Fay, Gustav, Hanna, Ike and 99, oh my!

And a BIG, oh NO!!!!
We are in for it BIG TIME!
The cone of uncertainty is on high alert for us in Florida.

Thank heavens the disaster in New Orleans, and surrounding areas was not as severe as it might have been.

But now, again, we are under the fire of nature’s wrath.
By the end of this week two more weather systems are arrogantly showing their ugly sides.
And we may very well, more than likely be in their path.
Cones of uncertainty and spaghetti plots don't lie? Do they?
Hopefully they will be wrong.
Hurricane Hanna has become a category 1 today, and may soon be a 2.
Ike is still just a tropical storm, but could have a little bit of Hanna envy, and grow much larger by Saturday from non shearing winds.

And Invest 99 is named after that famed Get Smart agent so I am sure she will have aspirations to break that glass ceiling in the storm game!

We are in deep… you know what.
Sorry, but my Blog is rated PG.

Anyway, we are still ready.
But boy are we getting cabin fever.
Not much is going on.
Most are staying close to home and information.

On the upside, today was a pool day for me, and the days will be drier for the next few. So were a few last week. Taking advantage of that is why we live in Florida.
Boating is hazardous though due to the storms, but we don't go much with the high gas prices, although we have a boat with a four stroke engine, which is more economical.
The fall is best for boating and fishing, calmer waters and cooler temperatures then.

Tomorrow with no storms close I will try to discuss something else.

Good night to all, be well, stay dry, and be thankful for whatever you can think of.

Well, nobody's perfect; least of all me...

New Orleans has levees not levies.
Levees are built to hold the water back while levies are taxes on property!
Oops, sorry what a dummy I am!
I'm so stupid! I don't deserve a computer with a keyboard to write my drivel.Take it away! Sorry... a momentary lapse into drama queen status.

Anyway, breathe... I made another more serious mistake New Orleans is targeted to receive the brunt of Hurricane Gustav 115 MPH storm at 2 P.M. Monday not Tuesday!
Thankfully, the news just reported all evacuees have left already today, Sunday evening.

Just in a newer report: now our news is saying Hurricane Gustav may very well just skim off of New Orleans, and go a smidgen to their west.
Still not great for their neighbors either; hope they left too.

The candidates are delaying the Republican Convention, and are asking you to raise money for the hurricane victims.
I heard earlier the Democrats are doing the same thing and also encouraging for volunteers to help out after.

This is all being discussed after the President stated that he wasn’t going to the convention, and this was because he would be needed to be available for the victims of this current hurricane. But didn't I just say this time they all evacuated!
The nightmare of Katrina, I guess it is haunting him, as it is all of us.

Hope things aren’t severe at all, and no one will be needed!

But of course that is unrealistic, and idealistic.

Clap those hands and pray or whatever works for you to wish well on the world.

Meanwhile, here at home; those feeder bands from Gustav have kept us all very wet all day not to mention those gusts of winds to 40 mph.
And we are still nearly 250 miles to the west of that nasty monster!

Please have a good night and think kindly of us weather ugly regions, and perhaps when you need us to do the same... we will!

A hurricane, a tropical storm, and many squalls..OMG

Our lives are becoming an enormous weather redundancy!
Updates: Hurricane Gustav is up to a category 4 with 150 MPH winds, nearly a cat five, a 5 is at 156 MPH winds, and this monster is still heading straight for the Big Easy!!

Fortunately, evacuations have already started and should be completed by Monday morning, and hopefully all lives will be saved this time, but there is no way to save the properties (remember that these are just things, not living), again. No positive way to know that the levies will hold, again. Hopefully the devastation will be not so horrendous. Gustav is predicted to hit that area on Tuesday around 2 P.M.

All day we have been receiving the squalls or offspring gusty winds and rain bands of Gustav even though it will miss us by several hundred miles out in the Gulf.

Hanna is still a tropical storm with 50 MPH winds, and has no idea where she is going, but we are still in her cone of uncertainty.

