Good news, bad news

[Kay/NC]

Irene is approaching as a Category 1 hurricane, but she is moving only 14 mph, so dumping a lot of rain.

We started hearing strange sounds about three a.m., limbs breaking and blowing against house, I guess. Heard some metal rumbling, and so wonder what the roof will look like in daylight.

Farm has been put into emergency mode, and we just have to hunker down and hope for the best. Message here is EMS will not be able to reach you, so place yourself out of harm's way.

Limping along on DROID connection this morning...keep the East Coast in your thoughts.

[belarus]

You and all the others in Irene's path are in our prayers Kay.

[Kay/NC]

Thanks. We are in a heavy rain band right now. Wind started to pick up quite a bit about an hour ago.

We are far enough inland To be okay as long as we stay put, I think. coast Guard is attempting a water rescue off of Oceanview right now...two people on a small sailboat in that surf! If you want to pray for someone, put in a word for them and especially those trying to save them.

[Nebrfarmr]

1) I pray you, and everyone else is safe through all this

2) I pray the CG rescues those on the boat

3) I pray damage is minimal

4) I pray those on the boat grow some brains, and next time,  not go out when a hurricane is coming.

No hurricanes here, only tornadoes.  Come with no warning, but in an hour, the storm is over, and you know what you are dealing with.  Also, the damage swath is small, so cleanup/repair goes faster.  A few years ago, I had friends lose houses in a tornado.  However, a half mile either side of the damage swath, nothing was hurt too bad, and in a week, with the neighbor's help, most things were cleaned up.

[Kay/NC]

Couple and their cat were saved. You know it is bad, when the CG had to have specialized assistance from beach fire department rescue swimmers.
I say they have some ' splaining to do, Lucy!

[Jim Meade / Iowa City]

Best wishes and good luck.  

[Kay/NC]

We are okay, thnak you, Jim.  Trees adn lombs down everywhere, but at least not ON the house.

Kids have to do one pole over at the horse arena, and to figure out where a few shingles in the yard blew off their complicated roofling.  Some tin to re-attach in a few spots, but nothing extreme.  The men have cleaned up trees blocking our road. 

We were on the good edge...7-8 inches of rain, winds mostly from sides where we have windbreaks form trees and/or outbuildings.  Kids live 1/2 mile east, got 9-10 inches, much worse wind.  Another mile east of that was 12 inches, and winds tore up quite a bit from there on, from what SIL tells us. 

It will be a while before I know the whole picture.  We are under curfew until furthre notice, so are not supposed to be out and about.  SIL took a VFD fire call this morning early, and they had to raise downed power lines to get engines under them.  Power out and will be for a while...hope to find out how loing tomorrow. 

My husband and the kids did a great job of preparing us for this one.  It is hard to sit one of these things out, with the wind howling through this old house for over 20 hours; but, son had done some repiars this summer that held up well, and having backup systems in place is reassuring.   

Going to go check the store now, to see if water got onto the new tile floor.  Kids told us last night the new roof, doors adn windows all looked okay, and Mike graded a bit this week to try to address the wetness problem there. 

Thanks for the encouragement.  Anywhere you get an earthquake and a hurricane in less than a week is a happening place to live!

[nwobcw]

   Glad you made it thru it all Kay  It sure cudda been a lot worse!

[bruce MN]

Good to hear that you came though as well as you did,

You mentioned Jim Kunstler in one of your post on book recommendations. Do you follow his weekly blog .column?

http://kunstler.com/blog/2011/08/katrina-in-vermont.html#comment-66747

[Kay/NC]

Have visited his website in the past, and enjoyed the "eyesore (atrocity?) of the month."  The one I laughed then felt sad about was the "playground designed by lawyers."   

The Long Emergency taught me a great deal about energy science and politics, past, present and future.  World Made by Hand was an interesting take on the post-apocalyse in America.  I think we are seeing a trend in the direction of the people who salvage and scrounge, and know how to do things with their hands actually having the upper one, and even mainstream press is catching on to that. 

I need to pick up and finish some of his others.  Thanks for the blogsite.  May go there and stay a while, when we are not still camping out in our home, approximating the end of energy, while we wait for the co-op to get us back on the grid.