We Really Got the Eye.. still a bit in shock and smiling...

So much to say and my mind wants to go on vacation. Am I in shock? A good shock.

A very strong, Category 1 Hurricane.

Typical damage but on the strong side.

Power is out in almost all areas. Thank you FPL for my power, bless you.

Went out to nearby store to get some Challah Rolls for Shabbos and to see if everything was okay at the library where I work.... very close to my house. The library is fine..city clean up crews are out cleaning up broken branches and minor debris from trees.

What did I see? A lot of big trees down.. here and there. No real consistency, just the luck of the draw. Street after street is fine and then some big ficus tree or oak tree is down and it blocks the street. Big tree down on 10th Avenue in North Miami Beach across the street from a friend's house.. blocking the street and major neighborhood street.. buses being rerouted. Big cranes out trying to get it off 10th Avenue.

So..where do I start?

Pet Peeve... annoyed the NHC didn't up the wind speed when it was obvious all day that the winds were intensifying. The pressure dropped from 1007 slowly down to 1001 and they had it at Fifty forever it seemed. Storm was clearly intensifying and on the way to bombing. Bright big purple dot explanding, growing into a massive round ball on radar and infared and moving onto shore obviously not slowing down. They should have upped the wind speed a little to accurately give a better picture to residents of Miami Dade County. Yes, Miami had a Hurricane Warning but if they had been told it was 70 mph when it probably was 70 not 50 people would have taken it a bit more seriously. And, believe it really was stronger. Damage reports will show that too.. Also, the track was clearly switching to south of west and advisories stonewalled it at west at 6 when it was clearly making the turn the GFDL and many forecasters called for..

Anyway..

There is a family of five missing down in the keys. They left Marathon in a boat early in the day. Hopefully they will be found okay. Though as of yesterday early in the day they believed the storm would be going far north of them. Even though if they were regular sailors they would have been aware of strong storms in distant bands. If...

Granted they did mention in the last discussion around 11am yesterday a forecasted track that we discussed online at The City for posts and posts. But, they mentioned it. Everything with the Hurricane Center and discussion is innuendo. Like a soap opera.. on One Life To Live if they suddenly mention "Uncle Bob" you can bet your bottom dollar that Uncle Bob will show up in town in a week or two. When they gave the discussion talking about the GFDL wanting to take it to the Florida Keys..they did that to show they were watching it, knew it was there but thought it was a bit too far to the south... but they felt it was important enough to mention.

Major wind event in North Dade and South Broward. Power went out fast. There were very few bands in this storm as it came onshore. It was nonstop strong wind.. rare. Not off and on squalls as much as ...winds hit fast and kept coming. On the good side.. less tornado threat, less microbursts... just constant wind. Nothing that most of Miami flora can't withstand. Unfortunately power lines go out fast when they are wound through Mango and Avocado trees that lose branches or here and there fall down. Didn't see any major transformers down like I did after Frances.. this was mostly fallen branches, low wires poorly strung or strung through some Black Olive tree that lost big branches or some big Ficus Tree going down.

Down in South Dade they had a massive flooding event. If you have a chance to look at an old loop you will see that when the storm turned SW the bottom (strong side of the storm) turned in on itself so instead of that band circulating around to the north along an eye wall.. it pretty much turned around on itself and got dragged SW much like a training effect being set up. Or maybe the storm relocated on itself. Smiling, teasing. Anyway..gave heavy rain more than heavy wind down in Homestead where most people have power but also a foot or so of water on their streets.

Kids are playing..hanging...eating all the food I bought. Glad we have power, not sure why but not complaining. Few people can bring food over to keep in fridge and or charge their cell phones. Hopefully one day I'll get cable back and see what CNN and TWC have to say.

Sharon called me from Maine last night, let me listen on the phone to TWC for a while. Cannot believe TWC had Cantore on South Beach in Dade County and dragged him back up to some beach in Broward where it barely got the storm. Amazing that TWC didn't have anyone in Miami but had people up in Palm Beach. Well, that I know of.. Why didn't they send Abrams back to Miami? Did they?

