I haven't written for a couple days despite the fact that I recently decided it would be good practice to update this blog daily. Not only because throngs of avid fans, desperate for my brilliance depend on it, but because I thought it would be a way for me to practice my writing skills and also get into the habit of doing something so a daily basis. My parents have this friend, Ron. Last time I saw him he was happily running a gem shop in the Castro in San Francisco, and I suppose he's still there. Ron had also written a book and when we caught up out west I was still a college student, anxious to learn anything I could about the art of becoming a great writer and Ron, as we sat in the restaurant near the Ghiradelli chocolate store (where, by the way, they give you a piece of chocolate each time you enter - not just, you know, once, even though you keep exiting and coming back in over and over again), said that the best advice he could give me was: "Write every day." Finally, at twenty-seven, I'd like to try that. Even if it doesn't amount to a bestseller I'll still have a log of my thoughts and adventures.

The reason, however, I haven't written lately isn't laziness. Honestly, every time I thought of something funny or ridiculous I'd like to share on my blog I couldn't get it out of my head that the first thing I needed to do was at least acknowledge the disastrous situation in New Orleans and its surrounding areas. The stories are unspeakably sad. I realize I don't have the slightest idea what it is really like to be down there but their voices on the radio, their pictures and the descriptions in newspapers give me some idea of the utter despair. Thankfully, there are good people to help. I'm not even going to try and address my anger regarding the sloppy response of the government (I'll save that for beer-drinking nights out and then you'd better WATCH OUT) but I have been impressed by the good nature of many individuals who've donated money and time and food to this cause.

There are, of course, many more interesting opinions and sources of information than mine.

This is a link to a story from Sunday's New York Times, demonstrating that while things might be, at least, better at the Houston Astrodome, Katrina's victims still have a very long road ahead. This article really got to me.

This is a link to a blog my friend Mike pointed out to me. It's being run out of New Orleans about the situation there and includes pretty unbelievable descriptions of individual's attempts to get food and water and simply understand what's going on.

Most importantly,this is a link to the Red Cross site - it is incredibly easy to donate online.

This weekend J and I had the pleasure of sharing a hotel room with our dear friends Jen and Nate during a trip the lab took up to D.C. to take in the sights, eat at good restaurants and see just how boisterous and crude everyone could get without pissing anybody off. Number of times the boys pretended the decorative circular pillow on each bed was a penis: 328,872. Stuff like that. But my fiancee, he won.

After declaring that everybody better use the bathroom if they needed to before he went in, J took a turn at the Hilton's delicate plumbing system. The thing is, every plumbing system is delicate to him because the boy can clog a toilet like nobody's business. Everyone knows about it and everyone mentions it when he exits a bathroom. "Did you clog it again J?" and then he answers "No" like he means it, or "No," and then looks away and starts talking about something else, which means "Yes." Sometimes, though, if he's around good friends as he was this weekend, well, it's like he's proud of this capability. Since I'm not a huge fan of talking about poop this has been a little difficult for me to get used to but I'm getting there. What I mean is it's being forced on me.

This weekend was a good example: J shouts "undefeated!" from the hotel bathroom as Nate, Jen and I are getting ready to take a nap. "What?" we mutter, giggling, and then the giggling ABRUPTLY stops as J exits and announces that he's clogged the toilet and then jumps into bed, naturally, as we all do when we've just created a living hell for our hotel roommates, especially the one who is getting over a urinary tract infection. We ask "Is it fixed," and he answers, "Not yet."

"Fix it!"

"Not yet."

"Fix it NOW!"

"It will fix itself. The poop will dissolve. I know. This happens all the time."

The. Poop. Will. Dissolve. We contemplated this brilliant strategy for about .006 seconds before telling the perpetrator that he'd better the hell call the front desk immediately or else. OR ELSE.

J returned to the bathroom. The thought of calling the front desk and explaining to them that his very large dump had clogged their pipes was too much to bear. We heard a flush, and then:

"Damnit."

Softly. Another challenge. The toilet, he explained, had started to overflow but he'd stopped it by turning off the water and mopping up the floor with one of the towels. One of the four towels we needed for showers. He presented this information with flourish, as though fixing the overflow problem was just as good if not better than fixing the original problem where none of us could go to the bathroom. J had an idea.

"You guys can just go in the lobby!"

"CALL THE FRONT DESK RIGHT NOW OR I SWEAR TO GOD..."

J somehow managed to get his way for a few more hours while he anxiously waited for "the poop to dissolve" but when the toilet continued to overflow he was forced to do our will and call down to the front desk and explain that "Room 770 is going to need some more towels. Also, the toilet seems to be clogged. That's going to need to be corrected."

A very nice man with a huge plumbing tool finally came to our rescue, exiting the room just as we'd returned from a trip to get some snacks. "There's nothing wrong in there!" he said with a smile, as though trying to assuage our embarrassment and appeal to our highly refined manners. Little did he know. Now that the toilet adventure was over those decorative pillows became even more alluring.