Post Whirly Whirly · 11:37pm Sep 14th, 2017
So yeah. I'm alive.
The eyewall skirted just west of where I lived. It thrashed through the next counties over. But even they fared a hell of a lot better than Naples, Fort Myers, and--Goddess alive--Barbuda, Cuba, and the Keys. That's the magic (ahem) of living so close to WDW as I do (about thirty-five miles). You're about as 'central' a 'Central Florida' gets. Even when a powerful-ass hurricane hits, odds are it'll be weakened by the terrestrial meatwall surrounding you. Irma was only a Category 2 by the time it visited us. It's kind of shitty to brag about it, so I won't.
We lost power for maybe... thirty-six hours? Something like that, much like last year. We were dayum lucky. I still have co-workers and friends here in Florida who don't have power. Where I was concerned, though, it was just like Matthew.
But this storm was way worse than Matthew.
Kinda humbling to wake up the morning after and find a tree uprooted in the back of your yard. Thankfully, it didn't damage anything. There were fences down between us and our neighbors. I saw a friggin' oak tree fallen over another neighbor's house. From what I can tell, it didn't break their roof. Others haven't been nearly as lucky. Where I work, I had a customer casually telling us about branches he had just cozyin' all up in his kitchen. I can't imagine something like that. Hopefully I won't ever have to.
The only thing stupider than Floridians is Floridians attempting to drive right after a hurricane. Dead stoplight intersections are an adventure-and-a-half, lemme tell you. Our cell phone service wasn't working (which I stupidly and naively did not expect), so for the first twelve hours without power I had to drive out to get in contact with anyone--including my sister in the Tampa Bay area.
I strolled past a Macdonald's that was open (pictured above). And it had a line of maybe 50+ cars just waiting to get in. I don't know which was more surreal--the caravan of fast food dependents or the legitimately closed Wal-Mart I walked past. Still, it was worth it to spot one of the most perfectly-defined rainbows I have ever seen in my entire life:
My family's okay. My co-workers are okay. From what I can tell, nobody in my immediate circle of acquaintances got too terribly fucked over by this thing... which would have sucked 'cuz the last thing I wanna die from is a storm named after an elderly German lady. That's not to say that this wasn't a bigass storm. Islands in the Caribbean have been utterly devastated, and there are people inside-and-outside Florida who are royally screwed, homeless, or without power. On top of that, you have the aftermath of Harvey, which I still think will be even worse in the long run.
So, y'know... those of you conscientious enough (and affluent enough) to give a dayum, don't hesitate to donate and all that jazz. I don't need any of the moniez. Lots of others need the moniez... and food. And other stuff. Be safe, though. Lots of scams online. I found https://www.charitynavigator.org/ to be quite useful in sorta... peer-reviewing the avenues of coin tossing. But feel free to Google your own avenues, if you're of a mind.
A shout-out to Propmaster for bridging communication between me and the Lemur Cave. You're awesome and selfless and sexy as always. Thanks for making worried marsupials less worried about mesa.
Thanks to Ponky for always being an awesome fuzzhead. You were the first friend I called when I could and it made all the difference. Thanks also for reading my easterly crapola (and somehow enjoying it? f'naaaaaa).
A shout-out to the zebra. I can't recall if the text-chat-group thingy was your origination or not, but either way... thanks for making me feel cared for and touching base with the rest of my friends.
Thanks also to Noble Jury and all the marsupials who also expressed their concerns and well-wishes. Again, I was one of the lucky ones. I'm back on board with the dailies n'shizz. My apologies for the delay. I don't want to repeat last year. Not so soon, at least.
I'll try to have some more blarghs out soon... including one about a certain video that needs being addressed. In the meantime, it's off to do far less constructive things... like fighting off an entire alien invasion with the Princess Squad.
-SS&E
Glad to know you and acquaintances are all good n safe. One thing i know after all this hurricane business though is that I definitely ain't moving to live on the coast anytime soon .
So awesome
It's great hearing that everything has gone okay (relatively speaking)! 😄
Good luck out there without the convenience of fast food
Glad to hear you are alright Skirts! Welcome back online.
