Monday August 7

Monday is gutters day off, which is wonderful. We all slept in until about 10 or 11. Breakfast was wonderful pancakes and grits, yum!

Stephen, our site coordinator, had asked my crew to help out a woman down the street move some of her boxes from her driveway to her sheds. We gladly accepted an opportunity to work in the community and chat with a resident. Especially one who had lived across the street from where we had gutted the day before.

We arrived around 12 without any gear, because what we were told was we were moving bozes. The woman had a totally different idea. When we first arrived she told us she wanted her sheds in the backyard moved back on to the cement blocks that they had been on before the storm. With no equipment or preparedness, this task was impossible. She finally settled for the idea of us putting her stuff in to the sheds and someone else coming to help move the sheds another day. We began to move her stuff.

Lets talk about this stuff for a moment shall we? It was gross, flood water, in the rain, moldy, growing creature type stuff. We had no gloves or suits, and we were just touching everything with out bare hands. It was disgusting. The resident, just sat on a chair, smoked and pointed out which boxes went where. At one point i did strike up a decent conversation when i started to talk about mudpies because her dishes were full of mud and i said it reminded me of when i was little. Thats about the only time the woman smiled, which i guess was good. We were all pretty frustrated by the time we left.

After that we showered then a few of us went to the French Quarter. Maria needed to get spices for some of her co-workers. We walked around the french market where I almost bought a silver bracelet with the fluer de lis on it. (Mandamae, i've got a great birthday present idea for you). We then got this candy called divinity, which is this marshmellow concotion that is way to sweet for teeth. We headed to dinner where i had the greatest grilled cheese ever (yes steve, better than the pour house). It must have had 9 slices of cheese on it. YUM!

Later that night we went to Bourbon street. I became the designated driver, it seems to happen alot. I was pretty bummed about the whole thing. But whatever its over.