Donate to the Nashville Relief efforts without costing a dime!

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I had 236 Swagbucks in my account and I just donated 200 of them to the relief, (increments of 50 I think)!

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How much can you donate?

Go HERE to sign up!

Still working on donation locations...

Clothing Drive for flood victims at Thompson Edison Elementary School in Antioch
Drop-off: Friday, May 7 after 3:30 p.m.
Pickup for families: Saturday, May 8 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

THIS is a great resource for information regarding helping out during this time of need.

Graceworks Ministries:
Graceworks is working with the Red Cross to collect donations for flood victims. They are in need of financial gifts, non-perishable food items (soup, crackers, pasta), bottled water, toilet paper, cleaning products, toothbrushes, shampoo, household items, furniture, baby items and gently used clothing (please separate by gender and age). Drop off donations at 104 Southeast Parkway, Franklin TN.

The Crag at Cool Springs:
Drop point for donated goods to be taken to Graceworks (see needs above).

Salvation Army:
The Salvation Army suffered losses just like the rest of us. They are in need of clean-up kit items (mops, brooms, heavy duty work gloves, masks, sponges, squeegees, scrub brushes, plastic gloves, bleach, all-purpose cleaner concentrate, trash bags, paper towels and cases of bottled water), Hygiene & personal care kit items (socks, underwear, t-shirts, shampoo conditioner, soap, deodorant, toothbrushes, toothpaste, etc), paper products and diapers. Drop off at 425 Neelys Bend Rd, Madison (10am-7pm), 611 Stockell St (9am-6:30pm) or 631 Dickerson Pike (8am-6pm).

Trevecca Nazarine University:
Group is taking food, water, first aid and toiletries to flooded neighbors around the university. If you’re in the area and want to help distribute, call Dan at 941-518-6740. Drop off donations at the Boone Business Building.

Golden Skin Care: Golden Skin Care is collecting donations of sunscreen for flood relief volunteers. Drop off donations at 2000 Richard Jones Rd. in Green Hills.

Christ Church: (This is where our Coupon Workshop was held!)
Christ Church (15354 Old Hickory Blvd) is collecting and distributing bottled water, new clothes and cleaning supplies.

Flavour Clothing:
Drop site for toilet paper, toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant, box fans, cleaning supplies, diapers and nonperishable staple food items. 1522 Demonbreun Street.

On The Go:
Needs donations of bottled water (cases), goggles with no vent holes, gloves, N-95 respirators, trash bags, cleaning supplies

The Anchor Fellowship:
Drop site for socks, toiletries, underclothing, summer clothes all sizes, bedding, fungal cream, water, feminine products (Stayfree anyone?!?!?!) (7am-7am, 629 3rd Ave S.). They are distributing items to the community as fast as they get them.

I am the National Media I am Nashville, by Cameron McCasland

Borrowed from The Red-Headed Revolution

Written by Cameron McCasland

I am the National Media I am Nashville

Greetings friends and foes,
Trying to dry out here in Nashville, but wanted to take time to say thank you to all the well wishes that have poured in from around the country. My family and homestead are doing fine, though other friends and loved ones have not been as lucky.

Friday Night i went to see the New Nightmare on Elm Street film, which was nice as I had not spent a evening out with friends in a while. The movie was a mess, but thats a subject for another day. Little did any of us realize that the theater we were sitting would be 10 feet under water 24 hours later.

I had Saturday off to spend with the girls, as jessica had to be at the school. We watched it rain all day, as it had done most of the evening before. I started hearing about the water rising and flipped on the news. As the day progressed the only thing that was pouring faster than the rain was the harrowing stories. I moved to Nashville in the summer of 2001 after spending the majority of my life in tornado country Texas. This is by far the worst devastation i have seen.

Less than a mile from my home Interstate 24 had turned into a river, washing cars and eighteen wheelers away. A mobile school house, even took to the waters and exploded a stones throw away from where we live. Jessica was trapped while trying to get some last minute supplies, as police and fire departments began shutting off roads. The grocery store where we shop was up to the top of the doorways in water. She luckily made it home unscathed and we battened down the hatches and prayed for daylight.

