Boy, I hope I never gut another prefab home in my life. Their efficient construction techniques make it very challenging to do repair (or in this case demolition) work. Once I got out to the house Merrie and the Kansas team were gutting, I'm glad it was mostly done because it would have been very tedious work. Unfortunately, there are some things you just can't do without ripping out the studs as well so it won't be truly "clean" when we're done. Regardless, the 2 grand-daughters had a blast tearing apart the house so it was good therapy for them.

We drove through Lakeshore and Waveland on the way home since the Kansas team had not seen the real devastation yet. It is still hard for me to fathom after all this time and much has not changed at all in some areas. However, we did experience an incredible moonrise this evening; I hope I can get some nicer pics tomorrow.

There was a town meeting at church tonight where reps from many of the government agencies at all levels were present for a brief status report and then a Q&A session. There were a few things that stuck out to me:
- there are several proposals in legislation that would greatly help the Gulf Coast if passed
- BSL still has about 300 of 450 donated gas water heaters available for those in need of one
- there is some type of IRS program that may allow some to receive refunds of taxes from previous years to aid in relief
- all the seafood here is edible though the oyster reefs were essentially wiped out by the storm so it will take 2-3 years before a crop can be expected
- the US 90 bridge will start contruction about Jan 18 and 2 lanes will be open in May 2007
- some people cannot start the rebuilding process because they cannot get permits for various stupid red tape reasons
- slabs are not eligible for cleanup by FEMA or the Corps of Engineers
I found the last comment the most interesting though. A woman wanted to know when President Bush was going to send the military down here to help rebuild the Gulf Coast in the United States rather than various places in Iraq. Needless to say, nobody couldh give her an answer to that pointed question.

I finally got to see a picture of the storm surge and I'm rather speechless. It was taken in Pearlington as it came in from the bayous and Pearl River. I'm not sure where the person was when it was taken since it was clearly fairly high up (maybe 20-25 feet judging from the power line) or how they managed to survive, but it showed the area already looked flooded and about a 12-15' wall of water was a 200 yards out and you could some larger swells a couple hundred yards beyond that.

This morning we finished up Mrs. Peters double-wide. Merrie and I had lunch with her and then sprayed it down. Then we did a little sight seeing and will run up to see Pete and Fay Jones before we leave in the morning.

We're talking with Mrs. Hair now and see was saying she's still not considered in the flood zone by the new maps though it's possible a few streets down from her they will need to raise their houses. However, if they do need to do that, it's only 2-4 feet, which would not have helped them at all. Our government dollars at work doing intelligent things again. Not!