Fay has come and gone to our section of Tallahassee. The only inconvenience we had was 3 hours without electricity. Since we have a backup battery and generator - even that had little effect on us. We were still able to watch satellite TV and use our iPhones to get on the Internet.
Our neighbor's rain gauge said we got over 15 inches of rain. Really - the gauge holds 5 inches of rain - and he had to empty it out 3 times - so it may have been more.
Although many sections of town were flooded - we live on a slight hill with a lake/pond in the back about 30 feet below house level - so our house stayed dry. A few well-placed drains and heavy sodding during our landscaping project removed any standing puddles.
As I write - Hurricane/Tropical Storm/Depression Fay moves west across America. We feel like we just sat down in a football stadium as the wave passes and moves farther down the bleachers - someone else is feeling it. The worst part of living in Florida and worrying about hurricanes is that you must wish it hits someone else instead of you. You know someone is going to end up to their neck in a swamp full of gators.
Two days later - 500 homes in Tallahassee are still without power - down from the 15,000 two days ago. The city owned utility company is doing a wonderful job with most workers going 16 hour shifts. Some housing developments with only one entrance are stranded - people being taken out by boats. Tallahassee - the tree capital of the world - has hundreds of felled trees - some falling on peoples' homes and cars.
Three things make the trees come down. 1 - all the rain makes the trees heavier. 2 - all the rain makes the ground makes the sandy soils very soft. 3 - the extra heavy wind does not help much either.
Yesterday - Lulu and I cleaned up a bit around the lot. There were lots of leaves and pine needles on the pool screen room. A few needles made their way into the pool. It took a couple hours to clean that up. We started on picking the twigs - branches - leaves - needles - pine cones - out of the grass. It will take another day to complete - because it started to rain again before we finished.
From June to December - you learn to live with this mess. I keep reminding myself that 15 inches of rain could be 12 feet of snow back home in Pennsylvania. I'll take my chances with the sunshine and hurricanes - I hated that snow shovel.
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