WWQP Bulletin Board Chat

Checking in

I don't visit every day anymore, but still stop in every week or so. Nice to see Ronna posting, but sorry to hear about her sister's recurrence. I have a friend in MI who is also going through chemo again. She had breast cancer many years ago and did have reconstruction, and was very happy with it. I don't think I would bother, though.

Ike went north and east of us, thank goodness. My brother lives on a channel on Key Allegro here in Rockport--the storm surge was about 5 feet, covering his dock and coming up to the first step up to his back porch, but very little wind and not enough rain to measure. My niece in Sugar Land southwest of Houston just got the electricity back yesterday. They didn't have any damage to their home, but did lose some plants in their yard. I've heard from almost all my friends in that area, still a few left to check in. I hope they're okay. We were all prepared to evacuate, got up at 0400 Friday morning to check the weather report one more time, and found we didn't have to go. My mother, who lives in Corpus Christi, had been evacuated on Tuesday with other folks with medical issues (she is on oxygen all the time now) to a church in San Antonio. We had thought they would be taken to a military base up there, and didn't know where she was until she borrowed a cell phone (she won't have one, don't ask) and called us Saturday to tell us that the bus was supposed to come to take them back to Corpus that afternoon. I tried calling her that night, but she wasn't home. She called at 5:30 pm Sunday, to tell us that the bus, which was supposed to be there at 3, still hadn't come, and would I please come to get her? Well, of course I would, so got ready and left home at 6 pm, got her and 4 of her friends, stuffed them and their luggage in the van with a borrowed tank of oxygen for Mom, and hustled them back to Corpus, got home a little after midnight. Next time, we will have arrangements made to take Mom with us! If we get a few of the regular green oxygen tanks on a little cart, and have them put a demand valve on, they will last until we get to wherever we are going (probably a LaQuinta, since they take pets), and we'll take her room air concentrator to use in the room and save the tanks for going out to eat. What a mess. We always start our prep for hurricane season by the end of May--have about 6 cases of bottled water tucked on the back porch, and canned stuff that we could subsist on for a few days, etc., keep plenty of dog and cat food in double plastic bags, all important papers in two plastic file boxes to grab and toss into the van if necessary. We had the window coverings on, did those on Wednesday. We use plywood on the downstairs windows--when we bought the house, we had a fellow put stainless steel bolts around the downstairs window frames and cut plywood to fit, with holes drilled to go over the bolts, so all we have to do is put the plywood on the bolts, add large stainless steel washers and wingnuts, and those windows are done. We had roll-down shutters put on the upstairs windows--would have liked to have them downstairs, too, but they're pretty expensive. There are still signs up on the major roads around here telling folks not to try to drive to Houston or Beaumont, TX because of damage and low fuel. We haven't had a problem getting fuel right here, but we live only 30 miles or so from all the refineries in Corpus.

Wow, this turned into a book, sorry, just glad to be able to check in.

Pat in Rockport, TX, who wishes she could have gone to Grace's retreat.

posted by Pat in Rockport, TX @ 11:21 AM