I Have a Bad Feeling About This

TD # 15. Don't panic though, I get a bad feeling about at least one a year. And none have come close for several years.

I've got my eye on you # 15. Watch yourself.

The Post Where I Get Snarky

But first I do have to say that in the approximately 38 1/2 years that I have lived in NW Florida, I have been incredibly lucky. While the area that I am in now took a nasty hit from Eloise in '75, I was living 2 counties west of here and many miles north. Frederick in '79 was nothing to me except a day or two out of school.
I lost a freezer full of food after Opal, but my parents had power. During Ivan the power and the cable were steady 100% of the time. (House hunting advice: Buy a home as close to the Police Dept, Fire Dept and City Hall as possible. Not only do you get a break on your Homeowner's Insurance, but these are the first areas of a city to receive power after the storm.)

I try very hard to make it a policy in my life that if I have not "walked a mile in your moccasins" then I will do my best not to judge. (Hard for me, I am very judgemental)

So, having said that, don't we, as a nation, as a people, as human beings, have a responsibility to take care of ourselves? Especially those of us who live in areas prone to natural disasters?

I completely understand WHY people do not evacuate, even if they have the means to do so. I do not understand why, less than a week after the storm, the lines are so long for food and water that it may take all day to receive 4 MREs and a couple of bottles. If a person chooses to remain, why aren't they prepared? This has bothered me since I first noticed the trend after Wilma in 2005. Pleople were complaining that they had to stand in line for half a day for one bottle of water, the day AFTER the storm. Why didn't they have water? Why didn't they prepare, plan? Why wait for government bail out?

Again, I know there are exceptions, the person with medication that MUST be kept refrigerated NEEDS the ice that FEMA has, but the rest of us do not. The person who does not live on a flood plain, whose house flooded, may not be able to use their bottled water and food supplies, but they should have had them to begin with.

How many people constantly complain about the government having a hand in everything they do? How many people talk the talk of a smaller national government? In my experience, these are the first ones with their hands out if life veers slightly off course.

Hurricane preparedness is not information that you are born with, or even information you pick up by osmosis, it is learned.* But a person living anywhere near the coast should have access to the needed information for free. At least it is available here: on handouts, on the radio, on the nightly news, in the newspaper. Most of the information is true and useful. Use it.

Am I being too judgemental? Should I keep my thoughts to myself? Those people have been through hell and maybe I should stay off their backs. But there are more storms in our future and we need to be able to prepare and take care of ourselves without depending on FEMA; at least for a bit.


*My first hurricane (as an adult) was tropical storm Alberto in '94. While it was a minor storm (we had had a regular thunder storm the week before with higher winds) I prepared my house in the same way that my parents had prepared our home when I was a child. I did the same things for Opal in '95 and Earl in '98. After Earl (when it appeared that Georges was headed our way) I was talking to my mom on the phone (they had moved to Memphis).
"Mom," I said, "I have done....(listing my preparation.)"
"Mom," I said, "why do I fill up the blasted bathtubs with water everytime a storm is coming? I have bottled water and I don't want to drink water out of the bathtub!"
"Ann," she said, "the water in the bathtub is for flushing your toilet if you lose water."
My mom is so smart. :-)

Monday General Thoughts

After four entire days off DSD is getting antsy. He is working on his resume right now and has started the networking process. Hopefully he will find something soon. Financially we will be fine for quite a while, but I don't know how he will be mentally and emotionally. He likes to work.

Thank you to everyone who left thoughtful comments; we appreciate your kind thoughts.

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Not a great weekend for college football in our house. My Gators didn't play; his Buckeyes took a shellacking (sp?) at the hands of USC; neither of us did well in the football pool.

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My thoughts are with all those in Texas, Louisiana and everywhere else who took a beating from Ike. I have read the horrors that many of these people have gone through and I have read many comments on other blogs and in news stories where people are constantly bitching that the government should not allow coastal living and how insurance companies should not cover those of us who choose to live on the coast. Just for the record, circumstances brought me to the coast and my job keeps me here. And I want someone, anyone to find a place for me and my family to live that is 100% safe from Mother Nature. Yes, hurricanes are horrible and scary, but so are tornadoes, mudslides, wild fires and freak blizzards, and we always get plenty of notice before the storms reach us. Ike killed people across the country and caused flooding in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio. Where do you holier than thou people expect us to live?

Why Would "They" Name a Hurricane IKE?

Word association, think fast. What is the first thing that pops into your head when you hear the name Ike?