The rain continued through the night, and was off and on until lunch time Sunday. Our yard had taken on about a foot of water, but it never reached the house. I braved the weather to see what destruction has been wrought on my neighbors. It was devastating. I did what seemed natural and began to document it through video. While I commend the local news service for their coverage, they simply could not be everywhere due to roadblocks, and general chaos. I captured the aftermath of the storm at I-24 and Haywood near Antioch Pike and Richards Road. All of the businesses had been up to the rafters in water, and were broken. I came home and edited the footage hastily, and sent it out to the news networks, as well as posting it to youtube. I’m not sure if it aired but it did receive thousands of hits in only a few hours.

I was unable to go to my job as floodwaters had blocked off most of the points in and out. The first person who died during the storm actually drowned at the highway exit that i take every day for work. Our friend Lee Vervoort came over to charge his phone and eat a hot meal, as his power like most of the city was knocked out. Our street had been spared. He ended up staying the night on Sunday.

I spent the entire weekend, and the better part of this week, relaying photos, news stories, safety information, and video via social networks. I was stunned that i wasn’t seeing our city on outlets like CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News. I actually heard one of them aired an hour long special on a new test car, though the horrors in Music City stayed contained to local outlets and video hosting sights. All of the photos and video I had seen looked eerily similar to the photos from post hurricane Katrina New Orleans, still silence on national airwaves. Our President had not said a word, and I began to understand the fury of those hurricane victims who felt isolated and uncared for by the media and their government. It was Monday and the sun was shining before any of the major networks hit the ground in Nashville.

I don’t say any of this to chastise our leaders, or slap the wrists of the likes of Anderson Cooper, Bill O’ Reilly, or Diane Sawyer. To Anderson Coopers credit, he did apologize, but I find it hard to imagine that they weren't aware of our situation. By all means the other major news of the day was of equal importance, as oil fills the gulf, and a would be assassin botched the bombing at Times Square in new York. What I learned quickly is that in this modern day they have become somewhat obsolete. While local anchors at WSMV, WTVF, and WKRN were knee high in water, local people including bloggers, tweeters, and film makers were filling in the gaps. The people at Nashvillest.com were tweeting around the clock with info on how to get in contact with shelters, as well as bringing pictures from local photogs of our city being laid to waste. There was no agenda, or control over what we could see. It was all available live and up to the minute brought to you proudly by the men and women of the Volunteer state.

I have shed tears in the last few days, both for the lives lost and the institutions that have seen damage. Early estimates put the damage at over a billion dollars. Our tourism industry is being shaken to the ground as the Opryland hotel was taken in by the river, and will be closed for repairs for at least six months. The botanical gardens were destroyed. Inside Opry Mills, where I had seen the movie on Friday night, the Aquariums were shattered when the floodwaters floated debris into the glass. Hundreds of saltwater fish were destroyed. A tank of Piranhas was also opened and they are said to be infesting the waters within the mall. It will be interesting to see if enough of them survived to enter the eco system.

Our cultural heritage has been decimated as the Grand Ole Opry, Country Music hall Of Fame, and Schermerhorn Symphony Center. all took on water. The Honky Tonks on Broadway were all filled ( though i hear some cowboys are still playing and drinking even with water in their boots). Our NHL and NFL arenas were both filled with water. It is a nightmare to behold, and needless to say it will be months and years before we recover, but we will recover.

As the rest of the nation now watches, they will see a force mightier than a flood. They will see communities arm and arm rebuilding structures, and restoring lives. We will make good on our namesake as Volunteers from within our city will put things back in order, and the greatest songwriters in the world will pen anthems to a flood. These witnesses will see our might, and hear our songs, and we will never forgotten again.

Cameron McCasland

Why Did It Take So Long for National Media to Notice We were Flooded?

Amen to this. Thank you Betsy at the Nashville Scene.

__________________________________________________

Why Did It Take So Long for National Media to Notice We were Flooded?

Posted by Betsy Phillips on Thu, May 6, 2010 at 6:21 AM at the Nashville Scene

In a world of 24-hour news, when said national news channels will devote hours of programming to interviewing people who sleep with famous people, and when they'll interrupt that programming to bring you speculation on the identity of a guy in grainy surveillance footage, it was mind-boggling to flip by CNN, MSNBC, and FOX on Sunday afternoon and see not one station even occasionally bringing their viewers footage of the flood, news of our people dying.

I mean, fine, if they didn't have people on the ground here, but MSNBC is, you know, NBC. They have an affiliate here. But god forbid their viewers miss out on even one minute of whichever iteration of sensational footage from America's prisons they're showing at the moment in favor of actual news.

I mean, this is the thing to me that rings so hollow about, "Well, with the oil rig explosion and the car bomb, you just kind of fell off the radar."

