Update on Hurricane Ike

All day long the TV has been on two things....the Weather Channel for me and Handy Manny for Zach. We are keeping an eye on Hurricane Ike as it slams into our coast. They showed a picture of Ike from space, and it engulfs the entire Gulf. I keep hearing "life-threatening" and "catastrophic". Galveston Island is protected only by a 15' - 17' seawall that is 100+ years old. There is already flooding there and the storm hasn't even made landfall yet. Scary!

I have lived in Texas my entire life, with the exception of the two years we spent in New Mexico after Steve and I got married. This is the first time that I can remember being under a tropical storm wind warning (from the NOAA...TROPICAL STORM WIND WARNING IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM SATURDAY TO 1 AM CDT SUNDAY). We hardly got any rain when Hurricane Rita hit in 2005, but Ike is a far different animal. So we are continuing our preparations; putting gas in the cars, buying non-perishables, batteries and flashlights, and bottled water. We generally lose power here (even though our power lines are all underground) even during a typical Texas thunderstorm, so I have a feeling we will be without power for several hours on Saturday.

I am quite sad about this turn of events because we had a big Saturday planned. Steve finally has a weekend off, and instead of having our big family day, we will be hunkered down at Cub Central instead. Tomorrow is the Dallas Stars Ice Breaker at the Galleria and then we were going to take the cubs to Going Bonkers, an indoor playground with an area specifically for toddlers. This would have been great fun since Zach and Emily are in their climbing and exploring phase. ***SIGH*** Stupid hurricane.