We are sending $100 to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts in the Gulf States. We know they will get contributions from across the land, and they should. The damage in human terms is ineffably sad.

As I wandered around last week, acquaintances in the community had different responses to the tragedy caused by Hurricane Katrina, a killer storm with a diminutive name. Some said "Watch the price of consumer goods go way up! Things like plywood and building materials are going to skyrocket."

Another claimed that gas prices will now certainly stay above $3 because offshore drilling rigs in the Gulf have been rendered unusable.

One radio commentator (Alan Prell, on KIRO) said he was unsympathetic with the people who died because they chose to 'ride out' the storm rather than heed warnings to go to a safe place. They were fools who did not deserve sympathy.

You may already know the curious geography of New Orleans, that it is built below sea level. I learned yesterday that the city is surrounded by dikes and that water is constantly being pumped into the Mississippi River.

I found these reactions interesting but had to wonder how these people might feel if something like this happened here. Devastation of this magnitude is almost unimaginable, and I suspect that watching it on television, where fantasy and reality seem to blur, we have become inured to human suffering

A Tale of Two Shirts

So I was washing some white shirts the other morning and noticed the tell-tale 'ring around the collar'. Because I do the laundry at our place, you would think I would notice such things as a matter of course. But I do laundry the way my wifely unit says men look for things that are lost; when I can't find the thing, she asks "Did you 'man-look' or really look for it?" Of course, I man-looked, which I now know is a breeze glance through the room and if it is not in plain sight, is regarded as not findable.

The way I do the laundry is to grab a pile of things out of the laundry basket and jam it into the washer, dump in some liquid soap in the hopper, slam the door and crank the dial to 'wash'. Then I leave the room and go back to my dent in the sofa and my book.

I do this with little regard to color fastness of fabric based on my personal and unscientific theory that once a garment has been washed a few times, any residual color that might have leached out at first is now 'fast' and will not influence other items in the load. I have quite a few pair of blue underwear, once tidy whiteys, to prove it. That is, to dis-prove it. But I don't care. I like blue underwear.

The other morning I smeared some viscous liquid on the collars of a couple of shirts when I saw the dirt pattern on the inside of the collar and then said to the redhead, who was browsing the internet for condos in Hawaii, "Redhead, I have concluded that 'Ring Around the Collar" is caused by external factors in the environment." I said it this way so she would not contradict me. She did anyway. "No it isn't," she said, between oohs over some oceanview place in Maui. 'It's from you not washing your neck."That's not true!" I demured. "I wash my neck.

"Do you use soap and a washrag?"

"What's a washrag?" I asked.

"You have to use soap and a washrag to get rid of dead skin and dirt on your neck," she asserted. "I have a very clean neck. Here, smell it," I offered, but she shot me a withering glance. "You are a dirty roughneck who doesn't take care of his clothes," she said instead of inspecting me more closely.

There was really nothing left to say. I put the stuff in the dryer and sat down again in the dent.

Earlier in the week, Kathy, the office manager, appeared in the doorway and said there was a doctor at the front counter who had some questions about running an ad. I said I'd help him and put down the Reuben and wiped the corner of my mouth and my fingers and walked to the front.

"Hi doctor," I said and stuck out my hand, which probably had some Reuben sandwich essence on it. He said he wasn't the doctor, but the doctor's office manager and he wanted to place a series of ads but wanted price information.

I opened a copy of the paper and was about to show him a sample size when I noticed something attached to my shirtfront just above the pocket. Through my lowerbifocal, it was slightly out of focus, so I had to pull out the top front of the shirt to make it out clearly.

It was a stripe of mustardy-mayo about two inches long and as thick as a pencil, attached like a caterpillar to my shirt.

I noticed the doctor's representative regarding me quizically, and at first believed it was because he had never met such a charming fellow as myself. It was at this point I realized he was struggling to avert his eyes from the mayo glob, not really know what it was and imagining it might be something that was not meant to be eaten. His face was twitching curiously like Clousseau's boss in a Pink Panther movie. I believe the cause was disgust.

I did the only thing I could do. (Well, I could have swiped it with my finger and licked it, but that seemed crude.) I yelled at Kathy, my office manager, demanding to know why she would allow me to approach the front counter with a smear of secret sauce on my shirt.

I hope that stain comes out in the wash.