I've reported on a variety of stories over twenty one years in the news biz.

Traveling to New Orleans with the Oregon National Guard left me with memories of a destroyed and dirty town---deserted except for the barking dogs.

My worst memory there involves a dog stuck in a house across the street from a convent where the Oregon soldiers were staying in the lower ninth ward.

Flood waters surrounded the home when we arrived, ten or eleven days after the hurricane hit. It was deserted. The home had security bars on the outside of the windows and doors.

The basement was clearly flooded. On a window sill at the street level---a dog stood on the window ledge inside the home, behind the bars over the window and barked and barked and barked.

And we couldn't do anything about it.

I hated that.

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