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Still trying to have a weekend, but every once in a while reality slaps me in the face and I get all agitated again. Every time I turn on the TV or radio, that happens, so I tried to take a nap. Forget it. I can't nap. I just lay there and drool, but I never actually fall completely to sleep.

And then there was the sight on one of the cable news channels of some Katrina victims on a rooftop of what seemed to be a typical retail strip, surrounded by water lapping the second floor of the buildings. They weren't waving towels or trying to get the chopper's attention. Instead, the guys- about three or four of them- were under a blue portable canopy providing shade, sitting in plastic pation chairs, drinking from styrofoam cups, a portable grill set up beside them and coolers at their feet. They look like they were tailgating before a Saints game. And they reminded me of what I love about New Orleans, the attitude, the laissez les bon temps roulez thing that probably caused some people to lose their lives ("ain't gonna let no rainstorm push me around") but defines the city. We know it has to be rebuilt, as unwise as rebuilding a city in a below-sea-level bowl is, because there has to be a port in the Delta to ship out agriculture from the Midwest. And there has to be a city there because there has to be a place for the folks who work the port and work on the Gulf oil rigs to live. And there has to be a city there because there's no place else for people like those guys kicking back on the roof waiting for rescue but in no particular rush- that's New Orleans. There has to be a New Orleans. And there will be again.

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Maybe the government screwed up, but there are private interests picking up some slack. Here's a smart idea: a registry of phone numbers, so survivors can register their numbers and people searching to see if someone's OK can check their number in a search:

(via Instapundit)

Good idea. As is this registry of missing folks, where you can put in the vitals of a missing friend or relative and a contact so people can get in touch with you:

Katrina Finder.

And credit where credit is due: Air America Radio (!) has a free voice mail system so survivors can enter their number and people searching for friends or relatives can dial in, enter the number, and get a contact message. The info's here.

I hope you find everyone you're looking for, safe and sound.

And if WWOZ's web page is correct, good news: on their list of New Orleans musicians found safe is Alex Chilton.

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We'll be doing something sadly uncharacteristic tonight- our civic duty, sort of. I'd prefer being at the ballpark tonight- think Barry will play?- or at home relaxing, but we'll be at the city council hearing instead. Should be at least a little interesting, since the main topic is consideration of environmental studies of a plan to build a big development of McMansions up the street from us. There wouldn't be much of a dispute except for one small item: the owners want to build on land that's prone to, er, landslides. Previous projects in the area have caused the land to move- the main road is repaved every few months because the land beneath it keeps moving- and it seems folly to build where there's a more-than-small chance that the whole thing might slide across the road (into our neighborhood, naturally). And there's another small matter- last Spring's mudslides, caused by drainage from... yep, the area where they want to build. There's been a moratorium on development of that land for 25 years, the owners bought it knowing of the moratorium, and they're applying for an exclusion so they can build 84 homes on 60 acres, displacing and then recompacting 4 million cubic yards of soil.

In a landslide zone.

And by the time the disaster happens, the developers will have sold all the properties and run off with their millions in profits.

There'll be dueling environmental reports, one from the developers that says, well, we may be able to build on the land and maybe nothing will happen, we dunno, and another from opponents that says IT'S A LANDSLIDE ZONE, DAMMIT! And I expect the usual parade of dull speakers and weirdos who always get up to speak at these things. We've been here over 10 years now, and this will be the first civic anything we've done other than to pay business taxes and property taxes and vote.

I feel so... local.

Anyway, we're going and this could be the start of more civic involvement or maybe the last thing like this we ever do. We'll see.

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Oh, my Lord, was that dull.

The crowd overflowed the surprisingly small, spartan council chambers, the 60 or so plastic chairs inadequate to hold the throng, so after a brief ceremony involving a Boy Scouts color guard, they took those of us who didn't get seats to another room where the meeting was being televised. Of course, it was being televised at home on cable, so while there was some benefit in showing up in numbers, the whole exercise turned out to be pointless. We stood at the back of the second room, then sat on the floor (no seats there, either), then squirmed while listening to a parade of speakers, each of whom set forth good reasons that the Environmental Impact Report prepared by the developer was bogus. And it was all very important, and I started to lose consciousness by about 8:30; we left at about 9:20 and we're home now, and the meeting is still going on. They won't be voting on anything tonight- it was purely for public comment.

When we were in the chamber, I had a sickening flashback. It was 20 years ago, and I was doing my brief time as a practicing lawyer, advising a town in New Jersey on municipal law, and there they were, a bunch of Stuffy White Guys in Suits. The same as the council members today. The same as all the people I see at the NAB conventions.

I'm gonna stay away from those council meetings for a while.

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Today's trip to the gym featured the following:

1. CREEPY OLD GUY WHO PICKS THE LOCKER NEXT TO YOURS, DISREGARDING THE FACT THAT THE RATHER EXPANSIVE LOCKER ROOM IS LARGELY EMPTY: This one looked like a cross between the "Pepperidge Fahm Remembahs" guy and Wilfrid Brambell-as-Paul's-Grandfather-in- "A Hard Day's Night" (as opposed to Wilfrid Brambell-as-Albert Steptoe, which would be both creepy and unsanitary).

