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Well you know me, I take my old Boy Scout motto "BE PREPARED" seriously. I think Elaine appreciates that more after this week. Now she knows why I have all the extra stuff in the basement. I should have taken a picture of all the extension cords ran around inside the house and the generator outside.
As you probably know, the remnants of hurricane IKE blew through Ohio with a vengeance. My weather station clocked a wind gust Sunday at 55 miles per hour, then the power failed. This was the biggest weather event to hit the area in years and my weather station was off. There were stronger gusts after that. Ron Spaulding has a weather station at his funeral home that had a 70 mph gust. South of Middletown, someone recorded an 84 mph wind gust. Our wooden fence partially blew down and boards blew off.
So a lot of old trees were knocked down, roofs blown off, utility poles blown over and power was out in 95% of Middletown Sunday afternoon. I got called to work to take care of a pole that fell in the street and for traffic lights on flash. The wind was still blowing strong while we were working. After I got back, I gassed up the portable generator and plugged in some lights and the TV so we could see what was going on. At one point Duke reported 90% of their customers were without power. Unfortunately we were one of them for 3 days. Power was finally restored to our neighborhood today at noon.
When the power went out, Elaine was starting to cook pasta on our
electric stove. We finished it up on the propane stove in the camper
out back. But she decided on a menu change. It was nice to know we could cook out there if we needed to.
We had fun Sunday night grilling out burgers after we discovered that the 5 or 6 places that were open for business were packed. I think the boys really enjoyed having their 'chicken sticks' prepared on the grill outside. That was after Paul and I went on a search to pick up some burgers. We passed White Castle, they were packed and the drive through line was a complete circle around the building. Frickers was packed. LaRosas was packed and people were trying to find parking. Frish's had people standing outside in line to get in and their drive through went all the way around the building, but not a complete circle. The only grocery open Sunday night was Marsh because they were on a generator. Tree and sign damage was everywhere.
Unfortunately we had a lot to do at work. We repaired major damage to our traffic signals and wires; the city police and fire radio systems were without power; we had to set up generators up a several locations. So for 3 days we have been gassing them up every few hours and fixing bad generators.
Power started coming back to some limited areas late Sunday. Paul &
Cindy got power back after dark. They are only 4 blocks away from us.
The good thing was that allowed a couple more gas stations to open. At
one point there were only two in town with power and they were crowded.
The gas lines got really bad on Monday. It looked like a run on gas.
We were sitting in the living room Monday night with two lamps on and watching TV off the antenna (the cable was out so Elaine couldn't watch the food network). I said to Elaine that this was pretty much like camping, but the furniture was more comfortable. Thats pretty much how it was, getting up early in the morning and taking a shower by lantern light. Trying to figure out what clothes matched by flashlight. Watching the morning news about the damage on the little battery powered black and white TV. Gassing up the generator. Camping, home style.
Mom and Dad had it much better. They went and got the motorhome and parked it in the driveway. They had their generator running stuff in the house. They had lights and satellite TV in the motorhome.
Here are some pictures of the damage.
This guy will be able to work underneath the truck easily.
This guy has a hand made for sale sign on the window his car.
This tree was perched on a little bit of what was left of the trunk.
We even had trees down at work.
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If you didn't already know, we have been experiencing a BLIZZARD here for the last 24 hours or so. We have drifts in our driveway in about 14 to 16 inches. About lunch time I went out and measured around the front yard and we probably have about 10 inches on average. For this area that is a lot. We probably have had another inch since then. With the wind blowing hard it doesn't do much good to go out and shovel. I won't shovel out until tomorrow.
Since we knew ahead that we wouldn't be going out, we planned to work on the master bath remodel. I'll post an update on that later.
Here are some good pictures.
Here is the back patio table with snow stacked on top.
The Expedition with snow piled on it from blowing off the roof. And snow covering the front porch.
This is the front of the house. I took this when I went out to find the paper.
Time to throw another log on the fire.
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You can't get in the room at the top, but you can get just below it. I decided to give it a climb. Elaine didn't want me to. Anyway it was a fun climb. 
