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 BECKY & KENT ALTEMUS, Shenandoah, TX, USA RON DIENER, Wendell, NC, USA DARHL STULTZ, Largo, FL, USA TIMOTHY MEADOWS, Anaheim, CA, USA MATT STOWELL, New Orleans, LA, 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 Supporting Patrons NGOZI RAZAK-SOYEBI, Jos, NIGERIA NICK ALLEN, New Orleans, LA, USA X.N. IRAKI, Jackson, MS, USA BARBARA ATWELL, Berkeley, CA, USA LARS KEFFERSTAN, New York, NY, USA MEREDITH TUPPER, Tampa, FL, 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: Rod Amis G21: The World's Magazine 1500 Royal Crest Drive, #156 Austin, TX 78741-2709 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. G21 at FeedBurner Rod Amis at the Huffington Post in February Rod Amis at the Huffington Post in May Rod Amis at the Huffington Post in July Rod Amis at the Huffington Post in August ENJOY WHAT ROD DOES! (From our Link Partner at Calabash Music. Merci!)

Rod Amis - Unbound

SMOKE & MIRRORS - MY LIFE AS A DOG: ROD AMIS spends sleepness nights in Texas and shares them with you in a style that has become inimitable.

SMOKE

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

Items from Rod's Email Box

Ric Williams, my lifelong friend who lives here in Austin, sent me this quote from T.E. Lawrence (a.k, a. "Lawrence of Arabia") that seems very appropriate these days:

The people. . .have been led. . .into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with honor and dignity. They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding of information. The Baghdad communiquÈs are belated, insincere, incomplete. Things have been far worse that we have been told, administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows. It is a disgrace to our . . . record, and may soon be too inflamed for any ordinary cure. We are today not far from a disaster. - Sunday Times, London, 1920

He also sent me this link, which should probably be filed under "Separated at Birth?"

And my pal, Matt Stowell, from New Orleans sent me this evocative and beautiful piece of writing from another New Orleanian. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Finally, here's your YOUTUBE MOMENT OF THE WEEK. It's history speaking back to us, people who don't remember history. I believe every person living in the United States of America should see this newsreel footage from 1947 at least once - especially in today's political climate.

Inside the Magazine

We only offer you five new features in this edition, as I've been wracked by personal and financial worries, for your World's Magazine and Rod the Person these days, and because I have to focus more on getting my freelance writing income back up to snuff. Like I hinted last week, it's very slim pickings in Rodville again after all this bouncing around the country trying to find a place I felt comfortable in living for a while.

Man, this financial uncertainty is getting old.

But, back to cases.

As you know, I've always and constantly have New Orleans on the brain. So it shouldn't surprise you, my little loves, that I've finally decided to make good on writing that New Orleans novel. At the recommendation of my friend Dragana, of Belgrade, it's a crime story. Yes, Rod has decided to go back to fiction again, one more time. You'll find the first installment of the proposed serialization here in G21 FICTION. (Apologies from the Publisher to those many writers whose work remains in my queue.)

MPHUTHUMI NTABENI has some things to say about the lame duck status of South African President Mbeki in G21 AFRICA. Definitely worth a look.

New contributor JOHN KARANGA KARIUKI offers our second G21 AFRICA piece on Nigerian films.

BRAD BALFOUR, meanwhile, sits down with Danish director NICHOLAS WINDING REFN to talk about his provocative trilogy of "Pusher" films in our ON FILM feature.

I think all four new pieces are strong. You be the judge.

NEWS TO ROD

You know what? It isn't just me and MSNBC's wonderful commentator Keith Olbermann. There is something rotten in the the United States of American, to paraphrase.

My only item for this week is from Paul Craig Roberts, who was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review.

In other words, this man has impeccable conservative credentials. Yet, he and I are on the same page as to the future of this country.

You can read what he has to say by following this link.

The BEG

Nothing is more demeaning than having to hold out the tin cup. Nonetheless, if you're an independent publisher on the Web and you mean to maintain the viability of your enterprise, occasionally throw a writer or two a bone and continue to be able to grow and improve as the technology becomes available, fundraising is de rigueur. From TruthOut to CounterPunch, even to a number of popular Blogs, we all do our seasonal begs for donations to keep our dream(s) alive.

