The post before the storm…

Here I am… rock you like a hurricane…

I don’t know why that song just popped into my head. Then again, I’ve always liked the Scorpions’ music.

Anyway, as it stands, I think I’m not in too bad of a position. I was in Villahermosa, Mexico earlier this week in order to do a site survey; I had originally scheduled myself to come back this morning, but after getting word of how nasty the storm was going to be, I decided to come home a day early. I got home yesterday morning, but ended up having to rush straight to work to pick up some tapes to take to the datacenter. After making sure all computer equipment would be safe, I went to the datacenter and replaced tapes so we didn’t need to go back anytime soon for that reason. From there… I went home. Bleh. The evacuations had already started, so what would normally have been a 45 minute drive instead became a three and a half hour drive.

I didn’t even bother going into work today; there really would have been no point. The roads are so backed up it’s unbelievable. Louie had called me last night to tell me he was going to Oklahoma City, but that he was leaving this morning at 4-5 AM because traffic would hopefully have eased off. I’m betting he’s back at his apartment now. One of our neighbors had planned to go up to Oklahoma City for her father’s birthday, but she came back after giving up on the traffic. It’s insane; people are getting heatstroke out there for lack of water, and cars are running out of gas idling in the highways.

As for us? We’re boarding up and hunkering down. I spent today helping Mom and Dad prepare the house for the oncoming storm, and also taking care of a couple of work related issues. We survived Alicia and Allison in this house; we’ll see what happens as far as Rita goes. I’m not entirely worried, mainly because there’s no point. We’ll take it as it comes and what happens, happens. I’m also set as far as communications go; granted, my main site and personal email accounts will be knocked out when (not really if) the power goes out. On the other hand, I’ll have my Blackberry with me and it’s fully charged, so even if heavy load on the voice lines prevents calls from getting through, I’ll still have access to my work email. Furthermore, in case of emergency, I unlocked my old Nokia 3650 phone from its T-Mobile-only restriction and its battery is charged to full; if we need an extra cell phone with a charged battery, that one is available to us.

So… when the storm comes through, we’ll see what happens. We’re boarded up, we’re going to make final preparations tomorrow, and we’ll ride it out. In the event that the DSL service gets knocked out, I’ll try and send an email to Missy and Malia letting them know how I am, and they might post something in their journals.

… damn, and I just looked at the TV. Traffic is STILL a nightmare on I-45 North at the Woodlands.

Anyway, catch you all after this blows over.