Category Archives: About Me - Page 21

The Search Continues

Posted by anachostic on October 22, 2017 No comments

Today, I treated myself to a nice, long, hot shower. I know at least one person who would say, “fuck yeah!” and at least one person who would say, “fuck you!” to that extended activity. Showers aren’t really a big thing to me. I’m typically always a solo showerer (“Boooo!” from at least one person) and usually, I just want to get it done and get my day started.

Because of my view that a shower is utility and not luxury, you would think my showering hardware would reflect that. You’d be right but oddly, I find myself in a perpetual search for the perfect showerhead. I initially wrote shower head and quickly determined that is something totally different. (“Boooo!” from at least one person)

I don’t recall the showerhead that came with the house when I bought it, and can’t remember when I first swapped it out, but I do remember at that time I had a real bug up my ass about saving as much water as possible. I don’t really know why, since the water bill is really low and my appliances are all water-efficient. But anyway, I bought this ultra-efficient head with a shutoff switch built into it.

41uMWEd8qpL[1] I think I might have experienced this spray nozzle once before in a hotel and I was impressed with the power of the spray while it still used very little water. So I sought one out for myself. When I got it installed, I learned a few things. One is that novelty wears off. If I had stayed a full week at that hotel instead of a night, I would have learned that the sensation of the spray isn’t all that wonderful, day after day. The other thing I learned is that when I used the shutoff switch, the water immediately starts cooling, so when the switch gets turned back on, you get a blast of cold water. Nope, this is not the last showerhead I will own.

89cb9d4f-8aaa-4f18-9118-8cc0719899c9[1] In 2012 (according to sales records), I purchased a Dream Spa showerhead. This head had a major advantage in that it had a hose on it. I don’t know why manufacturers always try to suggest that you will grab the showerhead and spray all over your body with it. I just turn around in the shower. It’s not that difficult, people. However, the hose allowed me to clean the the shower much easier than a stationary head would. Being a typical guy, it was not out of the realm of possibility to run a garden hose into the bathroom to spray the walls down. I’m not saying I did that… often, but then again, I’m not saying I clean… often.

I used this head for a really long time. And I did it in spite of the fact that the shower head designers were complete idiots. What I am referring to is the nozzles. Nothing like having a dozen or so faces staring aghast at your nudity. Don’t see it?

Because the water sucks everywhere in this state and even in my house, I eventually had to replace this showerhead. The limestone and other minerals clogged up, dried out, and cracked the rubber OMG faces, resulting in a suboptimal spray pattern. So I bought another Dream Spa head, one that had even more spray patterns. Honestly, they all sucked. I’m just sticking with a simple outer ring spray pattern until I move on to my next head.

Unrelated to my head problems at my own home, a different problem was occurring back in my hometown motel, where I was last weekend. You know how a lot of faucets have tilt-to-open, turn-for-temp designs? You see them pretty much everywhere.

th1ZY50ZGS thENG70UOQ th8R1AI46X thZLT4YA0K

Well, I was pretty surprised that in the lobby of the motel when I was checking in, there was a large-type printout explaining the proper use of the shower faucet. My assumption is they had one too many people snapping the handles off trying to tilt them to turn on the water. In my own room, they had another educational piece, printed on a high-quality placard.

Contact the front desk if you don’t comprehend what we’re try to explain. Don’t break our damn handles anymore.

Now And Future

Posted by anachostic on October 20, 2017 No comments

You might think there is someone new managing this blog. But no, it is still the same person. I’ve gotten a recent “kick in the pants” to write more. You can see in my history that I’ve posted a few times a month and sometimes when nothing was going on, or when lots was going on, I skipped a month. You can also see that I’ve been trying to post consistently every weekday as of late. This accelerated publishing frequency has necessitated that I dip into old drafts and refine them for posting. Not to worry there, I’ve got dozens in the backlog.

