Behold the wrath (and inconvience) of Charley
Yes, my house is still standing. We had so many trees blocking the front that Richard and I had to hack our way, Crocodile Dundee style, to get out of our house, but I got plenty of pictures to give to the insurance company. From where Richard and I watched from our bedroom window, other than a tree branch laying on the grass, thought that nothing major happened. However, after looking out the front, there were tree limbs upon tree limbs, and half of our backyard fence was down.
We spend most of Friday and Saturday picking up debris and finding out what the hell happened to our mailbox. Our mailbox that survived rainstorms, hard slams of its doors, and one drunken guy banging into it finally gave up the ghost when faced with Charley.
Charley was more devastating to other people than to us. While Richard and I made futile attempts to fill up our gas tanks, and find ice, we gasped at trees that had fallen onto people's house, and I spotted one woman angrily kicking down what remained of her destroyed pool enclosure. According to Richard, fixing it, if she did have the insurance, would be over $5000.
Yikes.
Richard and I took some time during our "blackout" to ponder why Charley took a hard right into Central Florida. My opinion. Charley heard us Central Florida folk laughing about the fact that he wasn't going to hit us. Charley did not cause anywhere near the loss of life as some of his older brothers and sisters (Andrew comes to mind when I think of a large amount of deaths) but he made his point with the "blackout" and in some areas, lack of running water. My friend Holly stayed over on Sunday night because she still had no power. We did, but we were still busy cleaning outside and rebuilding the fence to take time and enjoy it. After all of this, I really have learned to appreciate my power. As much bitching people have made regarding the electric company, I give them props. They have been busting their butts out there, and I have seen them do so.
Yesterday, we got a new mailbox, and Chase, who had been cooped up in the house for the past 5 days, was able to run in the backyard again. We lost all of our cold food, but that's no surprise. The family is fine, and that's what I'm truly concerned about.
We spend most of Friday and Saturday picking up debris and finding out what the hell happened to our mailbox. Our mailbox that survived rainstorms, hard slams of its doors, and one drunken guy banging into it finally gave up the ghost when faced with Charley.
Charley was more devastating to other people than to us. While Richard and I made futile attempts to fill up our gas tanks, and find ice, we gasped at trees that had fallen onto people's house, and I spotted one woman angrily kicking down what remained of her destroyed pool enclosure. According to Richard, fixing it, if she did have the insurance, would be over $5000.
Yikes.
Richard and I took some time during our "blackout" to ponder why Charley took a hard right into Central Florida. My opinion. Charley heard us Central Florida folk laughing about the fact that he wasn't going to hit us. Charley did not cause anywhere near the loss of life as some of his older brothers and sisters (Andrew comes to mind when I think of a large amount of deaths) but he made his point with the "blackout" and in some areas, lack of running water. My friend Holly stayed over on Sunday night because she still had no power. We did, but we were still busy cleaning outside and rebuilding the fence to take time and enjoy it. After all of this, I really have learned to appreciate my power. As much bitching people have made regarding the electric company, I give them props. They have been busting their butts out there, and I have seen them do so.
Yesterday, we got a new mailbox, and Chase, who had been cooped up in the house for the past 5 days, was able to run in the backyard again. We lost all of our cold food, but that's no surprise. The family is fine, and that's what I'm truly concerned about.