Surrounded by fur

[WiccanLiberal]

OK gang - we are out of the flipping shelter. Our landlord came up with this itty bitty apartment we can have until our place is ready again. We have no furniture here but two mattresses we brought over from the old place but we are with each other and our pets and that feels great. I don't miss my 2000 roommates at all. Time to go to bed without all the drama and BS we have had to deal with four 13 days.

[jafar00]

Good to hear your ordeal is coming to an end. I hope this experience has made you that little bit stronger and brought your family closer together. Adversity can sometimes bring out the best (and worst) in people. I'm sure the next time this happens, you will take it in your stride.

[taft2012]

Did Votes4Rinos run around the shelter ratting out other evacuees to the FEMA administrators?

[mundame]

OK gang - we are out of the flipping shelter. Our landlord came up with this itty bitty apartment we can have until our place is ready again. We have no furniture here but two mattresses we brought over from the old place but we are with each other and our pets and that feels great. I don't miss my 2000 roommates at all. Time to go to bed without all the drama and BS we have had to deal with four 13 days.


Whoa! You really had a time of it!

We only lost power for three days.

My goodness, I hope you recover your situation even better soon.

[gabosaurus]

Did Votes4Rinos run around the shelter ratting out other evacuees to the FEMA administrators?

The lounge is not a place for partisan rancor. I feel deep empathy for anyone who was displaced by the storm. I hope everyone is doing well and getting what they need.

[Abbey Marie]

WL, when you have more time, I'd love to hear some stories about what it is like in a shelter with pets and all.

Congrats on a big improvement!

[WiccanLiberal]

We dropped the pets off at the animal evacuation center first and I swear they got a better time of it than we did. We visited regularly, walked the dog and petted the kitties but it is certainly not the same as having them all around you. The first couple of days we were there, a woman tried to pass her bulldog pup off as a service dog so the animal could stay with her. I was bothered because the dog obviously was not a service animal and it makes it bad for those who genuinely do need such support.
Imagine army style cots lined up in two full sized gymnasiums - one upstairs and one down. It's cold most of the time because they keep the A/C on to minimize the effect of the hygienically backward. (There were showers available but some refused to use them) You can't eat inside the gym so have to huddle out in the hallway with the meals and the food is bland and protein poor. There are kids running all over because their parents don't control them and many of them were sick so you know where that goes. Kids get their hands all over everything. The lights go off at about 9:30 but the rancor among the residents can erupt at any time so we were treated to screaming arguments almost every night. There were people thrown out for sexual acts attempted in their cots, sent to the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and several perverts arrested for stalking kids. Some of the mothers thought it was OK to bring their sons into the women's locker room - school age kids not toddlers. I turned around several times to find a seven year old staring at my birthday suit. Needless to say you cannot leave anything valuable lying around. Someone went so far as to steal our phone charger. Every time we went out, anything we valued had to be placed in a locker with a small padlock we had to purchase.
After the first five days, it became apparent that those actually displaced by the storm were dwindling while those coming in were chronic social service recipients who would be quite happy to stay in this environment until the new year or longer. We filled our time with efforts to get us and our babies out of there. They filled their time with finding out where the next free stuff could be found. To be sure there were a few decent people there but by the time we left, you would have had a hard time finding any. We are quite happy to be away from the place. Mattresses on the floor, no furniture, but the pet center gave us cases and bags of food for the furbabies when we left. Mind you, we didn't ask for it - they asked if we had enough and hauled stuff out to the car for us.
Well intentioned though the Red Cross volunteers are, the effort was woefully mismanaged in some ways. Most of them were out of towners and had no idea where things like a laundromat or mechanic were. They only set up an on site laundry truck the last 3 days we were there. We knew very little of what was going on and there was no internet in the building and no TV until election day. That may sound petty in the face of such turmoil but the lack of access to news for us was truly distressing.
Time for me to get off here and try and get out of work on time.

[Kathianne]

We dropped the pets off at the animal evacuation center first and I swear they got a better time of it than we did. We visited regularly, walked the dog and petted the kitties but it is certainly not the same as having them all around you. The first couple of days we were there, a woman tried to pass her bulldog pup off as a service dog so the animal could stay with her. I was bothered because the dog obviously was not a service animal and it makes it bad for those who genuinely do need such support.
Imagine army style cots lined up in two full sized gymnasiums - one upstairs and one down. It's cold most of the time because they keep the A/C on to minimize the effect of the hygienically backward. (There were showers available but some refused to use them) You can't eat inside the gym so have to huddle out in the hallway with the meals and the food is bland and protein poor. There are kids running all over because their parents don't control them and many of them were sick so you know where that goes. Kids get their hands all over everything. The lights go off at about 9:30 but the rancor among the residents can erupt at any time so we were treated to screaming arguments almost every night. There were people thrown out for sexual acts attempted in their cots, sent to the hospital for alcohol poisoning, and several perverts arrested for stalking kids. Some of the mothers thought it was OK to bring their sons into the women's locker room - school age kids not toddlers. I turned around several times to find a seven year old staring at my birthday suit. Needless to say you cannot leave anything valuable lying around. Someone went so far as to steal our phone charger. Every time we went out, anything we valued had to be placed in a locker with a small padlock we had to purchase.
After the first five days, it became apparent that those actually displaced by the storm were dwindling while those coming in were chronic social service recipients who would be quite happy to stay in this environment until the new year or longer. We filled our time with efforts to get us and our babies out of there. They filled their time with finding out where the next free stuff could be found. To be sure there were a few decent people there but by the time we left, you would have had a hard time finding any. We are quite happy to be away from the place. Mattresses on the floor, no furniture, but the pet center gave us cases and bags of food for the furbabies when we left. Mind you, we didn't ask for it - they asked if we had enough and hauled stuff out to the car for us.
Well intentioned though the Red Cross volunteers are, the effort was woefully mismanaged in some ways. Most of them were out of towners and had no idea where things like a laundromat or mechanic were. They only set up an on site laundry truck the last 3 days we were there. We knew very little of what was going on and there was no internet in the building and no TV until election day. That may sound petty in the face of such turmoil but the lack of access to news for us was truly distressing.
Time for me to get off here and try and get out of work on time.

