Joe, please keep us informed as to their whereabouts and their situation. I'm sure we all would like to at least know they're OK. Marilyn -----Original Message----- From: ConroeJoe@aol.com Sent: Sep 27, 2005 7:02 PM To: pbs@lists.ibiblio.org Subject: [pbs] Off Topic: Hurricane Rita Hi Gang, I saw an aerial photo in one of today's newspapers showing several destroyed homes in Vidor, TX. I could help but worry about my friends there, among them Marcelle Sheppard and Margie Brown. I visited with both, just a week ago, on Tuesday, September 20, when Hurricane Rita was still only a possibility. Marcelle had been home from about a 3-month stay in the hospital for a broken pelvis and some broken ribs. An earlier storm (this year) had weekend a tree that fell on her as she exited a car for a church function. So, Marcelle was home and wheeling in her chair like a happy kid; she could also get about on a walker. Margie, just a few miles away, has been a longtime Gulf Gardener, and often planted many of Marcelle's special Crinum, rainlily, or Hippeastrum hybrids--to grow them out and to help Marcelle judge garden performance under different conditions. Now, for sure, the storm has devastated their towns. There is really no way to get in to visit them or to know how they are doing. Surely, they got to safety in time, and from the reports I'm getting they will not have been allowed to return to their homes yet. In any event, much of the area is without electricity and temperatures have hovered near 100 F all week. Southeast Texas is no place to be without air conditioning. In time I hope to hear good news from Marcelle and Margie, that their houses were spared, and that their gardens remained mostly intact (how could anything pull a big old Crinum out of the ground?). But, I also know that the wind could have damaged their greenhouses, or blown away Marcelle's seed crop for the year, or totally leveled their homes. I wish them luck. LINK 1: Marcelle's Crinums http://marcellescrinums.com/index.html LINK 2: Crinums in East Texas: Notes From Marcelle Sheppard http://crinum.iconx.com/ Cordially, Conroe Joe (100 F today [38 C], humid and sunny, Oxblood lilies in full bloom for 2-3 weeks now) _______________________________________________ pbs mailing list pbs@lists.ibiblio.org http://www.pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php