He cheerfully walked right up to me, opened the locker next to mine, dumped all of his stuff there, then pulled up three stools and placed his stuff all over them. Do you say something to a guy who does that, or do you just ignore it? I tried to ignore it. I did hold my tongue. But, dude, next time, give me some space.

2. GUY IN SHOWER WITH EMBARRASSING BUT UNAVOIDABLY OBVIOUS RASH: I wasn't looking for it. He was clear on the other end of the showers, a long way away. But you could not miss it. It was in a particular place that made it look particularly disgusting. I know he can't help it, but it was the kind of thing that makes you want to just immediately coat yourself in Gold Bond. I know it will cause nightmares.

3. GUY TALKING TO HIMSELF: Fearsome, large man hogging the cable pull machine, listening to something on a CD player, muttering with some evident anger. I thought he might be rapping along to the music until he detached the CD player, placed it on a bench, left the headphones on, and kept muttering. I needed to use the cable pull, but I gave him a wide berth. And, later, I realized that he may have hit upon the secret of being able to hog a machine or bench without being bothered. Nobody tells a guy who's talking to himself that he's over the 20 minute limit.

4. IMPATIENT GUY: I just started doing crunches when I felt a presence looming over me. Sure enough, it was Impatient Guy, standing at the foot of the bench, scowling, making sure I knew he needed to use the bench and I should get out of the way because he's far too important to be kept waiting.

I slowed down. Do NOT rush me.

Missing today: annoying kids. School's back in. My favorite time of year.

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I rarely remember my dreams. When I do, I realize why that must be: because my dreams are unbelievably mundane.

This morning, I woke up with the alarm clock, a rarity- I usually wake up 20 minutes or so before the radio clicks on and I get an earful of KFI. The alarm's a fail-safe for the rare times I'm actually sleeping at 4:30 am. Today, I was, and I was dreaming. Okay, Dream Doctor, analyze this:

I'm in a college building, a student center of some kind, on a campus that doesn't resemble my alma maters or any other college I would recognize. I'm sitting there, not waiting for anything in particular, just sitting. And about two or three people come by at random intervals and ask me where a particular room is, and I tell them the general direction and that there's a map of the building on a bulletin board across the way. They thank me and go look at the map. I go back to sitting.

The end.

Maybe the sudden George Noory blast interrupted the story before the big payoff, but I don't think so- I think that was it. That's what's going on in my mind. Other people have complex dreams with several layers of meaning. I have dreams where nothing happens, I'm not doing anything, and there's no conflict or stress or anything.

It's possible, now that I think about it, that the dream's about how I tend to be the guy who everyone comes to for information, for answers to weird questions for which nobody else has a quick answer. (That propensity led to an "Ask Perry" segment on the morning show at one of my old radio stations; it's my burden in life, I suppose) But the lack of concern or stress in the dream doesn't really indicate any feeling about that situation- no pleasure, no pain- and it doesn't bother me in real life, so what's the dream saying?

Apparently, nothing. It just... is.

It's official: I am the most boring person on Earth. My subconscious fantasies are blank.

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This might become a habit, but for the second night in a row, I remembered my dream. I never remember dreams, so for two in a row to occur, the stars must be particularly correctly aligned.

Unlike yesterday's terminally dull dream, this one was easy, I think, to interpret. Here's the rundown:

I'm in a large, ornate banquet hall. There are two long tables, and I'm at the head of one of them. The place is crowded and very busy with diners and waiters and busboys buzzing about. Dinner is being served- turkey with gravy, mashed potatoes, and apple pie. The dinners are being brought out and consumed, and I haven't been served.

I realize that I'm the only one who hasn't gotten dinner and I get a waitress' attention. She tells me she'll be right back and disappears. Meanwhile, the other diners are getting up and leaving. I wait for a few minutes, then I get up to go to the kitchen to find out what's going on, and I see my dinner plates, one on top of the other, squashed and waiting to be taken away to be cleaned.

And I wake up.

"That's easy," Fran told me when I related the dream to her this morning. "You feel deprived of food." I've been watching my diet lately, since I've gained a few pounds. But no, that's not it. Let me see if I have this one nailed:

I've been feeling a little unappreciated lately, careerwise. I've been kinda feeling like I don't get enough credit for the stuff I've done and the stuff I do. And yesterday, when I heard a radio host do a topic I know he got from my All Access column and give another site credit for it, it just rubbed me the wrong way- I don't expect credit for those topics, but if you're gonna give credit, give it to the right place, you know what I'm sayin'? I'm just feeling, well, overlooked.

(SFX: world's tiniest violin)

Plus, I'm hungry.

(I liked it better when I didn't remember my dreams.)

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Three in a row.

This time, the dream involved being at a convention in a place that looked like a sanitized version of Bourbon Street. I was walking up the street in the evening; it was largely empty, and I was looking for a place to eat. And at one place, the maitre d' said "Oh, you don't want to go to that place"- he gestured across the street- "Danny DeVito's there." And, sure enough, there he was, sitting at a sidewalk table, alone. The end.

Too easy: I really AM hungry from the diet. I'm going to a convention in a couple of weeks. New Orleans is obvious. And Danny DeVito was mentioned in a Bill Simmons column I read yesterday, cited as a lousy director.

Or it could indicate deep psychological issues. But I'm sticking to the diet-convention-hurricane-column theory.

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