I've refrained from doing so much of it this year but now, once again, the time has come for me to use some of this space to ask for your support in the form of donations. Size does not matter, in this instance. $5.00 USD is better than a sharp stick in the eye. If you can afford to give more, it would be vastly appreciated.

As you can see in the sidebar to your right, our address has changed. If you can't read the small print, here are the details:

1. G21 accepts donations in any amount via check, money order or Western Union.


2. Donations should be made payable to "Rod Amis".


3. Please send your donations to:
   G21: The World's Magazine
   Attn: Rod Amis
   1500 Royal Crest Drive, #156
   Austin, TX 78741-2709
   USA

Thanks in advance for your continued support and encouragement!

MIRRORS

4 October 2006: Here I am in Austin, Texas.

My first full day in town has been frought with many little frustrations, attendanat to having actual digs in my name - a room of my own, as Virginia Woolf advised - and being in a city once familiar where everything has changed. The Big Frustration is that I shan't have reliable Internet access until Monday. NOT that long to wait if you live in meatspace but if you live on the Internet, as I have these last few decades, it feels like an eternity.

"But there must be free WiFi hotspots, particularly in a place like Austin," I hear you say.

Yes, I'm positive there are. BUT, as my pal Ric so sensitively pointed out in telephone conversation last evening, I live in "the ghetto." Meaning, I live in southeast Austin, one of the few areas that you can still find cheap rent, and thus out of the main pulse of the city. I have to find that pulse, by trial and error, unfamiliar as I am with new place after being away for over twenty years and the spots that are amenable to my pursuits.

I made an attempt today. I simply hopped on a bus to go exploring, early in the morning. Like a salmon swimming upstream, I of course went to the first neighborhood I lived and worked in when I first arrived in this river city at the age of twenty-five. I got off the bus as close as I could to 24th and Guadalupe. It was on 24th that I found my first Austin job at La Fonda de la Noche (The Inn of the Night) a Mexican restaurant. I eventually became the manager of the place and met my ex-wife, Debra, there when I hired her to be a waitress.

I wandered around the neighborhood. The site where La Fonda had been is now a parking lot for a Quizno's sub shop and a Starbucks. I went looking for the second house I had lived in, a place I shared with a lesbian poet named Charlene. That site is now taken by a mammoth parking garage. Few of the buildings from when I first moved to Austin in 1976 in that old neighborhood of mine are still extant. It was jarring.

Public transportation here is good, though. You can ride cable-car looking shuttles they call "Dillos" here for free in the downtown area and around the University of Texas. A Day Pass on the Metro bus lines (a full 24 hours, BTW) costs you a dollar for unlimited rides. The City of New Orleans should take note.

I was searching for a free hot spot on this little journey of aimless exploration and believed I had found one on Rio Grande, near 23rd. I ponied up the money for lunch and a beer, only to discover that their configuration did not agree with Merlin's Staff, my little Macintosh laptop. Oh well, that money, which I could ill afford, was already spent. I needed to buy something to cook with, bread and salt, so I wasn't about to venture anywhere else and roll the dice on the few ducats still remaining in my coffers. It was time to head back to Low Rent Land.

Frustration.

I went back to my new neighborhood in southeast Austin and stopped at the dollar store to buy the needed items I'd put on my list at 7:30 a.m. this morning. Then, loaded with coffee filters and coffee, corned beef, sardines, smoked oysters, mustard (how did I forget to drop the mayonaisse in the cart?)sugar, salt, bread, I stopped and bought a bottle of bourbon and a couple of beers. End of the line, Old Son.

So I came home to be with you.

I called TimeWarner Cable, first though. They offer free cable at this apartment complex, which is meaningless to a man who doesn't own a television set, but at least says that initial cost as a barrier to my getting cable Internet service next week. That means, though, I shall have to put The Touch on someone so that I can cover the C.O.D. (cash on delivery) terms of installation. Matt looks likes he's at the top of the list. I can repay him when he shows up for my housewarming party.

