Goodbye Irene!

Well, for us, Irene was not nearly as bad as it portended to be, and that's a blessing! We all prepared for the worst but the storm situation ended up much better than predicted. We did experience some rain water coming into our basement-- it appears there have formed some hairline cracks in the basement wall where the crawl space is. I suspect that is due to the 5.8 earthquake we experienced earlier this week, so I will have to have this insprected and fixed.
The most frightening thing last night was the many and frequent tornado warnings. You can't really prepare for a tornado except have a place to go in the basement. You can prepare for hurricanes, but not for tornados-- they are sudden events. Plus, the East Coast does not have an adequate not efficient tornado warning system as tey do in the Midwest. In the Midwest a specific system of tornado sirens lets residents know about the level of danger. It's idiotic that this system does not exist here.
The biggest challenge from Irene today is the impact f all this rain-- potential flooding for many people, but not us.

It's A Waiting Game- Irene

What are the chances of being hit by 2 major natural disasters in a week? Earlier in the week the East Coast experienced a 5.8 earthquake and now we're preparing for Hurricane Irene! Hurricane warnings have been issued for our area, so now it’s a waiting game. When hurricane warnings are issued it means that the storm is expected within the next 36 hours.

This is a slow-moving storm so it grows as it moves north. The hope is that it will slow down as it hits landfall in North Carolina. Where it is expected to hit is not too far away from Virginia Beach, where we lived in the 1980's and where Sophia was born. I can only imagine the extent of flooding they will be likely to experience!
My sister lives on Cape Cod, and they are also expected to be in the path of this hurricane. Ironically, Irene is one of her middle names!!!
In the meantime, we try to prepare as much as we can. Yesterday, Ed drove to Kentucky to be with his mother, who is not doing well and has most recently been in and out of a coma, so I am guarding the home front with Lili and Phil. Today I’ll do some cooking and prepare food that will taste good even when cold. We are expected to lose power for several days. I do hope it won’t be as bad as they say it might be on TV, but then again I’d rather prepare for the worst and hope for the best!
For more details about this storm see the article in the Wall Street Journal by clicking the link below:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904787404576532171799510228.html?mod=googlenews_wsj