I’ve never been at a loss for ideas, but over the years, it became a significant effort for me to flesh out an idea into a post. It’s the same mechanism I use when writing music (which also has been neglected). You start with a riff, and if you’re lucky, you have a hook. Then you have to form the song around that riff. If you have a good hook, you have to elevate the rest of the song’s parts to match the hook’s quality. If it’s just a riff, you have to hope you’ll find the hook in the creation process.

Having ideas is easy. Anyone can have them. And that’s why Twitter exists. At various times, I considered moving to Twitter because I could get ideas out without having to construct a narrative. But now that I’ve shaken the dust off, I feel more accomplished being able to express an idea and surround it with context.

You’ll also notice that I’m starting to incorporate images and hyperlinks in my posts, where I rarely did before. Actually, if you go way back to when this blog wasn’t even on WordPress, you’ll see more images. So, I’m actually going back to my early blogging days.

On a completely different topic, I recently found out that the excellent blog composing utility, Windows Live Writer, which has been dormant for years and years, finally has a successor – Open Live Writer. This utility seems to be a continuation of the original Windows Live Writer code, just updated to work with current blog platforms. At a minimum, they fixed some issues with publishing to Blogger. It’s definitely worth a look if you haven’t tried it before.

And lastly, a small announcement for the week coming up. I’ve been practicing the skill of expanding a simple idea into something more substantial and to do that, I’ve written a small series of stories. Well, they’re too short to be stories, more like tales. Since it is Halloween season, these tales are all dark. I’ll be posting them all next week. Here’s a preview of what’s coming:

Halloween Scenes – Bundle Of Joy
Halloween Scenes – Everybody Loves You Now
Halloween Scenes – Desiccation
Halloween Scenes – Lesson Of A Lifetime
Halloween Scenes – Peep Show

Does My Offering Please You?

Posted by anachostic on October 18, 2017 No comments

Things my cat likes:

Friskies
Feline greenies
Origen original treats
Tuna flakes from PetCo
Pop tarts
Mounds coconut
Peanut butter
Pistachios
Cake
Hamburger
McDonald’s cheese
Cookies
Long John Silver’s fish
Frosted Mini Wheats
Froot Loops (sometimes)
Pizza
Grilled cheese sandwiches
Some types of cat grass
Cardboard boxes (bonus if there is crunchy paper in box)
Bean bags
Suitcases (open or closed)
People visiting
Sticking her paws in my speaker port holes

Things my cat does not like

Spaghetti
Milk
Rice
Steak
Splashing water
Tuna flakes from other pet shops
The other types of cat grass
Paper bags (even if the paper bag is in a box)
Other cats
Stepping on bare skin
The garbage truck

This One Time At Summer Camp…

Posted by anachostic on October 17, 2017 No comments

I made a trip to my hometown, the wasteland, this last weekend. It wasn’t exactly business or pleasure. I guess it would be considered more business than anything else, though. My mom now resides in a nursing home. I don’t think they call them nursing homes anymore. They’re probably called long-term care facilities. Cue George Carlin and his anger over the softening of the English language. But anyway…

I got to see my mom a couple of times. She doesn’t have a lot of stamina for visits and dismisses visitors with a “I want to take a nap.” No problem. I don’t really have much to talk about anyway. But one thing we talked about got me thinking.

In her new living quarters, they have a pretty set schedule with meals, activities, therapy, etc. Some things are optional or semi-optional, but a lot isn’t. When she was complaining about it, I was reminded of my years at summer camp. I thought, my mom’s at summer camp, for the rest of her life.

My first summer camp was an unpleasant experience. It was a military camp far from home that ate up six weeks of my summer vacation from school. I didn’t know anyone there and I was not exactly military material. Your day was regimented into sessions, of which you were allowed to choose things like Arts and Crafts, Model Rocketry, Basket Weaving, etc. Then there were others you couldn’t, like Softball and Soccer. Then there were parades and practice parades, and inspections, and of course, meals. You always went to meals in formation with your entire division. What a show.

