Houston is Freaking Out
Went on a supply run this morning, gas, smokes, food, water. I guess it's because people have been watching the horrors that Katrina wroght, but Houston is freaking out. My regular gas station had the pumps covered in plastic bags, the universal symbol for out gas, although the lady who runs it, turned one of the pumps on for me. She said she had about fifteen hundred gallons left and was giving it to her regular customers. As I drove out, and looked around, a fair percentage of the gas stations were showing that they had no gas. Most troublingly, my friend who runs the Chevron, she told me that there would be no more scheduled gas deliveries until after the storm has passed. And there were already gas lines between four and ten cars deep in the center of the city. But as I got out a little bit, it seemed to be less of a problem.
Went to the bank ATM, one of them was out of money already, and the other had a line of five cars waiting. Went to the HEB, one of the large grocery stores here, and it was a madhouse. The shelves were about half empty overall, and key items soup, tuna, peanut butter, charcoal, were all completely gone. Fortunately, I already had a light hurricane supply that I lay in every year, a case of water, a few cans of soup and corn, along with the other staples I keep around the house. I figure I've got about ten to twelve days of supplies on hand.
But as I was coming out of the bread/chips isle, which was nearly empty, I ran into a line of people and baskets. And being the good russian that I am, I fell into line before I even knew what they were giving out at the end of it. Turns out it was cases of water, they only got forty- eight on the truck, and I was about half way through so I picked up an extra case of water.
Headed back towards home, dropping off some stuff at a friends' place, and swinging by the whole foods near my house to buy rice. (In past storms here, the power goes out for a long time, but generally, the natural gas stays on.) Even at the whole foods people were going kindof crazy.
And this was all before 10:30AM on Wednesday. Three days before the storm is supposed to hit.
Also, It's looking slightly more likely on current projections that the storm will come in south of Houston/Galveston which would mean we are on the "dirty side or wet side" which means more rain and tornado threat than the other side. Again by today's projections, it looks like it's going to hit Matagorda county area which means we're about a seventy-five to a hundred miles away, so probably 70-90 mph winds and lots of rain.
I'm currently debating whether I'm going to stay in my house, or move over to my parent's house, which will be in the same situation, but is a far better structure. I figured I'd decide tomorrow; my neighbors seem to be about half staying, half going. Alot of the people who are going, are simply relocating to other family homes in Houston like I'm considering.
I'll post throughout the next few days just to keep everybody up on it.
Went to the bank ATM, one of them was out of money already, and the other had a line of five cars waiting. Went to the HEB, one of the large grocery stores here, and it was a madhouse. The shelves were about half empty overall, and key items soup, tuna, peanut butter, charcoal, were all completely gone. Fortunately, I already had a light hurricane supply that I lay in every year, a case of water, a few cans of soup and corn, along with the other staples I keep around the house. I figure I've got about ten to twelve days of supplies on hand.
But as I was coming out of the bread/chips isle, which was nearly empty, I ran into a line of people and baskets. And being the good russian that I am, I fell into line before I even knew what they were giving out at the end of it. Turns out it was cases of water, they only got forty- eight on the truck, and I was about half way through so I picked up an extra case of water.
Headed back towards home, dropping off some stuff at a friends' place, and swinging by the whole foods near my house to buy rice. (In past storms here, the power goes out for a long time, but generally, the natural gas stays on.) Even at the whole foods people were going kindof crazy.
And this was all before 10:30AM on Wednesday. Three days before the storm is supposed to hit.
Also, It's looking slightly more likely on current projections that the storm will come in south of Houston/Galveston which would mean we are on the "dirty side or wet side" which means more rain and tornado threat than the other side. Again by today's projections, it looks like it's going to hit Matagorda county area which means we're about a seventy-five to a hundred miles away, so probably 70-90 mph winds and lots of rain.
I'm currently debating whether I'm going to stay in my house, or move over to my parent's house, which will be in the same situation, but is a far better structure. I figured I'd decide tomorrow; my neighbors seem to be about half staying, half going. Alot of the people who are going, are simply relocating to other family homes in Houston like I'm considering.
I'll post throughout the next few days just to keep everybody up on it.
posted by mikevotes at
1:15 PM
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