That does not sound like an improvement over what the South encountered after Katrina. I'm so sorry for you and voted4. I do hope insurance kicks in and you find yourselves in an even better place than mattresses and furbabies. You both are in my prayers.

[gabosaurus]

I hope FEMA has made improvements in shelter arrangements since Katrina. One Mississippi shelter had a "no pets" rule, to the point where they excluded two people with service dogs. FEMA said it was "for the safety of all." I recall them being bashed repeatedly for that.

Many others got FEMA trailers that were conveniently sealed and painted days before distribution, to the point where the fumes made them impossible to live in. FEMA decried the "ungrateful" folks who refused the trailers, telling them that they should be able to live with "a few inconveniences."

[Kathianne]

I hope FEMA has made improvements in shelter arrangements since Katrina. One Mississippi shelter had a "no pets" rule, to the point where they excluded two people with service dogs. FEMA said it was "for the safety of all." I recall them being bashed repeatedly for that.

Many others got FEMA trailers that were conveniently sealed and painted days before distribution, to the point where the fumes made them impossible to live in. FEMA decried the "ungrateful" folks who refused the trailers, telling them that they should be able to live with "a few inconveniences."

As I posted a day or two ago, 24 out of a request of over 2,700+, unlikely. That was for Staten Island alone.

[Abbey Marie]

Thanks, WL. That must have been very difficult. I'm glad your pets were well taken care of, at least, so you could have a little less stress.

[Voted4Reagan]

I will put in my two cents on the subject as my better half has already touched on it.

Life in a shelter like this is an encompasses all social and economic are strata. There were people in there from very nice areas such as the North Shore of Long Island (Locust valley, Bayville, Oyster Bay), a few from my neighborhood in South Freeport, and many from the area of Long Beach/Island Park/Far Rockaway that .are quite poor.

here we all were together... all equal in circumstance and yet so far apart in ideology and methods. The people from the better off areas filled their days with Reading and work while those from the poorer areas felt content to sit down, do nothing, Drink, use drugs and try to escape reality in any way possible rather then to confront it..

While some of us worked hard to get OUT of the Shelter many felt it was Christmas... every day the same people lined up at the clothing drops and got more and more free clothing and supplies from the Red Cross and Salvation Army... and every day it was the same ones!

every day they would get shoes, sneakers, sweatshirts, jackets, baby supplies and evrthing else for free while complaining that FEMA hadn't gotten them their Emergency Checks yet. BUT HERE IS THE KICKER... every night they would go out and spend 30 or 40 dollars on McDonalds and other fast food to feed their kids while still eating their meals provided at the shelter. And as tim progressed and word got around, hundreds of others from other unaffected and power restored communities came and started to siphon off the supplies meant for those who had lost everything.

To those who are used to being on the system it was a field day... it was christmas every day and the Red Cross was Santa Claus! To those of us that have worked all our lives it was a living nightmare watching these leeches suck off the blood of the taxpayers and good hearted donations of people trying to help. Those of us with drive and ambition thought of nothing but improving our housing situation and getting out of this hell hole!

The Nights were the worst... although the quiet time was supposed to be a at 930pm the noise almost never subsided.. These welfare mothers and fathers allowed their kids to aimlessly roam the halls while they sat and talked to their friends. I observed several packs of these roving hooligans start ripping up the tile floors in the bathrooms, pulling down ceiling tiles, breaking light fixtures, destroying sinks and plumbing fixtures and locking each other in lockers in the shower area. Never once did MOM discipline her kids or attempt to keep them in line. and woe be it if you said something to them... then the mothers would get all agitated and bring their wrath down on you! I frequently told these punks to knock it off and told them if they didnt the police would be notified. They would leave and i was often left to deal with a welfare mom telling me "HOW DARE YOU YELL AT MY ChILD". To which I replied...IF YOU SPENT MORE TIME WATCHING YOUR KIDS AND LESS TIME SOCIALIZING WITH YOUR FRIENDS I WOULDNT HAVE TO.

Their were crimes of all kinds committed on a daily basis. Petty theft, grand larceny, drug sales, alcohol violations, assaults, domestic abuse, child abuse, pedophilia... all committed by these leeches of humanity. I even saw one guy hit a police officer and get tazed for his troubles.... that was a real pot stirrer... as it happened 50 african americans started to video with cellphones the incident saying how they'd help him sue the police... I told the police i saw the whole thing and said if they needed a witness they could call me.

In closing ... it would seem that there are two disticnt types of people... those who are ambitious and want to advance their position by hard work, labor and education and those who would lie wrapped in ignorance and lack of ambition content to let government supply everything for them while exerting no effort of their own.

Funny thing....all of those that were content to leech off the system and caused all these problems cheered wildly when OBAMA was announced the winner the other night... those who were doing all they could to get out of this hell remained silent when Romney gave his concession speech.

Everyday is Christmas when you have Liberals in power....

Dont tell me I am wrong... I was there and saw it every day...

[Abbey Marie]

This kind of abuse is one of the reasons we give to organizations like Samaritan's Purse, instead of United Way, Red Cross, etc.

My idea of Hell is to be in a room full of leeches cheering Obama's victory so they can go on to be even bigger leeches for 4 more years. You deserve a medal.