KATRINA & THE LOST CITY OF NEW ORLEANS by Rod Amis New Orleans is the Lost City of America. New Orleans has disappeared as surely as the lost city of Atlantis or the lost city of Pompeii, which former mayor Marc Morial and Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA.) have compared us to in their statements. That New Orleans, the New Orleans I mean to tell you about, that will never, ever, exist again--that city of love, lust, death and sex--will never exist again. A portion of the proceeds of this book will go to the New Orleans Hospitality Workers Fund. The cooks, servers and restaurant workers of New Orleans have provided fabulous times and memories for millions. Now we must remember them in their time of need. Buy the book or get a downloadable PDF Copy now! To order on Amazon.com, go here! A small, independent and outspoken magazine like this one can't reach you every week without the support and patronage of its readership. As our way of thanking those who have committed to keep your World's Magazine here on your desktop through their generous donations, we feature their names and cities here in our Roll of Honor. SUSTAINING PATRONS RON DIENER, Wendell, NC, USA DARHL STULTZ, Largo, FL, USA TIMOTHY MEADOWS, Anaheim, CA, USA TERRY TERRIAN, Sebastopol, CA, USA CHERYL HILL NATION, West Fairlee, VT, USA DRAGAN & DRAGANA VICANOVIC, Belgrade, SERBIA LESZEK MICHAELWICZ, New Orleans, LA, USA MARIE SINSABAUGH, Granville, OH, USA BECKY ALTEMUS, Houston, TX, USA Supporting Patrons BARBARA ATWELL, Berkeley, CA, USA MATT STOWELL, New Orleans, LA, USA LARS KEFFERSTAN, New York, NY, USA MEREDITH TUPPER, Tampa, FL, USA NGOZI RAZAK-SOYEBI, Jos, NIGERIA NICK ALLEN, New Orleans, LA, USA RIC WILLIAMS, Austin, TX, USA ROBERT PURVIS, Montclair, NJ, USA IAN CRYSTAL, Ph. D, New Orleans, LA, USA STEVE VIVIAN, New York, NY, USA STUART ALTMAN, ESQ., New York, NY, USA We encourage you to add your name to this Roll of Honor. GENERATOR 21 cannot continue and thrive without your support. Thanks in advance. To support G21, please send checks or money orders to: G21: The World's Magazine Attn: Rod Amis 1116 Crestline Road Wendell, NC 27591-9245 USA To donate by credit or debit card, please go to the Western Union website by following the highlighted link. Should you donate via Western Union, please notify us via e-mail. Please make all remittances payable to Rod Amis. Again, thanks. CURRENT MOON lunar phases G21 at FeedBurner Rod Amis at the Huffington Post

Rod Amis - Unbound

SMOKE & MIRRORS - AFTER THE FOOL: Our publisher, ROD AMIS reports on news for the members of your World's Magazine team and looks at his inability to lessen his own workload.

SMOKE

"Where there's smoke, there's fire ..." Popular Adage.

30 March, 2006: Things have been very hectic since our Tenth Anniversary Special Edition and my birthday. First of all, thanks to all those of you who sent me birthday greetings, called to sing, sent gifts, etc. (Rhonda & Bill, Cheryl, Dragana & Dragan, Rudell & Leon, Nelson, Barbara & Rich, Riley, Ripple and Graham.) The Old Magician is much appreciative.

Secondly, there was getting caught up with my Day Job of being a freelance journalist. My friend Matt telephone after reading one of the stories I filed and said, "Man, you really sound authoritative in that piece."

I chuckled. I think people often forget that I'm a professional journalist when they read my noodling here. Or maybe it's just that most people don't think of writing as a real way to make a living.

We received a wonderful review of Africa Fresh! New Voices from the First Continent in the Kenyan daily Nation from premiere literary critic and Northwestern University professor Evan Mwangi, which you can read here. (Free registration required.) I was quite overwhelmed with Dr. Mwangi's kind assessment of our effort.

MPHUTHUMI NTABENI sent me an e-mail with the wonderful news that another publisher was considering a work he had shown me - he'd begun a rewrite on it. And then these notes:

Did I tell you about the wonderful surprise I got when reading a biography of Nadine Gordimer - she's South Africa's first Nobel Prize Laureate for Literature - was finding myself quoted in the book by the author, Ronald Suresh Roberts. The book is called No Cold Kitchen. Here's the passage:

Gordimer has been read as a cultural hero of South African liberation and variously re-read as a writer residually submerged in the attitudes of colonialism or elitism, even Jewish self-hatred. She remains a polarising presence among South African blacks and whites alike. Near her there are always embers. "Unlike Nadine Gordimer, [JM. Coetzee] does not borrow courage of other people's convictions," wrote Mphuthumi Ntabeni, the African correspondent for the online magazine Generator 21: "This might be the reason he was so unpopular in political circles, where attitudinising is the order of the day."

