favorite blue flowered dress I wear so much now. And I couldn't even allow myself so much as a smirk either, out of fear of a coughing fit in line, and well? wincing... I may yet be young enough to still forget my underwear, I am apparently old enough to know and anticipate what would happen if I had a coughing fit in line at the drugstore. There's been enough flood, and for those who still don't understand what I'm getting at, well just pass me the "Serenity" pads when I have a cold accompanied by cough. Coulda been embarrassing, and I shocked myself with the amount of self discipline I displayed in that line. Yep, I'm caught up in the spaces inbetween these days. So to distract myself while in line, I thought of very serious thoughts, so I wouldn't laugh, and cough, and ultimately puddle their floor. So I thought about pneumnonia. That could be serious, so I thought about that. Then I thought how basically death by pneumonia is a drowning. And I almost laughed then, to think that I fled a flooding New Orleans, then fled a flooded rice field in Crowley due to Rita, to come back to New Orleans to drown in my own pleghm? I can't drown--I'm a witch! And I tell ya folks, not so much as a smirk in that long ass line in Rite Aid. I'm sure I had a strange look on my face though. And just for the record, I will be seriously pissed if I die of pneumonia at this point in my story. I want it on record that such an act would be only under extreme protest. I'm only half-way kidding there. I am a worn out half crazed woman who has been protecting herself from the Gulf of Mexico armed with a tired squeegee mop and a St. Joseph candle, for cryin' out loud! I cannot have my demise be the result of a self contained drowning. I won't have it! and omg... "rickety and rambling" serenity. grin? oh well.  Robitussin, benadryl, and zanax might have something to do with the rambling tonight, but the rickets?  Why folks, I do believe I have an OTC "buzz"--cept for the zanax--so I think I will retire now. I have a brand new mattress and box spring (<--first time in my life, EVER, too) satellite television and a remote control. That's some damned fine living for now. Nite ya'll. and oh yeah...I'll be around. *grin* |
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Sunshine
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-25
Posts 63354Listening to every heart |
quote: You'd best not, or there will be a LOT of P'O'd poets! |
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wranx Member Elite
since 2002-06-07
Posts 3689Moved from a shack to a barn |
Ya seemed entirely lucid to me, m'witch. In, as far as, your ability to communicate your "limbo"...LOL That serenity pad thing, I understand well. I nearly snorted out a kidney when I first saw Bob Dole hawking "stiffy pills" to those fellas suffering from..ummm...ED Now, its been my experience that any fella suffering from this Particular ED would rather cure it with a pipewrench. *snort* |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
*laugh*cough*laugh* Uh Oh.  Just kiddin'. But between the yeti and the witch, there's some right improper visuals goin' on in this thread. A pipewrench, huh? I tried that once, Ed. whoooops...wrong head. *wince* Now he's apparently dain bramaged. oh glory be...where's my tissue? *mutter*laugh*choke*cough* gleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee |
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inot2B Member Elite
since 2000-09-18
Posts 2205Arkansas |
You need to go to the doctor and make sure it isn't already pneumnonia. With all the bacteria floating in the air who knows. I remember as a child always being told if you have a cold,wear something on your head and feet. Don't remember anyone saying you had to remember undies too. Of course they may have thought that everyone did that anyway. Take care, I don't want to read about you in the OBITS. |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
 Funny you should mention that--have you ever been rudely surprised by an old friend's face in the obits section? Just this morning, I saw her there. 42 years old. Breast Cancer. It never seems to be the "thing" that you anticipate that "gets" you, or even WHEN--so I have superstitiously taken up the habit of naming my possible demise. Longevity by elimination of possibilities? So far, so good. ?thank you inot. You take good care of YOU too. |
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Christopher
Moderator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-08-02
Posts 8296Purgatorial Incarceration |