Me: "He sure did kick Tina's ass a lot."

So the National Hurricane Center pulls this name out and sticks it onto a storm. And he is definitely going to kick some ass.

I managed to find several not so scary I names on just one website.

Iago
Ichabod (who is scared of his own shadow)
Ice
Ian
Iggy

Of course, Opal didn't sound scary. Neither did Frances. Frances was supposed to be a Saint.

So, my thoughts are with PissedOffPatricia and everyone on the peninsula. And I will be doing an inspection of my plywood this afternoon, just in case this asshole heads toward the panhandle.

Absolutely soaked today!

I guess all the rain we were expecting over the weekend managed to hold off and make it a very wet Monday.

Thank you to all of you who sent me kind thoughts. Fallenmonk, I am glad you are getting some rain up there, what's good for North Georgia is good for NorthWest Florida.

I am ready for some sunshine, though and it doesn't look like it is going to happen for a few days.

And Gustav is lurking.

Where's Waldo?

Well, who cares? I mean, really!

But I care where I am and in yesterday's comments Carl mentioned that he thought I was on the east coast of Florida. Maybe near Daytona. I then realized that not everyone in the Universe knows where the Redneck Riviera is. Shocking!

So I thought I would do a quick post on the RR and my actual location.

I am not positive where the nickname came from, but apparently Tom T Hall was either the originator or he caught on quickly.

Gulf Shores up through Apalachicola
They got beaches of the whitest sand
Nobody cares if gramma's got a tattoo
Or Bubba's got a hot wing in his hand.
From the song "Redneck Riviera"

So, I can be found right in the middle of this area. This write-up is all about it, but it was written in 2001 and is slightly out of date. We are slightly more upscale now, trying hard to mimic South Beach and falling short. Very short.

So, in case you still have no idea what I am talking about, I thought a little visual would help. I had a nice PDF of this picture, with a cute arrow and a "I am here," but for some reason blogger will not let me upload a PDF. But this is the area typically known as the Redneck Riviera, at least along the coast. And if you look at Bay County, I am about two miles off the coast.

And this is Fay's projected path as of 0800EDT.

At least she is up to 6mph and isn't supposed to linger as she has the last couple of days. Of course, she was going to be downgraded to a depression before she got close to me. And, really, doesn't North Georgia NEED this rain? Wouldn't Lake Lanier be better off?

So it is going to be long weekend. Bay County will flood. We have horrible drainage on our streets and there are some streets that flood if there is more than an inch at a time. Last time we received a lot of rain (March maybe?) the Emergency Management Office flooded.

Keep in mind, with the new puppy, I am going to have to get out in this mess periodically. And do the laundry* all weekend for all the towels we will use to dry her before letting her back in the house, and the various outfits we will change into after she jumps on us all wet. :-)

And it couldn't even come on a weekday so that I could get an extra day off!

*We do not normally lose power (knock on wood). We didn't during Ivan 2004 or Dennis 2005. I think it is because we are on the same power grid as the police dept, city hall and the fire dept. Something to keep in mind when you are househunting.

I Don't Need This in My Business

While I am certain we in the Panhandle will have an easier time than central and eastern Florida did, I heard a possible 20 inches of rain this weekend. While it will just make my life miserable, it will cause numerous problems for the city, the county & those who live on lower ground than I do.

Fay, Fay, Go AWAY.

Flashbacks of Opal

Tropical Storm Dolly has moved across the Yucatan Peninsula and is starting to get her groove on in the Gulf of Mexico. As you can see from the projected path, it looks like poor Texas is on the hook again. Maybe she won't strengthen much (or at all) and they won't have a rough time of it.

She is supposed to hit hurricane strength, but at 18mph, she doesn't have a lot of time before she makes landfall again, according to the National Hurricane Center.

But looking at her track, I am reminded of another storm, 13 years ago. According to the National Hurricane Center, she came across the Atlantic, but I don't remember that. I remember waking up one morning and finding a system in the Gulf. I can't find a picture of it, but originally, she was forecasted to move due south. She didn't.

This was the path as it was forecast next and she stayed pretty true to this prediction.
You can read about and see what she did to NW FL here.

It was a very scary time, evacuating, alone, with a 6 year old (thank goodness he was a boy, it meant we only had to get out of the vehicle if I had to go!). I came home to no damage, except the meat in my freezer since the power had been out for days. But I was lucky and I know that.

So, I am keeping my eye on Dolly, and my fingers crossed that she fizzles in the Gulf and never makes landfall at all.