And in many ways, my mom’s new life is like that. Some things are optional, or a choice and some you can’t get out of. You go to meals with the same group and sit at the same table with everyone. You are going to do therapy. (They don’t talk about it, but the facility has to perform therapy or they are considered neglectful of their patients and would get fined or shut down.) There is a gift shop/concession place where you can buy things with money from your account (I had that too in camp). Other people can put money in your account for you to spend (just like my parents did for me).

So if my mom is unhappy at summer camp, it’s no different than how I felt in the same situation. Both involved being around strangers you have to become friends with, away from a lot of things that are familiar to you, and made to do things you may not feel like doing. If you’re an independent spirit like my mom (or me for that matter), it’s a nightmare.

While my mom and I discussed the summer camp concept, I finally admitted to her that I almost got kicked out of that military camp in my last year (the last of four) there. I had gone “cabin-trashing” with another camper and it isn’t really a surprise we got caught. We had to spend the time repairing all the damage we caused while all the other campers were at a picnic. I think we were still fed lunch, I can’t remember. And it caused me a lot of ill will with my cabin-mates.

But, the year following that incident, my parents sent me to a different summer camp. A computer camp that was only two weeks long. It was a totally different environment than military camp and I would have gladly spent six weeks there. But it was only a couple of years that I got to go and then I was on my own again.

Unfortunately for my mom, it doesn’t sound like there are other camp opportunities.

Wasteland Highlights

Posted by anachostic on October 16, 2017 No comments

Two trips to the hometown in one year! Wow! I mean, wow. I actually mean, meh. No really, blah. So, to summarize the best/worst highs/lows of the trip, here we go.

Before I even left for the airport, six hours before my flight, my flight was delayed. The flight was already a late one at 7:00pm, now it was 7:30. When I got to the airport, they announced, “your plane will not be arriving until 8:00.” A very odd way to announce a delay, but that’s what they did.

The TSA experience on the way out wasn’t too bad (oh, just you wait for this one…). A couple new regulations (aren’t there always?) to deal with. Everything electronic larger than a cell phone must be taken out and all liquids must be out as well. Ok, no big deal, a couple of Kindles and shampoo. I went on with my life.

At my destination, I went to pick up my rental car at the ungodly hour of 11:30. When I went up to the counter, the agent just stared at me with a big smile on his face. I said, “Hi, I have a reservation” which seemed to break his trace and he said, “that… is awesome.” And I understood. It was my shirt – “Quattro Gato”. Basically, this image here on the right, colorized and duplicated four times over. The agent asked me if I liked cats, had a cat, what type of cat, etc. Naturally, cat people are awesome. And awesome cat people get… Mustangs! Or at least that’s what he believed. Me paying for the cheapest rental car, and wearing a cat shirt, means I get upgraded to the sports car category. I guess I’m ok with that.

I got my car in the lot. There are SO many goddamn buttons on the console and steering wheel. What the fuck. I don’t touch anything. I try to get GPS directions out of the airport to a familiar highway (I always take the wrong route), but my phone has no signal. Finally, I get a weak signal and a route. I leave the airport and immediately get in the wrong lane and miss the proper exit. GPS simply changes the route, without even scolding me with “ROUTE RECALCULATION!”. Not sure exactly how much time I lost in that, but I made it to the motel and fell into bed at 1:30am.

I thought I had everything planned out well for this trip, which meant little to no personal time for me. In the end, I had way too much personal time because my brother kept bailing on our plans. So I saw and did everything I could think of. That’s a very short list in a very small town. And I ended up sitting in my upgraded rental, parked downtown for extended periods of time.

Everything’s closed in the wasteland. The mall lost Sears and JCPenney anchor stores, leaving only The Bon Ton. I asked a couple people I visited, “where do you buy clothing?” The only options were KMart, WalMart, and the Bon Ton. One said Amazon, the other said the outlets (a 45 min drive). How can you live like that?

After only two days, I was ready to get back home. My outbound flight was at 3:30, a time where you either get to the airport super-early, or risk being late. I chose the former, since there was nothing else to do. I got to the airport, returned the car, and chilled in the airport lobby for an extended time, reading.

