Like I mentioned previously, I have had the pleasure of working on Ms. Barbara’s house with Paul, Kenny, and Graham in Dulac. She is by far one of the nicest and sweetest people I have ever met and I have really enjoyed working on her home. Not only did we finish her living room on Saturday, today we completed her kitchen and the hallway (just for the record, we trimmed the whole kitchen before lunch). The bathroom still needs more work and the bedrooms just needs to be trimmed but overall the house is, in Ms. Barbara’s word, really starting to look like a house again.

Today we got a chance to listen to some of her stories about her experience during the hurricanes. Even though her home is raised four feet off the ground, during this year’s flooding there was about 16 inches of water in her house.
She also allowed us to take the rest of her MRE’s (Meals, ready-to-eat) from the military. Kenny is actually eating some of them as I type. It’s pretty awful and I can’t believe that people had to live off this after the storm. In each package there is “everything” you need to make a meal including a bag to heat up the meal. It uses a chemical reaction that releases heat and can heat up meats or drinks. It is kind of a neat concept but, according to Kenny et al, it’s pretty awful tasting.

She also gave us a bunch of Mardi Gras beads and one of those huge holiday tins of popcorn. She actually bought the popcorn for us which I feel is so sweet of her. She continuously offered us food throughout the day including dried shrimp, fried pig skins and chocolate covered strawberries. Her hospitality and appreciation for our work is incredible and I really wish that we could go back tomorrow and put in another day’s work for her.