I’ve been monitoring the post-hurricane devastation and chaos in New Orleans this week with much apprehension and sadness. I rang in the 2005 New Year in New Orleans, and lived in the French Quarter for the first three months of this year. Moreover, I’d long planned to go there this week, en route to a magazine assignment in Greece (”Looking for a hotel in New Orleans?” a Travelocity.com automated message chirped in my inbox this morning. “Try one of these!” I don’t think so).

I can’t really add any gravity or perspective to the reports that have been coming out of Lousiana and Mississippi, so I’ll just urge everyone to donate to legitimate relief organizations and do what you can on some small level.

On a rather surreal note, my old New Orleans friends Joshua Clark and Ellen Harris, who are still holed up in Josh’s apartment near Jackson Square in the French Quarter, have been regular telephone guests on NPR’s Talk of the Nation this week. It looks like they may well be on today’s show, too. Stay safe, you two!