Of Course it Quacks

What's BTT doing?
So surprise surprise!  BTT is in Houston this week, working with Harvey Housing Recovery.  The team is 12 strong including some of the usual suspects, Howard, Jon and Debbie, Ron, Erin, The Colonel, Me (Rod Sc.), and Doreen, but we also have Troll with us from Atlanta, Jennifer from Hale, Gary from Kentucky, and a brand new member of our team, Maria from Marquette. 

When did that happen?
We started down on Saturday morning and drove to Tulsa where we spent the night in an awesome church with a LOT of couches for us to sleep on.  Then on Sunday, we headed down to Houston, but we had to make a stop in Dallas-

What happened in Dallas?
You see, we were planning on going grocery shopping for the food for our meals once we got to Houston, after getting settled in and dinner going and everything, but we learned that Sam's Club (where Debbie was going to get our groceries) would be closed after 6, and we weren't sure we'd make it by then.-  So we decided to stop in Dallas on the way down and go shopping there.  That stop was supposed to take about a half hour but when Sam's Club shopping went longer, and part of the team sat down for lunch instead of getting it to go, the stop ended up setting us back about two hours.  Everything just took a little longer than we thought.  We got in to Houston around 7:00pm on Sunday night.   Made for a good story anyway.  Rod may or may not have done a U turn over a curb and onto some grass pulling the trailer to avoid going back out on the express way at one point. 

Where are you staying?
The church we are staying at is a HUGE United Methodist Church.  The campus has several buildings.  The one we are staying in used to be a mansion, and in fact, they call it "The Mansion."  They have converted a big space to housing volunteers and put in a bunch of bunks in.  They seem very happy to have us here. 

What was the disaster you are responding to?  
The area we are serving in is just West of Houston.  A community called, Katy.  There are two reservoirs nearby and as Hurricane Harvey kept dumping water in the area, one was filling to almost overflowing.  Overflowing would have destroyed the levies that contained the water on three sides, flooding areas around the reservoir.  Instead, they decided to open the relief valves and flood the area around the area where the water would run to anyway.  That included 740 homes in the part of town we are working in. 

What is the project you are working on?
The agency we are working for has us all working in one house.  The house had a couple feet of water in it.  They have been working slowly on this house since November.  The work that needs to be done is mostly finish work, like flooring, paint, installing doors, installing trim and a other wrap up things.  Today is the 2nd day we have worked and we have so far done some painting, some touch up to drywall, installed some doors, painted trim, started putting down wooden flooring and tile flooring.  Everyone has kept busy and we are getting a lot done.  There are a lot of doors left to install and a big chunk of tile floor to put down.  There is some painting to still be done and a lot of baseboard to put down.  Part of the challenge is that you have to do A before you can do B before you can do C.  And A gets bottlenecked which slows down B and C.  But I think the team is working well and getting a lot done. 


How can we partner with BTT?   
We are having health problems.  I took one volunteer to urgent care today and then he came back to work.  We took one volunteer back to the church we were staying at for dizziness and vomiting.  And I picked up some Mylanta for another volunteer.  I would ask for prayer for the team for health. 

Some people believe in spiritual warfare and some people think it's more psychological problem.  I would suggest that no matter which way you believe on that, pray for team unity. 

You can check out our Facebook page.  One thing that FB users are going to get that others are not are access to videos that Maria has been shooting.  If you are on FB and haven't "Liked" Be The Tool, I would encourage you to do so.  It helps get our message out when more people think it's worth paying attention to.  Click here:  Be The Tool Facebook page.  It will open a new window so you can get back here quick.  Besides the videos you can look at our pictures. 

If you're not on Facebook but want to check out our pictures, you can click over to our photo site page:  Click here for our photo site. 

If you want to donate some money to BTT, there are two options:   You can donate to Be The Tool by sending a check or giving online at this link:  Click here to go to the BTT website to donate.  If you're interested in supporting one or more of the volunteers who are on the trip, get a hold of Rod directly and he'll talk about who still needs some funds to pay for the trip.  Email Rod at:  rod@bethetool.org

You can email a note to the team telling us you're with us in thoughts and prayers and will. 

This new format
Let me know if this new format works better for you. 

The "goodnight."
Goodnight and thank you for being here with us. 

Rod