Monday afternoon in New Orleans. The Guv took us on a tour of the 9th Ward, his house and FEMA trailer, Fats Domino's house, and down through the parrishes, St. Bernard, and Lakeshore by Lake Ponchatrain where 15 to 20 feet water surges inundated houses during Katrina. I'm not yet ready to write about what we saw, neighborhoods struggling to come back, one street full of FEMA trailers in front of houses at every stage of rehabilitation, work crews everywhere; other streets devoid of any life, row after row of boarded up houses, some obviously marked for demolition. Yet hope abounds. The newspapers are full of stories about college kids coming down for Spring Break and volunteer work.

We're still settling into our little basement apartment, a sense of home for the next month. Bless Skype for letting me see Rachel and Nick, where all is well with both of them. And I'll close today with a picture of the beautiful, tranquil McClay Gardens that I took near Tallahassee, a true Southern garden, just four days ago. Beth