Monday, September 18, 2017

irma

well looky here I was absent again but I have (sadly) an excuse, Hurricane Irma.

We spent about a week with the maybe it will come this way and then it switched to it is coming this way and then there was all the, Florida folks are all gonna die crap ( I'm going to touch on that again later) and then thankfully for us but not for the West coast, she scooted around the State and made landfall in the Keys as a cat 5 and then re-made landfall in Naples and she just went on and on.

I spent a few days in manic prep mode. Most of you that know me know that I over prep. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure...or something like that. It can and does take hours to secure for a storm but I will do it over and over again to help to keep us safe.

I went through Andrew and it was a cat 5 but it was fast and dry, this storm was not. We were on what is called the dirty side, the northeast quadrant and even though the bitch was far far away she was ginormous and we took a pounding for approx 18 hours. 6 houses in this development never lost power, we were one of the 6. Some still don't have power! We had no phones and no internet and I know I worried a few people for 15 hours when i just could not contact anyone in any way, shape, or form. By day 3, I remembered that hospitals fire stations and police stations are the first to get restored so I drove close to a police station and walked Lunes in a park and when standing on one leg, whilst reaching for the sky I was able to get enough bars on my mobile to contact England.

Things are ugly, every ones fences are down, trees are down everywhere, and power lines strew the debris. I pulled up to the grocery store on Saturday and it had a sign that said, due to irma we are closed, it was open 2  days before. Gas stations are back to normal with no lines but one day before Irma I spent 2 hours looking for gas for a friend who was stuck in China. Life is nasty, there is a new normal, driving on the wrong side of the street as your side is blocked by a tree, no traffic lights make intersections hell. One is supposed to treat it as a four way stop but only if you aren't one the entitled, as the entitled drive straight through without as much as coming off of the gas.

But it is good, we survived unscathed.

Now back to the old, All OF FLORIDA IS GONG TO DIE, sentiment. Knock it off. It is scary enough being here without people who don't live in the State or country for that matter, telling us we are all gonna die or that we HAVE to evacuate. We have zones, they evacuate by necessity. I know my zone and I know what I am doing. The roads become car parks, 17.5 hours is how long it took a friend to drive a 7 hour trip and lets not forget the gas situation. And of course this storm took up the entire State so unless you hit further north than GA there was no guarantee. I can't fly with my dog and i am not leaving her.

Next. Dade County was hit 25 years ago by Andrew. The southern part of the county was wiped off the map and it was devastating for all. We went through hell. Oddly enough the county manned up and said enough is enough. No more cheap houses they have to be built to withstand a massive storm and with that they imposed some really strict codes and that was that. I have many clients ( weird but true ) in the construction business, some are engineers,  others contractors and the codes were a pain in the arse but they got used to them and they changed everything. So when a storm does come, we are safer than most. Not much can withstand 230 mph winds but we are built tough here. ( that might be the only positive of this town. Hah!)

News stations pick Miami, to report from, I live in Miami but technically I do not as I am 35 miles away and 40 miles from the beach.

Okidoki, some photos.
My little house, all boarded up with thanks to Ed. This was Thursday.
Monday morning......floody.
Trying to walk to a firends house to check on it.
no exit
Florida is only a few feet above sea level and we have have solid coral or limestone so our native trees have a very shallow root bed that spreads out as opposed to going deep. Sadly they topple and take the world with them.
It tore out all the fince and part of their tiled patio
big trees little rootball
trying to get the other side of that.
what a mess
all fall down

Now it's confession time. Of course I am perfectly aware that hurricanes can spurn tornadoes but it isn't something I dwell on. Just in case and compounded by our 2 story house, I emptied the cupboard under the stairs and made it a safe space. I put some semi important documents in it, lots of duvets and  a tonne of pillows. Then we tried to coax Luna in too.
she went in with no bother.
Lunes and Lily.....inseparable
someone decided she loved it there
she rearranged it a bit as apparently there were too many pillows
and she spent the entire storm, calm and unfazed in her new little house.
and when I tried to return it back to " the cupboard under the stairs" she complained, loudly. I am trying to re home my hoover!!!!
As for the tornadoes. We didn't have the incredible social media that we have now during the last storm. My phone started this god awful wailing noise at about 11.30 Saturday night with this flashing banner stating that a hurricane warning had been issued for my area and that meant a hurricane was imminent. It would not be silenced and went off three more times. Holy mother of god...lets give everyone a heart attack. I am sure at this point if you are oblivious to the f act that a storm is coming you must be living under a rock and won't be making it out alive anyway.

As things progressed and the winds and rain picked up we were still able to watch TV to keep an eye on things. I'm not sure if it was morning or afternoon but all of a sudden my phone leaps in to action again and starts to wail. This time it was a tornado warning. and then the report that one had touched down and then another wailing session and OHMYGOD I'm not going to lie it was so terrifying. Was the noise outside the normal noise of a hurricane or was it the tornado sound. The warnings kept coming and I think I posted something of facebook about needing Depends if this kept up. But finally they stopped and so did Irmas carnage to this area and now we start making it normal and hope more than anything that Maria changes her path ~ especially since I took all the boards down.

End note: Lily was a trooper. I ordered everything online from Lowes to have it delivered and was waiting upon the email stating the time. It didn't come and didn't come so I called and was told....all online orders have been cancelled we have switched to first come first served. I understand this philosophy but cannot get my head around not telling anyone their orders were cancelled. Big strike against them. So I grabbed my car and Lily and also all the measurements and we headed to Home Depot. The place was an insane asylum and the shelves bare. I knew what we needed and I know Home Depot like that back of my hand. All they had left, with any substance to it, was much thicker marine grade plywood. I had no choice and took it. 9, 4x8 sheets of 3/4 inch plywood and it weighed a freaking ton. We grabbed a container of Tapcons (masonry screws) and headed to pay. I called Ed and he said, well it's over kill and your house might blow away but your windows will be intact. 😆 Then we needed to get it on the roof of my car and so I called the unhusband, who always claims that this is still his house, and asked him to get to home depot and help us. With that we started loading it up, sheet by heavy sheet but no unhusband. A man watched us and then a really really nice man came over and helped and then he tied it down and told me to drive very very slowly. This part was odd, it was almost as if he knew me cos he wouldn't stop emphasing SLOWLY. I rang Unhusband back and said forget it. He said he would meet us at the house and help unload. He picked up one piece, said and I quote, this is fucking heavy, and with that he let go and it slid down the edge of my car leaving a fabby little  scratch. sigh. Lily and I got the job done and Ed and Richie came over and installed it.

I will say you really find out who your friends are in dire times and when you get divorced. My so called friend list got a lot shorter through this and I am not referring to the unhusband. And I nearly forgot, the opening photo is my before and here is my after even though it was taken from a different angle. The pots were taken indoors they didn't blow away.
No more hibiscus.
I was really bad at taking after photos as I was taking care of Chicken Feets house too and my mind was just on checking up on everything.

2 comments:

  1. Glad to hear you are all okay and that you have friends like Ed to help install the plywood!

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  2. Dawn you amaze me! True friends will always come through for & it sounds like you are blessed. (Un-husbands...well let's not go there!) I think you may have to keep Luna's hidey hole under the stairs it may help for thunderstorms.

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