Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Rita

Sooo... Rita is headed to Galveston it seems. My sister just moved to Houston with her fiance about three months ago. (Before which, I admittedly knew very little about TX geography, but now I know it's about 40 miles inland from Galveston, and in the direct projected path of this beast.) Anyone else down there? They haven't called for her to evacuate yet, but they have mandatory evacuations called for an area 3 miles from her house. This thing had better turn south! She said plywood, bottled water, batteries, and duct tape have completely vanished from any store in the area.

Our daughter and son-in-law and one of their friends will be on there way north (Monroe, LA) with two cats and a dog and two boats. They currently live in Beaumont, Texas and have been told to evacuate...Although, our son-in-law is in the Coast Guard Reserve and he has to finish this week's shift so they will not be able to leave until probably tomorrow...Told them to come to Austin, but they did not want to have to hassle with going around or through Houston in the wake of these latest evacuations...

Sheesh!

WhatFurrer

Well, my sister is a teacher down there, and her fiance is a doctor. So as it stands they are both supposed to stay around unless they call for an evacuation. I looked at the map the army corp of engineers put out for the Houston area. While they aren't in the "Evacuate for category 4 and 5 storms" area, they are uncomfortably close!

My boss will be in Austin this weekend attending the Austin City Limits music festival. I told him to pack his rain gear as it's likely to be very wet out on that field.

http://www.aclfestival.com/

My dad, step mother, and little brother and sister live in Kingsville which is 40 miles SW of Corpus Christi. I was born and raised in Kingsville and also lived in Corpus Christi, San Antonio, Austin, and Beeville. It seem most of the hurricane's that pass through there always turn north and head to just north of Galveston. I hope that anyone who lives there, and who has family there, gets out safe. I know BigJohn lives down there too. Hope he's not anywhere near where Rita hits.

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I know BigJohn lives down there too. Hope he's not anywhere near where Rita hits.

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I believe BigJohn lives in San Angelo, he should be fine there...I hope!
I remember hanging out at Sharkey's and the Crazy Cajun quite often while spending some time in Corpus Christi, fun place!

Best of luck to all of you Texans out there!

Ol' BJ (I miss him) is in San Angelo, which is about 300 miles inland, and West of the predicted path even after it comes ashore. So, he probably won't even get rained on.

Ok, I thought maybe he was in San Antonio. Thanks for the info.

De nada, mi amigo! (I'm in a Texas kinda groove now. )

You're not wearing [censored]-kickin' boots, are you?

On MY arthritic feet? No way Jose! Oh the pain.

For anyone who was concerned, my sister and her fiance got a flight out yesterday. They're safe and sound in Philadelphia at my mother's house now.

Well, our daughter, son-in-law and crew arrived in Monroe, Louisiana yesterday about 5:00...Glad they are out of the path...especially since it looks like Beaumont may take a good deal of the brunt of the storm...

Our in-laws here have a friend from Houston who drove up yesterday...they left at 5:00 AM and did not get here to Austin until after 5:00 PM...Almost ran out of gas but was lucky enough to find somewhere that still had some...

On a different note, here's a story of good tidings...Went this morning to fill up the car due to the storm and at an HEB (grocery chain here in Texas) they had run out of Regular and Plus unleaded gas...the only gas was Super Unleaded...The very cool part of this story is that they were selling the Super Unleaded for the Regular Unleaded price of $ 2.52 a gallon...That is class in the face of some others who jack the prices...

WhatFurrer

Sometimes they are few and far between, but when you come across good people, it's a great feeling.

Well, best of luck to everyone in the path of this thing. You're in my thoughts.

I also hope that everyone gets away from this monster, this time. Speaking of the gasoline wars, I filled up the day before everyone was talking about $4-$6 gas, fearing that I would never again pay under $3.00/gallon. I paid $2.46/gallon. When I had to fill up again, 2 weeks later the price had dropped to $2.54/gallon after reaching a high of $3. I made out like a bandit.

No offense but if you only have to fill up every 2 weeks then the gas crunch is not really effecting you. lol

My commute is 4 miles, round trip, so I'll spare you the details of how often I gas up.

I won't have it so good in Maryland.

Peter
I wish I had a smiley face that was sticking his tongue out at ya.
Jack
Ya think you could help me out with that.
I spend an average of 2.5 hours a day driving.

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I spend an average of 2.5 hours a day driving.

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Don't feel too terribly bad Bray, my commute back and forth for work is 4 hours each day. Yup, a 2 hour drive to work...and another 2 hour drive back home!

Jeeeeex, I would go nuts. I takes me 10 minutes in bad traffic to get to work and no more then 15 coming home at 5:00pm.

I don't know how you do it!

I'd be moving or finding a new job if I had a two hours commute....it's gotta be under 1 hour each way, perferably under .5hr.

It takes me 20 minuntes one way, I could never handle a 2 hour drive to go to work.

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I wish I had a smiley face that was sticking his tongue out at ya.
Jack
Ya think you could help me out with that.

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Or you could use the one available right here ont he forum [ tongue ] without the spaces.

Yeah, my dad told me the same thing. I'm not surprised though, Texas is good people. Down in the little town he's in, there is only one H.E.B. and he said the bread and canned goods were cleaned out.

Just now getting a few minutes to get back to this board. I live in an area that had mandatory evacuations. It took me five hours to go thirty miles to my brother-in-law's house. My house had no water or wind damage and I feel very fortunate. The people in Beaumont, Port Arthur, Jasper and Cameron did not fare nearly as well. The pictures coming out of those areas are horrific. By the way, the M60s were left up on the washing machine, the VP150 was on a shelf in my closet and the EP600 was hoisted on top of a coffee table. I was taking no chances on getting water in these speakers!

So glad to hear your house was fine. We were talking about what it must be like to turn the key and say a prayer - it must have been nerve-wracking. And hoisting the 600 anywhere - yowza!

I just had a vision of someone clinging to a floating EP600, kinda like the end of the movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" where the charactes are clinging to various pieces of floating furniture after the flood. I don't think an EP600 would actually float, though.

Latest from my kids...

My son-in-law was called back to duty and he was able to go back to Beaumont to survey the damage...

Luckily for them (they were the only ones in their neighborhood who put up plywood), they did not have any water damage...the wind tried to pull down the plywood but it held...now the aluminum chimney on the connected quadplex they live in did not survive as neither did the fence for the entire complex...

Our daughter was so freaked out about "their stuff" getting damaged...trying to make her understand that it was "just stuff and it can be replaced" whereas you, your husband and your animals cannot did not go over real well.

They still do not have power but a portion of the subdivision came back up yesterday...promising...

Hopefully, this will be the gist of it for a while...be nice to allow the area to have a breather...

Hope things are going well for others affected...

Best Regards,

WhatFurrer