Hoooleeeee shit. One of the most beautifully formed hurricanes I’ve seen in years. And it looks like it’s gonna stay in hot water all the way to Hatteras
@f00l I’ve been in some hurricanes where the flooding is the worst because they just move so slow across the state. Some estimates are that it’s going to be as bad as Hurricane Andrew…
I’m on the east coast of FL myself. Less than 15 miles to the ocean. I’m getting kinda worried.
@f00l It might as well be below sea level. The Mister & I were supposed to head for PA early Wednesday morning to catch a bit of fall colors and a festival this weekend. Not too keen on trying to outrun a hurricane.
@OldCatLady
Glad to hear you are so far inland. I still remember pix of Pass Christian, MIssissippi, after Camille. Even in the mid-70’s, after the debris was long cleared, the coast drive had almost no structures. Just empty grass lots.
And then it happened again in 2005.
One ancestor, as a small child (3-4 years old?) survived the Hurricane of 1900 that destroyed Galveston. The high point on the island was 10+ feet below the storm surge crest. Most buildings were pulverized or lifted off their foundations. I don’t know how anyone survived, as the ground floors of every building were temporarily under the Gulf of Mexico. This ancestor also had to survive cholera afterwards, I think.
For anyone thinking of visiting Galveston today, there is a notable sea-wall, and most of the island is something like 17 feet above the elevations of 1900. The locals raised the island, lifted the surviving buildings to the new street levels, and rebuilt. So far, so good.
@RiotDemon My cousin is one block from the ocean just south of Melbourne, FL. They haven’t lived there long and I suggested to her they might want to think about putting the things they value the most by the door or load it in the car on TH morning in case this thing hits at high tide and dumps too much rain. I gather 50mph winds with gusts of 70-90 are what is projected there right now.
@Kidsandliz I’m about an hour+ south. Stores are running out of water. I managed to get more cat food.
I’ll be cleaning my tub tonight so I can fill it for washing up water and water for my pets. Stupid me recycled three empty water jugs this morning instead of filling them up.
Charging my external phone batteries and drill tonight.
Putting up panels tomorrow. Bringing in all the loose patio furniture and what nots.
Got plenty of flashlights and lantern things.
Plenty of propane.
Grabbing gas on my way home from work. It was a 45 minute wait earlier… Not too bad currently. Hopefully better later.
Probably going to freeze more water in my deep freezer since it’ll already stay frozen for 2-3 days with no power.
I’m on the same power grid as the fire station, so power usually gets restored to us first… So I’m hoping it’s not terrible. Especially since they just changed from old wooden poles to concrete ones on the main run.
@RiotDemon Bug spray. Chocolate. Plenty of cash, and get as many singles, fives and tens as you can. ATMs and store cash registers won’t work for awhile, and if you just have to get a $1. item, the store may not be able to make change. Do you have cat carriers for each cat in case you have to evacuate? Cats don’t share well. Put your passport & similar documents into a big envelope, with the cats’ vaccination records. You can do that now. I hope it’s not terrible, too, but I saw the devastation in LA and MS after 2006, and I helped people try to get their lives back.
@RiotDemon If you are worried about water fill your washing machine too(but remember that water is going to have a touch of soap in it) and take your trash cans, if they have no leaks, and full them up. You can use that water to flush the toilets.
@Kidsandliz@RiotDemon And if this all comes to naught (hope on, hope ever), you can use a piece of hose to siphon the water out instead of using a bucket.
/giphy siphon hose
@f00l not really in my budget. My brother won’t need the generator. He can’t use it where he lives. (No porch to put it on, and it’ll walk away if left out front) He is also staying at a friend’s house since his apartment doesn’t have shutters. He just hasn’t had time to get it out of storage and bring it to me.
@Kidsandliz Tell me they bugged out. Please? Just woke up to see it looks like it’s coming ashore in the Melbourne area.
Right now I’m more worried about eldest daughter & her fiance’s family (she got engaged last Friday!) being stuck down on the Disney properties than I am about us further north. Trying not to Mom from up here. I’m sure she knows enough to stay away from the windows when it’s starts to blow, but still…she’s gone Northerner on us.
One of the worst things about riding out a hurricane in place is listening to the bangs and crashes happening under the cover of darkness. That morning light seems to take forever.
@LaVikinga My sister in around Lauderdale did not, my cousin whose house is a target (mandatory evacuation since they were on the barrier island - they are one block from the water which I would be nice, except right now) took off to Tampa to another cousin’s house. I hope everyone on our forums will be ok and their houses will be ok.
The timing of this might wreck the Schooner Race (yeah I know and a lot of other things, but tall ships and hurricanes don’t mix very well)…That will suck.
@Kidsandliz Hopefully everyone will stay in port if need be and we Won’t have anothe Bounty situation. I know dock committees on both ends are making sure we have options of storm docks.
@CaptAmehrican I figured there’s be decent plans in place. Hope they don’t have to be used. The race is Thurs/Fri, right? Depending on the direction of the wind might be a seriously fast sleigh ride… Not sure if I am glad I will be missing needle raindrops pelted in the face or sad I will be missing an exciting sail.
@Kidsandliz I’d go for the latter… maybe… depending on how exciting it would be. Wouldn’t want to be out in the storm itself but riding the wave ahead of it could be fun.
@CaptAmehrican They start the race ok? Any concerns about the Norfolk end? I realize that the storm will just be hitting land in FL when they will be docking in Norfolk, but I am thinking of people then sailing home.
I see that some of the boats are listed as “in spirit only” - does that mean they just donated but aren’t racing? Fleet looks pretty large. Big Nostalgia with some of those boats. That race sure has that grown since I was first involved in 1989 or 1990 - can’t remember anymore for sure exactly which year And back then there sure wasn’t a week of activities around it with boats in port that long. I’d guess you are big time busy right now with everyone there to watch them leave and all the boats on schooner watch running around. Hope you had some fun around your job and volunteer work. And saw some old friends.
@CaptAmehrican I guess I was a week ahead of myself when I was looking at the week’s schedule. Opps. Might make it harder for some of the boats to get there though depending on where they are coming from. I should know better too as my birthday is usually one of the days involved in this LOL
@jaybird when I moved in, the panels were here, but not a single wingnut. Last scare we had, I bought a bunch and charged my landlord. They’re still sitting in the plastic bag from the store. At least I know where they are.
This place has the headers and sills, so you end up painting the house around them, instead of over them, lol
@RiotDemon What’s the situation there? Around here they’re saying pack up and evacuate NOW if you are in a flood zone, aka Jax Beach, Fernandina, Jekyll Island, St. Simons Island etc. City offices and schools will be closed for all beach cities tomorrow. Ohshit, now all Duval and St. John’s County schools will be closed after today. I topped off my gas tank yesterday.
@OldCatLady all the islands are under mandatory evacuations, plus Manufactured/mobile homes, low lying areas. Storm surge is 3-5+ feet. Probably going to be high tide during the storm, so it could be worse.
I know the city north of me is going to flood like it always does… My city fixed a lot of their flooding problems and added in new storm drain things and I have a couple of, I’m not sure what they’re called, but basically lakes that are meant to hold some flood waters.
No one has water… But the publix stores are expecting shipments… Good luck getting there in time. I keep calling to see if the truck has arrived. They just say before 6pm. They don’t know.
I managed to get gas last night. Most places were out, but I saw a couple of tankers filling stations.
@OldCatLady Run a load of hot water and bleach through the washing machine. Then fill the machine with cold water. If you have on of those new machines that empties the drum when you stop the cycle. unlock the lid then pull the plug. The water will be potable for å few days then you can add a couple of capfuls of bleach.
@RiotDemon Stormwater retention ponds. I live on one. I used to be fairly knowledgeable about groundwater hydrology, so I’m morally certain it’ll be okay. See photo.
@OldCatLady Your duck herd reminds me of my backyard when I lived on the canal.m Had a pit bull that was allowed to chase them over the fence but not grab them. Then she figured out it was ok to tackle them so she would try to press them up against the fence until I called her off. Fun times.
@cranky1950 They’re NOT MY GEESE. The domestic goose is an escapee from a farm near here. Also, I fenced my patio off so no more goose manure decorates it. I may have tossed stale bread onto my evil neighbor’s patio after dark, though.
@OldCatLady ah yes! The name totally escaped me. Talked to some of my neighbors that have lived here longer than me, and none of them are concerned about flooding. They’re all concerned about the winds.
The new track that shows it closer to the coast, and then possibly doubling back next week, are making me nervous. I’m not that concerned about the house except I have roof turbines. I didn’t know you could take them off and cap them. I’m hoping nothing hits them…
They’re expecting 80+ mph winds tomorrow night, with gusts up to 105mph. Then Friday morning tapering off to 60mph or less.
They’re only expecting around 5" of rain in my area.
@RiotDemon I didn’t know that about turbines either. It’s a little late to try this time. Yes, it’s the silliest-looking track I’ve seen in awhile. It reminds me of my Roomba trying to dock itself, when it isn’t lined up just right.
@RiotDemon 'Gator Ponds. Those lakes are called 'gator ponds 'cuz you KNOW that’s where they live. Also known as The Golf Course. Evidently, alligators play golf as well.
@LaVikinga
One friend’s kid attended a south Florida wedding at a country club complete with alligator ponds. Much of the bridal party were house guests in nearby “golf course homes”.
The bride’s comment was “watch your kids and pets. No, you can’t wade or swim in those ponds. And any gator who wants to show up at the reception had better be wearing a tux”,
Get a stiff wire brush on a shank for your drill and clean the threads before you even attempt to put nuts on studs that have been sitting in the weather for years.
Maybe it’ll go away if we don’t feed it attention. A hurricane troll. Yeah. The highly colored weather maps now show the eye making landfall around Daytona on Friday morning. I do not like that at all. Must go download some music and check out radio reception on edevices. Heaven forfend we should lose power, Internet access and I have no music or radio. Digging out my hotel chain cards, because I haven’t used them in a few years. Ohshit ohshit ohshit. When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout.- RAH.
@OldCatLady So the big X target is now bit further north than yesterday’s projection of Melbourne/Brevard County? Good for my cousin who is spitting distance of Melbourne, but I guess not so good for you in Jacksonville.
@Kidsandliz The eye is (11 AM update) heading for Cape Canaveral, just a loud shout from your cousin. However, it’s a large storm, and there’s plenty of damage to go around. The only sure thing is that on Saturday, the beaches around Sebastian will be covered with treasure hunters, because gold coins still wash ashore after every storm.
@OldCatLady right now I’ll be south of the eye making landfall. They say it’ll be sustained winds of 60+mph with gusts 80-100mph. Of course the eye can move… The waiting is the terrible part.
