[quote= But if they chose not to have fire insurance, "we" shouldn't have to rebuild their house if it burns down...
[/quote]

Do "we" have to rebuild the burned-down homes of the uninsured?

Greetings,

The New Orleans evacuees who were taken away by tour busses, ended up in Alexandria and Shreveport, La.

Now, the unprepared are complaining about their "shelter accomodations".

I guess they were expecting FEMA to put them up in motels/hotels????? With an expense account????

You are right about that.

In the slight defense of those who could not or would not help themselves, there were problem. Shelter sites were arranged, with regular meds and water deliveries, and almost enough cots (almost), but a lot of them had short comings.

Not enough heads is one that I've heard a lot on the radio. 800 people and two porta-johns was one that I heard about, or 400 people with high school locker rooms with one down for remodeling- this isn't just about their comfort, but sanitation is needed to protect host communities.

The other one, as I said, was at least some of the sites didn't have enough cots, and no to few blankets. THAT tells me that ARC or FEMA or whoever was admining those sites flat out lied when they said they were ready to X-number of people.

Checking In.

Lost power Monday morning at home. Got it back last night.

Lost power at the hospital Monday afternoon, and was on emergency generator til Wednesday. Had some lights, some wall power, no ac.

(note: the sick mentally ill/ addicts are not a whole lotta fun with no ac and on a locked unit.)

We have a friend that is staying with us due to the oak tree sitting on her house/car.

The hospital "encouraged: folks to stay Monday, but once my shift was done and relief showed up, I left for home. I heard they locked the parking gates shortly after I escaped. My place is with my wife and child.

Other than some high winds/rain, and some downed trees and power lines to drive around (yes, I detoured around them unlike the others that drove under them), made it home to my wife and child ok.

Curfew is still in effect (10pm - 6 am), and some areas are going to be out of power for about 4 to 6 weeks according to the broadcasted estimates.

Things learned:

1) I should've put up screen doors and screens on the windows like I've been meaning to do for a while. Lot better than trying to improvise mosquito netting and duct tape in the dark.

2) Use the mylar insulation bags that you can buy at the grocery store inside the cooler with ice on the inside and outside. The goodies keep a lot longer than just in the cooler by itself.

3) Boil rice and freeze it in ziplock baggies (that and a can of redbeans is a nice easy good ol' S Louisiana comfort meal) Nothing says home like red beans and rice!!

4) We put ice in ziplock baggies to pack the freezer. I'm going with partially filled water bottles next time. The baggies got a little messy.

5) Store everything that you put in the cooler in plastic baggies.

6) Duct tape the drain valve on the cooler closed. Murphy has a warped sense of humor.

7) I'm plywooding the gable vents on the house. The horizonal rain came in and down my wall and turned my kitchen into a swamp.

8) The big 2 gallon water jug- next time just gets ice in it and wrapped with refletix. I filled it with ice water this time and it quickly became just plain lukewarm water pretty quickly. It is also being used now for putting ice in our soft drinks (see # 10)

9) I'm getting one of those camp showers (black bag with a hose on it). I'm ok taking a cold misty rinse-off, but a warm shower would do a lot for the morale of my household and hence my survival.

10) Lots of comfort food!!! Lots of chips, chocolate......

11) Store extra gas to share (see #12).

12) Friends are a wonderful thing. No one gets by for very long with out friends. One of our friends came by with ice, and we gave him gas for his generator.

13) Good old fashioned hand tools (saws, etc). Can't go wrong going old-school. They work no matter what the weather...

14) I have even a lower tolerance for whining than I ever imagined. I was jumping down people's throats at work who even dared to start whining. (you got a job to do, suck it up and quit [censored]).

Wouldn't a generator solve a LOT of your problems? I'm in a spot that probably gets hit a LOT less often than you do (NYC - we got the tail end of Hanna last night - some tornados north of us, but where I was, I've seen much worse "N'oreasters), and I'm seriously considering a nice 2000 watt generator

A generator has been on the back burner for a while.

One of those risk management vs resource allocation things.

With Andrew, Katrina, and Rita the most we were ever without power has been 12 hours. Not bad, and much better than even our neighbors down the street.

Wishing I had one now, though I refuse to join the panicking throngs scrambling to the Home Depot buying whatever they can get their hands on without thought to what their needs are or what having one entails.

We're going to look at one probably toward the end of season when they go on sale along with a little portable room sized ac unit.

I don't want to go on impulse and buy something without careful thought.

I'll pour a slab out back for it to chain/anchor that sucker down when the time comes. The hospital's had a number of carbon monoxide poisonings coming in from folks running in or too close to the house for fear of it getting stolen. Shoot, I may even build a little "dog house" for it....

Now we've got a different benchmark for "what could happen" and we can make a better informed decision.

At one time I had a generator that used a 5hp. briggs and stratton eng. I removed the muffler,added a 6in. nipple,a 90 deg. elbow and a 10ft ft iron pipe. No exaust problems. If needed you can make a bracket that bolts to the head of the eng. or use a "T" post to hold it straight. Now I just run an extention cord from the Gen. in the Motor Home.

In regards to the Hosp. locking the gates after you escaped, You do have a Get Home Bag don't you

Knowing you ,you probley do, but I must ask.

Had the usual BOB that lives in the trunk and on landfall day I went in with my Backpack prepared to stay for a while.

That's a good idea about the exhaust issue. I'll keep that one in mind. Thanks.

Try checking out your local pawnshops for generators and ac units. I work at one in Lake Charles, and we get practically brand new ones in after every hurricane season which we sale for less than you can buy them new.

Also, I freeze one gallon jugs of water (usually 4) then just rotate them to the lower part of the fridge and refill those from other jugs until the ice fully melts. not only do you you have large quantities of ice on hand, but also wonderfully cold water to drink at all times. It also cuts down on the amount of electricity required to keep your fridge cold.

Truckergut