Hurricane Happenings!

Hurricane Happenings!

I started nursing school exactly four weeks ago and I should be studying every second, but I felt compelled to write something about living with the constant threat of being blown to smithereens by that awesome force of nature… the hurricane. It seems the world’s weather patterns have shifted somewhat and the ocean is a couple of degrees warmer than it was a decade ago and now every little storm that forms in the middle latitudes of the Atlantic between the months of June and December will turn into a Category 5 hurricane and head straight for my house! Which would be fine- I’ve never really liked the place and it would be fun to have to replace it knowing what I know now.

The real fun comes in trying to acquire hurricane supplies. Now, I’ve lived in Florida for quite some time. I’ve had many near misses from hurricanes, never a direct hit. But I always take hurricane preparations seriously. I keep cans of tuna, baked beans and Vienna sausages in the pantry at all times, rotating stock each year so nothing gets too old. We have containers to fill with water so we don’t have to try to find it at the store or stand in line for five hours behind a semi to get some. I attempt to keep batteries, but now that I have teenagers in the house they disappear into one or the other’s boom box so I have to be careful about re-stocking those, but I feel, in general, that I am prepared enough so there will be no need to panic if the big one comes. Still, when a big storm threatens, I will usually venture out to the Publix to “top off” the hurricane supplies. I get some granola bars, goldfish crackers and boxed milk. We don’t usually have sodas in the house, but I usually get a 12 pack of something with caffeine so I don’t take somebody’s head off the first morning we don’t have power and I can’t have my coffee. And I will refresh my supply of Chunky Soup and Spaghettio’s because you can eat those right out of the can or heat them up on the camp stove if you HAVE to have hot food. If the big one doesn’t come, we will eat those things anyway. People who have never been through a hurricane might think I am overly cautious. One look at the devastation caused in the last month in this state should silence them, I should think.

I am astounded at the cluelessness of some folks, though. The fresh milk goes FLYING off the shelves. After Frances, we couldn’t get milk for a week! What do people do with all that milk when the power goes out? Same with bread. If you need bread, better get to the store a week before the storm hits, because there won’t be any left after that. Then there’s gas. They had to put police officers at the gas stations because there were fist- fights breaking out at the pumps!

The highlight of this year’s hurricane season for me was the night I was at my local Publix, refreshing my supplies. Frances was due to hit the next day, and my favorite weather guy (Tom Terry on channel 9) was predicting a full on assault. We would have 24 hours of really bad stuff and the power grid had already been damaged by a previous storm so we were looking at a possible two weeks without power. Since it was looking so bad for us, I was picking up some extra tuna, soup, batteries and snacks for the kids. A lady and her teenage daughter got into the checkout line behind me with one of those small carry baskets. It contained two cartons of yogurt, an apple, and some hummus, from which I surmised they were probably vegetarians. The woman spied my groceries on the belt and it seemed to jog something loose in her brain. She turned to her daughter and said, “Wait here, I better go get some hurricane supplies.” She returned a few minutes later with a plastic bag containing 4 hard-boiled eggs and two cans of sardines.