I have never been so happy to turn on a light...turn on a faucet...FLUSH.
Last night we had power for 5 glorious minutes. The older girls were in bed but not asleep and came running downstairs to celebrate. They blew all the candles out and then suddenly, the power went out again. It was like that scene from "Christmas Vacation," where the next door neighbors kept being alternately blinded by the light and then being plunged into darkness. Remember them?
{"Why is the carpet all wet, Todd?"
"I don't know, Margot."}
In the dark, the girls started yelling, "I can't see! Where are you?" They were bumping into each other and stumbling around. It was sooo funny!
And the power never came back on.
So we went to bed.
Jeff had a 6AM flight today so he had to get up at 3Am. Despite building himself a lovely outdoor shower yesterday, he wasn't about to go outside to use it at 3AM. The poor guy had to get on the plane wearing a ball cap. Thankfully when he arrived at his hotel, they let him check in early and get a nice hot shower. He sent me a text with a photo of the hotel hair dryer and said, "Don't hate me."
Ha.
I left for Walmart to see if I could score a hair dryer that would plug into our car charger. Alas, they did not have one.
Dejected, I headed home.
Upon arriving home, to my great shock and delight, I walked in and saw a LIGHT on!!! :)) We were all a bit afraid that our power wouldn't last so I told everyone to go use the bathroom and FLUSH before the power went out again.
Thankfully, we still have power and it seems that our little ordeal is over.
And just when I was getting used to being like Caroline Ingalls...
So...to recap the tropical storm in photos....
The rain...
the wind...
Wind and rain for hours... We lost one large oak tree and held our breath and prayed for the others. Thankfully, we didn't lose any more.
After the rain had passed and the majority of the winds had died down, Taylor decided to play with our patio umbrella.
Yeah.
Glad we brought that in out of the wind and rain to keep it from getting ruined.
{Don't think we would have let him do this to a nice umbrella. This one is in its last season because it already went sailing over the deck and crashed 10 feet to the ground below in a previous wind storm.}
Irene - 1 Taylor - 0
Let's try skateboarding and see if the wind will take me uphill.
Or over a curb.
Let's try this again.
Oh yeah....it works! What a nut!
Some of the damage in our area as we drove around.
The oak trees with deep root systems were snapped off. The maple trees were generally pulled over with roots showing. I didn't get any photos of those, though.
There were miles of this type of mess on the roads from leaves, trees that had been cut and removed, etc. Our car is covered with it and it's all hardened and gross.
I guess that is what we get for being early gawkers.
Tree down on a side road.
This road has been closed since Sunday. It's still closed--and it's our main connection to the nearest Walmart. Crews have been working there for the past two days.
Since we knew the kids would be opening the fridge by accident, Jeff barred the door. In the end it didn't matter...pretty much everything had to be thrown away anyway.
We tried to use coolers and ice for some of our stuff but all of the stores ran out of ice so it was hard to come by. Some gas stations were also running out of gas since so many stations had no power.
Here is our glamorous outdoor spa that Jeff built.
Don't be jealous.
It worked.
It was a bit cold, though.
After he got it set up, we used it as a one-size-fits-all potty and shower.
Someone should patent it.
Jake models the interior.
The bucket with kitty litter was today's potty because I just couldn't face the kitty litter {indoors} for one more day. It was seriously making me gag. Thankfully, the bucket was only necessary for a few hours this morning.
Nice, huh?
Nice, huh?
I can see why this type of set-up is generally frowned upon under normal circumstances.
Can I just say.....
EWWWWWWWWW..... it was SO GROSS!
It's pretty humbling to think that many in this world live in worse conditions than this on a daily basis. I feel a bit guilty about being so happy to go back to my cushy life.
Or maybe grateful would be a better choice.
