Monthly Archives: September 2005

SciGuy sums up the current mood here pretty well:

The current track for Rita is just about as bad as you could imagine for the Houston-Galveston area.

Unless the storm turns south or north in the next 24 to 48 hours we are set up for a truly horrific event. I am not going to sugar-coast this, my friends. If the storm comes ashore as forecast, it would essentially be the worst-case scenario described here.

As a Houston resident and property owner, I am truly mortified right now. If you are under a mandatory evacuation order, you should heed it.

Last week I was grocery shopping at work, Starbucks in hand, while a jazz band played in the background. Today that store looks like it’s been looted. Shelves are empty, the floor is covered in boxes and cans stacked 10 feet high in some places. The floors are dirty. Employees have scrawled signs on paper bags that read “CASH ONLY” and “NO WATER TODAY”. I grabbed one of the stockers and asked about water and he just said “No water. Two trucks came in and two trucks went out. Just like that.” Almost all of the decent food is gone as well. You feel like you’re scavenging more than shopping. It’s all very primitive.

People are mostly friendly though. If you make eye contact with someone they’re likely to wish you “good luck” as you pass. In fact I heard that being exchanged throughout the store. It was the same way in the elevator at work.

I have enough food and water to keep me alive for a month. God knows that if I need to use it all I’ll be pissed off, and extremely tired of cold cans of Beenie-Weenies and protein bars, but I’ll be alive.

Hurricanes tend to spawn lots of tornados in Houston and this storm could break records. One of the local newsmen just said that if the storm comes in on its current track we could expect 50-200 tornados in the area.

I think I’m gonna walk over to CVS and buy some Pepto, maybe mix it up with a little Patron, and see if I can settle my stomach and mind at the same time.

Welcome Instapundit, Michelle Malkin, Defense Tech, and Laurence Simon readers. I have a very full inbox after taking a few hours this evening to help friends of a friend secure their house. The work didn’t take long but folks showed up with wine and a ton of greek salad so we took some time to decompress and have a few (very nervous) laughs. Of the entire crew I’m the only one staying behind. The rest are heading for San Francisco, Toronto, and other far nicer places.

One of the guys was a Katrina victim from New Orleans who had just lost 2 homes and multiple cars. He was completely wiped out by the storm and now he faces an emergency evacuation from Houston. I think he is taking the easiest route out in the morning and he’ll drive until he can find a place to stay.

I haven’t followed the storm in much detail tonight but what I could catch was bad. Very bad. I’m still comfortable with my location but having surivived hurricane Alicia and a few other hurricanes I know that we could be in for a very rough night in Houston.

On my way home tonight I drove by a gas station near downtown with maybe a hundred cars lined up. Otherwise most of the streets were pretty quiet. I’m sure the roads north are chaotic and will remain so until it’s almost too late. A nearby bar had painted “Blow this Rita” on their windows. I’m not feeling quite that cocky.