Sometimes I wish we would go back to the way the Royal Navy dealt with Pirates in the old days.
We have an apartment, and will try to get moved in in the next few days. Heard that Seabrook Sailing Club was washed away which is sad. Not sure what they will do....
We scraped muck out of the house again today, found we have running water, which will make cleaning much easier tomorrow.
We talked to the Allstate people some of them at least, there's three, count em, three, different policies. The first says there's no claim. Hope that isn't the word from the other two.
We dropped by the shed where Surprise is stored, I found her intact and undamaged. Here's the photos.
http://good-times.webshots.com/album/567103735avukmN
We went back to the house and continued to work on stuff. Here's the photos:
http://community.webshots.com/album/567127274AyQLqS
The kitchen and the down stair bathroom are cleared, Day Sailer #3000 is back on her trailer, and got the electronics in the living room out on the lawn for inspection by the insurance people when they show up.
The sunfish were extracated form ther fallen limbs surrounding them and place in a part of the yard away from the work. We sawed up the fallen limbs and continued to clean the place up.
We moved the sunfish to the bakc, and emptied the refrigerator
During one of the breaks I went up to the Red Cross disaster relief truck on the corner of 9th St and FM 517, just to ask where the nearest FEMA Point of distribution was to get a bag of ice. They handed gave us a bag right there, and said they were going to start serving hot meals. I had had one of these meals yesterday, it was really good to have some hot beef stew after several hours of raking fulthy muck out ofthe house and trying to identify things that might hold some small value.
I plan to donate some money to the American Red Cross after this is all over, and if you feel like doing something good, I recommend sending a donation to them.
They are good folks doing tough work for people who are so taken up with restoring their part of the world or even just trying to survive that they may seem ungrateful, but are not.
More tomorrow!
The local CBS news media were in our area, we had them take some views from our balcony of the area. They didn't interview us on camera, just asked us a couple of questions in passing. We were hoping they'd use the footage, but they didn't. They asked us if we had insurance, and I replied "Of course, we're responsible people."
That night they had the predicable story highlighting people who can't speak decent English grammar. There was also a story about some dumb woman who lives in San Leon, crying about not having insurance( even though it's subject to floods and storms), and only recovering her late grandmother's Bible. Of course they had her cry... It was despicable. My wife on the other hand, had said to the media "San Leon will come back!" They weren't interested in that.
Kathy and I got to our property for the first time today after the storm. I've uploaded photos here:
http://community.webshots.com/album/567051644YfLAaP
We spent a lot of time just creating paths into the house. Lots of garbage in the garage, and sadly we have lost one of the Day Sailers we had been working on for a while. Hull #1795, was in the garage and upside down on sawhorses. There's no sign of her; all I can determine is that she floated off during the storm. I regret losing her, but on the other hand we still have our primary boat, Surprise, in a shed away from the house, which I have yet to check on, but I'm confident she's ok.
Another boat, hull #3000, is safe; she was picked off her trailer and is currently resting in the driveway. Her mast was damaged slightly, the spreaders will need to be replaced, and otherwise she's ok. Our third hull is sitting on the grass, that hull was going to be more for parts. Our two sunfish are still there, but we may have lost the rudders and centerboards. The pier lost some planks and will need repair, but we'll deal with that when we can.
As for the house, everything on the bottom floor is garbage now, but everything on the second floor is just fine. It's the oddest thing, like two different houses.
Manuel - Be advised the Day Sailer Southwestern regional trophy is safe and unharmed!
We put a lot of our property on the second floor prior to the storm and when we rebuild we plan to put everything on the second floor, but that's step 20 and we're on step 2 or so....
We've files with our insurance company, and with FEMA, just in case. We're staying with friends nearby, for which we are grateful!
The neighborhood is like a war zone. A house from the next block is on the road; our neighbor’s house burned during the storm and is gone.
It was a muddy, dirty day of work and we will have more to come, but we don't feel bad. We’re better off than many, and we take it a day at a time.
Nil Desperandum,
Bob and Kathy
Of course I have no idea how things are at my place specifically, but based on the data from the Eagle point weather station - less than a mile from my house, I think the lower floor of the house is flooded. Kathy put a lot of the things we valued most in the bottom floor up on the second level, before she got out. I never returned home, since it would have been insane to go all the way from Intercontinental airport south to San Leon, and then back north and west to Kerrville with the rest of the evac traffic.
Hopefully the roof stayed on well enough, although I expect we lost shingles. Things are covered in plastic there.
A latin tag came to me this morning - Nil Desperandum. Never despair.
We evacuated yesterday afternoon. Kathy got back home early enough to get to the house and boarded up things, grabbed a few essentials, and got the cats. I got back to Houston about 4:30pm, and met up with Kathy on I-10 west of Houston. It took us until 1am to get to Kerrvile where we will wait out the storm.
I expect we will lose a lot of stuff, given the storm surge, but we will see what we will see...
I went to downtown Sunnyvale and had dinner at an italian placve called Gumbas... had a Calzone after much trouble deciding great calzone.
Saw an episode of Mythbusters on tV afterwards, the building ot the right of M5 is being built up as I saw, but they do make the area look cleaner....
Hurricane IKE is coming to Houston, just in time for me to return. I'm currently sitting here in the San Jose airport, and when I get back to Houston this afternoon, we will be under a mandatory evacuation order. I hope I can get home, but not sure if I need ot go there for anything.... I may just head up to Kerrville. Moistly I hope I can get fuel for my truck.
I stayed in Sunnyvale, after training today. For dinner I went to a P.F. Changs, the first time I've been to one. I know they have one in Houston, but never got there. It was pretty good food, but a little pricy. The place was crowded, and I sat at the bar.
Afterwards, I went to a borders bookstore bought a couple of books.
I'm on a business trip to Sunnyvale today. I'm taking training on Tropos networks. if you're interested in what that is, google it. The training is good, and the subject interesting to me. I hope to use the skills I'm gaining soon.
I drove up to San Francisco after class today, with no idea where I would eat. I also wanted to see where M5 industries is located - that's where they film the TV show mythbusters.
I drove by it but didn't get too close, not wanting to be considered a stalker or something. The thing I found most odd is that the area there is FILTHY. Trash is lieing all over the place, there's scaps of garbage everywhere. It doesn't look that way on TV. It's very strange. to see it in the "real world". The street in front of M% is very narrow, and taxis come from a lot at the end of the street constantly. I wonder that they havn't been seen more in the show.
I found this excellent little bistro called Aperto on 18th St in SF. I ordered a risoto dish with fennel sausage, peppers and an interesting hard cheese.
I also ordered a Caeser salad where the croutons were slices, not cubes. really good.
My over all impression of SF is it's dirty compared to the last time I was here... 10 years? There's more trash on the streets. Sunnyvale is likewise dirtier than the last time I was here for a shuttle simulation exercise. The city looks a lot dirtier than it does on TV. SF looks a lot more dirty than on TV.... The streets here reminded me of the Monk TV show scenes, but dirty, grimy, etc. There's lots of papers on street poles, mostly political signs. There were surprisingly few Obama signs. They were mostly for local propositions.
I dropped by a little market before driving back, Located near 18th st and mississipi. It looked like a convenience store in San Leon, that is, a scary place. The area was pretty much a slum, except that there were a lot of nice bistros.
When I drove back to Sunnyvale, I heard the SF city council proceedings on the radio. They counded civil, which is good, but you would never get the impression that any government business is conducted civilly form watching the news. They were a little annoyed that one person didn't provide some budget data.
Some discussion on a Navy enviro impact some dort of remeidation... I think its for an old hanger in the area, possibly of historic value.