Unlike your new acquaintance, we got out of town JUST before Katrina. We were going to ride it out, but got scared (and smart) at the last minute.

We were only about 30 miles out of town for the big enent, just across Lake Pontchartrain, so we had a pretty complete experience of the rain and wind, but fortunately missed out on the post-hurricane levee-break flooding. We weren't able to return home, even for a quick look-see, for six weeks; didn't move back to New Orleans until January (i.e., 3 months after Katrina) and couldn't move into our own home until Thanksgiving (14 months).