Not much exploring planned for today. The official VM fiancee’s off (accompanied by her mom) to a salon where she’ll get a test-run of her wedding-day hair and makeup. For the daytime, I figure on chilling out, reading some Fitzgerald (Tender is the Night, which I evidently read in late 1992, but don’t recall much of), and watching\/reading some local news.<\/p>\n
The big stories were about how relocated kids may not be attending school in their new districts, how cases of identity theft are proliferating (really macabre story, but after reading about 9\/11 identity fraud, nothing really gets to me), and how the bar owners in the French Quarter are protesting the midnight curfew by throwing a big ol’ party tonight.<\/p>\n
One of the big questions I have, coming into this trip, is what New Orleans is going to try to rebuild itself as. Is the goal to return to its identity as a tourist destination and haven for drunken frat boys at Mardi Gras? It seems like that’s pretty much a recipe for going back to the socioeconomic messed-up-edness that left so many people stranded 7 weeks ago.<\/p>\n
But what can you do to diversify the economic base here, after developing better protection against the weather? (As I read the Times-Pic this morning, I realize this is going to be a really difficult process, insofar as the exact dynamics of the floodwall failure are still unclear.) Is there some sort of industry they can build up here? What will it take to get companies to move down here (and induce employees to relocate)? The city’s been so focused on tourist dollars for so many years, I don’t understand where it can start to change.<\/p>\n
The mayor’s short-term fix of adding casinos to several of the large hotels doesn’t seem like a viable plan to me. If you put your city in competition with Las Vegas on that stuff, you’ll get your ass handed to you.<\/p>\n
I’m rambling. I’ll try to get a little more coherent once I’ve gotten out to see some more of the place and chatted a little with some people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Not much exploring planned for today. The official VM fiancee’s off (accompanied by her mom) to a salon where she’ll get a test-run of her wedding-day hair and makeup. For the daytime, I figure on chilling out, reading some Fitzgerald (Tender is the Night, which I evidently read in late 1992, but don’t recall much … <\/p>\n