Saturday, September 19, 2009

More Stories

Here are some new stories for you, dear readers.

It looks like my current station doesn't have the server space my old station has, because stories that I'm linking now are disappearing. Hopefully that can be remedied in the near future.

Speaking of linking, the first story up today was shot last weekend on the anniversary of Hurricane Ike; the storm that kept its pimp-hand strong by slapping Galveston around a year ago. The woman featured hasn't been in her house since she evacuated, but not because she didn't want to be; it's being renovated by a locally produced, but nationally televised, PBS show and a local church. This is her homecoming.

 

Here's the synopsis in case the story isn't there. A local furniture store filled the house with donated furnishings, since she lost everything. The most important item she saved was a pocket-watch, which belonged to her father, who bought the house nearly a century ago. The designer on the show put it in a shadow box to hang on the wall in the living room, where it is practically the first thing you see when you enter. Oh, and one last point, dad's name - was Ike.

The next story was actually shot the day before. We thought we might have a good story about local people helping eleminate some blue roofs, but when we got to the location we found the weather had cancelled the work day. Our last chance was to drive to Kemah for a class on animal rescue. Thrilling, right? When we got there it was almost time for lunch, and they would be doing the mock disaster the next day, so all seemed lost, until we spoke to the owner of the kennel hosting the class.

 

Like many who have dealt with the physical destruction of these storms, she is having problems with her insurance company. It's not stopping her, but the frustration is clear. She also had to evacuate with her one-year-old, and the stress of that memory brought some surprise tears during the interview. The Bed and Biscuit she runs is a pretty nice place. The pet suites even have their own televisions, but I can't figure out, for the life of me, how dogs not more than a foot tall can watch a set that's five feet high in a 2'x4' space.