Do they think we don't get their stations here?

On Sunday, Fox was airing an interview with Ann Coulter, which is barely a step up from the prisoner-exploitation porn on MSNBC at the same time. And bless CNN's heart, they were showing interviews with their own staff about what stories the staffers were going to be working on in the coming days.

People, it is sad enough when you're so pressed for something to put on the air that you're just wandering around asking staffers what they're doing this week. But when none of those staffers, whose job it seems to be is to have their finger on what's happening, has their finger on what's happening in a major American city?!

News Network Folks, you did not run out of space for us. We weren't even on your radar. Let's not bullshit here.

So what happened to change that?

Sadly, I think it came down to "the hook" — that thing about a story that makes it immediately understandable to outsiders and makes it feel relevant.

After all, when you're running a 24-hour news channel, and you're after ratings, it's not about passing along information and reporting facts, it's about getting ratings and having something that will keep viewers watching.

"Much of Middle and West Tennessee is experiencing catastrophic floods" is just a bunch of facts. How does that "entertain" the viewer?

Once social media users on Twitter and Facebook started pushing the "we have been forgotten" meme, we had a hook. I mean, it's the point of this post, right? It's a question you can built a narrative around. It's something your viewers can imagine — what if this terrible thing happened to your home and nobody gave a shit?

That's terrible. Now we have a narrative. It's these plucky Nashvillians having to do it on our own because no one else has noticed we're in trouble.

And that got their attention. That gave them a way to frame the story. "We are Nashville."

And goddamn it, we owe a big one to the Grand Ole Opry House for taking one for the team, because that gave them the second way in. If you don't care about plucky underdogs, you care about the loss of our cultural heritage, right? Or at least that makes it seem that this event is of national importance.

Now our loss is a national loss.

Don't get me wrong. I'm glad we have national attention now. Folks, please, donate to Red Cross. Come and visit. Buy our stuff (though maybe not our used cars or furniture for the next little bit). Make yourselves at home and open your wallets while you're here.

But we live in a society where attention for a disaster means money and support. If people don't know you're having troubles, they won't know to help.

And, if anything, what we learned this weekend is that if you want help, you have to market your tragedy in a way that catches folks' attention.

I find that troubling.

And what about Ashland City? Or Pegram? Or the three homes in a clump along a creek out west of here that don't have a name? What if they don't have time to "construct a narrative" or a vast army of people to push it out to the national media?

Do they just suffer unknown?

Do they just have to hope that the generosity people show towards us is so great that some of it spills downstream onto them?

From Newsweek: Why the Media Ignored the Nashville Flood

Written by Andrew Romano, Newsweek

As you may have heard, torrential downpours in the southeast flooded the Tennessee capital of Nashville over the weekend, lifting the Cumberland River 13 feet above flood stage, causing an estimated $1 billion in damage, and killing more than 30 people. It could wind up being one of the most expensive natural disasters in U.S. history.

Or, on second thought, maybe you didn't hear. With two other "disasters" dominating the headlines—the Times Square bombing attempt and the Gulf oil spill—the national media seems to largely to have ignored the plight of Music City since the flood waters began inundating its streets on Sunday. A cursory Google News search shows 8,390 hits for "Times Square bomb" and 13,800 for "BP oil spill." "Nashville flood," on the other hand, returns only 2,430 results—many of them local. As Betsy Phillips of the Nashville Scene writes, "it was mind-boggling to flip by CNN, MSNBC, and FOX on Sunday afternoon and see not one station even occasionally bringing their viewers footage of the flood, news of our people dying."

So why the cold shoulder? I see two main reasons. First, the modern media may be more multifarious than ever, but they're also remarkably monomaniacal. In a climate where chatter is constant and ubiquitous, newsworthiness now seems to be determined less by what's most important than by what all those other media outlets are talking about the most. Sheer volume of coverage has become its own qualification for continued coverage. (Witness the Sandra Bullock-Jesse James saga.) In that sense, it's easy to see why the press can't seem to focus on more than one or two disasters at the same time. Everyone is talking about BP and Faisal Shahzad 24/7, the "thinking" goes. So there must not be anything else that's as important to talk about. It's a horrible feedback loop.

