Am wishing you, in advance, a happy Katrina Day. It’s been seven years to the day when we were almost wiped off the face of the earth by that lovely storm.

As I write this, and prepare to go home, hunker down and wait for the latest storm, it’s Monday afternoon, and it’s beautiful outside. There are fewer cars parked on Frenchmen, but people are strolling and biking down the street; some are eating at Mona’s. There are tourists with straw hats and backpacks ambling down Frenchmen. Yep, there are a few of us hardcore people working, getting ready for Isaac—at this writing still a tropical storm, but expected to become a Cat 1 hurricane as it moves toward the coast.

Will we dodge the bullet? I’m betting we will, although the wound from seven years ago isn’t quite healed (it will never be healed, come to think about it).

My last blog demonstrates the paranoia that a lot of us feel during this high point of hurricane season, especially since the damn storm is set to hit us almost on the very same day as Katrina.

But I guess I’ve also got some of dat hard-boiled New Orleanian in me, too, because after looking at the evidence, I don’t think we’re gonna get slammed. The worst part is the shutdown of the electrical grid; that really—and I mean really—sucks.  It’s still too damned hot to do without even a fan or a cool drink. But, if you live in New Orleans, you learn to endure. It’s just a few days, after all. Things will be back to normal on Thursday (she said, hopefully).

Now that we’ve hopefully made it safely through the storm, I am pleased and happy to welcome the newest member of the OffBeat team, our new Associate Editor, Amanda Schurr. Amanda is an exciting addition to our staff and brings a wealth of experience to OffBeat, and hey—way cool—she’s OffBeat’s very first female editor.

Amanda was a correspondent and syndicated columnist with the New York Times Regional Media Group, arts writer and editor for the Creative Loafing chain of alt weeklies and editor of Portland and Southwest Washington’s LGBTQ newsmagazine Just Out. Most recently, she was a contributor at the Times-Picayune, where she covered everything from Jazz Fest and the French Quarter Festival to special performances marking Loyola University’s centennial.

We interviewed a lot of great writers and devoted OffBeat contributors for this gig, but Amanda stood out for her dedication to her work, expertise in writing about music, arts and culture, her attention to detail, and her willingness to commit to OffBeat’s mission and values. Amanda brings a wealth of creative talent and her great sense of humor to us as well, and we hope you’ll like her as much as we do. Get in touch, introduce yourself to her. She’d love to make your acquaintance.