Father Forgive me for what I am about to do :)

Okay...free form thought time.

Its just you and me and the computer. My friends went to bed. My kids are tucked quietly in bed asleep or pretending really good. I can hear the fan blowing and it feels good. The AC is turned down a bit. I got cold.

I turned off the TV, will forego this troical update. All the local weather voices have spoken. The weather radio is even quiet.

I cannot finish the Creamy Chocolate Slim Fast (low carb) no matter how much I try. Is THAT how it works?? You just can't bare to take another sip so you lose weight? lol Nah.. usually I like it. Just not in the mood. Only 6 carbs and 20 protein. Worked late and too tired to think on chewing lol.

Oh haha..aren't I in a good mood?

So.............what do I think?
Okay...this is it.
Honest and open here online.

I don't want to die.
I don't want any of my kids to die.
I don't want to lose my house or my belongings.
I just got the bedroom decorated the way I want after all the construction.
Finally there is order after a summer of demolition and rebuilding of my house.
Honey Maple Cabinets, Blue Pearl Granite counters.
Even the backsplash is finished.
No...don't want a direct hit now.

My kids are split over where to go if we have a direct hit.
Some side with "Uncle Ronnie" others would go with me to my best friend Sharon.
All within a few blocks away so... can decide later.
Tropical Storm or Cat 1.. even weak2 will stay (unless my kids leave...)
Have bars on windows, tinting covering that provides weak weak protection but should be enough in a 1. Sigh...no shutters. I'm a single mom.. just bought school supplies, paid for camp and got shoes at payless for the kids. Gee...storm shutters weren't in my budget.

I don't want everything to be a mess. It was a mess after Andrew.
Piles of junk, debris and dead trees cut and put out onto the streets piled high like a fortress.
Took forever for them to put up street lights again..got used to the little stop signs.
Don't want to live in Miami without electric...been there, done that.. worse part..no fan!!

Like my job. Love my job in ways. Don't want the library to go whoosh in the night.
Then again I could sub.

I could move to Key West ...if its still there :(

Could move in with Dina in NY in her basement, start over.
Maybe my ex will get his own apt and I could send kids or even move in.. he always promises to take me to a play. We are friends. How nice. Good friends. As annoying as he was about the weather channel and the weather radio would rather have him here than be alone. He's good in emergencies. Well...so am I. He's stronger. lol .. Just good friends.

Emailed an old boyfriend. His wife didnt handle Andrew well.. told him to take her away for Labor Day weekend.

Don't want my whole world to fall apart or come crashing in.

Want to live. Have someone I care about who is out there somewhere and would like to spend more time with :) Well... as another old boyfriend says "shame the devil" its TRUE.

My life is strange. Stranger than a soap opera. Stranger than any movie that could be written about it. Stranger than leaping tall buildings with a single bound.

My life is a carvinal of people, places, sights and sounds.. Kids coming and going in a nonstop swirl of juvenile youth and vigor. Helpful..wonderful, supportive, adaptive... very understanding. High energy, talkative, artistic, strong on personal magetism and tough as nails. Don't want them to have to go through the direct hit idea.. of a Cat 4. No....no...no.

I want the hurricane to turn..off shore. Real close but offshore. Close enough to get some good pics (I do photography in storms) and to hear the wind..see some rain.. be blessed enough that I can thank God and appreciate what I have more. Not have it go places where people can get hurt.

I don't want to decide whether to go to Ronnies or Sharons. Last time (georges) I went to Sharon. Then again last time had the older kids who said they were going to another friends house, came back..broke in, I had to call the police to get them to move... leave... bad time in my life. Wasn't pretty then. Older kids were tough..younger ones are workable, easy.

So...where do I go from here? This isn't where I intended to be.

I just keep going. Keep functioning. Keep believing in a way this storm will avoid death and destruction on the Friday night nightly news.