And it goes on. I'm told there're other small passages.

Another great news is that the plays we're doing for the Environment and Tourism Dept. have started their performance along the Eastern Cape Heritage Route. We'll be on tour along the Eastern Cape for about three weeks - coming home on weekends. The great thing is that we've won funding from the Lotto to take the plays to the Grahamstown Arts Festival ...

We'll also be submit proposals to the SABC (South African Broadcasting Cooperation) to serialise the plays for TV.

I offered him my Good Luck wishes and congratulations.

I was flattered, also, to receive a request from one of the people in the Blogosphere, Steve Sanders of AmericanLiar.com, to reprint one of the articles I wrote for the Huffington Post Contagious Festival in February. You can view Steve's reprint, and thus visit his blog, by following this link. In his announcement e-mail, he wrote to his mailing list:

You've probably noticed that media criticism is a regular feature of American Liar postings. We rail a lot about the corporate media's responsibility for the generally apalling ignorance of the American public and its state of impairment when it comes to distinguishing fact from fiction, truth from lies, and in using deductive reasoning and rationality to sort out the affairs of government and society. (I don't mean to paint with a broad brush-yes, there are millions of aware citizens, and more are beginning to wake up every day, but as a whole the public is still in a generally sad condition in terms of being able to think and act as informed, responsible citizens. This is my own opinion; please let me know if you disagree.)

But is it the corporate media that is entirely to blame? The old "chicken and the egg" question comes to the fore in our guest commentary by Rod Amis (of G21.net), republished here from its appearance on Huffington Post. There's a strong case to be made that the American public bears its own share of responsibility for the state of ignorance and stupor it's in; we all make choices as to what we believe, who we believe, and what we believe in. The fact that the body politic has not been appropriately discriminating in making these choices places the American citizenry squarely in the docket, along with the nation's compromised and sold out "news" professionals and corrupt politicians, when we consider apportioning blame for the mess we're in now.

To paraphrase Edward R. Murrow, the legendary journalist, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not entirely in our scapegoats, but also in ourselves."

Well put, and as I said, I was flattered.

I was excited this past week when I received an inquiry from a producer for the BBC World Service radio programme "Outlook." It seems they had seen (probably the Reuters UK) announcement about Africa Fresh! making the short list for the Blooker Prize (which should be announced today, by the way) and wanted to feature one of the writers who contributed to that book. As this is the first book to be released under the new G21 BOOKS imprint we've begun, I was chuffed.

After days of frantic telephone calls, e-mails, pacing and smoking too many cigarettes - not to mention downing pots of coffee - I managed to arrange for our GAYNOR PAYNTER to conduct the BBC interview.

It would seem that this actually is becoming the "G21 Decade" as I've proclaimed with tongue firmly planted in cheek. For those who don't know, it's a take-off of the old joke that Al Franken had when he was part of the Franken and Davis comedy team on "Saturday Night Live" many years ago. He proclaimed the 1980s as "The Al Franken Decade" in a running gag that I found amusing. (I know, I'm showing my age, again.)


MIRRORS

2 April, 2006: I saw this most astounding red-crested woodpecker this morning while outside communing with nature, enjoying that special light that only comes in early morning and helping my body get used to Daylight Savings Time. I had the inkling that this was the Sunday when it commenced for the spring (I've ground accustomed to thinking of it as "fake time") and got out of bed early so that I'd go to sleep at the new-normal time tonight.

This is the time of year in these parts, I've learned, when the birds are in joyous profusion and variety. I've seen so many different varieties of these spirits of the air this season that I'm nonplussed. I can't remember anywhere, in recent memory, where I've seen so many different kinds of birds at one time.

Doves, crows, woodpeckers, finches, hawks; yesterday I was "buzzed" by one of the most beautiful golden eagles I've ever seen. It was breathtaking, the bird literally exuded power and grace. Like an ancient Roman, I took it as a good sign.

The first butterflies of the season are back, too. I've only seen a couple so far, it being early in the year, but got visited by them, my spirit familiars, as well.

It's early spring yet, so the bugs are not in great profusion but the warm breezes are awakening them from their winter sleeps. I don't especially look forward to the bugs but accept them as part of life. Watching a wasp swing past and seeing flies floating in last evenings' sunset haze, I realized that I'd have to prepare to work against bug bites again and the yard would soon be rife with ticks. Price of the ticket.

I kick myself for being woefully behind in my yard work - raking up pine needles and the last of the winter leaves - because the longer I procrastinate the more likely that I will have to contend with the wasps and ticks.

