Flood victims can find resources for aid, advice

March 9, 1997

By JIM BROOKS

If you've been one of the victims of the Flood of '97 -- or know someone who is -- you can turn to the Internet to find resources to help cope, clean-up and rebuild.

• Kentuckiana Online has added local flood information to its Web site at www.kentuckiana.com/97flood/.

You'll find a good list of tips for dealing with cleaning up when the waters recede as well as a page of facts related to the flood and list of important phone numbers.

The page offers free classified if you want to list items you need to replace or items you have for sale.

March is Red Cross month, and the American Red Cross offers lots of online information for flood victims at www.crossnet.org.

Red Cross press releases detail the number of people assisted to date, along with a running total of statistics at various relief efforts, including those outside our area.

The site also offers useful tips on family safety when disaster approaches, and how to deal with the aftermath -- both physically and mentally.

• The Red Cross has a Web site devoted solely to disaster relief information at www.disasterrelief.org.

The site has links to news stories at the top media Web sites, plus its own information on what the organization is doing.

One of the most useful parts of the site are the links built into the news stories that can take you, for example, to the Small Business Administration Web site for information on loans to help small businesses recover from the floodwaters. Other areas of the site link you to other relief organizations that work in conjunction with the Red Cross.

The site even includes charts to help show the counties that have been declared disaster areas and are available for federal assistance.

• Federal aid is primarily the responsibility of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and their Web site, www.fema.gov, has a scrolling window that lets you know the latest news of interest.

On my visit this week, it was, of course, the flooding in Kentucky and other states as well as the tornado damage in Arkansas.

You can find press releases detailing FEMA's current operational status in disaster areas, as well as contact information for help, and in case of Kentucky, the latest river levels and anticipated crests.

There's even a section called the FEMA Radio Network, which consists of sound bites of interviews of FEMA officials talking about their efforts at the various relief sites around the country. The clips are available for downloading in the RealAudio format.

• And while you're watching the skies for unwanted new rainfall, you can point your computer to the National Weather Service's Web site at www.crhnwscr.noaa.gov.

There's literally volumes of information here, and you can get a variety of forecasts -- from 2 to 5 days, as well as radar and infrared images of the region.

The weather service also keeps tabs on all the statistics for the area, including rainfall and river levels (for your records, on Wednesday, March 5, the Bardstown weather station had recorded total rainfall of 8.18 inches over the previous seven days, which was 7.27 inches above normal).

• The Floodplain Management Association's Web site at http://floodplain.org is aimed at the property owner who's located near a river or in an area that floods frequently.

The site is aimed at floodplain managers on a governmental level, but you'll find an interesting archive of articles about floods and dealing with them here.

The site is only a few months old, but still contains lots of timely information. Don't let the bureaucratic lingo you might find at the site bother you -- this site is the place to look for information related to floodplains.

FEE FI FO FONTS. In the golden days of journalism -- when newspaper people banged their stories out on a trusty typewriter that needed no electricity or hard disk space -- you usually had a choice between two fonts: pica or elite.

But in today's world of desktop publishing, there are hundreds if not thousands of different fonts to use.

Unfortunately, most of the best ones require you to purchase the right to use them -- even if you're just going to dress up that letter to your Aunt Bertha, or put together a snazzy graphic for your new Web page.

So how can you find printer fonts that will fit both your pocketbook and your creative urges?

The answer can be found in Usenet, the part of the Internet that services as the "bulletin board" for posting announcements and other information.

Usenet -- also known as "newsgroups" -- covers more topics than Carter's got liver pills -- including fonts for your computer.

All you need to do is fire up your newsreader software and go to the alt.binaries.font newsgroup.

If you need a newsreader for your computer, you don't have to go any further than your World Wide Web browser -- both Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer handle Usenet newsgroups.

If you become a serious newsgroup browser, I recommend using a separate newsreader, like Forte's FreeAgent software for the PC. In my opinion, the newsreaders bundled with both of the popular Web browsers is a little clunky. As far as I've seen, the standalone products are easier to use and faster too.

Once you are browsing the correct newsgroup, you can read each message. The headers for each message usually will indicate if it is a font -- and if you open it to read it, it will look like a bunch of random letters and figures.

The newsreader will convert these text files back to their proper format. Then all you have to do is go under Control Panel (in Windows 3.1) and under Fonts, select add (be sure you know what directory the font was saved to -- you'll need to retrieve it to add to your Windows system).

You'll find all kinds of fonts to use, too. Seasonal fonts, fonts that are based on popular TV shows (including Star Trek and the X-Files), and more.

One warning: All those cool, hip and happening fonts are easy to collect on your system. At one point I had more than 500 fonts. Realizing the memory this took, I sorted through them and narrowed it down to less than half that many.

Also I recommend testing each font once you have it installed. I've run across a font or two that didn't install correctly, and when selected, it temporarily caused an error with all Windows TrueType fonts. Check each font after you have it installed to make sure it is something you'll want to keep.

If you don't want to use a downloaded font now, you can always copy it to a floppy disk, store it in another directory on your hard disk or just delete it entirely.

You might want to create test pages of the fonts you install with the name of each so you'll have a hard copy of what each font looks like. I can't tell you how much time you can waste scouring a list of fonts trying to remember which one was the one you used last time.

Periodic trips to the alt.binaries.font newsgroup will usually provide you a chance to download a new font or two for your system.

And most importantly, you'll have the chance to wow your Aunt Bertha with all of your newfound fonts.

Comments and questions about this column may be sent to jbrooks@myoldkentuckyhome.com, or visit www.myoldkentuckyhome.com on the World Wide Web.

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