Hi all -

I wanted to give a quick update from what is truly the BIG state of Texas. I have seen much more then my share of it over the past 4 days... close to 600 miles to give an approximitation. I am currently sitting in a conference room at the Will Rogers Convention Center in Dallas, where hopefully I will be staying for the remainder of my tour of duty down here. The room is a makeshift command post, movie style with a big square of tables covered with chords, laptops, phones and TVs.

This location is what is called a DRC, or Disaster Recovery Center. It started as a shelter but has transitioned to more of an outreach operation. It is a place for refugees to come and register for assistance, but also a command post for sending out teams into the local areas going shelter to shelter to get people in a more stable position in regards to housing and employment.

My duties are to serve as a liaison between 5 Congressional offices and FEMA. This basically means trouble shooting concerns the Congressmen have about issues arising in their area as relates to FEMA. A small snapshot are things such as reimbursement issues for public entities, disgruntled refugees and shelters, miscommunications about what is really going on. It is a good fit for my background. However, coming in to the monstrosity of Federal Government with a new-born's knowledge has proven challenging. FEMA has a complicated operations structure and a frightening obsession with acronyms. Not to mention that FEMA is not really a teacher's favorite right now: my FEMA badge is enough to get me shot in some parts of the country. But the steep learning curve has done wonders for my education. So most of my day I spend running around yapping on my FEMA-issued cell phone and looking very important... but I really have no clue what is going on. Its an exercise in masquerade.

The whole thing is a fascinating dichotomy of organized chaos: I can't quite make up my mind if I'm impressed that things get done out of all the murkiness, or I'm disgusted by how haphazard it all is. Maybe a combination of both.

I have only two complaints. One, I am tired and have difficulty relaxing. Since I've been here I've driven from Dallas to Denton, Denton to Austin, then Austin to Fort Worth. The freeway system is a living nightmare beyond your wildest fears and makes for an exhausting trip. Constantly unpacking only to pack again also makes me weary. That, on top of 12 hour days that start at 6:00 Texas time, or 4:00 Oregon time, makes me tired. I get back to the hotel around 8:00 or so and just want to go to sleep. But I wake up on edge having no time to decompress. Second complaint: the water here is brewed in the pits of hell. It tastes, and I'm not even exaggerating, like liquefied mold. I've been in the south before and tasted bad water, but this stuff is horrendous. I wouldn't feed it to my dog.

Anyway, just wanted to say hi to all and let you know I wasn't swimming through sewage in New Orleans. Just drinking it out of the tap in Fort Worth.

Love to all...