My hope for the rest of the nation in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, is that lessons on all levels of our society and government are learned and better preparations are made for each of our own varieties of local disasters. Stop procrastinating on that emergency survival kit for yourself and family. You can expect not to receive any help from anyone but yourself and neighbors for at least a week after such a catastrophy. Be better prepared for it.

If you can't afford to fully stock an emergency survival kit, at least do what you can. Gather neighbors together to make contingency plans and share resources for your immediate area.

Californians, especially need to take this situation to heart. It will seem like deja vue when the anticipated big earthquakes hit the Bay Area and Los Angeles. The loss of life and property will dwarf in comparison.

You can lessen the loss of irreplacible items such as family photos, important documents and memories. Take pictures of things, scan and upload those and other family photos to any of the free photo website hosting places. If the physical items are lost, you'll have the copies on the internet to reprint for replacement.