All Eyes on Gustav!!

Hello all! Well, if you haven't been hiding under a rock for the past few days, you probably know that there is a hurricane threatening to slam into the gulf coast. Especially interesting is that tomorrow is the 3rd anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, so that just adds more emotion to it. Here is the current picture of the projected path of Hurricane Gustav and where it is expected to make landfall (current as of 2:20 pm central time on August 28th, 2008!).

See that little end dot right on the Louisiana coast? Yeah, that dot pretty much signifies our house! How nice to make it onto the map, huh?

Evacuation plans are being made, and since we are pretty darn close to the gulf, we'll be among some of the first waves of evacuations. Those right on the gulf would be first, of course, but we'd be soon thereafter. We are north of the Intracoastal Waterway, so that's good news as far a flooding probabilities go!

As for preparations, we are pretty set. We aren't planning on staying, but we still have to prepare the house. It's interesting to be taking part in this because it's not like a tornado where you have but a few minutes to grab some things and get to shelter. We know where the storm is, we know how fast it is coming, and we know when it will hit. So there is that degree of uneasiness, but not all out panic because it's not going to come out of nowhere!

So, on a funny note, yesterday I gave Tom some instructions to pick up a few extra gas cans at Lowes so that we could bring extra gas with us during the evacuation. I went out with some friends to see a movie, and when I got home later that night, I saw no gas cans, but I did see a fog machine. So, I asked what exactly we needed a fog machine for!?! (I'm pretty sure I've never seen "fog machine" on a list of emergency essentials!) He said it looked like fun. Yes, perhaps if we weren't preparing for a potential disaster I could see the fun in a fog machine. Actually, thinking about it, I still don't see much fun in a fog machine... I picture Tom standing in line at Lowes with everyone around him loaded up with batteries, plywood, bottled water...and he's in line purchasing a fog machine which will be pretty useless once the power goes out, mind you! I just don't understand my husband and his impulse buys sometime!

All that aside, never fear, we are prepared and I will update everyone on the situation when I get a chance!

Tropical Storm Edouard

We moved to the gulf coast about nine months after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit this area. As expected, there was always that fear in the back of our minds that something that devestating could happen again. But the longer we lived here and learned more, the less nervous I became. According to our FEMA printouts, this house has never flooded, and until recently was listed as a floodplain level C, which meant that it was least likely to flood. (Since we purchased our house, everything has been raised to a level A, making flood insurance extremely expensive, but, fortunately, we got grandfathered in.)


All this aside, we have always been very good about keeping emergency essentials up to date and having our 72-hour kits at the ready. We haven't ever desperately needed them, except for a few times when the power went out for a few hours. The boys were disappointed without the Wii, but we got some good s'mores out of it, so not a total loss! In the two and a half years we have been here, not one tropical storm has come our way.


Well, Tropical Storm Edouard is brewing off the coast of Louisiana as we speak! The natives tell me that tropical storms, though lacking the wind speed of a hurricane, actually drop much more precipitation. Also, it's not really headed directly at us. (The projected path actually shows it headed right for Los Shephitos of Houston, but we are currently in a tropical storm warning as well.) So, as Edouard brews over the warm waters of the Gulf, keep an eye on the weather map and think of us down here in the swamps of Louisiana!

School Shopping!

So, William officially starts Kindergarten in a few days! Hooray! He's so excited and can't wait to be in school all day Monday through Friday. (I think Natalie feels the same way about him!)

This being the weekend before school starts, the fine state of Louisiana's powers that be have proclaimed it "tax free weekend" (insert applause). Of course, that's only the 4.5% state tax that we're not paying. We still have to fork over the 4.5% parish tax, but I'm not sure everyone gets that besides me. Either way, eveyone-myself included-waits until this weekend to purchase school supplies. Keep in mind that it is also mandated in this very fine state that all public school children will be outfitted in school uniforms. Fortunately I had already purchased William's school uniforms when we were visiting Kirk and Jackie in Houston in the beginning of the month, so we're not looking at any major purchases. Just a short list of kindergarten supplies, right?

Yeah, not quite as easy as it sounds. And it wasn't the 50 trillion people all trying to get into the same two school supply aisles as me that was annoying. It was the incredibly specific school list from William's school that really got to me! Good luck finding a two-pocket plastic folder with no prongs or pictures on the outside of it. I had no problem finding two-pocket plastic folders, but they all had prongs in them. Then I found some of the prongless variety, but they were not plastic, although I'm not entirely sure what material they were. Tom got so frustrated looking through stacks of folders he finally said he'd just remove the d@*n prongs himself! But then, we finally found one, that's right just one, in a stack of prong-filled plastic folders there was one lonely two pocket plastic folder sans prongs. Never mind the fact that it is the color orange that will eventually burn your retinas if you stare at it too long. It is plastic. It has two pockets. It has no prongs. It is perfect.

(Let's not get into the non-plastic HEAVY DUTY zipper flat rectangular pencil bags we had to find next.)