When I got up to get some lunch, I found out all the food was behind security, so I guess I’m going through security now. I was ready. I remembered the changed regulations, even though none of the agents were making announcements about it. Ha! I was ahead of the game. I put my laptop and kindle and shampoo in a tray and confirmed with the agent that was right. He said the laptop had to go in a tray by itself. Fine. Anything else? Shoes. Oh crap. How did I forget that? Shoes on the conveyor. Then over to the scanner.

I got chided last time about doing a body-building pose when they told me to lift my arms, so I kept it simple. I got out and the guard stepped in front of me. “Anything in your pockets?” I patted my pockets. Oh fuck. My phone. I usually put my watch and phone in my carryon while I’m in line. I forgot. I pulled out my phone and handed it to him.

“Anything else?” I patted again. I had my handkerchief, which I didn’t think was any big deal, my passport, which I sometimes have in my hand when I get scanned, and oh crap, coin change. I pull the change out sheepishly and hand it to him. “Anything else?” Ok, I’m stressing now. My passport? He takes that too. “Anything else.” Uh, a handkerchief? He has everything now. He calls for a bowl from the other agents and sends everything off to get scanned.

“So, you want me to go through again?” I ask. The agent replies in a very annoyed tone, “No. Since you had so many things in your pockets, you’re going to have to be patted down.” Ohhhh FUCK. The agent then goes into a very long and detailed description of all the different ways he’s going to feel me up. I’m somewhat in shock, so I don’t hear much of it. He asks if I want a private room or just do it here. I said here is fine, as if I give any sort of a shit right now.

I have to take off my belt (which should have come off earlier, I guess), and hold it. Not much to say. I got groped plenty around my balls and swiped and rubbed. That might be bad, but hey, they gotta do their job. But here’s the stupid thing. They wiped my hands with some sort of device that probably was checking for explosive residue or similar. Now, if I was a “t-word”, would I have been so stupid to leave my pockets full going through the scanner? Bad guys are smarter than that. I’m just an idiot, and you’re checking me for residue?

I pass with flying colors, gather my shit and get the fuck out of there. The experience ruined my day completely. I tried to eat lunch but ate very little. I wasn’t upset or scarred or anything. Just mad at myself that I was so focused on the details I totally forgot the basics.

The flight back was much less fun than the flight up. Much more turbulence and many more passengers. Two very large women in my row. Idiot children in front of me, and a baby across the aisle.

But I did make it home safe and my cat was thrilled to see me. That’s enough travel for a while, I think.

Let It Be

Posted by anachostic on October 4, 2017 No comments

In the early programming days, back when the language was called BASIC, there was a instruction that has since become deprecated. That command is called LET. Because language parsers were simpler back then, there needed to be a way to identify assignment of a value to a variable. Nowadays, you just say x=1 and assignment is understood. However, saying x=1 could imply comparison, resulting in a true or false value. To avoid that ambiguity, in the past, you had to say LET x=1.

I started off with that little history lesson to say that I was listening to a recently purchased CD and a song title was “LET X=X”. Since I was driving while the song was playing, I couldn’t really make out any of the lyrics, but the title gave me plenty to think about.

A programming statement like that is pretty useless. It changes nothing. And that thought is somewhat powerful. Telling someone “LET X=X” could be saying “Leave things alone.” or “Don’t change a thing.” Or you could be a bit more philosophical about it, applying a Que Sera Sera viewpoint to it – whatever happens, will happen.

So I looked up the lyrics and to me, they don’t make any sense. But whatever, that artist rarely makes any sense to me. But I got my own meaning out of the title, and I think that makes up for any confusion.

Not Getting Sick

Posted by anachostic on September 25, 2017 No comments

I don’t get sick. The last time I mentioned getting sick was four and a half years ago. I described it as a “nasty cold”. In fact, that old post is talking about deviation, and my time for a major deviation was due.

