Sitting in the library, where at least there’s air conditioning and no cover charge.

Grr.

Being the first town of decent size one might encounter whilst fleeing Alabama’s Gulf Coast, Tuscaloosa is currently playing host to a number of hurricane refugees.

As this is the beginning of fall, our school’s first home game is this coming weekend.

This school’s football team having a fan base that stands out as particularly rabid even among the nutters who are college sports fans, all the hotel rooms were already reserved from tomorrow onward.

Realizing this university exists largely as an excuse to have a football team, the Powers That Be declined to postpone this weekend’s game even though going through with it will mean local hostelries will tonight start kicking out people whose homes and livelihoods were just destroyed.

Wishing to portray something passing for humanity in their cold, small hearts, the Powers That Be are opening up the Student Recreation Center (a fancy gym, in other words) for the hosting of displaced regugees.

I think I’m actually too bitter over this to be angry, but give me time.

(The one thing that can possibly pass for good out of this: the Rec Center having now been established as a central location for the refugees, there is now somewhere I, and we, can concentrate our volunteer efforts and material donations.)

Update: An intrepid reporter has called around to local hotels and has found that they’ve all agreed not to kick out any refugees already holding rooms, which is great news. These hoteliers really do deserve to be commended.

The temperature at which a sturdy plastic cup bursts into flame is at or lower than the temperature at which a standard house candle burns. This means that, contrary to what one may assume, sturdy plastic cups make very poor candleholders indeed.

Addendum: The sight of an orange cup melting and burning and commingling with the candle it holds is really quite a lovely sight, a fierce sunrise trapped on an end-table, but its surprising beauty probably isn’t worth the risk of losing one’s home.

Atrios offers up two near-identical photos from AP coverage of Katrina. He also provides their near-identical AP captions.

The only difference between the two photos and captions? The first is of a black man swim home after foraging for food in the wake of the disaster. The second is of a couple of white folks doing the same. No problem thus far, but there is one other teensy, tiny wee little difference in the captions:

The black man, according to AP, has recklessly looted his groceries from some innocent shopkeep’s supply, whilst the white people have bravely and resourcefully found their food. Those enterprising white folk.

You really should check out the link above, because it’s truly unbelievable. Just make sure your most recent meal is well-digested before you peek.

Picked this up from Pandagon and couldn’t resist.

The idea: Go to Music Outfitters, type your high-school graduation year into the Search box, and choose the result for the top 100 songs of that year. Take the list and bold the ones you like, strike out the ones you hate, and leave be the ones you don’t know or are neutral toward. Mine:

Top 100 Hits of 1992 / Top 100 Songs of 1992

1. End Of The Road, Boyz II Men
2. Baby Got Back, Sir Mix A-lot
3. Jump, Kris Kross
4. Save The Best For Last, Vanessa Williams
5. Baby-Baby-Baby, TLC
6. Tears In Heaven, Eric Clapton
7. My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It), En Vogue
8. Under The Bridge, Red Hot Chili Peppers
9. All 4 Love, Color Me Badd
10. Just Another Day, Jon Secada
11. I Love Your Smile, Shanice
12. To Be With You, Mr. Big
13. I’m Too Sexy, Right Said Fred
14. Black Or White, Michael Jackson
15. Achy Breaky Heart, Billy Ray Cyrus
16. I’ll Be There, Mariah Carey
17. November Rain, Guns N’ Roses
18. Life Is A Highway, Tom Cochrane
19. Remember The Time, Michael Jackson
20. Finally, CeCe Peniston
21. This Used To Be My Playground, Madonna
22. Sometimes Love Just Ain’t Enough, Patty Smyth
23. Can’t Let Go, Mariah Carey
24. Jump Around, House Of Pain
25. Diamonds and Pearls, Prince and The N.P.G.
26. Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me, George Michael and Elton John
27. Masterpiece, Atlantic Starr
28. If You Asked Me To, Celine Dion
29. Giving Him Something He Can Feel, En Vogue
30. Live and Learn, Joe Public
31. Come and Talk To Me, Jodeci
32. Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana
33. Humpin’ Around, Bobby Brown
34. Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover, Sophie B. Hawkins
35. Tell Me What You Want Me To Do, Teven Campbell
36. Ain’t 2 Proud 2 Beg, TLC
37. It’s So Hard To Say Goodbye To Yesterday, Boyz II Men
38. Move This, Technotronic
39. Bohemian Rhapsody, Queen
40. Tennessee, Arrested Development
41. The Best Things In Life Are Free, Luther Vandross and Janet Jackson
42. Make It Happen, Mariah Carey
43. The One, Elton John
44. Set Adrift On Memory Bliss, P.M. Dawn
45. Stay, Shakespear’s Sister
46. 2 Legit 2 Quit, Hammer
47. Please Don’t Go, K.W.S.
48. Breakin’ My Heart (Pretty Brown Eyes), Mint Condition
49. Wishing On A Star, Cover Girls
50. She’s Playing Hard To Get, Hi-Five
51. I’d Die Without You, P.M. Dawn
52. Good For Me, Amy Grant
53. All I Want, Toad The Wet Sprocket
54. When A Man Loves A Woman, Michael Bolton
55. I Can’t Dance, Genesis
56. Hazard, Richard Marx
57. Mysterious Ways, U2
58. Too Funky, George Michael
59. How Do You Talk To An Angel, Heights
60. One, U2
61. Keep On Walkin’, CeCe Peniston
62. Hold On My Heart, Genesis
63. The Way I Feel About You, Karyn White
64. Beauty and The Beast, Calms Dion and Peabo Bryson
65. Warm It Up, Kris Kross
66. In The Closet, Michael Jackson
67. People Everyday, Arrested Development
68. No Son Of Nine, Genesis
69. Wildside, Marky Mark and The Funky Bunch
70. Do I Have To Say The Words?, Bryan Adams
71. Friday I’m In Love, Cure
72. Everything About You, Ugly Kid Joe
73. Blowing Kisses In The Wind, Paula Abdul
74. Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven, Bryan Adams
75. Rhythm Is A Dancer, Snap
76. Addams Groove, Hammer
77. Missing You Now, Michael Bolton
78. Back To The Hotel, N2Deep
79. Everything Changes, Kathy Troccoli
80. Have You Ever Needed Somone So Bad, Def Leppard
81. Take This Heart, Richard Marx
82. When I Look Into Your Eyes, Firehouse
83. I Wanna Love You, Jade
84. Uhh Ahh, Boyz II Men
85. Real Love, Mary J. Blige
86. Justified and Ancient, The KLF
87. Slow Motion, Color Me Badd
88. What About Your Friends, TLC
89. Thinkin’ Back, Color Me Badd
90. Would I Lie To You?, Charles and Eddie
91. That’s What Love Is For, Amy Grant
92. Keep Coming Back, Richard Marx
93. Free Your Mind, En Vogue
94. Keep It Comin’, Keith Sweat
95. Just Take My Heart, Mr. Big
96. I Will Remember You, Amy Grant
97. We Got A Love Thang, CeCe Peniston
98. Let’s Get Rocked, Def Leppard
99. They Want EFX, Das EFX
100. I Can’t Make You Love Me, Bonnie Raitt

