Wednesday, September 07, 2005

The Onion rips Houston

The Onion, the humorous online magazine, takes an easy shot at Houston in their Katrina "coverage":
Refugees Moved From Sewage-Contaminated Superdome To Hellhole Of Houston
HOUSTON—Evacuees from the overheated, filth-encrusted wreckage of the New Orleans Superdome were bussed to the humid, 110-degree August heat and polluted air of Houston last week, in a move that many are resisting. "Please, God, not Houston. Anyplace but Houston," said one woman, taking shelter under an overpass. "The food there is awful, and the weather is miserable. And the traffic—it's like some engineer was making a sick joke." Authorities apologized for transporting survivors to a city "barely better in any respect," but said the blistering-hot, oil-soaked Texas city was in fact slightly better, and that casualties due to gunfire would be no worse.
On the negative side, it certainly perpetuates Houston's less-than-stellar image stereotype. But on the positive side, not only is it funny, but, as a pretty sharp McKinsey partner pointed out to me a long time ago: Houston's quality of life, affordability, restaurants, mobility, and culture is a great secret that we get to keep to ourselves, which keeps our growth moderate and manageable. If the truth ever really got out on a widespread basis, we would be inundated with millions of new residents and end up like Los Angeles.

2 Comments:

At 3:59 PM, September 07, 2005, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Similar to that, the following appeared in the Houston Chronicle just prior to Katrina's strike on New Orleans...


"Roommates Michael Seward, 45, and Jesse Rowe, 28, went out Sunday to buy a battery-powered radio. They... feel perfectly safe in their second-story apartment.

Seward pointed out that the Quarter was on some of the highest land in the city...

Rowe said... family and friends were calling to beg them to flee to Mississippi. Seward... quipped: 'That's a fate worse than death.'"

 
At 4:01 PM, September 07, 2005, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I should have said "Similar to the item in The Onion".... not similar to kjb434's posting.

 

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