Rudy

Good luck Ken. Keep up that positive attitude!

garehaan

Keep looking on the bright side of things!
Realistically I think you got to prepare yourself for some mess you're going to find at your home.
Material stuff can be replaced, although I know from experience how hard it is to loose your personal belongings.

On the other hand: you were lucky and smart enough to leave early and you and your family are ok.
Good luck with your insurance is what you need next I guess, and keep your head up like you did before.

cobradav

Good luck and hope its better than you expect

ademitt

Travel safely and good luck to you and your family.

kscarrol

Thanks for all the kind thoughts guys. Must admit it was hard to see the house, even though I knew what to expect. The downstairs is a total loss, as is the whole house frankly. Luckily our roof remained intact so the second floor looked like we had walked out a few hours ago to run errands! All the art and oriental rugs are safe and the kids clothes and furniture were salvaged. No mold or mildew had made it upstairs! We have the rental truck loaded and will bring it to houston on saturday.

We had a little over 7 ft of water downstairs, so everything made of wood or cloth floated around is scattered everywhere. We had a dining room chair sitting up on our stairs. My 6 yr old is fascinated w/planets, and one of his little plastic planet earths had floated up to our thermostat and come to rest there. Even the fridge floated away and was half way across the kitchen. At least it stayed closed so all the rotten food is locked inside. The smell was bad enough without having that thrown into the mix. Two of the three trees in front of our house survived, but we are only two of four that are still standing on our entire block. The whole neighborhood looks like nothing I've ever seen. No birds, no green, all the plants and trees are dead, killed by the salt water that flooded in from the lake. Did see one lonely squirrel trying to find something to eat.

Several of our neighbors came while we were there, very sad, not just the destroyed property, but now everyone is scattered all over the south, trying to rebuild lives. The neighbohood has been destroyed, and I don't mean the property. The saddest was Mr. Otto who lived next door. His daughter drove him by and we helped him get into his house (all the wodden doors are swollen shut). He looked at my wife and said "it's OK, you're young and will survive. Me, my life is over" He's 90 and his wife died just three months ago. He had lived in that house for 54 years, now its gone.

As I sit here having a beer (alright, maybe my third), I realize my positive outlook is under some pressure. I have a bunch of digital photos, but I'm simply too tired to fool with uploading them. I'll do it tomorrow.

Goodnight...

das

Many lives were changed because of this.

There's not much I or anyone else can say to make it better.

It does pay to remember that worry over things we can't change is worry wasted, as trite as that sounds.

Best of wishes, from all of us...

Rudy

Thanks for the update ks...I've been thinking about you all day. It sounds like you ended up with many of your valuable belongings intact and that's certainly something to celebrate.

I'm sure that I'll find the photos fascinating once you have a chance to upload them. (By the way, I'm curious to know how are you connecting to the internet?)

CENTRAL CALI

:'( :'( :'(


Hang in there buddy, your family is in my prayers.


Central Cali

kscarrol

Hey Rudy, we're staying in Baton Rouge w/ the inlaws. I can connect through their wireless network. I'll try some picutres now, hopefully they are not to large...

kscarrol

let's give this a go...

sorry, not working, pictures are tto big. I'll try one of those ofoto things to post them...