Of course, the media is also notorious for its ADD; no story goes on forever. Which brings us to the second reason the Nashville floods never gained much of a foothold in the national conversation: the "narrative" simply wasn't as strong. Because it continually needs to fill the airwaves and the Internet with new content, 1,440 minutes a day, the media can only trade on a story's novelty for a few hours, tops. It is new angles, new characters, and new chapters that keep a story alive for longer. The problem for Nashville was that both the gulf oil spill and the Times Square terror attempt are like the Russian novels of this 24/7 media culture, with all the plot twists and larger themes (energy, environment, terrorism, etc.) required to fuel the blogs and cable shows for weeks on end. What's more, both stories have political hooks, which provide our increasingly politicized press (MSNBC, FOX News, blogs) with grist for the kind of arguments that further extend a story's lifespan (Did Obama respond too slowly? Should we Mirandize terrorists?). The Nashville narrative wasn't compelling enough to break the cycle, so the MSM just continued to blather on about BP and Shahzad.

If I sound like I'm condoning the media's inattention here, I'm not. My explanation is meant as a criticism. Given audience demands—especially at a time when traditional media companies aren't doing so well—it's impossible to avoid the stories with the most buzz and the strongest narratives. Nor should we. But urgency should be at least as important. In this case, the most urgent aspects of the oil spill and the Times Square attack had already been covered to death; the culprit was already caught, the containment was already underway. And yet we still kept rehashing each of those stories—and fighting about politics—while thousands of homes and business were destroyed and dozens of people died. That matters. Media silence means public ignorance, and public ignorance means fewer charitable donations, slower aid, and less political pressure. If that's not reason enough to cover the flood--to do our jobs--I don't know what is.

Nashvillians, PLEASE CONSERVE WATER!

This request is just not getting through to people. Those residents in counties where the water supply has been affected, Davidson, Williamson and others, please do what you can to conserve water.
Officials are asking that we only use water for food prep and basic hygiene. If you aren't filthy, wait on that shower. Break out the paper plates and try to drink bottled water.

If we don't conserve now, we will all be regretting it when there is NO water.

People who need clean water can get one free case of bottled water per vehicle Wednesday between 3 and 9 p.m. at the following locations:

• Nashville Fairgrounds
• Antioch Middle School
• Bellevue Middle School
• Pearl-Cohn High School
• Bailey Middle School

Sherwin Williams will give away 3,000 gallons of water Friday at Harris Teeter at 6200 Hwy 100 from 10 a.m. until supplies last, said John Gaeto of Sherwin Williams.

Residents can call Metro Water Services at 862-4600 to report water main breaks and leaks.

Gaylord Donates thousands of pounds of food

In the wake of the flood, there are some good things happening. My Mom was telling me earlier that since the Hotel is closed until who knows when, they decided to go through the unaffected kitchens in catering and clear out all the food to donate.

There was an article posted HERE regarding this, here's the text from that article, I am loving that they are donating filet mignon and gourmet cheeses to the Rescue Mission! Those regulars are going to have a surprise in store for them!:

Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center announced Tuesday that they have donated tens of thousands of pounds of perishable frozen and refrigerated food to Tennessee Baptist Disaster Relief to assist with their emergency feeding response in the local Nashville community

The donated food was purchased by Gaylord Opryland for a conference of more than 1500 attendees scheduled for three days of events at Nashville’s largest convention center. Some of the other food, for example, was donated by the restaurants and other parts of the resort not impacted by the flooding.

The donation was made to the Tennessee Baptist Disaster Relief Group that will use the food items to feed thousands of meals to local citizens, evacuees and volunteers that are assisting in the disaster response across Middle Tennessee.

“Making something good out of a natural disaster is what makes this world go around,” said Carl Lord, volunteer for Tennessee Baptist Disaster Relief. “Gaylord Opryland making this generous food donation will help thousands of evacuees and homeless throughout the state. We are grateful Gaylord called us to help.”

“It is uplifting to all of our STARS (employees) to be able to give something to the community during this challenging time,” said Pete Wiein, Senior Vice President, Gaylord Opryland Resort. “The donation adds a little sweet spot to the bitterness that has covered the hotel and the city the past few days.”

“Our incredible banquets and restaurant teams volunteered to help load the meat, dairy, vegetables and fruit into the refrigerated trucks provided by the TN Disaster Response Group,” said Vincent Dreffs, Director of Catering and Operations, Gaylord Hotels. “It has been a pleasant diversion and now it is back to work.”

Tennessee shelters can also expect to receive a shipment of unique food items such as gourmet cheeses, filet mignon, lobster and fresh produce.