This comes back to a point that one of my favorite weather guys have taught me about human nature and storms. People insist on replaying the LAST storm they had. It HAS to be like Andrew.. Irene.. Frances. Other storms went up to Palm Beach ..this will too. Wrong. Katrina is Katrina; not Betsy, not Donna; not Frances. It's important to understand what past storms have done as history does repeat itself but not immediately.

Anyway...cooked for Shabbos and it's in the freezer.. was fine. Going to make some salads... clean up the house which is a mess and watch the TV coverage.

What did we do last night? I talked on the phone to friends.. a few friends. We took mattresses into the living room that is very sheltered from exposed windows and sat around listening to Norcross on the radio and taking turns trying to see images on the itsy bitsy TV screen we had and hung out.

We will all remember sitting outside in the driveway on chairs staring up at the sky hoping to see some blue. Telling ourselves this really was the eye. Understanding finally how people really think the storm is over. Would have bet money if I had just moved here from Cleveland that the storm was gone.. away... not about to hit again. Hung out .. like we usually do in this house.

Nice, calm hurricane party.. prayed it would stay mild and nothing bad would happen. Just some trees down.. people safe.. losing power.. gaining five pounds on cheap, fattening, fast snacks. Got hungry around 10 and everyone attacked the Tuna Casserole that was in the Fridge. Truth is the kids were very, very good and the small problem we had ... well.. he went to my brother's house a few blocks away.

People do get nuts before storms. They do strange things. Priorities fly out the window faster than reality.. everyone goes into some strange panic mode or they get very calm and tell you it will be fine and dandy and that God looks out after them always. Funny that the more religious ones I know seemed to panic and the lady at work who is the least religous looks up and says to me that God always takes care of her.

Bottom line..we got very lucky. A good reminder early on during the season how much damage can happen from a Cat 1 storm. And, a reminder we need because in this crazy hurricane season of 2005 I am sure this is not the last storm we will have this season. At least one in October that catches a strong cold front up from the Caribbean and or... maybe a big one in September.

Remember September. This is August.. August you must.. remember September.

And, as I said yesterday the astrological aspects were very strongly in favor of a big, violent wind event to happen. Lastly..Mars was in Taurus at almost the exact same degree as it was during the 1926 Miami Hurricane. And, it was squared planets in Leo. Again. Astrological signature so to speak for Miami to have a hurricane. Andrew chart has comparisons also.
Do I believe? Well .. I'll tell you this.. I am a student of science... earth science. Geology. Meteorology. Oceanology. And, I study and watch and am open to things outside the box. Benjamin Franklin was one of our first weathermen keeping track of weather, watching, commenting, learning, writing in his almanac and the man was a member of some of the strangest astrological ..kabbalistic societies they had back then. Seems to me when you are a true scientist.. your mind is open to anything that could be possible. Otherwise... you would laugh at Columbus when he tells you he thinks the earth is round and that you can't sail off the edge of the world.

Scientists rock! Weather people rock wildly! Writers are wierd people who watch everything around them and weave what they see into beautiful patterns of words ... a web of words all online on the web. Anyone can read them.. anyone can see them. Live the world thorugh the eyes of the people on the web who are writing what they see and feel for your to read.. learn.. believe.. experience.. even if you are reading this from Arizona or Alaska.. you are learning something, opening your world and eyes to the world far away from your own.

Take a journey on the web to places you love, people you love... people you need and want to read... a magic carpet ride.

As for me.. going back to hurricanecity and seeing what is going on. Then going off. Checked out flhurricane and read a bit.

I'm tired.

Don't know about you... one last text message woke me last night to tell me it was on the way to the Keys.. I smiled, more at their love and loyalty to keep me informed.. partly to the mention of the Keys.. and smiling fell back to sleep listening to the rain and the wind hitting the windows...Katrina slowly moving away.

Watch out Louisianna.. wouldn't put it past her to come your way. Could happen. Might happen... don't let your guard down. Miami storms going westbound... Betsy, Andrew..others tend to keep going til they see the sights of New Orleans and the Bayou. The name will most likely be retired so it seems to me that Katrina will kick up her heels and enjoy her time on the maps.. she's a party girl. She tried to crash the party for the MTV awards... where will she go next?

Later.. Bobbi
ps...still not up to spell checking... you EDIT me.. and thank you for the magical present of electricity.. I do appreciate it greatly. Always good to give thanks and appreciate when you are BLESSED.