Thoughts and prayers are with the Gulf Coast folks. Hopefully this will be nowhere as bad as Katrina, and not just because it looks like most people have evacuated.

I saw some folks loading up with pallets of bottled water and Gatorade in the Wal-mart today. I assume they're going to help out at the shelters that have been set up in the DFW area, because the quantities they were buying seemed far greater than what a Labor Day celebration would require.

Some of "our" ambulance crews (my county and the surrounding counties) have gone to help out. I always feel a little proud about that, even though I realize it's irrational to, because I personally have nothing to do with it.

Standard advice: if you feel the need to do something and aren't in an area or a position where you can go volunteer, there's always the Red Cross and the Salvation Army for donations.

We're supposed to get rain later this week from the remnants. One individual on one station that will remain nameless said "15 inches" at one point but I find that extremely hard to believe, and later forecasts seemed to suggest that as much as 5 inches of rain would be an unexpectedly large amount.

Then again, there are CERTAIN weathercasters who seem given to hyperbole around here. I don't like hyperbole mixed in my news; it gives it this tinny artificial taste.