Weird Wind

This blog is written in part for myself. OK, mainly for myself.

I put articles that I love up here on the "cloud" so I can access them from any computer, whether it be in my office (30 feet away down in the barn-room), or my laptop, 20 feet away in the dining room), or in Canada when we are there. Genny can access my thoughts from Manila. Becca from Terrace Park.

As if anyone wanted to do that! But some do! Averaging 2:30 minutes per visit, except when I don't post due to an emergency such as no electricity.
Then the visits fall to a few seconds.

Following a mini-reunion at Hills & Dales Park in Dayton, and the Ohio State-USC game that night over the tube, from 1:30 pm Sunday until 9:14 pm last night (Tuesday) the electricity in our neighborhood of Cincinnati was out. Over 1,000,000 people in the Cincinnati area were without power.

It was caused by winds from "Ike" whirling for four hours and gusting to 74 mph on Sunday, all without any rain, on a hot day.

Over a very wide area of Ohio many trees were knocked over and power lines affected. This after the great drought last summer, making the root-system of the trees fragile.

What did I learn? Get the kids off the soccer field before they are blown over.

Get D batteries to run my portable radio. I had them in the radio but had cadged them for something else over time.

Having flashlights can be good.

Some people cook with gas which can be good when the electricity goes out.

Glendale has a very good Mayor Hubbard and City Manager Wally Cordes.

The US Bank on Springfield Pike operates without electricity if you know your account number and want $300.

Dry ice can be purchased nearby on bypass 50.

You can take a warm shower even when you don't have electricity.

You can sleep 12 hours at night without listening to BBC.

You can beg and wheedle all night and not get it, even when there's nothing else to do.

My wife can read in bed with incredibly little light.

My neighbor, the gadget-man, has a generator and he and his wife have nice block parties. Actually both side neighbors have a generator, the northern neighbor being the Cincinnati Bell tomb-like switching office.

My laptop computer does not take a charge, so requires a new battery.

Many Krogers's do not have back-up power.

Korean restaurants two shops down from Krogers lose about $400 per day of outage. Such restaurants are "safer" than the one in Hamilton, but the traffic to this mall isn't as much as hoped, even though bypass 50 dead-ends into this shopping center (and the beautiful Hamilton County walking path behind it).

The night sky on a clear night in a city without lights is beautiful.

One can spend three hours picking up debree.

WLW is stupid to continue broadcasting the Sunday Reds-Diamondbacks game while the City is in crisis and needs information. They have admitted as such.

The Bengals can lose a home game in a four-hour wind too. Are the players worrying about their families while the weird wind blows through Paul Brown Stadium? I would have.

Walgreen's is out of D batteries (first day) but Lowes has gobs of them (second day).

People who visit my blog during days when I don't write anything only stay a few seconds. Did I already say that?

When the power came back on it was as if the world started afresh, and I thought for an instant Mom was alive again and I was in high school and each minute would be like the last and would imply a better future.