So this is it

I'm spending my last night in Gentilly, creating this blog as A. shows me a suitcase she's stuffed under the bed, the kind an expectant mother might prepare for the hospital, but this one if filled with her journals (or should I say, her journals that were not destroyed in Katrina). A. came home from Rockn Bowl and told me she was going. It's kind of weird, because Josh and I have been staying in A.'s house since we came back from vacation. We have actually put a deposit down on own apartment, but since it's right down the street, right near the lake, we have not moved in yet.

Tomorrow, we will move to a friend's house in Bywater and 'watch' it for her as she takes a flight to Tennessee. Josh and I have been camping and beach housing with our two dogs for two months. Most of my stuff is on the second floor of a storage unit uptown, and since the car is full of camping gear and we don't have an apartment, we are oddly equipped for a hurricane.

Here is the list I emailed my father a few hours ago:

15 gallons of water (We can fill up more things with water at C.s when we go there tomorrow)
20 AA batteries
4 AA lithium batteries
15 C Batteries (the radio takes C)
10 D batteries
A flashlight that can use all 3 types of batteries
A flashlight that uses AA batteries or can be wound up and is also a radio
A huge light that you can charge and lasts for a long time.
8 votive candles of various saints/jesus/virgin mary
A Red Cross Radio/phone charger/ac adapter that runs on AA batteries or can be wound up with a crank and can give one minute to the phone per ten cranks.
A Coleman stove and propane for it
A raft (from camping; we really won't need it)
A 2 month supply of dog food for Lupe, all Lupe's medicine (heartworm/flea)
A 2 month supply of cat food ( i can't find the cats though)
A 2 week supply of Diesel's food (we can get more; the dollar store is full of the stuff)
A gas lantern and whatever goes with it (it's Josh's and I don't know how it works)
Matches
Tons of lighters and cigarettes
Gauloshes
A survival knife
Rope
A tent
A tarp
Josh's tools (hammer, screw gun, other portable tools that he says are useful)
A full tank of gas in the car.
A ten gallon red gas thing full of gas
A generator that someone is lending us that we don't have yet
An ad on craigslist asking to rent/buy/borrow generators
3 friends within spitting distance with generators
No way to buy a generator at Lowe's or Home Depot b/c they are all so expensive since the cheap ones sold out
Almost a month of my medication
Laptop w/ T Mobile signal
2 T Mobile cell phones with 504 area codes (josh is 504 344 4448)
A legitimate press pass (Nolafugees is a real corporation now)
A video camera and tons of tape
A huge cooler
A really good first aid kit
Acceptable clothing for the situation (i.e. shorts with pockets for me to wear if I have to)
Sunblock
Bathingsuits
Charcoal and lighter fluid (to grill the meat before it rains)
A Map of various evacuation routes
The Club for the car
Diet rootbeer
Canned foods (C. has tons, and she said we shouldn't worry about eating them, but we have our own too)
An axe (from camping)
Mace
A sword
Plywood to board up C's windows if necessary
Ugly dog
Books to read

I don't want my parents to worry about me, but they can't help it. They are already worried that I will die hacking my way through an attic or by being raped by looters or in the Superdome. They don't remember that I took swimming lessons until I was 15. They, like most of the country, are already convinced the city will be gone forever as soon as Gustav hits.

I can't blame them.

They have, after all, been watching the news.