I think we done with the worst of it. No more squalls or rain, and the wind’s died down.
Whew. Good luck, the rest of you. Please check in when you can.
We’re all set. Plenty of food to last and books to read. 15 gallons of extra gasoline in cans. 6250 watt gasoline powered generator will run everything in the house except a/c, and we’ve got several fans. Water comes from a well that the generator also powers.
Two chain saws ready if trees fall. Tractor’s tank full of diesel fuel and all loose items secured as well as possible.
Main concern is a bridge that was damaged by 5.1 inches of rain last Wednesday. Another 5 inches of rain and we could be cut off from civilization. We’ll park one vehicle across the bridge tonight, just in case.
If it sounds like we’ve been through this before, we have. In 1995, after hurricane Opal, we were without electric service for 24 days. Now that got OLD!
Everybody hang tough!
Heh. Raincoat is one thing. We live on the highest ridge in town. I’m worried about Mr. Tornado. :eek:
I’m puttin’ my seatbelt on.
Og, I hope Entergy is ready for this one.
We’ve got rain and a stiff breeze now. I was west bound on the Howard Franklin Bridge Saturday at 2:00AM and thought I would be blown into the bay for about fifteen minutes. Heaviest rainfall I’ve ever seen, I do believe.
Wow, it’s a CAT 4 now and coming in hard!
Everyone stay safe!
Not much in Tampa, just a lot of rain. To all those in the Panhandle region, please please please stay safe. Somehow I get the feeling last season was just a “warm-up”…
So far, we’re okay in Tallahassee. Monsoon-type rain and occasional gusts of wind. We live at the top of a hill, and I’ve seen small branches floating down the street, and gushers of water running down the hill. Some branches are down in our yard - we’ve heard a few of them hit the roof on the way. But that’s from a sweet gum tree, which loses a few bits every time it rains anyway. The power hasn’t gone out, except momentarily (thank Og for UPS!). There was no TV or internet for some hours this morning, but they’re both back. As I type, I notice that it’s tapered off quite a bit since I started this post. Maybe it’s a lull.
Be safe, everybody!
It’s still a little windy here, but the sky is a little sunnier and it hasn’t rained in quite awhile.
Hope everyone in the panhandle has boarded up and gotten out! Looks like landfall within the next couple of hours. Stay safe, everyone.
Oh yeah, Shibb, the best time to visit the Keys is probably in the winter. The weather is great and there are fewer mosquitos. High season is from Dec-mid March, so I’d avoid those months as the traffic can be really heavy. Summer is almost too hot and humid (although you do have that ocean breeze), lots of tourists, and of course you don’t want your vacation ruined by a hurricane! There are always cool festivals, like Hemingway Days, which is coming up at the end of this month, and the Chicken Fest (in June). And yeah, at the end of October you have FantasyFest, which is vedddy interesting! Here is a small sampling.
Those festivals I was talking about are in Key West, btw, which is very different from the rest of ‘the Keys.’
The rain has become more and more sporadic over here. One of our ornamental trees is seriously listing (hibiscus) and another is a few degrees from right.
Nice pics, LoganDear, which one is you?
We’re forecasted for squalls! I had to look up the real meaning of squall. It’s definitely not a word I’ve seen when referring to inland weather conditions.
-Lil
Shibb, actually those aren’t my pictures. I did an internet search and came up with that. Turns out the house in Marathon (and the boat) survived. Our guava tree blew down, a tree fell on the car port, and the top of the fish-cleaning table blew off. So no major damage. And Dennis is no longer a hurricane. Yay!
The eye (longitudinally) is north of us now. whew. All we had was some light rain and lots of gusty winds. I had taken down my wind chimes and moved my potted plants to the patio just in case.
Hubby was so excited about a 24-hour slow drenching “hurricane rain” that he broke up a garden plot and planted 4 rows of peas. In the rain… 
This morning, about 4:50 am, I was awakened by the sound of sprinklers. We live in a “villa home”, which is a glorified duplex, so they are very close together. So I’m not sure it was our sprinklers going on, but it may well have been. What kind of idiot waters his yard during potential flood conditions?
:smack:
Maybe the sprinklers were on timers, ShibbOleth?
Well, yeah, and it’s sort of a community by-laws requirement, but last month was one of the rainiest June’s we’ve ever had. Most places had over 20 inches of rain last month. And we’re about on target for one of our rainiest Julys ever. And maybe one of our “hurricaniest” years ever. So it might behoove us to figure out how to turn the timers for the sprinklers off.
Shortly after I made my post yesterday, the power went out around 2 PM, and stayed out until 4:50 this morning. We had to venture out for food, and discovered that there was power everywhere in our neighborhood except three streets - naturally, one of them was ours. Now that it’s back, Comcast internet is down all over the city. Those freakin’ people ought to give us a monthly rebate on connection downtime.
Other than several hundred little bits of branches and about a dozen big ones down in our yard, we had no damage. Up the street and around the corner, a guy had a tree in his side yard split, and a humongous branch hit the side of his house on the way down. There was more debris in our area than we could see driving elsewhere in the city today.
On the way back from lunch today I noticed that the whole netting structure for a driving range on 66th Street, between Ulmerton and 124th Avenue, was folded in half. These are huge poles supporting the netting, about 18-24 inch diameter metal. Snapped neatly in two down a nice row. That’s going to be expensive for someone.
Thought I’d share (feel free to ignore, or add your own):
You know you’re from Florida when…
You have more than 20 C and D batteries in your kitchen drawer.
The freezer in your garage is full of homemade ice.
You flinch when you are introduced to a person named Charley, Danielle, Frances, Jean or Ivan.
You find yourself dropping words like “millibar” and "convection"into everyday conversation.
Your pantry contains more than 10 cans of Spaghetti Os.
Making coffee on your propane grill does not seem like an odd thing to do.
You are thinking of repainting your house to match the plywood covering your windows.
When describing your house to a prospective buyer, you say it has three bedrooms, two baths and one safe place.
You are on a first-name basis with the cashier at Home Depot.
You are delighted to pay $2 for a gallon of unleaded.
The road leading to your house has been declared a No-Wake Zone.
You decide that your patio furniture looks better on the bottom of the pool.
You have the number for FEMA on your speed dialer.
You own more than three large coolers.
You can wish that other people get hit by a hurricane and not feel the least bit guilty about it.
Three months ago you couldn’t hang a shower curtain; today you can assemble a portable generator by candlelight.
You catch a 5-pound catfish. In your driveway.
You can recite from memory whole portions of your homeowner’s insurance policy.
At cocktail parties, women are attracted to the guy with the biggest chain saw.
You have had tuna fish more than 5 days in a row.
There is a roll of tar paper in your garage.
You can rattle off the names of three or more meteorologists who work at the Weather Channel.
Someone comes to your door to tell you they found your roof.
Ice is a valid topic of conversation.
Relocating to North Dakota does not seem like such a crazy idea.