Waveland, MS

Went to Kipp brothers on the northside this afternoon for work (we buy balloons for the kids in Ghana). Their warehouse is HUGE. I also bought a couple (4) chess sets for our chess club (for less than $10 total! what a steal!).

This weekend (this Fri) I have our Church festival I'm volenteering for. I'll be face painting, hair coloring, sand arting, and dealing in the casino. Yikes! It actually lasts all weekend.

I wish the spell checker worked on this blogger. I'm such a bad speller - I have to keep asking Maddie how to spell things (like "balloon" and "volenteer").

I had a nice lunch today with DaveL, MikeW, and SamA. I felt so popular! It's great to have such nice friends.

Here's more info on my upcoming trip to Waveland, MS:

I’ll be driving down to St. Clare Parish in Waveland, Mississippi on Saturday, October 21^st and returning Thursday, October 26^th to help with the ongoing Katrina cleanup.

Some background from the St. Bartholomew (Columbus, IN) website:

With the blessing of Archbishop Daniel Buechlein and $15,000 in financial support from the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, St. Bartholomew Parish has joined a collaborative effort with the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and Old St. Pat’s of Chicago to coordinate the long term recovery of St. Clare Parish in Waveland.

The eye of Katrina passed directly over this heavily Catholic town of 7000 people, literally destroying everything within 7 miles of the beach, including their church, school, and more than 75% of their homes. Today, 11 months after the disaster, most residents are still not back in their homes. Many are retired with limited or fixed incomes, have received little or no insurance compensation, and are physically unable to make repairs. They are losing hope of recovery.

The bad part about me going is I'm an unskilled laborer, which means I'll be basically doing stuff I'm not good at, or used to, doing. But, on the upside, the town of Waveland gets like $19/hour from FEMA for each hour I volenteer. Crazy!

So far, my work is kicking in half of the cost of my going (and giving me the time off), and I've raised $20 more. If you want to contribute, you can send me the money or send it to my work (via check or credit card). If you send it to my work, note that it's for "Hurricaine Katrina/Kieron Mitchell".