A few notes from here and there:

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If you recall the columns I wrote prior to my mission trip, you know that I spent a weekend in June practicing soap-making with my mission trip colleague Carolyn Schussler and her husband Dave at their brand new home near the bridge in Bay St. Louis, Miss. They had just moved into the house a few weeks earlier; they didn't even have all the curtains in place.

Bay St. Louis was hit by a 22-foot storm surge during Katrina; the bridge is out.

I knew early on that Carolyn and Dave had gotten out of town before the hurricane; because of Dave's new job, they now have an apartment in another state anyway. But knowing how close their home was to the water, I worried about it.

Well, the house did have 3-4 feet of flood water, but it seems to have almost miraculously survived structural damage. There are homes all around with serious damage, and there is debris laying against the side of Dave and Carolyn's house, but not even a window was broken.

Speaking of my mission trip, I was once again gratified and humbled at the response to my series of stories. Everywhere I go, someone mentions having read them. A lot of people asked about the leg where I was bitten by what might have been a spider; it's just fine, and in fact the red spot had faded quite a bit before I even got home.

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Last year's mission trip coincided with most of the Celebration, so I missed seeing any of the show last year. It was great to be a part of it again (although by the time it's over, I think most people are ready to get back to normal). I brought several of my mission team friends up one night; they had never seen the show before and were delighted by it.

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Attention, fast food restaurants: a piece of white chicken meat is not a "boneless chicken wing," even if you drizzle it in buffalo wing sauce. A wing is a wing is a wing. A piece of white meat may be a nugget, or a strip, or a chunk, and it may be perfectly delicious, but it is not a wing. Are we clear on that? Thank you for your attention.

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I caught an episode of "My Kind Of Town" on WKRN-TV (Channel 2) Sunday night, and thought it was a hoot. It's sort of like the old "Truth or Consequences," in that various people are chosen from the studio audience to participate in stunts or games, and a few of them have been set up ahead of time by their friends or family. But the gimmick is that all of a given week's audience comes from the same small town. The producers shoot some segments ahead of time in the town, and one audience member has a chance to win a valuable prize (this week, it was a laptop computer) for each and every person in the studio audience.

Admittedly, I'm a sucker for game shows, but I thought this was good-natured fun, with everyone in on the joke.

John I. Carney is city editor of the Times-Gazette and covers county government and other topics. His home page is lakeneuron.com.