Sometimes you wonder why this is happening, all these natural disasters to us worldwide. Not just here.
Some will give religious beliefs as the reason; others global warming.
I think some of these disasters are just a horrific cleansing of our earth by nature herself, and that the media has been able to inform us about each incident just so much, much quicker than ever before!

What frightens me is that with all our scientists, and knowledge of climates, geology, meteorology, and all those other ologies or whatever is concerned with these things I'm really surprised that in this in our 21st Century we are still impotent in stopping or preventing these things!

Helpless is not something we humans ever like to feel, but these weather anomalies make us become that way, out of control. What can we do?
Take control of our own well being and safety, and that is about it.

This all remains harder to handle with all the information so close at hand, TMI, too much information; it actually creates high anxiety!
But keeping up with procedures that emergency agencies have discussed in your local area is one way to do something!
Be diligent and stay on target, and learn when to do what you should.
Having a plan usually helps.

Good night to all, be safe, and trust your own instincts with danger in the air.

Spaghetti plots and what's happening...

Colorful is all I can say about this fairly new way of watching what's going on in the tropics...confusing may be the other word I would use.
Tropical Storm Hanna who is taking a backseat to her more deadly bro Hurricane Gustav who is creating those Spaghetti plots that I mentioned. Although, Hanna is slated to become a hurricane by Sunday!
For non followers of our storm season let me explain as best as I can... many different primary colors in a string-like form are being used to try and to map out where the storm will be heading, and this is much different than the, "cone of uncertainty" I mentioned previously.
These spaghetti plots, in my opinion allow more room for error.
They are still saying but not sure that she, Hanna, could be heading towards Florida; anywhere from the east coast to the west coast to the south on to Cuba or out into the Atlantic Ocean missing everyone!
I'll take that choice.
Oh, sorry I thought we had a choice.
Unfortunately, we don't.

WOW! New topic: McCain chose his running mate, and boy was everyone surprised!
Sara Palin, a 44 year old Governor of Alaska for the last two years, is that a state?
Sorry, I do know that it became one in 1959, our 49th, I believe just before Hawaii 5- 0.
Anyway, this woman, Sara Palin is the extreme opposite of what Hillary Clinton stood for... Mrs. Sara Palin is a very conservative, conservative. She is against Rowe V. Wade, and for the NRA, and against Gays having any rights.
And that is why McCain chose her to win over those 18 M Hillary supporters????
The only thing the two have in common is that they are both women.
Personally, I think he made a booboo.

What I have read about her she is extremely ethical, which is a plus in my book.
But her other ideas concern me.
She is also a very happily married mother of five, a good thing.
Her Birthday is February 11, 1964, exactly 12 years older than my youngest son.

She says she has stood up to the good old boys neighborhood, but from what I have read she seems that she stood up by following their ways of doing things, which is not very good.

Now about Barack Obama's speech last night...I fell asleep, but my pitch hitter; my hubby says it was good enough to make him a believer!
And that's good enough for me.

Good night to all, and think for yourself and allow others that same privilege.

I fell asleep last night, and missed Joe Biden's speech!

Darn, and I really did want to hear that.
During the day yesterday the blurbs I saw and heard about his rituals with attending to his senate job for over thirty years were most impressive.
He goes home every night from D.C. to be with his family; I like that.

It all started because of horrible circumstances losing his wife and young daughter in a horrendous car accident where his two young sons were also injured.
He kept true to his promise to his two surviving sons by being home every night for them, and that was 32 years ago.

Luckily for him he met and married his current wife five years after that terrible day, and incredibly was blessed with another daughter.
He still to this day takes that train home to his wife every night.
Those children are all grown today.
He is as regular a Joe as any of us, and this is due to him never forgetting his roots and his family, which makes him totally relatable to most of us.
Oh well, Mr. Obama will be the main speaker tonight, and I am interested in what he has to say! After all he could very well be our next president.

New topic: Tropical Storm Gustav is still on the same path; but even a little further away from us, and definitely heading towards Louisiana, scary! He may very well be a cat 3 by the time he gets there.

