Hurricane's here

I'm officially off today... Government in DC shutdown... What a bunch of ... I did go in this morning for a few hours to check windows locked (or a least closed!) and do my weekly network backup. Nice to be able to move around without a million folks doing their worst to make the drive and day miserable. Stopped in to Home Depot to get some bar lube for my chainsaw...happened to pass the battery display...looks like a direct hit with a small nuclear bomb...lots of residue (cardboard boxes and wrappers... thought I was a light blood trail too [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] )... every battery of ANY description is gone!

The winds are kicking up a bit... looks like about a 200 yard limit on shooting and that would take about 5 minutes of wind easily... big storm should be here in a few more hours.

Being about 60 miles south, we took a direct hit. I am one of 1.7 million without power at home. Dominion power only has 2.2 million customers and over 80% are without power. Their biggest hit before this was 800,000 loss and took 5 days to restore power. Had to cut my way out of the cul de sac with tree over the road. Took three of us about 3 hours to clear it. Neighbor has one through his house and other than that we got off lucky it looks like. Only two traffic lights working in Fredericksburg area, but luckily everyone is acting nice and stopping and politely moving intersections. Quantico Marine base took smaller hit and lot of residents without power. Of course the commisary and PX are without power also. Crews working to get them and gas station on line as quick as possible. Hopefully it will not be a week before power comes on in F'burg area.

Lots of flooding here on the Eastern shore. Hoopers Island reported 6ft waves ON LAND!!! several gusts were recorded at over 100mph,...crab factory was destroyed. Roads to H.I. are closed off,...under about 2 ft of water.

Here in Salisbury, we got the wind and rain pretty hard. I had to cut several trees off the fence and out of the yard,..but they all missed the house.

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You try to get closer to the target,..and I keep trying to get further away.

I spent the better part of the day cutting trees off local roads and from yards of local friends. Only a small tree down at my place (never liked that particular one anyway).

I'm lucky enough to live in a small development in Montgomery County that rarely if ever looses power...only a few flickers but it's been lights on here for the duration... Never should have said that!!

I was down at Hoopers Island on Saturday (well almost to Hoopers Island). Had to drive through a foot or so of water crossing the Great Marsh Bridge. Our hunting trailer was 3 inch from floating away. The water was up to the front door. JustC since you know the area, I hunt Golden Hill Farms on the corner of Meekins Neck Rd and 336 (Between Gootee's Marine and Hoopers Island). Took the boat and 4 wheeler back down for duck season. I live in Michigan now but my father and brothers still hunt dowm there. I am going to make it back for early muzzleloader season and opening weekend of rifle season (Sat and Sun).

Matt,...I know it well. I grew up in Dorchester county. My father-in-law owns an RSA down on taylors island, just across from the marina and just before the bridge onto the island.

Hoopers island is hit hard,...lots of damage. The gov, flew in sunday afternoon to look around. A few houses are overboard,..lots of businesses are destroyed and there might be a handful of piers left on the entire bayshore.

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You try to get closer to the target,..and I keep trying to get further away.

Well it looks like the Hurricane coming into the country from the other side got down graded to a tropical storm not long after we started seeing it yesterday. We got cloud cover about 8 am yesterday, and today it started to rain. Not much, this is the Sonoran desert after all. But a nice gentle rain, and the winds have died down.

It would be nice to get an inch or so of rain out of this, we only got 4" here for our summer Monsoons and the ground is in dire need of more water.

I'm hoping that no one looses power in this area. Especially since I'm on call this week for the electric company, and I'd rather sit here, than go work in the rain!

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If I can kill that coyote from here, Will you walk out to get him?