rita p.s.

Random hurricane thoughts

• What's left on the grocery shelves when almost all the non-perishable food is gone? Bush's Chili, for one. I don't know what it tastes like but that's a powerful consumer vote of no-confidence if the hurricane-panicked won't even buy it.
  
  
• Picked up yard items to reduce the number of projectiles. I reluctantly brought in our plaster "gnome with a gun" (perhaps you can't imagine what he looks like; here's an example of a similar, if less beguiling, armed gnome). If we end up sustaining a lot of damage from this storm, I kind of wish he could go out in a blaze of glory: sailing through the air, stubby rifle clutched in his gnome hands, a twinkle in his faded, painted-on eyes just before he hits the side of the new Compass Bank building.
  
  
• Deciding what to take and what to leave is really not that hard. Especially when you have this much warning. What is harder is dealing with the possibility that you might have a hoarding (make the air quotes) "problem." However, now is not the time to begin sorting through all your shit. Really.
  
  
• In spite of the fact that this is a very dangerous storm and that we're doing everything we can to protect ourselves, you can not deny the undercurrent of excitement. Our lives, however happy, are not very edgy. So, yes, we're a little fearful of the next 36 hours but you can't ignore the adrenaline rush...okay, it's more like an adrenaline spritz.
  
  
• If you had t-minus 12 hours to a hurricane, what might you be doing? Hmm? Our neighbor is vacuuming his porch. First of all, vacuum and porch should never be used in the same sentence unless you're talking about being sucked up into a tornado while sipping iced tea on the veranda. (And wouldn't that be ironic, an appliance that sucks being consumed by Nature's biggest vacuum cleaner.) Then, there's the curiosity of getting it all clean so that the debris will have someplace tidy to land. Maybe it's nervous energy that drives him.