Windy Days

Wow, what amazing weather we've had this last weekend. Have you ever experienced wind gusts up to 90+ mph? After this weekend, I sure can say yes! If you think riding out a regular storm is hard, circulating winds around the bay mixed with water for an 18 hour period of time is sheer madness! By the end of Sunday, I was pretty much done hearing wind whipping around the house with its Eerie high-pitched screams! You couldn't even count how many times the house shook as the raging winds and rain beat down upon it incessantly!

Inside, we're scouting all the news stations trying to find out the latest on the position of the storm and how fast it is moving. Trying to find out the projected paths and how the experts are tracking the water issues and the wind issues and what is projected for your area. Seeing the news reports of power outages is enough to frighten anyone who has sump pumps in their basement and no back-up gas powered generators knowing what a mess will be there to clean up if you lose power! Having the storm stall and move slower was a huge issue and probably a lot of the reason for the huge power outages that STILL are affecting the state. I still know people who don't have power and are being told it will be September 7th before they feel they will be able to have it working again! Mon Dieu! How they are surviving day to day, I have no idea! While I like the idea of grilling my food, I'm not sure I would be happy to be forced to go to the grocery store every day to get perishables to cook on the grill to consume immediately without leftovers. That kind of planning would get old really fast! And it's not just one or two people here, it is entire towns and parts of towns and in many different counties! Not just the shore communities got hit, there are people who aren't even close to the water that still don't have power today, and people with babies and young children too! I know there are people who have 100ft extension cords going to their neighbors houses nearby sharing electricity just to keep their refrigerators going to keep some food handy. But that doesn't help the lack of running water, heat, air conditioning, light, computers to run their business. I have a friend who has to go to the library every day and wait on line and there is a 2 hour limit on time you can be on the computers. And she's still not getting all her work done for her home business. Camping is one thing, but this is completely another. I don't think the world realizes there are still people, right now, that do not have power from that huge storm that passed by over the East Coast!

While we were watching the news during the hurricane, we kept worrying we would lose power so we sat back and watched what we wanted and surfed the internet to get our fill because we knew that at any moment the forces of the universe would snatch that power away from us and not return it for a long time. We had preparations with water for drinking and water for the lavatory. We had coolers and ice packs that could keep things fresh for a little while. We had flashlights and batteries, oodles of candles, lighters and matches. Blankets on all the windows (yeah, try finding WOOD to board up your windows when a hurricane is announced will hit your area - good luck with that and a generator) to stop any flying glass should the need arise. Everything movable out of the yard and secured - you sure don't want to be the cause of flying objects going through your neighbors windows!

I couldn't sleep, the raging wind and rain pummeling the house was making such a racket I just couldn't sleep. I think it may have been around 2am after the latest Weather update that I finally was able to snooze a little overnight, but the wind continued to rage against the dying of the light! Sorry, couldn't help but get some literary reference in there! LOL

We survived the hurricane and, luckily thank the powers of the universe, did not lose power. We still had water seepage in the basement that we had to deal with from various sources that were not at the sump pumps, but compared to what it could have been, I am very very thankful.

My only wishes are for the rest of the people to have resolution quickly and power restored so they can get on with the rest of their lives and survive this crisis.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, I am sure. All of the Ohio Electric trucks going round the state shows that we truly are getting a lot of help, I guess they just need to get to everyone. The good news is the weather has cooled down quite a bit! It has been cold every morning, unusually so and I'm sure we can contribute it to everything that has happened. I only hope we get enough warm weather to get rid of the saturated water throughout the state before we get hit by winter.

So how did you fare during the recent weather? Were there any interesting incidents you can report?

Thanks for listening...