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Milton‘s Gone

Milton’s gone and good freaking riddance to it and its feeder bands. The last week has been chaotic for most Floridians as we prepared for the storm. We were all prepared for the storm, whether at home, Goalielocks at UCF, or J and M in Tally. The hubby put up our shutters yesterday meant a great night’s sleep. Thank you complete darkness! Of course, by the time Hurricane Milton landed, most of our action was over. We did have the most incredible, albeit brief sunset. Nevertheless, I’m glad that we were ready. I don’t want to get caught ill-prepared for a major storm. Also, I know it gives our folks, worrying from afar back in our hometown, peace of mind.

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There are a couple of axioms when it comes to hurricane preparation. If you’re fully prepared, the storm will wobble away from you. So be prepared. If you don’t lose power during the storm, you lose it intermittently post-storm (wtf FPL.) Everyone becomes a weather expert. Most are benign, but the ones that smugly downplay the storm are dangerous. I saw a few posts from a friend on Facebook that made me cringe. I don’t know which post was worse, the one making fun of people for preparing or the one stating that yesterday’s tornadoes were akin to what we see in summer storms. They weren’t. Not only were they deadly, but they were strong and in wedge form. Florida doesn’t typically are large, wedge tornadoes.

Unfortunately, one of the large tornadoes that hit Wellington impacted one of our friends. I guess this is why I find the glib posts about the storm and tornadoes so offensive. The storm uprooted people’s lives. Thankfully, our friends are safe and only lost property. Sadly, several confirmed reports of fatalities in St. Lucie County have emerged due to the tornadoes Milton spawned. The last axiom when it comes to hurricanes is probably the most important. The storm can impact you even if you’re not close to the center of the storm. Milton was over a hundred miles offshore in the Gulf when the supercells in the feeder bands spawned a tornado outbreak. But hey, at least it’s over and Milton’s gone!

What’s something you would attempt if you were guaranteed not to fail.

I would love to run a marathon without dying. It seems like an overwhelmingly strenuous activity that would be incredibly rewarding.

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Hurricane, hockey and airports

Hurricane, hockey and airports oh my! Goalielocks and I are Boston bound for his first tournament of the year. Providence clearly had a hand in the planning as we’re escaping Palm Beach right as Hurricane Dorian is knocking on our door. It’s slated to hit somewhere on the East coast of Florida as a cat 4 storm. Unfortunately, there is still a lot of uncertainty in both the path and forecasted strength. At this points, it’s a plan for the worst and hope for the best scenario.

As crazy as it sounds, it’s a bit tough to leave the state right now. While my goalie and I are heading north, we’re leaving behind the hubby, the mayor, Jake and our puppies. I think I’ll be equally nervous for them as I am watching my goalie play. I’ll try to update on both the hockey and hurricane preparations as much as I can. If you’re in Florida, stay safe. If you’re not in Florida, please pray for my family and neighbors’s safety.

Signing off from 36,000 feet!

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Finding the Rainbow In the Storm

Irma was without a doubt a miserable experience for most of us, but even with Irma it is possible to find the rainbow in the storm.  Major events like this have a tendency to bring the good out in people  Yeah, there were looters in Lauderdale and Miami, but those were isolated incidents and widely condemned.  In fact, part of our hurricane preparation included the possibility that looters could show up at our door.  They haven’t, but had they shown up we were more than ready to neutralize the threat.  This post isn’t about the looters though; its about the finding the rainbow in the storm.

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Here are some of the rainbows I found this weekend:

    1. I got to spend a lot of quality time with my family.  Some of this time included no internet, cell or cable service, so we had to talk to each other.
    2. We have awesome neighbors on our cul-de-sac.  Whenever one of these ugly storms rear their ugly head, our neighborhood man crew mobilizes to shutter all the houses and get the circle storm ready.   For that moment in time, they’re our super heroes.   Additionally, the post prep beers and drinks are definitely a plus.
    3. With Hurricane Matthew missing us, this was really our first storm in our house.  I have to say that I felt safe and secure in these walls even as the winds howled fiercely outside.
    4. We never lost power during the storm.  We did, however, lose power twice this afternoon.  This sudden loss of power on a sunny afternoon prompted me to take my run outside, which was another plus.  I have complete and total sympathy for those that lost power as it is tortuously hot in South Florida today.
    5. I was able to binge watch (uninterrupted) the entire first season of the BBC’s Victoria with Jenna Coleman.
    6. When out preparing for the storm, people were kind and people were helpful.  For a moment, I thought I had been caught up in Irma’s tornado and deposited back in Minnesota.  Alas, I was in South Florida and people were truly being kind and considerate.
    7. Not only were people being kind and considerate, but people were being smart about the storm and preparing accordingly.  We’ve been through several storms down here.  We witnessed with Hurricane Wilma the utter devastation that accompanies a strong storm and ill prepared people.  The aftermath was awful.  This wasn’t going to be the story with Irma.   People were preparing for the worst case scenario while hoping for the best.
    8. When we were finally able to escape the cave today, we had  some fun exploring the neighborhood.  Our poor dogs have been miserable the past couple days as they’ve been cooped up inside.   Athena was living the high life as we walked the neighborhood as she shot footage from the Mayor’s GoPro.