Couple of notes: I suspect I would hate several of the songs I left unchanged if I could actually remember them, especially the Amy Grant and Color Me Badd ones. Also, I very much liked “Bohemian Rhapsody” at the time but it has been way overplayed since.

(Also, “Mysterious Ways” ranked higher than “One”? My atheism is confirmed.)

Posting from Bad Ass again. Nothing to say, just wanted to express my displeasure and mild disbelief with the fact that the scuttlebut has it that my building will likely be without power for a couple more days.

The disbelief, see, comes from the fact that every single other block along University has power. All of ‘em. Every one. It’s just us that are doing without.

I’m sure there are other places in the city still without power–Frannie still didn’t have it back as of late this afternoon–but it’s just galling to be situated between bright glowing lights while having to do without myself.

Grr.

I’m here leeching off the Crimson Cafe’s wifi, not willing to stand in line 15 minutes for a cup of joe. They’ll get over it, I’m sure.

Power went out at around 8:30 last night, and while I’m sure the electro pixies are hard at work there’s still no waying of knowing when I’ll again be juiced. This is sad, as I still have no teapot and use an electric grinder for my coffee. I am sans caffeine for the foreseeable future, eep.

Tuscalossa, mercifully, avoided becoming a disaster area, although we did lose a number of trees. Got a call from Frannie last night around nine, turns out a big tree fell and crushed her garage, which itself housed both her car and her older daughter’s brand new used one she had yet to drive due to mono. (Frannie and fam need any mojo you can spare, actually.)

So, yeah. Minor disaster there, no power for me, and school’s closed until tomorrow. Whee.

Sally Jenkins has written what Atrios is able to unhyberbolically call “the stupidest thing I have *ever* read”, an argument that Just the existence of professional athletes somehow lends credence to the notion of Intelligent Design.

Amazingly, Ms. Jenkins’s argument suggest, or even hinges on, the notion that not only are species created to spec by an omnipotent Designer, so are individuals!

Tar and feathers would be wasted on such a columnist, but it’s tempting anyway.

Katrina fallout here may be worse than I’d expected. The university has just published a notice saying it’s closing at noon today, which bodes ill. While Alabama institutions will shut down at the first hint of a serious snow flurry, it usually takes more than a stiff wind and a small flood to make us close up shop.

The light outside has a sepia tent, and everything is hot and still. Things remain dry here so far, but we should be getting lashed by Katrina side-effects by the mid-afternoon, I’m thinking.

Thank Whomever NOLA was spared the worst of what was possible, and thank It again that it doesn’t look like we’ll be getting any incidentally spawned tornadoes or even particularly heavy weather here.

Still, I think it’s going to be nasty enough that I’m going to have to break down and by a parking permit rather than try to swim to campus for the next couple of days.