I’ve been to the Sick AF Theme Park and I always manage to get out without going on any rides. Well, sometimes I end up on some of the kiddie rides like Shit Yo’self or The Dehydrator, and I’ll get on with my life. The bigger rides always kind of spooked me. This time, I must’ve gotten lost trying to get out because I ended up in line for the #2 ride in the whole park – IN-FLUUUUU-ENZA EXTREME. And let me tell you, it’s a long fucking ride. (Since I’m writing this now, I can say that I’m lucky to have not gotten on the #1 ride, Nu-Moan YAAAAAAAA.)

Day 0 – Wed

Getting ready to go to bed and out of nowhere a large sneezing fit hits me. A little later in bed, a second fit strikes. This starts my sinuses draining like mad. They drip into my throat all night. Ticket for one? Thank you, climb aboard.

Day 1 – Thurs

At work, the entire place is full of coughing and sneezing. I guess I got on board just in time. By the end of the day, my plan for when I get home is: sleep, eat soup, sleep more. When I do get home, I feel terrible. A different terrible, a foreboding feeling that something is not right this time. I check my temperature and it’s 99.6. Half an hour later it’s 99.9. I call my boss and take the next day off work.

And here’s the other huge issue with this. The next day, I am going on a trip to see my mom in her new nursing home digs. At this point, I’m optimistic I can bounce back enough to make a safe trip.

Throughout the night, my fever continues to climb, broaching 101. This is all new to me. I don’t get sick. Oh, first time rider? Have fun and enjoy. You’re going to remember this one.

Day 2 – Fri

Fever is hovering in the 101 range. Every joint and muscle in my body hurts. Even sometimes my skin hurts to the touch. I put on a brave face and go out to infect the world. I get some Dimetapp and Halls from Walgreens, a small pizza from Hungry Howies, and some Gatorade from Dollar General. I’m good. But I’m not. The smell of the pizza is turning my stomach and one tiny bite was spit right back out. Big ol waste of money.

Around 5pm, I capitulated and went to the Urgent Care. The receptionist took my information and commented, “Boy, you haven’t been here in a long time!” I said, “I know, I don’t get sick, but when I do, I do it with style.” My time there was short and I wasn’t admitted or anything. I got an Rx for a flu med, 10 doses over 5 days. Five days! I go back home and over the next 36 hours or so, I got to experience all the wonderful twists and turns in this insane devil ride.

For me, being under a constant fever gave my brain license to do whatever it wanted. And this is what I got. When I was unconscious, I was in some sort of disaster zone, providing help. All the rubble was black blocks (there’s more to it, but it’s too weird to describe). I had a special power that whenever I coughed, I could demolish a partially collapsed building. When I was more awake, it was kind of the same, except everything was white, not black. As time went on and my condition improved, so did the disaster. Then I had to start dealing with situations like “There are reports of water at this other camp, but we can’t tell anyone because they will overwhelm that camp.”

And everyone should be happy that I did not get on the plane. Everyone except my wallet. $600, everything nonrefundable. But I would literally be the grim reaper walking into a nursing home in my condition. Do something good for once, you dickhead. Don’t kill people.

Day 3 – Sat

My second full day of absolutely nothing. Probably 22 hours in bed. Can’t get up. Can’t eat. Only sleeping in 1-2 blocks, which involves the inescapable scenario of fixing a disaster scene. But at some point in the afternoon, I woke up and my fever broke (high score: 103.3). I recognized this because I was sopping wet. My clothes were soaked the whole way through and sweat running down my arms. That’s something that hasn’t happened to me even in my most careless hiking jaunts in the summer heat. My joint and muscle pain is gone, but something was traded for that relief. Now I have a pain that feels exactly like someone folding your ear cartilage. It doesn’t fade in and out, it’s a sharp, piercing pain that makes me convulse. And it comes along about every 15 seconds. Minute after minute, hour after hour. Sometimes it will pause long enough for me to get a small window of sleep, but it is relentless.

With the clearing of my fever, my continuing struggle in the disaster zone literally turned into an empty field. I think that’s a good thing? Anyway, good ride so far. Lots of unexpected surprises. What else ya got?

