We’ve been without power for about one hour at this point. Per company app says that crews have been assigned. Our area appears to have relatively few customers without power though.
“Florence is heading for South Carolina!”
“But Florence is IN South Carolina!”
“No, you don’t understand! Florence is headed for Florence!”
“But Florence is IN Florence!”
“Yes, Florence is coming at Florence in Florence! And if there’s a woman named Florence who lives in Florence in Florence, then Florence is coming at Florence in Florence in Florence!”
I’ll be here all week. 
There’s a decent chance that Florence could hit the trifecta of places my wife and I lived in South Carolina: Florence, Columbia, and the small town of Clinton, which is up I-26 from Columbia just before where I-385 splits off.
And its remnants could hit Bristol VA/TN, where we lived and worked after we left SC.
It’s stalking us, with a lag time of decades. 
Power is back! Now I get to see the grumpy reporter the local station inexplicably sent to Myrtle Beach (it’s raining there now).
I am beginning to feel a bit if a jinx–a couple of weeks ago I was in Myrtle Beach and now it is in the news for this. A month or so ago I was in Cades Cove, and now they are in the news for someone getting et by a bar.
My wife has cousins in Lexington, SC. They’re hunkered down and at the moment are okay, but they are still thinking about escaping to Atlanta, although with everyone else fleeing and hurricane-related destruction, they might get trapped at home. I suggested they make a decision sooner rather than later, but they’re going to try and wait it out as long as they can.
Brother and wife live in southern coastal NC. Luckily they’ve been on vacation but keep sending me updates about their town from news and evacuated neighbors: flooding, “significant damage” to houses, power outages, and a curfew in effect. 15 inches of rain so far.
True story: I was driving down I-95 from Landover to Backlick Road, when I saw a big neon sign reading:
I-95 CLOSED IN NC - NO TRAFFIC REVERSAL - PROCEED WITH EXTREME CAUTION
Gee; ya don’t say? Damn.
Florence’s current location: LOCATION…33.6N 79.8W ABOUT 40 MI…65 KM S OF FLORENCE SOUTH CAROLINA
Close counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and hurricanes.
The governor of NC is asking for people to avoid traveling through the state if they can at all avoid it. The flash flooding from this thing is going to be really ugly.
Managed to avoid the worst of Florence. Power was only out for 5 hours, and the nearest flooding is 75 miles away. Still raining, though.
I’m north and west of Charlotte so my enjoyment of the storm doesn’t start for another 4-5 hours and then continues for the next 24 hours or so. I lived in Florida for over 30 years and thought I had gotten away from this type of thing. Evidently I didn’t move far enough.
Right now we have 13 or so mph winds with gusts of around 25. Later tonight, the wind speed is supposed to go up to 25 mph with up to 60 mph gusts. I am in a rural area so when the lights go out I expect to be without for days, hopefully not weeks.
Also, just FYI if you are traveling: I-40 is closed between I-95 and Wilmington, and sections of I-95 between Dunn and Lumberton are also closed. Obviously plenty of secondary roads in those areas are also going to be closed due to flooding.
While hurricanes are bad for lots of people for others it brings opportunities–looting:
http://www.wect.com/story/39097792/watch-looters-raid-family-dollar-police-pull-back-at-management-request
Went out to get the newspaper this AM. Got a couple sprinkles on me and the newspaper wrapper was a little wet. Just the beginning of … probably not much.
I’d like to grill a burger this evening but maybe some other time.
I’ll take that over what the people in the Carolinas are experiencing. The seemingly endless rain bands moving in over NC are amazing on radar. Not so amazing if you’re under them.
BTW it’s tropical depression Florence now and the NHC has handed the storm monitoring off to the WPC.
Hey LHoD, how are things down in Asheville right now?
The remnants of Florence passed over Bristol in the wee hours of the morning. At least the storm is moving fast now, so it’s not dropping too much rain in any one place.
Reporting in from Charlotte proper. Very happy and a little abashed to say we’ve come through it with no ill effects at all, a grand total of maybe 5 minutes without power, and an unexpected 4 day weekend.
Asheville’s fine, it rained but not heavily. We didn’t even cancel our Ultimate frisbee game yesterday.