Houston: the Aftermath

Like nearly everyone else in Houston, my son and his wife are fine. In fact the power came back on where they live in less than 24 hours after the storm.

There are numerous blogs of people's experiences. One I have especially enjoyed following is Cynthia's. Here's one brief excerpt on the line-ups the day after the hurricane:

It's not understandable to me that people would pass up several open establishments serving food within the same mile strip on Westheimer, and then stand for hours in a line in the heat. They clearly didn't see that several Walgreens pharmacies, a Sonic drive-in, and even the Fox & Hound Grille and Pub, were open and had food to serve in the form of snacks, fast food, or full meals with beer. People were fixated on needing groceries, and needing them yesterday. What were they going to find in there that couldn't wait until tomorrow, when more places were open? More water?

Gas and food aren't the only things in short supply around here. For some people, there's also an appreciable lack of common sense.

Her experience reminds me of the big snowstorm I lived through in Chicago in 1967. The streets were so clogged with snow that we knew there would be no deliveries to the stores for several days. For some reason, everyone in the Hyde Park area was panicked about getting meat and milk. Meat and dairy counters in local groceterias were completely cleaned out. Yet the shelves still had dried milk powder and tinned stews. ...

To weather that storm, we went into a drugstore and bought two big bags of M&Ms.... Each.