  1. Now that the storm is over and the recovery begin, the same team that helped get you ready for the storm helps you recover from the storm.  Our dad crew was out early this morning removing as much brush and landscaping debris from the driveways and yards they could.  The Hubby left for my bro’s house just south of us to help him remove the large oak from his roof.  He’ll be back tomorrow.
  2. It’s okay to have caramel rolls and mimosa brunch more than once a year and a hurricane party is the perfect excuse.  Of course, there is a downside to all of the hurricane treats. It should be corporate policy to allow leggings and/or yoga pants for at least a week post hurricane.IMG_9931.jpg

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Hurricane Irma Sunday Morning

Happy Hurricane Irma Sunday morning to the Blogosphere, I’m happy to say that we’re still safe and enjoying all the comforts the 21st century offers.   Given the intensity and size of this storm, I would be surprised if we didn’t lose power sometime today.  We’ve experienced too many tornado warnings to count at this point.  Scarily,  many of these tornadoes have been close to our neighborhood.  Fortunately, they’ve been close to our neighborhoods, but not in our neighborhood.

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Nevertheless, the weather has been loud all night.  Given the posts on our community’s Facebook page, I’m not quite sure how we slept through one of the squalls that came through earlier this morning.  Perhaps its the pure exhaustion from anticipating the storm or the nyquil we took to help alleviate the sinus pressure.   Either way we slept through the crazy weather early this morning, but woke up to another loud squall line around 8:00 am.

One peculiar aspect of the hurricane experience, if you will, is the sinus and ear pain that comes with it.  As the pressure changes, the sinus headaches and ear pain can begin.  Last night around 9:30, the Mayor started to have a sinus headache, so he had some ibuprofen and went to bed.  No more than two hours later, Goalielocks was also complaining of a sinus headache.  I was not immune either, so I took some Nyquil before bed to alleviate the pain.   If you’re local to Florida and experiencing similar symptoms; tylenol,  ibuprofen, flonase (or any nasal steroid), or Aleve will help alleviate the pain.

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The Hubby was able to get the dogs outside quickly between squall lines and got a picture of the street.  Fortunately, there’s been no major damage here less palm fronds littering the streets.  We did, unfortunately, lose on of my favorite trees.  My lime tree.  We bought the lime tree because we love mojitos, margaritas and coronas with lime.  After this storm, we will be looking for a new lime tree.  If that is the worst damage we have, we are truly fortunate given the pictures I’m seeing from the Florida Keys, Miami and the Caribbean.  Prayers for all my friends and family in Irma’s path today and tomorrow.  I’ll continue posting as long as I’m able as it is a great outlet for nervous energy.

 

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And So It Begins

And so it begins, after much anticipation Irma and her nasty weather are here!  We’ve been able to enjoy time outside with the neighbors today before the storm and in between the feeder bands.  I can’t say enough about how amazing our neighbors are, but we are super lucky.

I had to laugh when I walked out earlier today and the neighborhood men were taking turns riding the dirt bike.  No better time to learn how to ride than during a hurricane!  Life is all about making lemonade from the lemons and that’s truly what we’ve been doing.

 

While the adults played on the bike, the kids were indoors.  Interestingly, the kids came back outside after the dirt bike was put away.  They love playing football.  In between the rain bands, and even during them, the boys were playing football with their neighborhood friends.  It was a godsend for the kids to have a chance to burn off some of their energy.  We are all getting stir crazy inside and the storm has barely just begun.  We’ve been trying hard to overcome the boredom all day.

We’ve had several tornado warnings already tonight, but have not lost power as of yet.   As long as I can post and film, I will continue to do so.  To all my readers in Florida, please stay safe and godspeed!

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Endless Anticipation

The difficulty of hurricane season is the endless anticipation that proceeds the storm.  I’ve been in South Florida for over 11 years now.   Currently, there is a level of concern in the air that I have not experienced.  When we went through Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005, we were very nervous as it was our first hurricane season in Florida.  Katrina and Rita came through South Florida without much fanfare, but Wilma really kicked our butt.

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Hurricane Irma will likely be a lot like Wilma in that it will be a predominantly a wind event.  Unfortunately, along the our coastline it will be a storm surge and wind event.  It is easy to panic when you see the 170 mph winds that this storm is currently packing.  The storm is enormous!  It is supposed to weaken before a Kat 4 before hitting Florida, but storm strength is hard to forecast.

Hurricane Irma

For our family and friends watching outside of Florida, this is a troubling time.  They see this big lumbering beast moving its way towards their loved ones and are afraid.  Their hope is that we will evacuate out of South Florida, but that isn’t in our plans.

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Why aren’t we evacuating?  Well, first it is hard to think about leaving our home with no understanding if and when we can return home.   Secondly, we are inland.  Our home is not located in one of the flood zones under mandatory evacuation orders.   If everyone evacuates, the roads will become clogged.  As a result, those that truly need to evacuate are unable to get out as needed.  Moreover, their is a finite supply of fuel in South Florida. Even if we were going to go, we wouldn’t be able to get far as fuel is hard to come by.

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I shopped flights for several days with no luck, so we couldn’t fly out of here either.  The Mayor’s suggestion was that we buy a large box and fill it with food.  Once we fill it with food for us and the dogs, we should UPS ourselves to Minnesota.  I love his creativity.

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We intend to ride the storm out in our house, unless it continues to be a stage 5 monster.  Then disregard the entire last paragraph as all of S. Florida needs to get out in that case!  Our cars are gassed up for after the storm and our cupboards are full.  Unfortunately, hurricane food is not necessarily healthy food.  I tried to buy things that were as healthy as possible, but there weren’t many options available. As the storm gets closer, I’ll post updates and pictures of our preparation.  We’re planning to go check out the surf tomorrow before the weather really deteriorates.

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If you’re looking to track the storm, here are some great websites:

National Hurricane Center  – This site shows the forecast and warnings for the storm as well as the forecasted path.

Should You Evacuate? – Great article in the Palm Beach Post about whether or not you should evacuate.

Mike’s Weather Page –  This site is a great resource for those tracking the tropics.

WPTV – my local NBC station

The Sun Sentinel – Newspaper covering Broward County

Palm Beach Post – Newspaper covering Palm Beach County and the Treasure Coast