Day 4 – Sun

My fever is gone, but I’m still sweaty and temperature sensitive. My joints and muscles are not sore, but I’m weak. I haven’t really eaten anything in days. Looks like I lost about 7 pounds. I’m still laying around in bed, because I can’t do anything else. I can’t really sleep because of the constant ear stabbing. So I decide to listen to some recent CD purchases I hadn’t played yet. That was a pleasant reprieve. Then I picked out another song from a different album to play. It’s a favorite of mine – happy, joyful, and executed exceedingly well. When the song started playing, for absolutely no good reason, I started crying uncontrollably. I took a while to compose myself and clear out my sinuses (SO much!), but when I would think of the song again, I would start sobbing again. And again. And later on yet, again. What the fuck is wrong with me?

I reprise my earlier soup extravaganza, which is probably the most I’ve eaten since this started. I tried a burger for lunch so I could get some protein for some energy. Just a couple bites. Pathetic.

Now my sleep patterns are all messed up. Didn’t get tired until 2 in the morning. Even then, I only slept in 1-2 hour blocks, like I had been. I’d either wake up soaked in sweat, or with pain in my chest from sinus drain. It’s ridiculous.

Day 5 – Mon

Thanks for riding. I hope you enjoyed it. No, thank you for letting me get the fuck off the ride without dying.

Now, an attempt to return to normalcy, although I know in reality it will probably be a couple of weeks to get back to the way things were. Cleaning the sick bedding, cleaning the sick house, realizing I don’t have a lot of energy available to do any of this for extended periods. I break out in sweats easily. I tried a small meal at Panera and had to actually take my time and eat. Like every bite took a few minutes to settle. And people thought I ate slowly before… oh boy.

What a long-ass post. Six days wrapped up in a stupid story. I should have live-blogged the whole event, or maybe death-blogging would be more apropos. Next time I think I’m dying, I’ll try that.

After Irma

Posted by anachostic on September 12, 2017 No comments

This guy.

Way back in 2004, after the rash of hurricanes that I went through, someone gave me this thing as a holiday gift. I’m completely stumped as to what it is. A talisman? Totum? Spirit ward? Golum? Gargoyle? Whatever it is, it was packaged with an explanation that the object was intended to ward away hurricanes. After being through 4, it was a thoughtful gift. It’s been hanging in the kitchen since the day I moved in.

Well, I’m not sure if the object has a shelf life or an expiration date, but 12 years later, along comes a hurricane. My initial thought was, the hurricane is going to miss us and go to South Carolina. Then the track changed and it was going to go just east of us. Well, ok. The west side of the hurricane is the less intense part. Then the track changed again and Irma was going to the west of us. That’s not so good. The track changed one last time and resulted in a direct hit on my neighborhood.

Good going, thing. Way to do your job.

The power went out at about 8:30 that night, with the eye wall expected to hit at around 12:30am, in the dead of night. We took in about 3 hours of sleep, which was becoming normal – 2 or 3 hour blocks of sleep here and there to keep alert. Woke up around midnight with the weather getting steadily worse. Since the bedroom windows were facing the storm, the rain was hammering the glass and being generally distracting. We then moved to the living room.

I planted myself in front of the front window, on which I had finished putting shatterproof film before the storm. Our neighborhood’s power was out, there was still light coming from somewhere in the distance, so you could see shadows of trees blowing around. Sometimes you would see flashes of lightning or maybe power transformers, or car lights or whatever.

The eye wall came and it was impressive, although not exactly scary. The only shocking moment for me was during one massive gust where the rain being carried dropped the visibility to near zero. It was like being in an automatic car wash. And within about 10 minutes, it was generally over. We went back to bed.

I woke up the next morning to see what was left.

My jerk neighbor, whose trees I’ve complained about for a very long time, finally got his comeuppance. One full tree down and many limbs broken off. One limb fell on my/his/our fence, but that section was already damaged from a previous fall, so it was not really new damage.

I knew those trees were going to be trouble, so we purposely parked the cars in another location so they wouldn’t take any damage. They got pelted with leaves, but that’s about it.

