Life is good, Kit. You had a chance to inventory your possessions and revaluate your priorities.
No doubt -- this season had provided some good lessons.
Charley: Changes in strength and direction can happen at the last minute. So can pants-shitting.
Frances: Flashlights, batteries, gas, water, and food are all mandatory, direct hit or not. I also found out they can ban the sale of alcohol after a storm. With no power and nothing to do for days, what a nightmare that would have been! (Note: as of today, some people in Florida still didn't have power restored.)
Ivan: Besides figuring out what is important to pack and checking for insurance validity, I seriously hope Ivan has nothing to teach me. Really, I've learned my lesson. Do you hear me, weather gods? I don't need to learn anything else, like how a roof holds together in catagory five winds or how deep flood waters can get in a state that is essentially nothing more than a large sandbar. At least I found neat old photographs and newspapers in my searches, which was good, and I finally got to generate a proper keepsake box. A waterproof one.
We're all hoping that wherever Crazy Ivan and Rain of Terror hits that everyone fairs well, and that includes my friends in New Orleans who are, I think, well into Northern Alabama by now to stay with family to weather it out, although it certainly won't get them away from it. At last word, hurricane-force winds exptended out more than 110 miles from the center and tropical storm force winds extended out more than 200 miles. Atlanta residents were told yesterday to expect possible catagory one winds. This thing is just now edging past Cuba and around noon, today, we looked up to see "hurricane haze" at high altitudes -- the outflow from an approaching hurricane that starts out as rippled cirrus clouds that melt to a thick overcast layer. All the way in Tampa, we're supposed to get some good winds even if it hits West of the panhandle.
That is madness.
