Pamela Parker

In the eerily timed department…. the city of San Francisco has launched an ad campaign preaching personal disaster preparedness around the theme “72 hours” — that being the amount of time people would have to fend for themselves after a major disaster. After that time, the federal goverment would presumably rush in.

Anyway, as we know from Katrina it could take longer than 72 hours. The storm has certainly heightened my awareness of the need for personal perparedness, should there be, say… an earthquake.

The city has put together a pretty comprehensive Web site to disseminate information at 72hours.org.

My buddy Chervokas (who I still haven’t forgiven for coming to my ‘hood and not calling me) says so well what’s been on my mind.

FEMA’s apparently saying Katrina may be the worst natural disaster the country has ever experienced, and from what I’ve seen and heard in the media, I believe it. What is there to say but that I’m so sorry this is happening?

My brother lived in New Orleans for two years after college, and, growing up in Houston, I had the opportunity to visit quite a bit over the years. When my Scottish husband and I took our first big cross-country trip after buying our car, we made sure to stop into the Big Easy — I had to show off what I consider to be one of America’s great cities. Now I have to wonder how much of it will be left. And, of course, the loss of life and property looks to be immense. It’s stating the obvious, but it will be a long time before things get back to anything resembling normal for a whole lot of people.

Kudos to the folks at the Times Picayune (which, I believe, include two members of my journalism school class) for keeping the world informed, despite the difficulty of doing so.