Way back when I said this summer would be the summer of change.
I was right.
It has been.
I've seen walls knocked down.. things rearranged, retiled, repainted.. changed.

I've seen things I never thought I would see and done things I never thought I would do. And, I want MORE.

Why does everything have to be so complicated?

Smiling.

I remember the night before Andrew. We had done all we could do. We lived on Miami Beach in an old 1926 wood frame stucco house. Dade County Pine..tougher than concrete. And, my exhusband and I who were married then... left the kids at home and went for a long drive around South Beach.. way after midnight. Like memorizing the way it looked one last time before we thought it would be blown away by storm surge. We were wrong. We were lucky. My beautiful SW Miami that I grew up in was amost blown away...off the map. But, I'll never forget the feel of driving around a boarded up city waiting for demolition in less than 24 hours.

Sharon and I went to the beach. We said we were going to Publix one last time and so we did..sort of afterwards or Walgreens. But we drove over to the boardwalk around 35th Street and Collins and stood there watching the storm surge while my daughter Miriam who was five ran around with her arms spread wide making circles and sounding like a plane about to land. The ocean was wild. People were walking from Collins to the bus stop on 41st Street where the buses would take them to the mainland ...same parking lot they use for Dolphin drive and ride buses. It looked like the Fall of Saigon on Miami Beach as people streamed across the bridge on foot carrying pillows and sheets from the hotels and apartments. We stayed. Thats another story. Heard the ocean pounding in at the height of the storm over the screech of the wind. Stupid or foolish or lucky??? My friends house in Kendall got destroyed in the storm. We were always going to go there if we left the beach. Providence we didn't. No..thats in Rhode Island.

Anyway...

I have a color print out of the August 25th run of the GFS model.. it was like days out. Maybe 13. Friends sent it to me to tease me. I printed it. On a whim. Never did that before. Going to see how close it came that far out.

Tonight the models flip flopped back to the west. Duh.. Well its moving fast to the west/wnw which means it keeps getting further west.

Somewhere I keep thinking of Billy Wagner ..what will he do? How legitimate is it for the storm to go through the straits? Possible.

The ULL moved west to wsw all day.

Told Hurric this morning I HATE that ULL.

Helps pull storm west, ridge fills in behind it... dragging the ridge as it disapeers west into the Gulf.

Billy Wagner has to decide real soon whether to evacuate the keys just in case..at least non residents.

Tough call. Especially since the door is narrowing on a Carolinas storm.

Will it be like Floyd?
Think during Floyd I could see what the NHC was talking about with that curve but today ..they don't have it curving do they? Turning in up the coast.

Will it be up the coast?

Or slam into the coast?

Now hearing talk of the storm going into the Gulf.
Gee only one way it can get into the gulf......

FSU ensemble says South Florida it seems...its secretive, guess its in morse code but Avila did say that. Thank you Lex. Wanted to know all day what it said.

So............

Miami?
WPB?
Cape Canaveral?
Through the straits?
Miraculous turn off shore?

I said days ago...days and days ago. If it doesnt go north into Ga/Sc..would be WPB/Melbourne.

Going to stick with it...but hope it doesnt come in to the south of forecast like so many this year have...

Help.

Really help.

Really, really help.

Going to put on the WXR radio a bit. Clear off my bed. Set my cell phone for alarm to wake up the kids. Close my eyes and dream... dream of all the things I'd like to do with someone special if I make it safely through the storm.. and all the other storms going on in our emotional lives and world and wierdness that is my patchwork quilt of a life.

Not up to Buffett. Afraid Willie Nelson will do me in.
Just going to listen to the wxr radio... or turn it off and fall asleep.

To sleep.. perchance to dream.

Yes... a Leap of Faith.. but that is another old boyfriend..one who wasnt really a boyfriend but a boy friend, sure somewhere out there he is praying his heart out for a miracle to save us all from the storm. He loves Florida too.

Nite, Lois.. Amy... Bracha... Bobbi

Barbara, Patron saint of storms.