Meanwhile, in the Atlantic somewhat, Tropical Storm Hanna, used to be depression 8, has become a reality, and some meteorologist are saying she is the one to watch because that she may be coming right for us!
Only time will tell.

Busy, busy.
Must be on alert, keep on our toes, and all those other clichés for such occasions!

As I have said before this is our hurricane season, and I guess the action speaks for itself.

I will keep you posted, as long as I stay awake, although my back up, my hubby is pretty good at keeping info updated. He has corrected and straightened me out on more than one occasion.
That could be because as of this weekend August 31.2008 we have known one another for forty-one years, would you believe? We have been married for thirty-eight this coming Valentine's Day.

Good night to all, and keep up with whatever is going on in your world or all our encompassing world. Don't stay on the sidelines!
Life is interesting and should be monitored by all!

Opinion, and something to think about...

Update: Gustav is a tropical storm once again with only 50 MPH winds, but is promised to return to the form of a hurricane by tomorrow.
He is still in the Caribbean, and the fear is that he will stay south of Cuba, and then turn into a category 3, possibly a four once in the Gulf of Mexico narrowly missing southwest Florida by skirting us. His forward speed is down to 3MPH giving him the time and all that space to develop into the monster that they are predicting he will become heading towards the mid Gulf States with all inclusive Louisiana in that realm.

Have you been watching the Democratic Convention?
I have.
Michelle Obama speaking that first night, and those two daughters were just so darling, and she was charming and portended to be the strong but demure first lady that Barack will be entitled to once in office.

The next night it was so strange at first listening to Hillary Clinton, she is such a strong speaker it was tough believing she would no longer be in the running for the top job.
But she is definitely the right person to follow with deep respect for her choice of Barack Obama, creating unity.
Her speech was not only clever but intelligent and to the point with all reasoning qualifying our solutions for change of our choice for our political leader.
We thought that our decisions were getting hard with her out of the race, but last night I was fired up all over again by her logic, and she got to the nitty gritty of what really matters to all Americans, and we should all be proud to be called woman when we have people like her; as a speaker for us all. She has restored our hope with a man named Barack. The differences were not as large as first assumed, and she proved that with her exquisite surgical detailing of ideas; technically so correct!

I am not a Democrat or a Republican...I am just an American, and just want to be free, healthy and happy!

Good night to all, and be free, healthy, and happy yourselves.

A few things to discuss...

Good news, so we are told it looks as if this newest Hurricane Gustav is going to head away from us, we will know more by this Friday. It really is a lucky thing for us because many counties are flooded still, and even tonight we were having mandatory evacuations to our south!

But it's a mixed blessing since it is becoming more powerful and will be up to a category 3 or 4 by the time it hits its designation which now looks like anywhere from Louisiana to Texas!
We all hope it will diminish and fizzle. They don't need this either, pray it goes poof, gone.

We did do our civic-minded diligence today and voted at our district precinct, which we were the 16th and 17th voters of the day, and this was little after ten in the morning.
I asked about the usual turnout for our local district, and I was informed that it was usually a little more than 10%; to me this was shocking.
Our precinct is very small quantitatively in registered voters. I was told there are only 886 registered, but we are a minuscule housing neighborhood where we have a lot of snow birds as winter nesters, and not all that many year round residents. This is still shocking that they were expecting only about 90 voters for the day.

It’s true it was not the BIG major November election, but these little primaries have a lot more to do with our local government, and our daily lives are affected by that.
Today we actually had the candidates running for sheriff on the ballot, and that is a major race locally!
Only problem for us being registered non partisan we are NOT allowed to vote for any candidates.
This is ridiculous in my opinion.
Anyway, we were able to vote on two other important issues, and we did do that.
And I checked with my hubby after, and we voted the same way without discussing it before hand; great, at least this time we didn’t cancel each other out. On occasion we have done that! LOL

Good night to all, and hopefully by now you voted locally if you had an election to vote for today. And remember November 4.2008 it's up to us.