Praying for Pestilence

So I’m watching Fox News. Geraldo is at the Convention Centre in New Orleans…although as far as I know, he could be in Cincinnati.

Yeah, you heard me, Geraldo. I'm amazed they let you out without a GPS tracker on a collar around your neck.

Could this guy scream any louder? O’Reilly even had to tell him to calm down at one point. If it had been me, I’d have told him to call me back when he wasn’t an overexcited little midget cat and hung up. Whenever someone attends to the evac of personnel from Charity Hospital, could they pick up some fucking Valium for Geraldo and drop it off? I’m concerned for his well-being at this point. He seems more traumatised than the people who’ve been there for five days.

Thank you.

And I don’t want to go to the New Orleans Convention Centre next year now. It’s pretty gross. And I know the people are suffering, but so is everyone else, everywhere in New Orleans.

And for the record, Lawrence Guyot is a fucking retard who made a total fool of himself in his interview with O’Reilly. Guyot needs to get off his fat ass, quit preaching hate and get his tremendously obnoxious self down there and start helping if he’s soooo interested. Go help evacuate the elderly, sick, and children—black OR white—you self-righteous fucknut.

As my grandmother used to say, I wouldn’t pee down his throat if his guts were on fire. What a waste of primordial ooze.

And Jabbar Gibson—the twenty-year old who hotwired the school bus and evacuated people on his own to Houston—Mr Gibson deserves a medal. And help getting his life together, ‘cos he’s got potential. That’s exactly—or damn close to—what I would have done. Good going, Guy. One more person who understands that “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you” really is a funny, funny joke.

“I really don’t know how you’re going to organise a rescue in this town…” But yet you’re going to complain about what’s being done? Go get some sleep, Shepard. You’re turning into an overexcited little midget cat, also.

Yep—them’s the rules: If you want to criticise, you have to offer viable alternatives that don’t rely on hindsight. Didn’t your Mom teach you that?

Ok, now that being said, hoo-boy, isn’t this a cock-up? I can’t say that I know what should be done, but I am amazed that no one had ever considered that such a thing might happen and oh, maybe had a plan, or something. Christ; I LIVE to worry—let me handle your urban planning, and I’ll have thought of every possible disaster from hurricanes to alien abductions to unexplained sock disappearances from local Laundromats. I just worry like that.

Ok, now all *that* being said, I have good news that I might interrupt to make fun of Geraldo if the opportunity presents itself. Although, despite how my comments may seem right now, I do believe that the media has been essential in this instance. Where in the hell else is anyone communicating? Well, besides that one blog. So much for planning ahead and installing some kind of disaster-proof communications system (yes, it can be done). Let’s just cross our fingers and hope Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC show up, eh?

Ok, I promise I’ll keep the blogging in front of the television to a minimum from now on.

My brother is on alert. This is a good thing. My brother is also in Napa Valley, on vacation right now. He has to call in any time he changes where he’s located, or every (howevermany) hours, whichever comes first, to advise of where he is. He says that this is becoming more of a “when “than an “if”. He may have to return to Texas, or wherever else they tell him he has to go, in order to respond to the Katrina disaster.

This is a very, very good thing. It's a good thing because until now, my brother was supposed to be going over to Iraq.

Now he’s irritated. He’s a military doctor, and has been doing double time to get to that elusive “somewhere” for a while. You know—the whole money-power-prestige thing. I mean, after all, that’s the only reason people want him around, right?

Ok, in fairness, the days of going into private practice as a GP are over. That won’t keep your kid in diapers and your wife in Pottery Barn these days. I acknowledge that. Really. And I'm glad he has an area of specialty, and I'm glad he's feathering his own bed.

And I’m not saying that I’m not proud of him. He's obnoxious, but in my own way, I'm proud of him. He’s been—in addition to his practice—active as a researcher; he’s written articles, and even a chapter in a text. He’s managed to steadily increase his responsibility on his undertakings to where he has wholly run many of them. He was supposed to go help run a hospital in Iraq. This, he says, would be It. Doing something like that would make him, career-wise.

And that’s why I’ve been angry at him for a few months. That's when we found out that he was going, even though nothing is official yet.

I don’t want him to go. I didn’t want him to go into the military in the first place. No one asks what I think. I think it’s a good way for me to be without a brother. And, as obnoxious as mine is, I’ve grown attached to him. I don’t want him to get his ass shot off by a sniper when he tries to go out for lunch. I don’t want him to get abducted and be beheaded because he’s an American. I don’t give a damn that this is a chance of a lifetime. I don’t care that he would have his pick of places when (if!) he gets back. Fuck the Iraqis. Let them all get hoof and mouth disease and die. What the fuck do I care about them?

Ok, so I have a pretty solidified opinion on this. So shoot me.

But if he has to go do this, he can’t go do that. At least not when he’s supposed to, which was any time from the end of September to November. That’s why he and his wife went on vacation right now. It was supposed to be their last before he left. And if he can’t go when he’s supposed to, maybe things will have changed later. Maybe they’ll need someone to do what he was going to do immediately, and send someone else. He has a moderate amount of experience with infectious disease. That's what these evacuees are going to be full of, if things keep going the way they are.

And so that’s what I’m hoping for. I guess we’ll see what happens. It's a moral dilemma: You benefit only when others suffer. I guess it's clear what my choice is. I'm not ashamed of it. Anyone who wants to judge me can go right ahead. This is my BROTHER we're talking about sacrificing for some third-world country that couldn't give a shit less whether he lives or dies. Enough said; I am not going to try to apologise for my feelings. Hopefully we'll have a few good cases of bubonic plague or something, and my brother will be safe for a little while.

And on top of everything else, it turns out that I do know someone on the New Orleans police force. So I suck as a person to know; I can’t keep up with everyone everywhere. And last I knew, he was a police officer in Alabama. Ok, so it turns out that that was a long time ago, and he and his wife moved so that she could go to med school. And it turns out that I’ve been told this several times. So I forgot. Ok? I admit it. I forgot. I’m a suck person.

Butsoanyway.

His name is [removed; he and famille are doing fantastically]. And I’m not obfuscating on this one. If anyone reads this and feels like thinking of someone, please think of []. His wife is safe in Georgia. He’s called his mother a few times to tell her he’s still on duty and still ok. I hope for his continued safety, as much as I hope for anything else.

And I hope he stays away from Geraldo; I think that man may have rabies.