@Kidsandliz There were some treasure ships wrecked offshore, and although the actual ships may have been found recently, the treasure will keep washing up with the tide for years.
@OldCatLady So do people find things daily or just occasionally? Also aren’t you supposed to be preparing and packing for a road trip up some mountain or something sometime in your near future? Quit posting so I can get back to work grading papers LOL - and yes I am blaming you and not the goat.
I mean seriously you should be on the phone now that you have found your hotel cards making reservations before other people beat you to it. And buying cat food. Lots and lots of cat food. So your kitties don’t eat the hand that feeds them. I got bit a week ago by a foster cat taken from the roof of a house in the Baton Rouge floods. She is a darling cat but did not want to go back into the cage (my friend is fostering 4 of them while they try to find the owners - a bunch of those cats ended up here at a no kill shelter while they hunt for owners) and so sunk her teeth hard into my hand. 9 hours later I was in the ER getting IV antibiotics because of how much it swelled and how fast I developed a quickly spreading cellulitis.
@Kidsandliz I’m higher than a Cat 5 and major storm surge evac area. No plans to leave. Cat food is stocked for about 60 days, ditto people food. (Cat bites are major trouble; I wish I’d gone to the ER for one last May, but my PC didn’t think it was much. It was.) Tomorrow I’ll fill some trash cans and bathtubs, but I’m on city water so it’s just reflex.
Love the TV reporter reading questions from viewers. ‘We’re leaving on a cruise Saturday from Jacksonville- will this have any effect?’ -my answer: No, come on, it’ll be fine. The Navy just sent the USS Iwo Jima and some visiting ships out to sea to weather the storm, but I’m sure your cruise will be okay. That’s not what the TV said, though.
/giphy "USS Iwo Jima"
Once got trapped by hurricane flooding tho 300 miles from the coast. Tropical Storm Hermine? House was fine, but a local creek annexed all the streets and driveways. Something like 12 inches of rain in a few hours?
@cranky1950 And the 100 year flood plains are turning into 50 year flood plains as the more the area gets built up the more there is run off on cement and less onto grass where it is filtered and slowed down as it heads to the stream or where ever.
The update I just heard, with the storm models increasing the continuing western trend of this storm certainly does not look good for all you east coast and somewhat inland FL folks.
I’ve never used the hurricane panels on this house… And omg, I wish I had. A lot of the panels are bent so I’m not able to line them up in the holes properly. I’m getting pretty frustrated. I’ve had to rearrange some of the windows to get them to overlap and work properly. My two sliding doors are the worst though. I think I’m going to have to get a pair of pliers and start bending the tops because they keep getting stuck on the headers when I’m trying to slide them in. Whoever cut these panels, cut them very roughly and the tops have jagged edges that are getting in the way.
My drill went AWOL so I’ve had to tighten the wingnuts up by hand, which isn’t the worst thing I’ve had to do. It’s just annoying on top of everything else.
My mom’s landlord texts her today to let her know she has shutters in the outside storage closet. My mom had no idea. She hasn’t lived there that long. She was coming to stay with me because she thought she didn’t have any. I guess this means I’ll have to go over to her place in the morning and put the shutters up unless the landlord comes out and does it.
Then my Mom was told today that she has to stay at her place of work tomorrow before the storm hits, and then until it dies back down… (She’s a nurse) So she’s staying at least one night. They are trying to say they won’t pay more than an 8 hour shift and she would have to use her personal time to get paid for the rest. Wtf kinda shit is that? I’m pissed for her.
@RiotDemon
I think your Mom’s employer is abusive. If they’re not paying her, they should have exactly zero say what she does on her off hours. I met some people who work as visiting nurses. They do not get treated like that. The places that contract for visiting nurses know that if the place gets a reputation for abusing the visiting nurses, the nurses will start refusing those assignment offers.
One friend’s step-daughter made the choice to become a sonogram specialist instead of a nurse, just to avoid the kind of employment treatment your mom is getting. And two years out of school, she’s making more than $70k I think.
@f00l I just talked to her again. Apparently I misunderstood her. She’s forced to stay at work. If she takes a nap, or a break, she has to clock out. So even though they make her stay at work, if she gets tired and has to sleep, she’s not paid. I just don’t understand that. She’s not allowed to go sleep in her own bed… It seems that she should get some kind of compensation.
I ended up finding my attachment for my pneumatic wrench so I drug my compressor around the house to tighten all the wingnuts. All the bent panels have been bent back into submission with a hammer. I only have a couple left to put on my slider door to my backyard so I can let the dog out. I hope she’ll use a peepee pad during the storm if I can’t let her out. She’s one of these dogs that’ll hold it for hours and hours.
Okay, I have to laugh. Local beach communities (Ponte Vedra Beach, very pricey real estate) have been evacuated, and some residents have fled to the Hilton Garden Inn in downtown Jacksonville. Which has just given all its customers a letter recommending that they leave the area, for safety. TV interviewed people who had just checked in and been given the letter at the same time. They’re staying. I should add that Jacksonville is on a large, tidal river, and about half of it is fill land. All city offices will be closed the next 2-3 days.
@OldCatLady@f00l hey check out storm (by weather underground) if you want storm tracking… it costs but since they conveniently “broke” storm tracks on their website, and haven’t “got it fixed quickly”… it sure is handy.
@OldCatLady The Hilton DOES have Ruth’s and they make a lethally mean martini…
Or is it that the DoubleTree?
Husband uses the NOAA weather. Said it didn’t fail him in 30 years of Navy life. I’m alternating between saying it’ll be just fine, and little flights of panic. My sister went through Ivan in Pensacola. No power for three weeks. Limited damage to property, but no power. Was washing clothes in the bathtub and stretching out a charged garden hose in the sun to take a semi-warm “shower.”
@cranky1950 Home of Florida Man. The whole state is like living in Darwin’s Waiting Room. No telling what stupid things are going to happen here next.
“Hey, y’all! Hold mah beer and watch THIS!”
@cranky1950 Yes, yes it is. I live far away from downtown, and there is a Hilton Garden Inn close to me, but I’m betting they are looking forward to a vacay downtown, with restaurants and stormwatching on the riverwalk, and then go see Cirque du Soleil across the street. Oh, you say that’s been cancelled? And the symphony’s performances of Beethoven’s 5th too? And the library is closed since it’s a city office? Maybe the reporter could check back tonight.
Wonder how the riverwalk will fare.
We’ve got our bread, water, chips, queso, yanno… the essentials. Ran back out for applesauce this morning. Stores in Orlando are busy, but no chaos yet. Wife picked up some wine last night. As ready as we’re gonna get here.
Not sure why, but wife drew a bath for me. Filled it way too high though, so had to drain a little bit out before hopping in. Fresh and clean and waiting for her to get back with more supplies.
@mikey “I don’t know what happened, Officer. He must have slipped in all that clean bathwater, hit his head several times and drowned. Poor dumb bastard.”
@OldCatLady What @cranky1950 said. We’re old hands at hurricaning now. I was just levitying the situation with the bathtub joke.
The rest though… honest word. Just made another run to Publix for M&Ms, snickers, OJ, chex mix, and fresh chicken breasts. So the “poor dumb bastard” remark probably still applies.
@f00l I stopped at the grocery store this morning to get more milk… I can’t be without milk for days. However, there was a line at the deli for cold cuts. Was watching people buy icecream and other frozen things.
My thought is if the power goes out, I’ll be eating the stuff I already have in the freezer so I don’t throw food away. Maybe these people didn’t have any food in their freezer?
@RiotDemon
I suppose, if it were us, doing the hurricane watch, we might get ice cream on the agreement that “we start eating it the second the power goes out”.
@f00l Last time I did that, I was in the shower when the power went out and had to finish and dry off in pitch black because my flashlight was on the night stand. An hour later the storm panel blew away and the sliding door caved in. Great memories if you survive.
@cranky1950 Just tried to get to Publix for potato chips (plenty of beer on hand). After three light cycles in gridlock and four lights away, I came home. Local version of 7-11 Store, the Gate store, closed at noon. They were out of gas anyway. Will make do with Chex mix.
@OldCatLady I have so many chips it’s ridiculous. There isn’t a Trader Joe’s by me, but I was close by one, so I went and stocked up before the storm. Somebody asked if I was having a party. A sad party of one, lol.
They have unique stuff I can’t get, and I probably won’t be in that area for months. Chips last a long time at least.
@RiotDemon The nearest Trader Joe’s is out at Jax Beach, which has been evacuated. The last time I went there I stocked up on lots of unlikely things, and didn’t regret it at all.
@OldCatLady it’s fun to go shopping there to get some different stuff compared to normal. I love publix, but sometimes a change is good. Occasionally I’ll go to Aldi which is owned by the same company as Trader Joe’s. It’s too bad they don’t carry some of the same stuff.
One step short of schadenfreude: last Saturday the Carnival ‘Elation’ sailed from Jax. Local news interviewed passengers - are you worried about the storm? Every one said no, they trusted the cruise line to keep them safe. As of now, six ports on the east coast are closed: the ships can’t come in. Cue the ‘Gilligan’s Isle’ music. http://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=7255
@Kidsandliz It’s engraved in my brain. Last year the SS El Faro sailed out of Jax for Puerto Rico, into Hurricane Joaquin. It broke up, plenty of blame to go around. Voice and data recorders have been recovered, with clear footage of the wreck on the ocean floor, taken by submersibles.
@OldCatLady sadly I had a friend on el Faro and knew the captain on Bounty. I am really hoping to break my streak of losing people to hurricanes on boats.
Hoping for the best for all of you affected. My gf’s nephew is a freshman at FAU. This is certainly something new for him. I’m guessing he and his friends are spending the next few days playing XBox and getting high. Seems like a plan…
@cinoclav tell them to order their pizzas NOW for pick up. Stock up! Room temp pizza is almost as good as fresh when you’re really hungry and you have no power.
@LaVikinga I checked the FAU website and saw their cafeteria would be open for campus residents. They’re providing takeout boxes so the students can bring food back to their rooms. At 18 I’m sure they’re all looking forward to it.
Interesting link sent to me by one of the schools I teach online for (that is more or less ground zero for landfall) by one of the grad meteorologist students who got it from somewhere else (until the server goes down they are sending updates to the school emails)
Here is the information in the email that came with this map:
Temp and dewpoint in deg F (red and green text), wind barbs themselves in knots, if a gust over 20 mph is recorded that will be shown to the top right in yellow (and in mph). Clicking on a station will show a popup that can link you to MesoWest pages, and clicking on the map itself will also let you refresh the page to that location. Top menu lets you filter by network as well.
