MetaChat - Hurricane Ike

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15 September 2008

Hurricane Ike Took out a big chunk of the beach town where my family used to stay when I was a kid.→[More:]I've got a lot of great childhood and teenage memories of this place, where the houses on the barrier beach were always built on stilts because of the frequent flooding, and life was relaxed, and everyone swam and ate and played and was in a good, beach mood. It looks like a pile of toothpicks. Thus passes away a glory from the earth.

Despite my sadness, I could not help but relish a very Texan detail:

Of particular concern is a resident who collects exotic animals who is now holed up in a Baptist church with his pet lion. "We're not going in there," Jones said. "We know where he (the lion) is on the food chain."

post by: Miko at: 15:20 | 8 comments

I guess it's more than a chunk, it's pretty much gone except for a few buildings.

Found the pics via this Flickr conversation.

posted by Miko 15 September | 15:22

Very sad. I'm sorry to hear this, Miko.

(Dude, however, should not be "collecting" exotic animals... I firmly believe a lion needs to go be a lion and be free, not someone's bad-ass housepet.)

posted by loiseau 15 September | 18:17

Oh, loiseau, of course I agree with you too, but it's Texas and it's crazy. It can't be helped.

I once visited a marginal fly-by-night zoo in East Texas where two old retired circus folks were raising dingos, kangaroos, wombats, and yes, lions, completely outside any sort of formal regulatory structure. They could see we liked animals, so they brought out the baby lion cub for us to hold. It was one big, heavy kitty.

More on the lion story (via MeFi).

posted by Miko 15 September | 20:01

I completely missed the guy in a bear suit. People are strange.

posted by puke & cry 15 September | 20:51

Camp before Katrina, Camp after Katrina.

My heart goes out to you.

posted by ColdChef 15 September | 20:55

Ohhhh, Miko. I'm sorry.

posted by brujita 15 September | 23:27

Awww, ColdChef.

I know a lot of people had their lives come down around them - so I'm not really sad for myself, just sorry for the loss of a lovely community. Looking for the pictures of Crystal Beach was just a way to find a small personal connection to what's going on in another part of the country.

posted by Miko 15 September | 23:32

Geez, according to NPR, the towns are really just gone. I just heard one guy, choked up, saying something like "I've lived here 66 years, and it took me all day to find even one landmark that will help me see where my house had been."

posted by Miko 18 September | 16:40

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