Katrina and gas prices

I've been such a nut over the last few days. We've been so busy at work with minimal staffing and extra pages for coverage of Hurricane Katrina coverage. I have a new song in my head the last few days: Green Day's Wake Me Up When September Ends.

I know I'm not there - but having to work with the stories and photos day after day, it gets really depressing. It's so sad just to look through the pictures - especially the ones we don't publish. Babies that are crying. Animals that are abandoned or that were left tied to poles. An old man slumped over in a beach chair - dead. I feel almost as badly as I did 4 years ago around this time.

But I am doing something about it. I'm organizing a fundraiser kit with all my wonderful friends at Scrapdish and RAKScraps. We'll have a cool kit available in a few days that we're going to sell to raise money for the Red Cross. So far, it's just amazing and I still need to get moving and create my part. It makes me feel even a little better thinking we can help in a little way.

I think we're all going to feel it. For me, it's not just work. I paid $34 bucks for gas today and my tanks was just halfway empty.

A few people I know have family in the area where Katrina hit. My friend Tracy Rivera (Decemberroses) has a lot of family there. She donating all the profits from her scrapbooking kits through Sept 15 to hurricane victims. You can find them at www.digitalfreebies.com or www.scrapoutsidethebox.com
And my co-worker Lynnette is a New Orleans native. She wrote this column about the city and it's natives that ran in today's paper.