One other thing, you can add “limitations” to some variables to only display stations that meet certain thresholds. That can be done by adding “&limit=” to the URL string. You can do things like this:
Show me stations that are currently reporting tropical storm force sustained winds:
@OldCatLady I remember my sister relaying messages back and forth to strangers in the North who were frantically trying to get info on their families. Her neighborhood was hard hit and even phone land lines were screwy, but she was able to track down several “missing” people (6 Degrees of Separation is a thing), and pass word back that almost every one was safe. She refused to be the one to tell one family that their missing family member had drowned at home.
She said after watching the water creep up her street from the bayou, and being in the middle of Ivan’s winds she would NEVER ride out a hurricane again. Little twerp is on her way to PA to enjoy the weather, and all the fun. Even has access for tickets to PennState’s home game this weekend. The pisser of it all is I know she won’t go to the game because she’ll be too stuffed with festival sausages, spiced nuts, pumpkin whoopie pies, and boardwalk fries to even move.
@OldCatLady During andrew, civil defense announced" People with cell phones in Kendall stop calling 911 there is nothing we can do for you and you’re clogging the system with useless calls".
@cranky1950 The system and capabilities have changed since then. However, everything that has been planned for will prove to be useless, and aspects nobody thought about will prove critical. Logistics and facility planning 101.
@cranky1950 Thanks for the good wishes. They won’t shut it down, but it may be patchy. I just got a Code Red Alert from the city, mandatory evacuation of zones a, b and c- as well as anyone who lives in manufactured housing. Do you know how many people in FL that is? I feel for the poor librarian where I volunteer; not only does she live in a 6th floor condo in a flood zone, but she does not own a car, so doesn’t know how she could evacuate.
@OldCatLady If you’re gonna get hit by the storm they shut it down to prevent damage from downed high tension cables. I had a 6" wide gap across my front walk where one of the lines that went back to the old cutler generating plant got loose from a hot stick. When civil defense take over they shut it down.
@cranky1950 Which is why I have six powerpacks all charged. And a landline phone with a cord. I may be the only person in my neighborhood with such an antique.
/giphy "phone cord"
@OldCatLady Still have a landline AND a HUGE button phone (just like the one Clint Eastwood’s family gave him in that “hey, kids, get offa my lawn” movie). When the cell phone towers go tits up or blown all the way to Oz, we old timers will still be able to place/receive calls.
@Mehrocco_Mole You spoiled the image I had of someone confused by a phone cord. Well, perhaps they had to take a class to learn how to use it. I still have a package of splitters somewhere. I am awed by private citizens who have satellite phones, which includes a few of my friends.
@OldCatLady I did not say they know how to use them. At one time one of the emergency management offices installed seismic equipment. Why? I don’t know as we don’t have Earthquakes in FL. I guess they just had the $$$ and needed to spend it. They also had a very active train track running about 30 feet from the back of the building.
Ummm… guys? I think I see a problem here…
@Mehrocco_Mole We do too have earthquakes in NE FL. Every century or so. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Florida
The location of the monitor confirms my theory that government offices and politicians exist to provide entertainment to taxpayers. Think about it. It explains so much.
@OldCatLady Y’know, being a child of the 50’s nothing than more viscerally frightening as hearing hearing that 2000 cycle tone and “This is the emergency broadcasting system, this is not a test.” (your heart skips a few beats at this point) then they blither on about the storm.
@cranky1950 Yeah take cover from the bomb under your desk at school or next to the furnace. Who were they kidding? Sheesh you’d think grownups could get along and not bicker like little kids, especially if they are heads of state. LOL
@cranky1950 Lots of areas will. Since beachfront real estate is always high-priced, the replacements will be even more so. The fringe housing market of very old low cost houses, built before the 1970s, and ‘manufactured housing’ may not come back.
@OldCatLady Used to think those cinderblock beach home on Pensacola Beach that survived hurricanes from the 50s, on up were bomb proof. We were stunned to learn several of them simply disappeared from their foundations when Ivan hit. Gone in a matter of hours.
@LaVikinga They built a brand new pace warehouse store near my house they hadnt stocked it yet. Maded from precast panels. Was driving down US 1 after the storm and all at was there was piles of crumbled concrete,not one whole or anything that resembled a part of a precast panel. Also the Uhaul store on US1 had a 20 moving truck sitting serenely sitting on the roof of the office like it belonged there.
@LaVikinga Empty concrete foundations all around New Orleans and Miami should have convinced builders. FL did pass a housing bill around 2001 that required all roof trusses to withstand 120 mph winds, but there’s not much you can do about flooding, except not be where it happens. Oh, thanks, local news: it just showed a graphic forecasting 125 mph winds here tomorrow.
@OldCatLady The original south florida building code that HUD made them gut in the 80s was originally for 150 mi/hr roof. Most of the construction from the 50s- 70s came through with a couple of sheets of plywood missing. Most of the stick built housing that hud and fha forced in the 80s got blown down.
Checking in.
I slept through the worst of it. Woke up because I’m starting to get hot without power. Half my county is without. I’d love to open my front door but something metal is moving around outside and it’s definitely raining sideways still.
There’s a bunch of frogs having a party outside. They’re yelling really loudly.
We are really lucky that Matthew stayed off the coast.
I’m hoping there isn’t much damage when I go outside.
@CaptAmehrican@sammydog01
Thanks y’all. Walked around outside after the metal thing stopped moving around. Must of been in my neighbors yard. My backyard is partially flooded. My trees took a beating, but not too crazy. My house looks fine from what I can tell. I’m going to look again soon since the sun is up.
My neighbors are already starting to run the generators… I’m keeping an eye in the power company’s outage map. When the numbers start going down, instead of up, I know things will be looking up.
@RiotDemon Watching here probably 200 miles north of you. Rains still haven’t arrived. Storm is about 120-30 miles south of us and due to roll in sometime mid-afternoon. Glad to hear the damage has been minimal so far.
@LaVikinga I’m in the Treasure coast area, so east of the lake basically.
My backyard only has lots of tree debris, and flooding. Part of my oak and my areca palm tree has limb damage. My neighbor across the street… The whole top of their palm tree fell down. I’m not really surprised though because woodpeckers have been damaging that tree steadily for a long time.
His backyard fence fell down though, and the neighbor’s shed door is banging open. I’m not even sure if they are home. The neighbor with the broken palm didn’t put up shutters… And I doubt he has impact windows. He’s lucky.
My power is back on, woohoo! But my septic is flooded… Boo. My landlord is already working on getting it fixed because it was a problem before the storm. My drain field isn’t working properly, and all this rain made it worse. I used to be able to flush my toilet and take short showers… Now I can’t even do that
To be fair, the storm gutter right in front of my house (where the drain field is) is completely flooded, so the gutter probably backed up onto my lawn.
@f00l My local emergency management office robocalled at 0730 to alert everyone that a hurricane was coming. That makes the fourth call so far. You had to push ‘1’ to acknowledge that you heard, or they would continue to call. I pushed ‘1’, rolled over, and slept until 0900. Wind N22, otherwise same as @LaVikinga. Jim Cantore is in Ft. Pierce, so we’re probably safe. Power just flickered, but I already made coffee.
Good to know you have your priorities straight! I wish I had thought of that before Ivan or Katrina. The last time we got hit (Katrina) we were without power for about three weeks. They brought generators to the nearby fire station. We’re at the other end of I10 in Pensacola so if you find you need anything…
@Mehrocco_Mole Thanks very much. Let’s wait and see what this silly thing is going to do next week. If we do lose power, I know how to make cold brew coffee, which is trendy but good. Also, in a past fuku, meh sent me a perfectly good Cobra powerpack, and it’s all charged. I tested a few small appliances on it, and it worked.
@Mehrocco_Mole My Dad & sister still live in P’cola down towards Beach Haven/Warrington just up from Bayou Grande. They wanted us to bug out and set up camp at my Dad’s house (meanwhile, the ratfinks are in PA enjoying glorious fall weather).
@Mehrocco_Mole Rode it out. No damage to the house, but LOTS of big branches down from the maples and pines. Big mushy areas still left at sunset today. Lost power from 2 PM yesterday to about 9:30 this morning. Generator kept the fridge & freezer and the box fans in the bed rooms running. Coffee this morning was extra tasty.
@Mehrocco_Mole Cantonment. As kids while waiting at the bus stop in the morning, we always knew when the wind was coming from that direction.
Why do paper factories smell so BAD!?
@LaVikinga Yeah I know. About 1987 my wife was offered a transfer to Orange Park. So we go up there and get a hotel, wander around Sat everything is fine. Open the door Sunday morn. take one wiff and both of us go __Nah. got in the car and drove home.
@LaVikinga It’s not so bad anymore. They reduced operations at the paper mill so they don’t bleach the pulp as much. The sulphur dioxide used to bleach paper is what stunk. Now we only get treated to the mill farts once or twice a year. Years back I worked at the old Winn-Dixie. It seemed like every day everyone had just finished eating a couple beans and cucumber sandwiches.
/giphy paper mill
And also since a storm could hit the coast and spinoff to here, as has happened. And since tornados. And since ice storms. And since windstorms. And since injection wells brought us the wonders of earthquakes.
Insurance. Sigh. Not cheap.
Want a beach house to handle hurricanes? Have a few mill to spare?
According to what I’ve read, this house is, by county and state permission, exempt from evacuation, and weather scientists, news crews, safety personnel, and the like hunker down there during storms by standing invitation from the owners.
The house is designed to still be functional if the lower floors flood and to withstand full-force (500 mph, according to a news story) storm winds. Storm shutters are generator powered, and the house design includes a redundant generator system.
@f00l There used to be a home like this on Pensacola Beach. I think there’s one similar out near the Jax Beaches. It might be a duplex half built into the dunes. I believe it had been up for sale at one point.
I got bored waiting for the winds to hit, so I painted my finger nails a sparkly violet that probably won’t last through yard clean up, found a pair of scissors and cut a few inches off the ends of my hair, and destroyed half a can of salted cashews all before noon.
Winds are really beginning to pick up. Pinecones are hammering the roof and the backyard is more flooded than I care to see it. Aaaand now the power is flickering. Rutroh.
@RiotDemon Around two in the afternoon a giant branch decided to go dangling from the wires on the power lines that attach to those huge cement poles that run along the right away behind our property. Set off a shower of arcing and blue light like I’ve never seen. Temps are relatively moderate so it’s very comfortable in house and can run a box fan with the generator.
Big limbs from pines and maples down all over back yard. Standing water every where. Lost part of an ornamental tree and it took out part of the fence but Super Husband manhandled it off fence and nailed it back to posts.
Hoping for power to be restored by lunch time tomorrow but not counting on it. Tomorrow morning will be interesting.
Thank goodness for grill. Managed to cook a Publix pizza for dinner.
