So what are people doing for the weekend?

Cookout/party Saturday afternoon/evening/into the wee hours.

Going to help clean/set up for the party tonight (in a few minutes, actually).

Sunday, having coffee (or, most likely, late lunch/early dinner) with an old old old friend who's in town for the weekend.

Somewhere in there I need to wedge in hitting the gym and cleaning out at least one closet.

I suggest you go. I didn't get to. :(

Not sure how up to it I'll be after a full day of running around Gilroy in head-to-toe black scolding people and ranting, but I feel like I'll regret it horribly if I don't at least make the attempt.

JZ, where is the Faire? I suspect I may not do much of anything tomorrow, since I am still not 100 percent, and I have traveling of my own to do starting Wednesday, but it could happen.

The universe owes me a NAP.

Hey, JZ, you were supposed to give me a heads-up when your Faire started. Link please?

Tomorrow: bridal shower (which I still have to get a gift for, eek!)

Ha! I have a gift! Which I got last night. I should probably wrap it after I finish watching SciFi Friday.

I also need to do at least one load of laundry so I have something clean to wear to the shower. Crap.

possibly seeing the Decembrists Saturday night

I just saw a different schedule and it said they were playing at The Fillmore on Sunday and Monday. We need to double check.

The Decembrists at The Fillmore, though. That's just...perfect.

shrift!

I need your mailing address. I think you sent it to me before, but I misplaced it.

I've got glam rock to send you. Also, Neo-Glam. Maybe more.

hecubot at gmail is good.

It opens tomorrow - info is right here. I'll only be working Saturdays, and sporadically at that due to Emmett's birthday, my grandfather's memorial service, and other family stuff, but I'll definitely be there tomorrow, the following Saturday, probably October 1, and definitely all of closing weekend.

From the NY Times, the reason for the delayed Federal response to Katrina. It's so fucked up.

******************

WASHINGTON, Sept. 8 - As New Orleans descended into chaos last week and Louisiana's governor asked for 40,000 soldiers, President Bush's senior advisers debated whether the president should speed the arrival of active-duty troops by seizing control of the hurricane relief mission from the governor.

For reasons of practicality and politics, officials at the Justice Department and the Pentagon, and then at the White House, decided not to urge Mr. Bush to take command of the effort. Instead, the Washington officials decided to rely on the growing number of National Guard personnel flowing into Louisiana, who were under Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco's control.

The debate began after officials realized that Hurricane Katrina had exposed a critical flaw in the national disaster response plans created after the Sept. 11 attacks. According to the administration's senior domestic security officials, the plan failed to recognize that local police, fire and medical personnel might be incapacitated.

As criticism of the response to Hurricane Katrina has mounted, one of the most pointed questions has been why more troops were not available more quickly to restore order and offer aid. Interviews with officials in Washington and Louisiana show that as the situation grew worse, they were wrangling with questions of federal/state authority, weighing the realities of military logistics and perhaps talking past each other in the crisis.

To seize control of the mission, Mr. Bush would have had to invoke the Insurrection Act, which allows the president in times of unrest to command active-duty forces into the states to perform law enforcement duties. But decision makers in Washington felt certain that Ms. Blanco would have resisted surrendering control, as Bush administration officials believe would have been required to deploy active-duty combat forces before law and order had been re-established.

While combat troops can conduct relief missions without the legal authority of the Insurrection Act, Pentagon and military officials say that no active-duty forces could have been sent into the chaos of New Orleans on Wednesday or Thursday without confronting law-and-order challenges.

But just as important to the administration were worries about the message that would have been sent by a president ousting a Southern governor of another party from command of her National Guard, according to administration, Pentagon and Justice Department officials.

I just saw a different schedule and it said they were playing at The Fillmore on Sunday and Monday. We need to double check.

Sunday and Monday. [link]