Meanwhile, manuscripts to review for this summer's book projects languish on my desktop, one of the editors I freelance for awaits new story pitches and I've added new a writer to the list of those I have decided to take under my editorial wing.

I had said that I would go into a season of restfulness, slow the pace a bit before the summer push and focus only on this effort and my book promotional efforts. I always say that I won't pile more projects on but I never succeed in keeping my promise to myself. Then I joke that "rust never sleeps ... " It is a treadmill of my own creation.

Elaine, as our friend Bob has dubbed her, the only remaining chicken, has been profusely laying eggs for weeks. I have joked that we shall soon have to begin to start selling them. I worry for her, though, as one of our neighbors, who owns a huge chocolate dog, has begun to let the dog run wild through the neighborhood again. That dog was one of a pack that slaughtered the other chickens we had last summer. Elaine was smart enough to hide in the woods behind the house for months. During the past few months, she has had free range of the yard, the dog was penned. Now the neighbors are letting it loose again, I expect the worst.

These are the bright and mundane details of my life in the woods, my little loves.

I had considered putting some photos of New Orleans as it looks now into a "Rod's Photo Album" section in this space for this edition but I thought better of it last night. You have seen how it looks elsewhere, I'm sure, and how heartbreaking it is. I decided that I had had enough of that heartbreak for a while. There is already too much heartbreak in the world.

Along that line of thought, I finally watched "Hotel Rwanda" last night. I ordered it as part of the NetFlix free trial offer, inveterate film buff that I am. (Remember, "free" is one of my favorite words.) This is the second film about the Rwandan tragedy I have watched during the last few months and the more powerful of the two. It serves as a chilling reminder of both the madness of humanity and our ability for callous disregard of the suffering of others. It was worth the time but reinforced my feelings about heartbreak ...

Perhaps next edition, I'll have something lighter to say at my conclusion.

Thanks for coming back this week.

THINGS ROD HOPES FOR THIS WEEK

1 - Success in my latest job application efforts.

2 - Getting back on top of generating more book sales.

3 - Getting control of my "To Do" list.

"Work like you don't need the money,
"Love like you've never been hurt,
"Dance like no one is watching ... "

Love,
Rod

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ROD AMIS has published this magazine since 1990. It first appeared as a hardcopy 'Zine. In March, 1996, he launched it here on the Web. Rod was a Contributing Editor at Suite101.com, where he wrote the " 'Net Publishing" feature. His work has been featured in the San Francisco Bay Guardian Online, NRV8, and at the (U.S.) Public Broadcasting System (PBS's) WebLab's Reality Check site. Rod was a contributing writer on technology for Faulkner Information Services. He wrote on Web issues for MethodFive.com's Hyper newsletter.

Rod was a columnist for the Andover News Network, where he wrote over two hundred articles on web design and development issues. He was principal writer and Editor for IT Manager's Journal, where he reviewed technology issues weekly, producing 383 editorials. He became the Managing Editor for Electronic Mail/Newsletter Publications at Andover.net at the end of February, 2000, and left in September of the same year. He was a contributing writer for ACCESS Internet magazine, which appeared both on- and offline for 10 million readers in 100 newspapers like the San Francisco Chronicle, New York Post, Boston Herald, Austin American-Statesman, Denver Post and Orlando Sentinel, among others. Rod was the US reporter for Silicon.com, a division of Network Multimedia Television in London, UK, r eaching 3.5 million European readers, until May, 2001.

In 2002, he worked as Assistant to the General Manager of a Big Easy company that does restaurants and nightclubs. He did stints as the Resident Philosopher at three separate gin mills in that city in the French Quarter and the Marigny, earning his stripes during two successive Mardi Gras seasons. Oh yeah, Rod's had Day Jobs working construction. Mostly renovations of old New Orleans structures, houses and a bar. Sometimes he designs Web sites for other people so that he can get his creative juices flowing the way he can't at a staid publication like this one. And he's been the instructor in Editing for Internet Publications at the Novi Sad School of Journalism in Yugoslavia. When he's not busy here, he writes technology columns for IT Manager's Journal and business columns for Enterprise Leadership. Rust never sleeps.

Our Resident Philosopher has exchanged his legend mobility for a means of keeping your World's Magazine going. Now he must become earnest about gaining a financial underpinning for this enterprise. (Read: Buy back his freedom.}.

In his spare time, he chases women in the manner that a fly pursues a spider.

He continues to be committed to integrity, chastity and a dose of humility.

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E-mail your comments. We always like to hear from you. Send your kudos, brickbats and suggestions to rod@g21.net.