First, let’s get the whinging out of the way: I need a new pillow, I think. I woke up this morning at around 2:30 AM with a headache (neck strain, most likely) and slept fitfully the rest of the night because of it, never waking up quite enough to get up and take some ibuprofen for it. When I did get up at 5, I had to make the coffee twice, because I hear the coffee tastes better when you remember to actually add the coffee grounds to the coffee maker. And just when I thought the day might pass uneventfully, I heard from takaza that there has been a fiber cut to his employer’s building, so they’re without phone or connectivity and he’s left to twiddle his thumbs until they work it out (just got an e-mail from him – they’re back up. Good).

All of this, of course, is completely meaningless and insignificant compared to what is going on down on the Gulf Coast. There’s plenty of discussion and finger-pointing and speculation going on so I don’t see much need to add fuel to the fire except to say let’s tend to the living and bury the dead first, folks. It’s a question of priorities. It’s worthy of note that, according to New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, the city worked to get everyone who couldn’t get out into central locations and then…the system failed. No one appeared to ship them out to safe locations, and so there many of them have stayed. Make no mistake, I believe there should be some serious analysis of what happened, just…not now. Not yet.