Grateful that you made it out, okay, I had quite a few friends in the path of the storm, including you, so I was worried.
Glad to hear you're alright, I live right next to fort myers but I didn't get hit too badly, thankfully.
Glad that you're alright. :)
Celebration!!
Yay!
Sneks do that all the time in XCOM. LOS is still drawn based on the soldier's original tile - you just have to remember where that was. That's XCOM baby!
1.bp.blogspot.com/-Dq9Qd0e7lm0/VrgDFW6xJwI/AAAAAAACg7Y/dHOcTc4MFqA/s1600/ZULUiOm.jpg
(PC is the only way to play, imo - modding is amazing!)
Glad you and yours came through ok. Im just hoping Tesla is designing their power walls to be under 6 foot of conductive and corrosive solution for multiple days, or in another ten years, you might be ok but all the neighbors going up will make things really tricky.
Meanwhile, Jose is stuck in the Bermuda Triangle?
And people scoff at me for wanting to build reinforced concrete igloo houses whose walls are measured in feet. why?.. Ok, so it doesnt take much to handle 150 mph winds. Trouble is, its the 150 mph Debris its got to handle. And when that debris can consist of 9 pound armour piercing bricks and napped ceramic edged roofing slate, things get nasty.
Hope you get the area sorted out quickly enough. And the rest of the season calms down.
Good to hear that you and your family made it through that safely. I'll be glad to read the dailies again as soon as they start up.
Thank God you're alright, my man. I have plenty of family and friends in Florida who are dealing with all the fun things like water and uprooted trees, so I know a little bit of what you're going through. Stay safe and don't be a dumb Floridian. :)
Glad to know you're alright Skirts. Irma was a bitch alright, but we'll get through. Florida always does.
After the storm is always the hardest part. Takes days, even weeks for life to get back to normal. Things you take for granted suddenly aren't there anymore, or are scarce. It's been two weeks since Harvey flooded my town and things are still in the process of recovery--most of the businesses are back in full swing, or getting there, and people who didn't take as much water damage (like me) are getting things back on track and getting back to normal life, but then there are the enormous trash piles sitting around all over the place that nobody's collecting, and those are health and fire hazards plus drawing mosquitos like some kind of Biblical plague. One end of our apartment complex looks like a damn landfill.
I really hope neither your end of the nation nor my neck of the woods has to put up with any more of this crap this year. Seriously, enough is enough. _-_
What ever became of Pilate anyway? Pilot isn't ever on fimfiction anymore -- that's for sure.
Oh ya Irma was about as much fun as a lighter knot splinter. Eye passed about two miles from me when it passed Plant City. The wind gusts blew the rain into a spray that resembled fog. Between plant city and Lakeland you can see places where small tornadoes touched down. we got lucky or blessed.
4668613
I wouldn't live on the coast in Florida if you gave me five acres and a house, and I live in the state!
I got a pretty similar situation, saw plenty of mobile homes that got completely wrecked. Glad you were safe from the worst of it, mate.
Glad you're okay, Skirtsy. Hopefully all of the other Floridian horsebros are, too.
Glad to hear you are OK. Based off your photos, the level of damage in your neighborhood is the same we get here every time it rains (except your streets are not covered in fallen power lines).
The only floridians I know personally are living safe and soundly here in the middle of Southamerica, where the devil lost his poncho; but a friend's friend lives in Florida and his stubborn family didn't want to leave the house they were in, so he left with some friends and ended up near Fort Myers. He's fine, it seems, but hearing the worry in the voice of my friend during the weekend and first half of this week was stressing.
That takes me back to the big ice storm we had in Arkansas a decade ago that we were not at all ready for. A tree branch pierced through our kitchen ceiling. It was... surprising. I had to go back and look at it again to make sure it was real.
Happy things worked out okay for you, Skirts.
damn.
our torment continues
Glad to know you're alright.
Good to know you and yours are alright after that. My heart goes out to everyone, from Barbuda to Florida.