Rambling Rhodes

My Katrina Q&A

As incredibly unlikely as it may seem, I, Ryan Rhodes, keeper of this blog, managed to score an unprecedented interview with Hurricane Katrina. I won't divulge my methods or my contacts who helped coordinate this astounding sit down interview, but you know who you are, and I thank you.

ME: Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me, Katrina. How are you?

Katrina: Pretty much exhausted really. Worn out. Dissipated.

ME: Okay. Well, I have to get this one out of the way. Why'd you do it?

Katrina: A girl's gotta let off some steam once in awhile, you know. There I was, off in the Atlantic, thinking "this tropical storm status is just not for me." I always wanted to be more. I wanted to be SOMETHING.

ME: But, a Category 5? Wasn't that a bit over the top?

Katrina: In retrospect, maybe. But, there hadn't been a Category 5 since, what? 1969? I figured "why not me?"

ME: But, you killed a lot of people and did a lot of damage.

Katrina: Helloooooo?! I'm a HURRICANE! That's what we do.

ME: I suppose. A lot of people have attributed your unusual strength to the phenomenon of global warming. What are your thoughts?

Katrina: They're just trying to steal my thunder, so to speak. I'm a hurricane; a naturally occurring weather event. And since when has weather ever, in the history of recorded time, been predictable? Sure, I was a Category 5, but the reason there's a Category 5 classification is because, you know, there have been Category 5 hurricanes in the past. I was a powerful bitch because, well, I'm a powerful bitch.

ME: Doesn't sound like you have much in the way of remorse.

Katrina: Look, I'm a hurricane. I can propel 2x4s through walls. I can reduce housing complexes to toothpicks. I can dump enough rain to flood most major metropolitan areas, especially those that are already below sea level. In other words, I can, and will, deal out the hurt when I arrive. If you can't understand that, then you're just kind of dumb.

ME: Were you at all surprised by the number of people who didn't evacuate the coastal communities?

Katrina: Not really. People are funny that way. Be honest now: now many tornado sirens have gone off in your lifetime and, instead of running to the basement, you went outside to take a look?

ME: . . .

Katrina: Come on. . .

ME: All right, probably most of them.

Katrina: Exactly. A lot of people just don't have any concept of what Mother Nature can dish out until they've experienced it firsthand. If you had walked outside and taken a few licks from a tornado, I'm betting you'd be hightailing to the deepest cavern you can find then next time a siren blows. As it is, because you haven't, you'll probably be right outside the next time. Right?

ME: . . .

Katrina: Come on. . .

ME: All right. Probably.

Katrina: Thank you. It always amazes me that people live at the base of Mt. Vesuvius, and Mt. Fuji and even on the currently-active volcano in Hawaii. I mean, from a common sense standpoint, those people are fucking insane. Those mountains are gonna fuckin' blow. It's gonna happen. At some point, a lot of you fucking people are going to die. Likewise, if you live on the Gulf coast, powerful bitches like me are gonna come along. It's inevitable. And yet every time, every fucking time, after all the bodies are piled up and the damage is calculated, people STILL stand around and ask "how could this happen?" And then the news reports start rolling and before you know, people are so busy blaming themselves and others, they'll forget that a Goddamned hurricane was the cause of it all in the first place. It's pretty damned amusing, really, from my perspective.

ME: Well, maybe, but you have to agree that the relief effort from bottom to top was pretty well fudged.

Katrina: Oh, yeah, no doubt. But, here's the thing: how do you prepare for something like me? How do you plan for relief after something like me? Not to thump my own chest or anything, but I'll say it again, I'm a powerful bitch. I'm a mushroom cloud laying motherfucker, motherfucker. I'm the guns of the Navarone. Every time my fingers touch brain, I. . . sorry, where was I? Oh yeah, my point is, when a bitch like me comes along, and people stick around to see what I can do, and you have every variable in the world stacked up against you, including already basically being under water, you're going to have yourselves one big-assed disaster. Good luck coordinating a seamless relief effort after I come knocking. That's not to say you little bi-pedal fuckers didn't mess up all across the board but, I gotta tell you. . . if I were you, and I went up against me, I'd probably screw up plenty of things, too.

ME: Do you think the Gulf coast will recover?

Katrina: Oh, yeah, because that's what you weird little fuckers do. I may belittle you for not being able to stand up against me, but I have to admit, you're tenacious little bastards. I'll give you that.

ME: Hurricane Katrina, thanks again for taking the time to speak with me.

Katrina: No problem. I have to go now. I'm gearing up to recollect myself and dump about four feet of snow on a bunch of dumbasses living in Rochester, Minn., sometime around January 10. It'll be a hoot.

Posted by Ryan at September 14, 2005 12:07 AM | TrackBack