Ernesto part two

Still no power but my neighbor has a generator and let us hook up the fridge and freezer and I piggybacked the computer so I can do homework and send you all some pics of what I saw when I came home yesterday.

This is taken from my porch door. The limb came up to our steps but missed the house thank god.


I had called Grumpy to take the Expedition to work as I thought it would be safer than his little Geo tracker. Our neighbors told me the limb fell 30min later and it would have smashed the car had Grumpy not taken it to work.

Here you can see where it hit on the drive way.


Another shot of the house and front yard


different angle same limb you can see how it stopped at the steps.


The limb that fell is bigger than some trees around here.


Here is a shot after I cleaned up the loose branches

This I can't move until a friend with a chainsaw comes to help me. He is actual the reason I am up he had said he'd come at 9 but I think he is running later to let me sleep in.

looking out from my porch


close up from the porch


close up different angle


My back deck. Not to many branches down there.


look at the lawn its turning into a little lake

my lake


water


Here is the debris that I could clean up myself without a chain saw. Close up on the debris Okay this is my neighbors yard look closely under the tree - you can see the bumper of it.

So all in all we were very lucky the house and the car was spared. I had initially called into work because I thought my neighbor had a chainsaw and I was going to be cleaning up, but he didn't so my clean up went much faster than anticipated. So I called to see if they need me since the house had no power and there was nothing to do and at least that way I'd get a warm meal. My boss actually called me when I was on my way (no doubt because some of our greedy waitresses bitched at the idea of having 5 vs 6 working) saying if I wanted to stay home. I was like what no warm meal and money???? He said to come on in if it wasn't busy he'd at least feed me. Well it was a good thing I thought with my stomach we got slammed. We were one of a few places open and over 300,000 had lost power. I didn't get home until close to midnight. I was out on the patio and made over $100. Now remember these where not our regular customers and my tips weren't that great for example I had a $69 check that left me $5. Our entire restaurant was full and we had people waiting outside for tables it was a madhouse. The news said that not all power will be restored today so we may be busy again. But I don't think it will be as much as yesterday because the people that do have power will have BBQ's to rid themselves of all the food that thawed.

Ernesto

So this is whats going on right now Tropical Storm Ernesto. Trees are blowing sideways, the rain is so thick and combine with the wind looks like fog; no umbrella or raincoat will keep you dry and of course no power.
Well no power at the house anyway. I woke up this morning at 6 and saw that the power must have gone out and come back because my alarm clock was flashing. I reset it and tried to peak out the window but it was to dark. I could hear the wind and the rain and know it wasn't pretty. I turned on the news and about 10min later we saw a blue flash and the everything shut off. The transformer for our part of the neighbor hood had blown. Then a few minutes later the other ones in our neighbor hood blew too. I fell back asleep and woke at 8:30, called the office secretly hoping there was no power and I could stay home. But no we are on the Hospital grit so even after Isabel where there was no power in most places for 2 weeks (including my house - talk about cold showers, and no tv or computer!) the office had power after a couple of days. Ernesto is not even a hurrican so I am hoping we have power later on tonight, just not this afternoon so the restaurant would be closed and I could stay home. The puppies wouldn't even go outside this morning so I went with them (and got soaked) but even then did they not leave the porch. Can't blame them the back yard is turing into a lake and there is tree limbs and leaves everywhere. I will probable leave work early to be sure the pets are okay and no tree fell on the house. Depending on how long the power is out I may not get to go online for a few hours/days. I will try to take some shots of what it looks like later today.