Local NBC channel just had footage of a pretty sloop riding out the storm in the river, or so they said. Looked like a very tattered mainsail, and possibly at anchor, but I only caught about three seconds of it. People are playing in the surf at the beach; of course they are. The eye is about 50 miles east.
I’m getting pretty annoyed at people complaining that we did all this preparation for nothing. What? Would you rather get pummeled? I just saw a photo on Facebook of St. Augustine and it was under water.
@RiotDemon Me, too. My 80 year old Great Aunt lives alone in a trailer park on a small island off the coast of Orlando. The winter people aren’t there yet, so the population of the island is very small at the moment. I tried to convince her to evacuate, but she was having none of it.
@OldCatLady In other news, the main street of Benson, NC (home of Mule Days) is under water. I recognized the photos from our redneck water ski trip. It looks like inland North Carolina was the big loser (after Haiti). I hope the ski camp survived.
@sammydog01 That’s dreadful. Nobody expected inland areas to be hit that hard. In Florida, beach areas got badly chewed up, even though they were braced for it. Rebuilding is going to take a long time. Food and clothing donation drives are just starting, as people are being allowed back into their houses.
@OldCatLady she lives in Fruitland Park, near Leesburg. She always told me it was an island off the coast, but I just looked it up on mapquest and it looks like it’s in the middle of the state. We have been out of touch for decades and only reconnected a few months ago. I’m hoping to visit her in the spring. I want to drive but it’s a more than 3,300 mile round trip, so that may have to give way to a plane ride.
@OldCatLady@RiotDemon@LaVikinga - I’ve been following your stories here, SO glad you are all relatively unscathed. Is there anyone we haven’t heard from?
@KDemo Facebook activated their ‘check in’ feature, which has saved a huge amount of time and worry. I still don’t have power but perhaps tomorrow. I will definitely change phone carriers. Sprint coverage is patchy. Most of the time I have one bar at home.
@RiotDemon It’s up and down. Doesn’t stay on long enough for the cable channel guide to populate. I’m very lucky that this is the worst problem. St. Augustine is a major disaster, and other beach communities haven’t finished disaster assessments. People are just now being allowed back into their houses.
We had rolling blackouts last nite and drizzly rain and gusty wind all day yesterday. Must have been at the exteme edge of the fringe winds. Coastal SC got nailed pretty badly and I guess the local power grid was over taxed as a result. Anyway we lost power for about 20min about 11pm. Temps are in the 60s here so it really didn’t matter at that point. Some parts of town lost power friday nite were out all day yesterday, luckily not my street.
Is anyone else getting emails from this thread? It says I subscribed to it, and let me unsubscribe. I don’t know how I did it. It wasn’t when someone mentioned me, it was every single time someone commented, lol
Matthew also flooded fire ants out of their mound in my neighbor’s yard, and they set up shop in mine. Amdro! I did my Achmed-the-dead-terrorist voice as I sprinkled it around. Neighbors asked if I was okay. Clearly my impressions need work.
@RiotDemon That was it. I explained that I was channeling a puppet representing a skeletal dead terrorist. It didn’t go too well. That’s @Ignorant’s fault.
/giphy Achmed
@OldCatLady Boy, I really wish I could have seen THAT exchange. Floating rafts of fire ants have been a thing here the past couple of springs when the backyard flooded for a few weeks. Of course now I would love to have that problem since it hasn’t rained in a month or more. My ‘lawn’ has reached a flash point that I think I could trigger with static electricity from my (thinning) hair!
Glad you made it thru Matthew relatively unscathed!
@OldCatLady I don’t know if you saw, but apparently Jeff is going to be on a food network show hosting a Halloween competition. I might actually watch regular TV to catch that.
Link?
Nope, but now @matthew needs to do an infrared thermal image of himself. Or of Irk.
@narfcake Or a video of @matthew spinning around in the rain. In infrared.
Or someone smart needs to superimpose @matthew’s face onto that image below.
3 ft of rain
Beautiful you say?
Go ahead, enjoy, all of you. Every update shows it moving farther inland by the time it hits Jacksonville. I do not approve. It’s @Ignorant 's fault.
@OldCatLady people are already freaking out. I might actually buy some more water.
@OldCatLady Meh, jump in the car come stay with me I’m 200 miles inland. At cat 5 don’t even try to save anything but your butt.
@cranky1950 Aw, thanks. I have a complete bugout kit, with a carrier for each cat. If the cat 5 winds are coming inland, I’m heading for the hills.
@OldCatLady me too. cat 3 in 2004 was ok. i ain’t playin with cat 5
@OldCatLady
How far inland are you? Elevation?
What is the elevation range in Jacksonville? Is there are storm surge estimate yet?
If a storm runs up the coast like that, I guess everyone gets the full surge.
@f00l I’ve been in some hurricanes where the flooding is the worst because they just move so slow across the state. Some estimates are that it’s going to be as bad as Hurricane Andrew…
I’m on the east coast of FL myself. Less than 15 miles to the ocean. I’m getting kinda worried.
@f00l It might as well be below sea level. The Mister & I were supposed to head for PA early Wednesday morning to catch a bit of fall colors and a festival this weekend. Not too keen on trying to outrun a hurricane.
@f00l Atlanta, ain’t no hurricane coming this far. On a ridge and the Chattahoochee is about 50ft lower than me.
@RiotDemon Andrew was cat4 and fast moving, if it were slow moving like this one I would be dead.
@cranky1950 There is no elevation in Jacksonville
@f00l Over 20 miles inland, on the west side of a very large river which has high banks. Not even a cat 5 storm tide would make us evacuate.
@OldCatLady
Glad to hear you are so far inland. I still remember pix of Pass Christian, MIssissippi, after Camille. Even in the mid-70’s, after the debris was long cleared, the coast drive had almost no structures. Just empty grass lots.
And then it happened again in 2005.
One ancestor, as a small child (3-4 years old?) survived the Hurricane of 1900 that destroyed Galveston. The high point on the island was 10+ feet below the storm surge crest. Most buildings were pulverized or lifted off their foundations. I don’t know how anyone survived, as the ground floors of every building were temporarily under the Gulf of Mexico. This ancestor also had to survive cholera afterwards, I think.
For anyone thinking of visiting Galveston today, there is a notable sea-wall, and most of the island is something like 17 feet above the elevations of 1900. The locals raised the island, lifted the surviving buildings to the new street levels, and rebuilt. So far, so good.
@RiotDemon My cousin is one block from the ocean just south of Melbourne, FL. They haven’t lived there long and I suggested to her they might want to think about putting the things they value the most by the door or load it in the car on TH morning in case this thing hits at high tide and dumps too much rain. I gather 50mph winds with gusts of 70-90 are what is projected there right now.
@f00l My mom’s uncle worked for the corp of army engineers and helped build that seawall.
@Kidsandliz I’m about an hour+ south. Stores are running out of water. I managed to get more cat food.
I’ll be cleaning my tub tonight so I can fill it for washing up water and water for my pets. Stupid me recycled three empty water jugs this morning instead of filling them up.
Charging my external phone batteries and drill tonight.
Putting up panels tomorrow. Bringing in all the loose patio furniture and what nots.
Got plenty of flashlights and lantern things.
Plenty of propane.
Grabbing gas on my way home from work. It was a 45 minute wait earlier… Not too bad currently. Hopefully better later.
Probably going to freeze more water in my deep freezer since it’ll already stay frozen for 2-3 days with no power.
I’m on the same power grid as the fire station, so power usually gets restored to us first… So I’m hoping it’s not terrible. Especially since they just changed from old wooden poles to concrete ones on the main run.
I’m sure I’m forgetting something.
@RiotDemon Bug spray. Chocolate. Plenty of cash, and get as many singles, fives and tens as you can. ATMs and store cash registers won’t work for awhile, and if you just have to get a $1. item, the store may not be able to make change. Do you have cat carriers for each cat in case you have to evacuate? Cats don’t share well. Put your passport & similar documents into a big envelope, with the cats’ vaccination records. You can do that now. I hope it’s not terrible, too, but I saw the devastation in LA and MS after 2006, and I helped people try to get their lives back.
@RiotDemon If you are worried about water fill your washing machine too(but remember that water is going to have a touch of soap in it) and take your trash cans, if they have no leaks, and full them up. You can use that water to flush the toilets.
@Kidsandliz @RiotDemon And if this all comes to naught (hope on, hope ever), you can use a piece of hose to siphon the water out instead of using a bucket.
/giphy siphon hose
@Kidsandliz
I thank your Mom’s uncle then. The Galveston sea-wall is cool.
@Kidsandliz @OldCatLady
Thanks. Good ideas.
I just wish I would of stocked up on water ahead of time.
I’m on a well, as long as I have power, I’m fine… My brother has a generator. He lives an hour south. If need be, he can bring it to me.
@RiotDemon
Prob too late to buy your own generator locally? OOS?
@Kidsandliz 50-75 is not a big deal, you get that in a summer palmetto pounder.
@f00l not really in my budget. My brother won’t need the generator. He can’t use it where he lives. (No porch to put it on, and it’ll walk away if left out front) He is also staying at a friend’s house since his apartment doesn’t have shutters. He just hasn’t had time to get it out of storage and bring it to me.
@LaVikinga it’s not the franklin applefest, is it?
@Kidsandliz Tell me they bugged out. Please? Just woke up to see it looks like it’s coming ashore in the Melbourne area.
Right now I’m more worried about eldest daughter & her fiance’s family (she got engaged last Friday!) being stuck down on the Disney properties than I am about us further north. Trying not to Mom from up here. I’m sure she knows enough to stay away from the windows when it’s starts to blow, but still…she’s gone Northerner on us.
One of the worst things about riding out a hurricane in place is listening to the bangs and crashes happening under the cover of darkness. That morning light seems to take forever.
@LaVikinga My sister in around Lauderdale did not, my cousin whose house is a target (mandatory evacuation since they were on the barrier island - they are one block from the water which I would be nice, except right now) took off to Tampa to another cousin’s house. I hope everyone on our forums will be ok and their houses will be ok.
The timing of this might wreck the Schooner Race (yeah I know and a lot of other things, but tall ships and hurricanes don’t mix very well)…That will suck.
@Kidsandliz
Do they put to sea?
@Kidsandliz Hopefully everyone will stay in port if need be and we Won’t have anothe Bounty situation. I know dock committees on both ends are making sure we have options of storm docks.
@CaptAmehrican I figured there’s be decent plans in place. Hope they don’t have to be used. The race is Thurs/Fri, right? Depending on the direction of the wind might be a seriously fast sleigh ride… Not sure if I am glad I will be missing needle raindrops pelted in the face or sad I will be missing an exciting sail.
@Kidsandliz I’d go for the latter… maybe… depending on how exciting it would be. Wouldn’t want to be out in the storm itself but riding the wave ahead of it could be fun.