I immediately started clearing debris, and most of my neighbors had started doing so as well. The winds were still gusting pretty good, but the skies were mostly clear. The power came back on at 12:30 – an outage of only 16 hours. Much better than I expected.

And after all that, My house and vehicle took zero damage. No shingles were lost, no screens were torn, no windows were broken.

This guy. He’s still on the job.

Irmageddon Approaches

Posted by anachostic on September 9, 2017 No comments

Storm arrives tomorrow. All prep is done. Everything is stowed away and vehicles are strategically placed to avoid the inevitable fallout from my neighbor’s shitty trees. People have been contacting me non-stop. There’s nothing to report yet.

I went out to get mail for the last time and my neighbors were out and wanted to chat. They all consider themselves prepared as well. One has his windows boarded up. Another has what looks like painters tape x-ing his windows. I finished installing shatter-resistant film on my front window.

Gas in my area isn’t as difficult to find as I thought it would be. My car and motorcycle are topped off and the GF’s car is also topped off. We also have 10 gallons of gas in cans. I don’t know how much good it will do us now, since I was unable to get the generator started. The old gas has apparently killed the carb.

Last night we went out to Lowe’s to get paint, since we’ll be stuck inside for a couple days. It was rather what you expect. The line for plywood went from the front to the back of the store. The three people in front of me each had a window AC unit.

Today was a stop at Target for a few supplies, and a last meal at Olive Garden. The hostess said they had a lot of employees bail on their shifts. No rush crowd by noon, just a few tables. We sat at the bar and let the Weather Channel explain how death was coming, but during commercial breaks, “Trust the Weather Channel”. Kinda creepy when you think about it.

The cat was been acting super weird on Friday, very clingy and agitated, but today has been more calm and reserved. So now it’s just a waiting game. Oddly, Friday delivered the first rain band – a far, far outlier, but it still behaved like a tropical downpour. Today, nothing. it was nice and sunny, sometimes overcast, but no rain.

I’ve Got… Aunt Irma Visiting

Posted by anachostic on September 5, 2017 No comments

Prep day 1 for the natural disaster, Hurricane Irma. Recently upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane, which is supposed to be death from the sky, probably will be Cat 4 or even 3 when it gets here. But hey, 3 or 4 cats can make a significant mess of things.

I was here in 2004 when we had four hurricanes cross over us. I remember at the time it became a joke – another weekend, another hurricane. At the time, I was living in an apartment in a newer apartment complex on the middle floor. So I had no potential for roof damage and no potential for flooding. The events were all pretty easy going. The balcony was always to the back of the storm, so I just sat out there and watch thing go by. I saw part of a metal roof get ripped off and I saw a displaced alligator walking around.

When I got my house in 2005, I was fully prepared. I got a generator, a chain saw, a chest freezer and a dorm fridge. That should keep me going for as long as I needed. And when did the next hurricane come along? It never did. Until now, 12 years later.

Today, I dug the generator out of the shed where it hadn’t been used once except for a test of the electrical output. It was surprisingly clean, but its functionality is still unknown. I need to change the oil and get some gas in it.

Speaking of gas, there’s a general hysteria going around now. Of course, when I’m out of gas in my car right now. So I stop at one station. I tried a pump and it didn’t work. Odd. I went to another pump and waited for a guy to fill 6 five-gallon gas containers. That pump didn’t work either. But it was just working! It dawned on me that the station was out of premium gas. So I went to another station. As fate would have it, they were out of regular gas and only had premium. So I got my car filled up. But in both places, there were cars everywhere. Luckily, everyone was civil (so far).

I also noticed that people were eating out a lot. Everything was crowded. I guess people didn’t want to deplete their stock at home. After eating, I went to a small store and found pretty much what I expected: no water, no bread. I bought other things, like pop-tarts and canned tuna fish and chips. My idea of survival is different than others.

And you know what, there will be more shipments. I’ll get some bread eventually. I have cases upon cases of Coke and drinks. One paranoid thing I did get tonight? Cash. Can’t use credit cards when there’s no power.

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Anachostic