Compared to the devastation caused by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria, we came through Irma practically unscathed, except for food spoilage.
Dear friends from South Florida, plus a neighbor and her lovable, humongous dog, took refuge with me.
The worse we suffered was stress when the wind caused a neighbor’s large pine tree was blown into the power lines across my long driveway and we lost electricity—something we only learned what caused it once Irma had passed—and my generator that would have given us lights, fans, refrigeration and allowed us to pump water wouldn’t start. We had battery lanterns, plenty non-perishable food, drinking water and water we had drawn just in case, before Irma hit.
While we could drive under the tree, if we needed a fire truck or ambulance, it wasn’t going to get in and if the tree came all the way down, we weren’t going to get out. Despite leaving messages on the power company’s automated outage reporting phone system about our situation and finally reaching a live person at customer service, we were told to be patient.
Then we lost landline phone service twice, the second time for four days. While it was out the first time, the power company restored service to all but five of us affected by the tree still hanging in the wires. Ready for this, they left a voice mail saying our power was back on. No, it wasn’t.
Finally, the power is back on and the landline is working, so I have Internet service again. Now it’s a matter of cleaning up a mess of branches and twigs all over the yard, and coping with Trump’s madness: threatening to obliterate North Korea, tearing up the Iran nuclear deal, threatening Venezuela, calling NFL players who exercise their First Amendment right by refusing to stand for the national anthem “SOBs,” while doing little to help the people in Houston, Florida, Puerto Rico and the islands, many of whom have lost everything. How much longer are we going to be forced to put up with Trump and his equally soulless cadre of billionaires and millionaires who are tearing the government down with the aim of further filling their pockets?
Bev Conover is the editor and publisher of Intrepid Report. Email her at editor@intrepidreport.com.
Bev. I am so glad Intrepid Report is back! Glad also that you and your friends made it through all the stress–listening to that wind blowing is maddening and on top of that listening to a tree fall which also takes with it the power … then losing power and feeling like O God if only they would hurry up…. Glad your neighbor’s dog also made it through the howling wind and then the interminable days of no power, no A/C.
Donald Trump is a very irksome, irritating …. true SOB! O:-) And still there are people who defend him and praise him. I don’t get it.
The tree didn’t actually fall. The wind or something twisted it around about 24 inches above the neighbor’s 5-foot fence and it just bent over and hung in the wires on the other side of my driveway. We could actually drive under it but what worried us is if it came alll the way down, we couldn’t get out.
I am pasting here this that I just posted to FB.
Thank you, Bev.
Wooosh!
Fallen Tree. On the fence oor on the ground is intimidating. At least you could drive under it (ever so carefully) to hopefully get to a place serving hot coffee, or tea, or a hot meal … We had a tree limb hit the front wall of the house on a previous hurricane and it sounded horribly.
(P.S. Amidst all of the terrible pictures and videos posted on the internet about the damage done by Harvey, Irma and Maria … one of the saddest pictures for me is one of a whole bunch of pink flamingoes. All deplumed and dead lying lifeless against each other, tree limbs and whatever else was there. So innocent, and so powerless to do anything about their own lives. Then my thoughts go to just how much human casualties of war would look like those pink flamingoes, and most especially if this nut SOB in the White House decides to use his nuclear codes and the Generals and other Trump Worshippers in the White House do nothing to stop him from doing so. …