@CaptAmehrican They start the race ok? Any concerns about the Norfolk end? I realize that the storm will just be hitting land in FL when they will be docking in Norfolk, but I am thinking of people then sailing home.
I see that some of the boats are listed as “in spirit only” - does that mean they just donated but aren’t racing? Fleet looks pretty large. Big Nostalgia with some of those boats. That race sure has that grown since I was first involved in 1989 or 1990 - can’t remember anymore for sure exactly which year And back then there sure wasn’t a week of activities around it with boats in port that long. I’d guess you are big time busy right now with everyone there to watch them leave and all the boats on schooner watch running around. Hope you had some fun around your job and volunteer work. And saw some old friends.
@Kidsandliz they are not in baltimore yet the race is next week early. The in spirit only means no intent to race
@CaptAmehrican I guess I was a week ahead of myself when I was looking at the week’s schedule. Opps. Might make it harder for some of the boats to get there though depending on where they are coming from. I should know better too as my birthday is usually one of the days involved in this LOL
I’m glad my house has hurricane panels. I haven’t ever had to put them on in the 6 or so years I’ve lived here. I still hope I don’t have to.
I have all the wingnuts and the wingnut driver ready… And I just realized that maybe I should charge my drill, so I guess that’s something.
@RiotDemon some of my wingnuts flew away…and many of the bolts have paint on the threads now.
@RiotDemon Sorry, I can’t keep a straight face when someone says ‘wingnuts’. It’s election season.
/giphy wingnuts
@jaybird when I moved in, the panels were here, but not a single wingnut. Last scare we had, I bought a bunch and charged my landlord. They’re still sitting in the plastic bag from the store. At least I know where they are.
This place has the headers and sills, so you end up painting the house around them, instead of over them, lol
@OldCatLady haha
/giphy wingnuts
@RiotDemon You might want to try them to see whether they’re both threaded the same way. No joke.
@OldCatLady I’ll double check, thanks.
@RiotDemon stupid suggestion take at least one out and double check size to make sure it fits now.
@OldCatLady great minds think alike
@RiotDemon What’s the situation there? Around here they’re saying pack up and evacuate NOW if you are in a flood zone, aka Jax Beach, Fernandina, Jekyll Island, St. Simons Island etc. City offices and schools will be closed for all beach cities tomorrow. Ohshit, now all Duval and St. John’s County schools will be closed after today. I topped off my gas tank yesterday.
@OldCatLady all the islands are under mandatory evacuations, plus Manufactured/mobile homes, low lying areas. Storm surge is 3-5+ feet. Probably going to be high tide during the storm, so it could be worse.
I know the city north of me is going to flood like it always does… My city fixed a lot of their flooding problems and added in new storm drain things and I have a couple of, I’m not sure what they’re called, but basically lakes that are meant to hold some flood waters.
No one has water… But the publix stores are expecting shipments… Good luck getting there in time. I keep calling to see if the truck has arrived. They just say before 6pm. They don’t know.
I managed to get gas last night. Most places were out, but I saw a couple of tankers filling stations.
@OldCatLady Run a load of hot water and bleach through the washing machine. Then fill the machine with cold water. If you have on of those new machines that empties the drum when you stop the cycle. unlock the lid then pull the plug. The water will be potable for å few days then you can add a couple of capfuls of bleach.
@RiotDemon Stormwater retention ponds. I live on one. I used to be fairly knowledgeable about groundwater hydrology, so I’m morally certain it’ll be okay. See photo.
@cranky1950 Doesn’t work so well with front loaders.
@OldCatLady Well that’s what you get for being trendy.
@OldCatLady Your duck herd reminds me of my backyard when I lived on the canal.m Had a pit bull that was allowed to chase them over the fence but not grab them. Then she figured out it was ok to tackle them so she would try to press them up against the fence until I called her off. Fun times.
@cranky1950 They’re NOT MY GEESE. The domestic goose is an escapee from a farm near here. Also, I fenced my patio off so no more goose manure decorates it. I may have tossed stale bread onto my evil neighbor’s patio after dark, though.
@OldCatLady It’s good to be able to walk on your patio barefooted
@OldCatLady I may have tossed stale bread onto my evil neighbor’s patio after dark, though.
And I’m cranky
@cranky1950
That must have been exhausting. I hope you fueled up with homemade tamales first.
@f00l No man, you buy tamales and papas. Me making crumbly things is a no go.
@OldCatLady ah yes! The name totally escaped me. Talked to some of my neighbors that have lived here longer than me, and none of them are concerned about flooding. They’re all concerned about the winds.
The new track that shows it closer to the coast, and then possibly doubling back next week, are making me nervous. I’m not that concerned about the house except I have roof turbines. I didn’t know you could take them off and cap them. I’m hoping nothing hits them…
They’re expecting 80+ mph winds tomorrow night, with gusts up to 105mph. Then Friday morning tapering off to 60mph or less.
They’re only expecting around 5" of rain in my area.
@RiotDemon I didn’t know that about turbines either. It’s a little late to try this time. Yes, it’s the silliest-looking track I’ve seen in awhile. It reminds me of my Roomba trying to dock itself, when it isn’t lined up just right.
@cranky1950
I meant homemade tamales that you bought outta someone’s ice chest that were made in someone’s home kitchen. That kinda homemade.
When we talk about homemade tamales, round here, we rarely were the people who made them.
@RiotDemon 'Gator Ponds. Those lakes are called 'gator ponds 'cuz you KNOW that’s where they live. Also known as The Golf Course. Evidently, alligators play golf as well.
@LaVikinga
One friend’s kid attended a south Florida wedding at a country club complete with alligator ponds. Much of the bridal party were house guests in nearby “golf course homes”.
The bride’s comment was “watch your kids and pets. No, you can’t wade or swim in those ponds. And any gator who wants to show up at the reception had better be wearing a tux”,
@f00l Well, ya can let kids and pets splash about in the water, but odds are it’s gonna be a single time occurrence.
@RiotDemon lol, that’s almost our annual rainfall (6-7").
Get a stiff wire brush on a shank for your drill and clean the threads before you even attempt to put nuts on studs that have been sitting in the weather for years.
Time to pull out some favorite reading: John D. MacDonald’s ‘Murder in the Wind/Hurricane’. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00RTY99CK/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
@OldCatLady
Am a fan.
This one isn’t Travis McGee
The hurricane is named Ella, I think.
@OldCatLady My library doesn’t have it. Bummer. I would have taken it to jury duty tomorrow.
@f00l I read that a long time ago. It scared me off condo ownership forever.
@OldCatLady They made a bad tv movie of it too.
Maybe it’ll go away if we don’t feed it attention. A hurricane troll. Yeah. The highly colored weather maps now show the eye making landfall around Daytona on Friday morning. I do not like that at all. Must go download some music and check out radio reception on edevices. Heaven forfend we should lose power, Internet access and I have no music or radio. Digging out my hotel chain cards, because I haven’t used them in a few years. Ohshit ohshit ohshit. When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout.- RAH.
@OldCatLady So the big X target is now bit further north than yesterday’s projection of Melbourne/Brevard County? Good for my cousin who is spitting distance of Melbourne, but I guess not so good for you in Jacksonville.
@Kidsandliz The eye is (11 AM update) heading for Cape Canaveral, just a loud shout from your cousin. However, it’s a large storm, and there’s plenty of damage to go around. The only sure thing is that on Saturday, the beaches around Sebastian will be covered with treasure hunters, because gold coins still wash ashore after every storm.
@OldCatLady right now I’ll be south of the eye making landfall. They say it’ll be sustained winds of 60+mph with gusts 80-100mph. Of course the eye can move… The waiting is the terrible part.
@OldCatLady Oh cool. I guess I can’t get there in time to find gold coins. So maybe they need to find the source and get them from the motherlode. LOL
@Kidsandliz There were some treasure ships wrecked offshore, and although the actual ships may have been found recently, the treasure will keep washing up with the tide for years.
@OldCatLady So do people find things daily or just occasionally? Also aren’t you supposed to be preparing and packing for a road trip up some mountain or something sometime in your near future? Quit posting so I can get back to work grading papers LOL - and yes I am blaming you and not the goat.
I mean seriously you should be on the phone now that you have found your hotel cards making reservations before other people beat you to it. And buying cat food. Lots and lots of cat food. So your kitties don’t eat the hand that feeds them. I got bit a week ago by a foster cat taken from the roof of a house in the Baton Rouge floods. She is a darling cat but did not want to go back into the cage (my friend is fostering 4 of them while they try to find the owners - a bunch of those cats ended up here at a no kill shelter while they hunt for owners) and so sunk her teeth hard into my hand. 9 hours later I was in the ER getting IV antibiotics because of how much it swelled and how fast I developed a quickly spreading cellulitis.
@Kidsandliz I’m higher than a Cat 5 and major storm surge evac area. No plans to leave. Cat food is stocked for about 60 days, ditto people food. (Cat bites are major trouble; I wish I’d gone to the ER for one last May, but my PC didn’t think it was much. It was.) Tomorrow I’ll fill some trash cans and bathtubs, but I’m on city water so it’s just reflex.
@Kidsandliz Treasure hunting is big business:
http://traveltips.usatoday.com/treasure-hunting-beaches-vero-area-florida-22607.html
and http://archive.tcpalm.com/entertainment/tcpalmsocial/1715-fleet/treasure-hunter-reveals-he-found-45-million-in-gold-coins-off-wabasso-ep-1236573982-332939191.html
Love the TV reporter reading questions from viewers. ‘We’re leaving on a cruise Saturday from Jacksonville- will this have any effect?’ -my answer: No, come on, it’ll be fine. The Navy just sent the USS Iwo Jima and some visiting ships out to sea to weather the storm, but I’m sure your cruise will be okay. That’s not what the TV said, though.
/giphy "USS Iwo Jima"
Once got trapped by hurricane flooding tho 300 miles from the coast. Tropical Storm Hermine? House was fine, but a local creek annexed all the streets and driveways. Something like 12 inches of rain in a few hours?
@f00l That happens, that’s when people find out they bought in a 100 year flood plain.
@cranky1950 And the 100 year flood plains are turning into 50 year flood plains as the more the area gets built up the more there is run off on cement and less onto grass where it is filtered and slowed down as it heads to the stream or where ever.
The update I just heard, with the storm models increasing the continuing western trend of this storm certainly does not look good for all you east coast and somewhat inland FL folks.
@Kidsandliz Nothing I can do will influence it. I’m d/l Google Play Music onto every non-AMZN device, because you can play radio stations even with no internet connection. I remember the first hurricane we went through- transistor radios had JUST become available. Back to the future. http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/listen-favorite-radio-stations-offline-google-play-music/
I finally found water! Small victory.