don't dis Serenity! defunct the Television show may be, but it was highly underrated and too intelligent for the masses, which caused its now-defunct state. be proud, Karen, be proud to be associated with that really cool ship on whom some sardonic, dry-humored cosmic cowboys ride. watch the series (incomplete as it may be), then you will see that it's a good thing, not bad. |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Hey C! On your recommendation, I just may have to do that. And it did occur to me, that there's worse sins than "ramblin'". Why I was just telling my sister today... It's the rickety part that is painful. Okay. I'll check it out. I suppose if I had my druthers, I would much druther be a ship...er, considerin' we just may have a port for sale at that.  And wow. There was a hint of hope on the front page today. It just could be that "The Donald" may be encouraged to give a big thumbs up to his Trump Tower in New Orleans project. Hmmm. A Trump Tower in a Bouret town. Sounds perfect to me! Although I'd not like to face him in a hand of our brand of gambling, we just may be in the position to go "no low". A difficult hand to play and win, but I have done it m'self. Several times. But I guess you knew that, C. Hugs.*wink* |
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Mysteria
since 2001-03-07
Posts 18328British Columbia, Canada |
Well, that is a good sign! Where the Donald goes those with money will indeed follow. However, you can bet he is getting that real estate at a real deal, and now that he has sparked interest, you can bet there will be lots more. I saw a nice gesture on Ellen yesterday, where Hillary Clinton and Ellen reminded everyone that the folks in LA, and specifically NO are still in need of us to keep helping, and used your Thanksgiving as a reminder of that. Hopefully some of the misplaced people there will have a dinner, never mind a home. Karen, is there an organization planning to feed people on your Thanksgiving down there where people can donate? |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
I was gonna say, in the condition we're all in, don't send food, send Robitussin, but then I pictured a parade of pink tanker trucks filled with cold meds coming in from Canada--so Sharon, sweetie, you are too gracious m'friend. I-was-just-kidding-about-Robitussin. I mean that too. Do not send anything. *glare* ahem As a matter of fact, your mention of Thanksgiving reminded me to say thank you yet again, to you and all of the generous benefactors who helped me out while I was on the road. The people who helped me, helped me help others, and that helped me cope better. <--see Shar? I've got meds..ramblin' again here. (I always fall apart AFTER the fact, folks. I go into some kinda adrenal mode during crisis, so ...yeah. My gears get stuck sometimes.) <--like that.As a small thank you, while I get my shtuff together, I wanted to tell you all that my favorite radio station, WWOZ is up and running and this thursday as announced by my favorite local columnist Chris Rose. The station is running a repeat show--a very special show, that kind of explains the essence New Orleans--here--read about it: http://www.nola.com/rose/t-p/index.ssf?/base/living-0/1132642586247910.xml This thursday, the party's on us. I'd really like ya'll to be there. "Iko Iko," "Ya-Ya," "Ooh Poo Pah Doo," "Cha Dooky-Doo," "Ta Ta Te Ta Ta," "Tee Na Na Na Na Nay," "Look-a Py Py," "Hey Pocky Way," "Handa Wanda," "Indian Red," "Coochie Molly," "Ki Ya Gris Gris," "Ho-Di-Ko-Di-Ya-La-Ma-La," and "Ya Herd Me." Nope. Yer PC is not showing the codes again, that's New Orleans lingo, my native tongue--and if you wanna know what it means, read the story. But better yet, tune in and listen to the music. We're already dancin'. ooh poo pah doo!" Happy Thanksgiving from an eternally grateful serenity. And yep, I had to come back to edit, I knew I'd screw it up. I sure know how to screw up an exit. Mainly by not leaving. aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee somebody shut me up please! argggghhhhhhhhhh |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
And OH. QUICK PRAYERS. And Reb, I have the toothpaste all ready for ya, so crack the knuckles on your left hand and get ready to brush. The hubby's got a few job interviews this week. He just left for one now... We're trying, folks, and okay, okay, I'm leaving now.  Love to all! |
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Mysteria
since 2001-03-07
Posts 18328British Columbia, Canada |
Sheesh! I see you must be feeling way better? Job interviews are a very good thing too! Actually here is the short version to the "bottom line" for ya'll (Karen taught me that word.) From the "Times Pee-kay-une" as this Canadian says it, and makes the Cajun folks laugh uncontrollably. quote: I just can't wait to hear it either. Oh and by the way, if they finally have pink tankers, it's about time! |
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Sunshine
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-25
Posts 63354Listening to every heart |
Fingers crossed... knees crossed... can't cross my eyes or I couldn't see what I'm saying... Here's to good news...serenity...and if not THIS one, then the NEXT one.... |
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