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15 October 2006: After one of the worst weeks in recent memory (my final payment from NewsTrust.net failed to even be mailed until Thursday, the day before my proposed housewarming party, my mail seems somehow screwed up and I was running out of money - a part-time job somewhere is now is order to supplement the little I now make from freelance writing,) I spent the weekend entertaining. Matt was up from New Orleans to bring me my few worldly possessions. For the first time in nearly three years, my belongings and I are actually in the same apartment. I have my music CD collection back, a bunch of software CDs, etc. and, finally, all of my clothes in one place. I even have my cookware. What a concept.

I kept pots and pans but no dishes. So I only have the one plate I purchased at the 99-cent store in Shenandoah, one bowl, but four coffee cups. Matt was amazed that coffee is that important to me. I set the pot up in advance every night before bed.

In theory at least, my last paycheck from NewsTrust will arrive tomorrow. I have to hope the mail man shows up early enough that I can make a deposit. Even my cell phone is down because I can't afford to deposit more money in my prepaid account. Other than the Internet, I am again cut off from the outside world.

I lost one of my advertisers and no donations, despite last edition's Beg, have come in, other than the few ducats Matt handed me to keep me in cigarettes and beer when he left. "You gottah at least be able to buy beer, smokes and some cheap food at Jack in the Box or somewhere," he quipped. Lord knows, I appreciate the willing largesse.

So we went to a programmers lock-down for an organization called the League of Technical Voters I was assigned to cover for NewsForge. We hit my neighborhood bar for a nightcap after a couple quick burritos, and came back to my place to go to bed early last evening, Matt's second in town, so that we could be relatively fresh to watch the New Orleans Saints football team play the Philadelphia Eagles. The Saints are now five and one. It's a good day for Saints fans.

Matt had to take off after the game, and our brief meeting with another New Orleans transplant here, the writer Utahna Faith, an old friend is who expecting a baby very soon, and her new husband, Mark. They came down after the game.

Because Matt didn't leave New Orleans until after one in the afternoon on Friday (it's an eight hour drive) it was a hurried weekend. It didn't help that we stayed up gabbing until five in the morning on the night he arrived.

It was a good visit, though, because Matt was getting a bit exhausted with being Jo'ed every week and spending all his time in the bars just to get out of the unpleasant atmosphere in his apartment and I really thought it would be nice to have a visitor and get my stuff back. We tried to squeeze too much into only a couple of days.

Now that he is on his long drive back to NOLA, I'm sorry I couldn't show him more of my old city. As we drove across town yesterday, I started to notice that there is something about the layout and geography of the place that has stuck with me - even after over twenty years.

IF I can land a part-time job right away, doing something, anything, and manage to stay here for a while, I'll be very pleased.

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16 October 2006: I sleep under my trench coat at night because I posess neither blanket nor comforter. Most things that other people take for granted are simply not part of my existence. I use a box as a chair and my desk is another box. I shall have to try unpacking the desk eventually. Merlin's Staff is light enough that I don't need the filler.

I lie awake at night worrying about getting more freelancing assignments, rebuilding my income, making the bills. These thoughts are cheek by jowl with the writing ideas, with some tidbit I have read and mean to mediate. Worries and inspiration wrestle for my attention. I think today of the great American orator and stateman of the last century, Adlai Stevenson. He once said that a place is free if it safe there to be unpopular. I think about that notion in reference to my own country and the less than stellar reception of ideas presented in this project.

That only makes me appreciate Stevenson's wit the more. There is a story about the man having a speech interrupted during one of his two presidential campaigns. A lady in the crowd cut him off by exclaiming, "All the thinking people in this election will vote for you, Mr. Stevenson!"

To which he quickly rejoined, "But that is not enough, Madam. We need a majority."

That is our challenge here. There's ample evidence that we have garnered the appreciation of thinking people. Our challenge is to muster the rhetorical force to now and again have the proverbial light bulb turn on over the head of the unthinking and the (often) uncaring.

Keep me in your prayers as I keep you in my own.

Thanks for coming back this week.

THINGS ROD HOPES FOR THIS WEEK

1 - Getting my freelance writing career back in high gear so I can earn the ducats to survive.

2 - Developing a rewarding social life in Austin.

3 - An outside job so I can survive.

"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.

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 NewsForge, business columns for Enterprise Leadership and Slashdot. Rust never sleeps.

Our Resident Philosopher has decided to return to Austin, Texas, after over two decades away. Wish him luck..

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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© 2006, GENERATOR 21.

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