I’ve never used the hurricane panels on this house… And omg, I wish I had. A lot of the panels are bent so I’m not able to line them up in the holes properly. I’m getting pretty frustrated. I’ve had to rearrange some of the windows to get them to overlap and work properly. My two sliding doors are the worst though. I think I’m going to have to get a pair of pliers and start bending the tops because they keep getting stuck on the headers when I’m trying to slide them in. Whoever cut these panels, cut them very roughly and the tops have jagged edges that are getting in the way.
My drill went AWOL so I’ve had to tighten the wingnuts up by hand, which isn’t the worst thing I’ve had to do. It’s just annoying on top of everything else.
My mom’s landlord texts her today to let her know she has shutters in the outside storage closet. My mom had no idea. She hasn’t lived there that long. She was coming to stay with me because she thought she didn’t have any. I guess this means I’ll have to go over to her place in the morning and put the shutters up unless the landlord comes out and does it.
Then my Mom was told today that she has to stay at her place of work tomorrow before the storm hits, and then until it dies back down… (She’s a nurse) So she’s staying at least one night. They are trying to say they won’t pay more than an 8 hour shift and she would have to use her personal time to get paid for the rest. Wtf kinda shit is that? I’m pissed for her.
@RiotDemon
I think your Mom’s employer is abusive. If they’re not paying her, they should have exactly zero say what she does on her off hours. I met some people who work as visiting nurses. They do not get treated like that. The places that contract for visiting nurses know that if the place gets a reputation for abusing the visiting nurses, the nurses will start refusing those assignment offers.
One friend’s step-daughter made the choice to become a sonogram specialist instead of a nurse, just to avoid the kind of employment treatment your mom is getting. And two years out of school, she’s making more than $70k I think.
@f00l I just talked to her again. Apparently I misunderstood her. She’s forced to stay at work. If she takes a nap, or a break, she has to clock out. So even though they make her stay at work, if she gets tired and has to sleep, she’s not paid. I just don’t understand that. She’s not allowed to go sleep in her own bed… It seems that she should get some kind of compensation.
I ended up finding my attachment for my pneumatic wrench so I drug my compressor around the house to tighten all the wingnuts. All the bent panels have been bent back into submission with a hammer. I only have a couple left to put on my slider door to my backyard so I can let the dog out. I hope she’ll use a peepee pad during the storm if I can’t let her out. She’s one of these dogs that’ll hold it for hours and hours.
Okay, I have to laugh. Local beach communities (Ponte Vedra Beach, very pricey real estate) have been evacuated, and some residents have fled to the Hilton Garden Inn in downtown Jacksonville. Which has just given all its customers a letter recommending that they leave the area, for safety. TV interviewed people who had just checked in and been given the letter at the same time. They’re staying. I should add that Jacksonville is on a large, tidal river, and about half of it is fill land. All city offices will be closed the next 2-3 days.
@OldCatLady
What’s the best storm-watching app?
@f00l Local TV stations provide all the entertainment I need. Weather Underground app is pretty good.
@OldCatLady @f00l hey check out storm (by weather underground) if you want storm tracking… it costs but since they conveniently “broke” storm tracks on their website, and haven’t “got it fixed quickly”… it sure is handy.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/storm-radar-storm-tracking/id955957721?mt=8
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wunderground.android.storm&hl=en
@OldCatLady The Hilton DOES have Ruth’s and they make a lethally mean martini…
Or is it that the DoubleTree?
Husband uses the NOAA weather. Said it didn’t fail him in 30 years of Navy life. I’m alternating between saying it’ll be just fine, and little flights of panic. My sister went through Ivan in Pensacola. No power for three weeks. Limited damage to property, but no power. Was washing clothes in the bathtub and stretching out a charged garden hose in the sun to take a semi-warm “shower.”
Why would anyone evacuate to Jacksonville for an east coast storm. That’s pretty much beyond stupid.
@cranky1950 Home of Florida Man. The whole state is like living in Darwin’s Waiting Room. No telling what stupid things are going to happen here next.
“Hey, y’all! Hold mah beer and watch THIS!”
@cranky1950 Yes, yes it is. I live far away from downtown, and there is a Hilton Garden Inn close to me, but I’m betting they are looking forward to a vacay downtown, with restaurants and stormwatching on the riverwalk, and then go see Cirque du Soleil across the street. Oh, you say that’s been cancelled? And the symphony’s performances of Beethoven’s 5th too? And the library is closed since it’s a city office? Maybe the reporter could check back tonight.
Wonder how the riverwalk will fare.
@OldCatLady everything will be shutdown for cleanup for about a month.
We’ve got our bread, water, chips, queso, yanno… the essentials. Ran back out for applesauce this morning. Stores in Orlando are busy, but no chaos yet. Wife picked up some wine last night. As ready as we’re gonna get here.
Not sure why, but wife drew a bath for me. Filled it way too high though, so had to drain a little bit out before hopping in. Fresh and clean and waiting for her to get back with more supplies.
@mikey “I don’t know what happened, Officer. He must have slipped in all that clean bathwater, hit his head several times and drowned. Poor dumb bastard.”
@mikey It wasn’t a cold bath by any chance was it?
@cranky1950 My thoughts exactly! Bet he’ll be cleaning the tub and refilling it when she returns.
@OldCatLady Think he’s not being forthright
@OldCatLady What @cranky1950 said. We’re old hands at hurricaning now. I was just levitying the situation with the bathtub joke.
The rest though… honest word. Just made another run to Publix for M&Ms, snickers, OJ, chex mix, and fresh chicken breasts. So the “poor dumb bastard” remark probably still applies.
@mikey
When there’s a hurricane, anything edible that doesn’t want refrigeration sounds like a good purchase.
@f00l I stopped at the grocery store this morning to get more milk… I can’t be without milk for days. However, there was a line at the deli for cold cuts. Was watching people buy icecream and other frozen things.
My thought is if the power goes out, I’ll be eating the stuff I already have in the freezer so I don’t throw food away. Maybe these people didn’t have any food in their freezer?
@f00l Like people tsk tsk when me and the wife buy frozen pizza on ice storm nites. We’re already set just getting munchies for the night to come.
@RiotDemon
I suppose, if it were us, doing the hurricane watch, we might get ice cream on the agreement that “we start eating it the second the power goes out”.
A tiny reward for living in the storm zone.
@f00l Last time I did that, I was in the shower when the power went out and had to finish and dry off in pitch black because my flashlight was on the night stand. An hour later the storm panel blew away and the sliding door caved in. Great memories if you survive.
@cranky1950 Just tried to get to Publix for potato chips (plenty of beer on hand). After three light cycles in gridlock and four lights away, I came home. Local version of 7-11 Store, the Gate store, closed at noon. They were out of gas anyway. Will make do with Chex mix.
@OldCatLady bummer, beer but no chips and dips is a logo
@cranky1950 damn autocorrect
@OldCatLady I have so many chips it’s ridiculous. There isn’t a Trader Joe’s by me, but I was close by one, so I went and stocked up before the storm. Somebody asked if I was having a party. A sad party of one, lol.
They have unique stuff I can’t get, and I probably won’t be in that area for months. Chips last a long time at least.
@RiotDemon They only last a long time if you don’t eat them LOL
@RiotDemon The nearest Trader Joe’s is out at Jax Beach, which has been evacuated. The last time I went there I stocked up on lots of unlikely things, and didn’t regret it at all.
@OldCatLady it’s fun to go shopping there to get some different stuff compared to normal. I love publix, but sometimes a change is good. Occasionally I’ll go to Aldi which is owned by the same company as Trader Joe’s. It’s too bad they don’t carry some of the same stuff.
One step short of schadenfreude: last Saturday the Carnival ‘Elation’ sailed from Jax. Local news interviewed passengers - are you worried about the storm? Every one said no, they trusted the cruise line to keep them safe. As of now, six ports on the east coast are closed: the ships can’t come in. Cue the ‘Gilligan’s Isle’ music. http://www.cruisecritic.com/news/news.cfm?ID=7255
@OldCatLady How stupid is that? Perhaps they should review the US Coast Guard videos of when the HMS Bounty went down in the last hurricane. Sigh.
@Kidsandliz It’s engraved in my brain. Last year the SS El Faro sailed out of Jax for Puerto Rico, into Hurricane Joaquin. It broke up, plenty of blame to go around. Voice and data recorders have been recovered, with clear footage of the wreck on the ocean floor, taken by submersibles.
@OldCatLady sadly I had a friend on el Faro and knew the captain on Bounty. I am really hoping to break my streak of losing people to hurricanes on boats.
@CaptAmehrican I’m so sorry.
Hoping for the best for all of you affected. My gf’s nephew is a freshman at FAU. This is certainly something new for him. I’m guessing he and his friends are spending the next few days playing XBox and getting high. Seems like a plan…
@cinoclav tell them to order their pizzas NOW for pick up. Stock up! Room temp pizza is almost as good as fresh when you’re really hungry and you have no power.
@LaVikinga I checked the FAU website and saw their cafeteria would be open for campus residents. They’re providing takeout boxes so the students can bring food back to their rooms. At 18 I’m sure they’re all looking forward to it.
@cinoclav Husband is an FAU alum!
Here is a picture I came across of the storm
@MrMark CT scan of IRK? LOL
That’s really neato
If it were me I’d go camping on the Blue Ridge for a couple weeks.
@cranky1950 Well, that sorta was the plan…cabin, fall colors, fall festival, fireplace, family. Phooey. Stupid storm.
@LaVikinga Damn I’d lockup the house and go, nothing worse than florida without A/C
Interesting link sent to me by one of the schools I teach online for (that is more or less ground zero for landfall) by one of the grad meteorologist students who got it from somewhere else (until the server goes down they are sending updates to the school emails)
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8
Here is the information in the email that came with this map:
Temp and dewpoint in deg F (red and green text), wind barbs themselves in knots, if a gust over 20 mph is recorded that will be shown to the top right in yellow (and in mph). Clicking on a station will show a popup that can link you to MesoWest pages, and clicking on the map itself will also let you refresh the page to that location. Top menu lets you filter by network as well.
One other thing, you can add “limitations” to some variables to only display stations that meet certain thresholds. That can be done by adding “&limit=” to the URL string. You can do things like this:
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=SG39
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=GG39
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=SG39,GG39
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=SG74
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=GG74
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8&limit=SG74,GG74
I hold no responsibility if it breaks or if it isn’t super mobile friendly haha.
