1174 and headed North...

Now I know that they blogstars feel like, but it takes the storm of the half century to get me there. According to my referrer logs in TypePad I have had 1,174 people visit my site in the last 22 hours.

Thoughts on the Charley a couple days later...

1. Ice is important when your power goes away. Watching the food in your refrigerator waste away isn't much fun. But you really need an insulated cooler, the other stuff doesn't work...

2. It's a good time to be in the tree busines or owning your own crane. People will suck up to you, and agree to pay you outrageous sums of money. I have heard stories of really serious gouging, but then again when the tree has crashed through the roof of your home, how much bargaining room do you really have. (Remember to read your homeowner's policy...here in Florida there is a 2% deductible, so that if you have a nice house, your get to pay the first 2%, and hence it could get to be a very bad day before you insurance kicks in!)

3. The idea that bloggers can be serious correspondents about certain things presupposes that they will have accees to power and WiFi. When the cable modem and DSL modem don't have power, they don't work.

4. If you have a digital camera, start taking pictures early as Americans are really into cleaning up stuff, and then all the good pictures go away.

5. When everyone else is without power, even a bad restaurant with power prospers!

6. As I was sitting at Tijuana Flats today (which is a good restaurant) enjoying the air conditioning, I overhead two great comments:

From a pretty woman who was downing a Corona....if it weren't for the Hurricane, my kids would be in school, and I would be at work.

From the manager at the same place...We have had our three best days ever!

7. I need to find the right person to thank at:

Kinko's...great WiFi, plenty of power and AC, and no one pushing me to move on.

Panera Bread..more of the same, but excellent food, and unlimited sodas.

Borders...again more of the same, but a nice sense of humor. They keep pitching the "booklights" so you don't have to read in the dark, and every so often remind us "to return our seats and trays to the upright position", kind of reminds me of the days when they actually served something besides pretzels on transcontinetal flights.

8. I need to figure out how to use Outlook to send mail via SMTP at Kinko's, Borders and Panera! It's a bitch to get E-Mail inside outlook and have to use Gmail to send it out. They probaly think that I would spam my 10,000 closest friends.

9. Be grateful that I don't live in a trailer, as they seem to be magnetically attracted to big storms.

10. Be grateful for the hot water at the YMCA, as your hot water only stays hot for about a day.

It occurred to me that if I were going to prioritize how power got turned back on, after the normal stuff, I would make sure that a great sports bar would get power, because it would fill some basic needs, AC/Junk Food/Adult Beverages, and the Olympics.

And just to put things in perspective, I learned this evening that it will be 2-5 days before my power gets turned back on.

Comments

[Richard Callaby]

I am also in Florida and I know what you mean about ICE. ICE is by far the least thought of commodity when you think of disasters but it is one of the most important commodities. I am also blogging my experiences with this hurricane as I signed up to help rebuild people's homes in the area as soon as we get the supplies. I will be down in the Arcadia and Wachula areas which do not get any news coverage so I will cover that area with my blog and digitial camera if needed. Now because they have such a lower population they might take even longer to get power than Orlando. However i did see an army of workers trying to restore power in the area. Trouble is when I was driving I had no choice but to drive over downed power lines. It was a bit scary but fortunately they were not juiced up. otherwise I would not be posting this.

Keep up the good work in keeping the rest of America informed and if you really want ot relax go down to Tampa where their is plenty of power, food, ICE, shelter, etc.