Another map, similar functionality except taking advantage of APIprecip service to serve up 24 hour total precip values:
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap_24h_precip_api.cgilatcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8
And of course there is this one, not much in the way of TA sites left down there (this is the current pressure tendency map):
http://meso1.chpc.utah.edu/usarray/cgi-bin/usarray_pres_tendency.cgi
But, plenty of 5 min ASOS sites (same map):
http://meso1.chpc.utah.edu/usarray/cgi-bin/usarray_pres_tendency_nwsfaa.cgi
One link is broken. This one works.
Another map, similar functionality except taking advantage of API precip service to serve up 24 hour total precip values:
https://home.chpc.utah.edu/~u0790486/wxinfo/cgi-bin/wxmap_24h_precip_api.cgi?latcen=26.69163742147271&loncen=-80.244140625&net=0&zoom=8
@Kidsandliz I’d say TMI but I can’t stop playing with it. Thank them for me, please.
@OldCatLady I figure if you are going to be run over by a storm might as well see it coming in micro detail LOL
@Kidsandliz Yes. I keep remembering Katrina, when I had frantic people on the phone with me, asking for help, until cell signals regionwide went down.
@OldCatLady Well lets hope that doesn’t happen this time. By the way this likely is not TMI for the weather geeks that sent it to me.
@OldCatLady I remember my sister relaying messages back and forth to strangers in the North who were frantically trying to get info on their families. Her neighborhood was hard hit and even phone land lines were screwy, but she was able to track down several “missing” people (6 Degrees of Separation is a thing), and pass word back that almost every one was safe. She refused to be the one to tell one family that their missing family member had drowned at home.
She said after watching the water creep up her street from the bayou, and being in the middle of Ivan’s winds she would NEVER ride out a hurricane again. Little twerp is on her way to PA to enjoy the weather, and all the fun. Even has access for tickets to PennState’s home game this weekend. The pisser of it all is I know she won’t go to the game because she’ll be too stuffed with festival sausages, spiced nuts, pumpkin whoopie pies, and boardwalk fries to even move.
@OldCatLady During andrew, civil defense announced" People with cell phones in Kendall stop calling 911 there is nothing we can do for you and you’re clogging the system with useless calls".
@cranky1950 The system and capabilities have changed since then. However, everything that has been planned for will prove to be useless, and aspects nobody thought about will prove critical. Logistics and facility planning 101.
More on hurricane prep
Hey! before they shut the grid down. Good luck everyone who’s close to the coast. Hope to bitch at y’all tomorrow or the next day.
@cranky1950 Thanks for the good wishes. They won’t shut it down, but it may be patchy. I just got a Code Red Alert from the city, mandatory evacuation of zones a, b and c- as well as anyone who lives in manufactured housing. Do you know how many people in FL that is? I feel for the poor librarian where I volunteer; not only does she live in a 6th floor condo in a flood zone, but she does not own a car, so doesn’t know how she could evacuate.
@OldCatLady If you’re gonna get hit by the storm they shut it down to prevent damage from downed high tension cables. I had a 6" wide gap across my front walk where one of the lines that went back to the old cutler generating plant got loose from a hot stick. When civil defense take over they shut it down.
@cranky1950 Which is why I have six powerpacks all charged. And a landline phone with a cord. I may be the only person in my neighborhood with such an antique.
/giphy "phone cord"
@OldCatLady Still have a landline AND a HUGE button phone (just like the one Clint Eastwood’s family gave him in that “hey, kids, get offa my lawn” movie). When the cell phone towers go tits up or blown all the way to Oz, we old timers will still be able to place/receive calls.
@LaVikinga It just occurred to me to wonder: do the disaster management offices have landlines, or were they all set up by 20somethings?
@OldCatLady They have sat phones, cell phones, landline, and radios.
@Mehrocco_Mole You spoiled the image I had of someone confused by a phone cord. Well, perhaps they had to take a class to learn how to use it. I still have a package of splitters somewhere. I am awed by private citizens who have satellite phones, which includes a few of my friends.
@OldCatLady I did not say they know how to use them. At one time one of the emergency management offices installed seismic equipment. Why? I don’t know as we don’t have Earthquakes in FL. I guess they just had the $$$ and needed to spend it. They also had a very active train track running about 30 feet from the back of the building.
Ummm… guys? I think I see a problem here…
@Mehrocco_Mole We do too have earthquakes in NE FL. Every century or so. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Florida
The location of the monitor confirms my theory that government offices and politicians exist to provide entertainment to taxpayers. Think about it. It explains so much.
Just a side observation: Sam Champion is very easy on the eyes. He’s at Juno Beach getting all wet.
@OldCatLady Who’s Sam Champion?
@OldCatLady
Is he in his natty broadcasting suit?
@OldCatLady Y’know, being a child of the 50’s nothing than more viscerally frightening as hearing hearing that 2000 cycle tone and “This is the emergency broadcasting system, this is not a test.” (your heart skips a few beats at this point) then they blither on about the storm.
@f00l No, a Weather Channel hooded slicker. I’ll keep checking.
@OldCatLady We saw Jim Cantore reporting at the beach one year on vacation. We were asked to evacuate the next day. Boo Jim Cantore.
@sammydog01 Harbinger of Death. Works in conjunction with ol’ Geraldo. You see BOTH of them in your town??? Some shit be goin’ down somewhere!
@cranky1950 Yeah take cover from the bomb under your desk at school or next to the furnace. Who were they kidding? Sheesh you’d think grownups could get along and not bicker like little kids, especially if they are heads of state. LOL
@cranky1950
Your parents ever go bomb shelter shopping? 1962 was such a happy time?
Around middle of the country, they were way useful as tornado shelters. And places to get stoned.
We may still need these someday. Not sure there would be much left when you climbed out tho.
@f00l Nah, my dad was a full timer with the national guard, we had shelter space.
RutRow, looks like Boca is gonna some suburban renewal.
@cranky1950 Lots of areas will. Since beachfront real estate is always high-priced, the replacements will be even more so. The fringe housing market of very old low cost houses, built before the 1970s, and ‘manufactured housing’ may not come back.
@OldCatLady It depends. My old neighborhood turned into OpaLoca south after andrew. I was so glad I cashed out and left.
@OldCatLady Used to think those cinderblock beach home on Pensacola Beach that survived hurricanes from the 50s, on up were bomb proof. We were stunned to learn several of them simply disappeared from their foundations when Ivan hit. Gone in a matter of hours.
@LaVikinga They built a brand new pace warehouse store near my house they hadnt stocked it yet. Maded from precast panels. Was driving down US 1 after the storm and all at was there was piles of crumbled concrete,not one whole or anything that resembled a part of a precast panel. Also the Uhaul store on US1 had a 20 moving truck sitting serenely sitting on the roof of the office like it belonged there.
@LaVikinga Empty concrete foundations all around New Orleans and Miami should have convinced builders. FL did pass a housing bill around 2001 that required all roof trusses to withstand 120 mph winds, but there’s not much you can do about flooding, except not be where it happens. Oh, thanks, local news: it just showed a graphic forecasting 125 mph winds here tomorrow.
@cranky1950 Okay, that’s truly epic. There will be an epidemic of flood-damaged cars again; it happens every time.
@OldCatLady The original south florida building code that HUD made them gut in the 80s was originally for 150 mi/hr roof. Most of the construction from the 50s- 70s came through with a couple of sheets of plywood missing. Most of the stick built housing that hud and fha forced in the 80s got blown down.
@cranky1950 @OldCatLady I’m sweating the fact that THIS was the year I decided to let our flood insurance lapse.
@LaVikinga Oy
@LaVikinga Yikes!
That harbinger, Jim Cantore:
@OldCatLady Geraldo looks good in a sun hat and no mustache.
@OldCatLady That’s kinda how it went. “Hey, that’s Jim Can… shit.”
Hey, I wonder if this storm is gonna hit Miami on the flipflop.
@cranky1950 you mean, chancleta
@cranky1950
Isn’t Miami to the point now where you dump out a gallon of ice tea and that causes the coastal areas to flood?
@f00l Not quite but close.
Checking in.
I slept through the worst of it. Woke up because I’m starting to get hot without power. Half my county is without. I’d love to open my front door but something metal is moving around outside and it’s definitely raining sideways still.
There’s a bunch of frogs having a party outside. They’re yelling really loudly.
We are really lucky that Matthew stayed off the coast.
I’m hoping there isn’t much damage when I go outside.
@RiotDemon glad you are ok. Stay safe.
@RiotDemon Good to hear.
/giphy frog party
@CaptAmehrican @sammydog01
Thanks y’all. Walked around outside after the metal thing stopped moving around. Must of been in my neighbors yard. My backyard is partially flooded. My trees took a beating, but not too crazy. My house looks fine from what I can tell. I’m going to look again soon since the sun is up.
My neighbors are already starting to run the generators… I’m keeping an eye in the power company’s outage map. When the numbers start going down, instead of up, I know things will be looking up.
@RiotDemon Watching here probably 200 miles north of you. Rains still haven’t arrived. Storm is about 120-30 miles south of us and due to roll in sometime mid-afternoon. Glad to hear the damage has been minimal so far.
@LaVikinga I’m in the Treasure coast area, so east of the lake basically.
My backyard only has lots of tree debris, and flooding. Part of my oak and my areca palm tree has limb damage. My neighbor across the street… The whole top of their palm tree fell down. I’m not really surprised though because woodpeckers have been damaging that tree steadily for a long time.
His backyard fence fell down though, and the neighbor’s shed door is banging open. I’m not even sure if they are home. The neighbor with the broken palm didn’t put up shutters… And I doubt he has impact windows. He’s lucky.
@RiotDemon Glad things were not as bad as potentially predicted. Hope it stays that way for people north of you.
@RiotDemon
Wishing you Hot Perfectly Grilled Waffles this morning.
@f00l I had bananas and potato chips. Close enough, right?
My power is back on, woohoo! But my septic is flooded… Boo. My landlord is already working on getting it fixed because it was a problem before the storm. My drain field isn’t working properly, and all this rain made it worse. I used to be able to flush my toilet and take short showers… Now I can’t even do that
To be fair, the storm gutter right in front of my house (where the drain field is) is completely flooded, so the gutter probably backed up onto my lawn.
hola! ¿como estas?
Everyone good so far?
@f00l My local emergency management office robocalled at 0730 to alert everyone that a hurricane was coming. That makes the fourth call so far. You had to push ‘1’ to acknowledge that you heard, or they would continue to call. I pushed ‘1’, rolled over, and slept until 0900. Wind N22, otherwise same as @LaVikinga. Jim Cantore is in Ft. Pierce, so we’re probably safe. Power just flickered, but I already made coffee.
@OldCatLady
Good to know you have your priorities straight! I wish I had thought of that before Ivan or Katrina. The last time we got hit (Katrina) we were without power for about three weeks. They brought generators to the nearby fire station. We’re at the other end of I10 in Pensacola so if you find you need anything…
@Mehrocco_Mole Thanks very much. Let’s wait and see what this silly thing is going to do next week. If we do lose power, I know how to make cold brew coffee, which is trendy but good. Also, in a past fuku, meh sent me a perfectly good Cobra powerpack, and it’s all charged. I tested a few small appliances on it, and it worked.
@Mehrocco_Mole My Dad & sister still live in P’cola down towards Beach Haven/Warrington just up from Bayou Grande. They wanted us to bug out and set up camp at my Dad’s house (meanwhile, the ratfinks are in PA enjoying glorious fall weather).
@LaVikinga So did you? We’re more moline/Cantonment. A couple miles from the Alabama border.
@Mehrocco_Mole Rode it out. No damage to the house, but LOTS of big branches down from the maples and pines. Big mushy areas still left at sunset today. Lost power from 2 PM yesterday to about 9:30 this morning. Generator kept the fridge & freezer and the box fans in the bed rooms running. Coffee this morning was extra tasty.
@LaVikinga Good to hear. I just noticed auto correct got me. It’s Molino not moline. I wish autocorrect would leave my shirt alone!
@Mehrocco_Mole Cantonment. As kids while waiting at the bus stop in the morning, we always knew when the wind was coming from that direction.
Why do paper factories smell so BAD!?
@LaVikinga So you know you’re in Jacksonville.
@cranky1950 Close. Next county over. You have to head towards Georgia these days before the smell hits you. Thank goodness! There was a time…
@LaVikinga Yeah I know. About 1987 my wife was offered a transfer to Orange Park. So we go up there and get a hotel, wander around Sat everything is fine. Open the door Sunday morn. take one wiff and both of us go __Nah. got in the car and drove home.
@LaVikinga It’s not so bad anymore. They reduced operations at the paper mill so they don’t bleach the pulp as much. The sulphur dioxide used to bleach paper is what stunk. Now we only get treated to the mill farts once or twice a year. Years back I worked at the old Winn-Dixie. It seemed like every day everyone had just finished eating a couple beans and cucumber sandwiches.
/giphy paper mill
@Mehrocco_Mole After a few minutes watching without any sound, this clip becomes increasingly odd.
@LaVikinga Nancy Sinatra has become increasingly odd period.
@cranky1950 Not sure if it’s bad orthodonture, or plastic surgery gone awry, but something about her has always looked…off?
@LaVikinga Plus she has sharp knees.
@therealjrn Gosh catty much?
Ordered some power packs, since purple.
/image TCU purple
And also since a storm could hit the coast and spinoff to here, as has happened. And since tornados. And since ice storms. And since windstorms. And since injection wells brought us the wonders of earthquakes.
Insurance. Sigh. Not cheap.
Want a beach house to handle hurricanes? Have a few mill to spare?
According to what I’ve read, this house is, by county and state permission, exempt from evacuation, and weather scientists, news crews, safety personnel, and the like hunker down there during storms by standing invitation from the owners.
The house is designed to still be functional if the lower floors flood and to withstand full-force (500 mph, according to a news story) storm winds. Storm shutters are generator powered, and the house design includes a redundant generator system.
I want a house like this soooo badly.
http://www.monolithic.org/homes/featured-homes/the-eye-of-the-storm
@f00l There used to be a home like this on Pensacola Beach. I think there’s one similar out near the Jax Beaches. It might be a duplex half built into the dunes. I believe it had been up for sale at one point.
I got bored waiting for the winds to hit, so I painted my finger nails a sparkly violet that probably won’t last through yard clean up, found a pair of scissors and cut a few inches off the ends of my hair, and destroyed half a can of salted cashews all before noon.
Winds are really beginning to pick up. Pinecones are hammering the roof and the backyard is more flooded than I care to see it. Aaaand now the power is flickering. Rutroh.
@LaVikinga how’d you fare?
@RiotDemon Around two in the afternoon a giant branch decided to go dangling from the wires on the power lines that attach to those huge cement poles that run along the right away behind our property. Set off a shower of arcing and blue light like I’ve never seen. Temps are relatively moderate so it’s very comfortable in house and can run a box fan with the generator.
Big limbs from pines and maples down all over back yard. Standing water every where. Lost part of an ornamental tree and it took out part of the fence but Super Husband manhandled it off fence and nailed it back to posts.
Hoping for power to be restored by lunch time tomorrow but not counting on it. Tomorrow morning will be interesting.
Thank goodness for grill. Managed to cook a Publix pizza for dinner.
Yeah. Pretty. No damage here so far.
@OldCatLady Edit: one small (15’) (already dead) tree down. Pressure is 29.40 in., and dropping.
Local NBC channel just had footage of a pretty sloop riding out the storm in the river, or so they said. Looked like a very tattered mainsail, and possibly at anchor, but I only caught about three seconds of it. People are playing in the surf at the beach; of course they are. The eye is about 50 miles east.
@OldCatLady how you holding up?
@RiotDemon power off. In love with powerpacks and radio app on phone.
I’m getting pretty annoyed at people complaining that we did all this preparation for nothing. What? Would you rather get pummeled? I just saw a photo on Facebook of St. Augustine and it was under water.
I hope everyone else in Florida is ok.
Especially since the county north of me still has 32k people out of power, and my county is about 20k without power.
@RiotDemon Only president Underwood should be that upset about it.
@ELUNO I had to look that up. Never seen the show.
@RiotDemon And I just spoiled something so you might as well not. (not really, it is really minor.)
Good to hear you are doing ok!
@ELUNO honestly, I hate politics so much that I’ll probably never watch it.
Thanks! Just some cleanup, putting stuff back out on my porch, and removal of shutters to do.
@RiotDemon Damage reports haven’t started. Still on mandatory emergency travel only. Will know more tomorrow.
@RiotDemon Me, too. My 80 year old Great Aunt lives alone in a trailer park on a small island off the coast of Orlando. The winter people aren’t there yet, so the population of the island is very small at the moment. I tried to convince her to evacuate, but she was having none of it.
@moondrake people are set in their ways. They figure if they haven’t died yet from a storm, they won’t die now.
@moondrake Orlando isn’t on the coast. I grew up there. Whereabouts does your great aunt live?
@OldCatLady In other news, the main street of Benson, NC (home of Mule Days) is under water. I recognized the photos from our redneck water ski trip. It looks like inland North Carolina was the big loser (after Haiti). I hope the ski camp survived.
@sammydog01 That’s dreadful. Nobody expected inland areas to be hit that hard. In Florida, beach areas got badly chewed up, even though they were braced for it. Rebuilding is going to take a long time. Food and clothing donation drives are just starting, as people are being allowed back into their houses.
@OldCatLady she lives in Fruitland Park, near Leesburg. She always told me it was an island off the coast, but I just looked it up on mapquest and it looks like it’s in the middle of the state. We have been out of touch for decades and only reconnected a few months ago. I’m hoping to visit her in the spring. I want to drive but it’s a more than 3,300 mile round trip, so that may have to give way to a plane ride.
@OldCatLady @RiotDemon @LaVikinga - I’ve been following your stories here, SO glad you are all relatively unscathed. Is there anyone we haven’t heard from?
@KDemo Facebook activated their ‘check in’ feature, which has saved a huge amount of time and worry. I still don’t have power but perhaps tomorrow. I will definitely change phone carriers. Sprint coverage is patchy. Most of the time I have one bar at home.
@OldCatLady - I forgot about check-in, it’s such a great resource. I’m just glad your old cats didn’t get wet.
@KDemo People who see each other twice a year still like to know.
@OldCatLady POWERPOWERPOWER !!!
@OldCatLady Good! Wishing you a cool and dry Sunday.
@cranky1950 Aaannnd… no power. I did make coffee, and the house cooled down. Was just about to clean the freezer. Oh well.
@OldCatLady It’ll be back
@OldCatLady luckily you got to cool the house down. Hope you get power back soon.
@RiotDemon It’s up and down. Doesn’t stay on long enough for the cable channel guide to populate. I’m very lucky that this is the worst problem. St. Augustine is a major disaster, and other beach communities haven’t finished disaster assessments. People are just now being allowed back into their houses.
Hope those of you who live further up the coast also stayed dry enough and don’t have your own private lake in the living room.
We had rolling blackouts last nite and drizzly rain and gusty wind all day yesterday. Must have been at the exteme edge of the fringe winds. Coastal SC got nailed pretty badly and I guess the local power grid was over taxed as a result. Anyway we lost power for about 20min about 11pm. Temps are in the 60s here so it really didn’t matter at that point. Some parts of town lost power friday nite were out all day yesterday, luckily not my street.
Is anyone else getting emails from this thread? It says I subscribed to it, and let me unsubscribe. I don’t know how I did it. It wasn’t when someone mentioned me, it was every single time someone commented, lol
@RiotDemon There is a little envelope that says subscribe up top. You probably clicked it by mistake.
@sammydog01 thank you. I never noticed that.
Matthew also flooded fire ants out of their mound in my neighbor’s yard, and they set up shop in mine. Amdro! I did my Achmed-the-dead-terrorist voice as I sprinkled it around. Neighbors asked if I was okay. Clearly my impressions need work.
@OldCatLady You mitta been too good and Homeland Security is commin a knockin to find out about your powder spreading ways.
@cranky1950 I don’t believe they are familiar with Dunham. It’s a little too subtle for them.
@OldCatLady maybe it was the constant, “I KEEL YOU!” that confused them.
@RiotDemon That was it. I explained that I was channeling a puppet representing a skeletal dead terrorist. It didn’t go too well. That’s @Ignorant’s fault.
/giphy Achmed
@OldCatLady Boy, I really wish I could have seen THAT exchange. Floating rafts of fire ants have been a thing here the past couple of springs when the backyard flooded for a few weeks. Of course now I would love to have that problem since it hasn’t rained in a month or more. My ‘lawn’ has reached a flash point that I think I could trigger with static electricity from my (thinning) hair!
Glad you made it thru Matthew relatively unscathed!
@OldCatLady I don’t know if you saw, but apparently Jeff is going to be on a food network show hosting a Halloween competition. I might actually watch regular TV to catch that.
@RiotDemon Thanks! Food Network says the show started Oct 3, so I have two episodes to watch. We need escapism right now.
@OldCatLady uh oh, I missed the beginning! I guess I didn’t catch that part of the commercial.
@OldCatLady You’re close to Starke, I’m surprised there wasn’t a good deal of escapism.
@cranky1950 …Starke? My brain is not connecting.
@OldCatLady Raiford
@cranky1950 Sigh. Aaagghh.
Yesterday they evacuted along the River in Greenville NC and ECU students were told not to comeback to school.
@cranky1950 Ever?
@chienfou till the get the ok to return. The mayor of greenville was telling evacuees to prepare to be gone for week.