When we tell people here that we’ve just moved from the Gulf Coast region, they nearly always say, “Ah! Then you’re used to this heat!” (Nobody gets used to heat like this. You just endure.)
I’m kind of expecting the next couple of days to bring an entirely different reaction: “You moved from Texas? Ah! Then you’re used to hurricanes!”
Folks… when I look around our fabulously beautiful new home and its surroundings, my one and only thought is…. OMG! A hurricane would be an unmitigated disaster here.
Not only are we effectively living in a forest, we have a glass house — huge banks of windows, many skylights, and a solarium to boot! Taken altogether, this is not conducive to passive thought when eye-balling a hurricane cruising up the east coast.
Happily, we’re not going to have a problem near as I can tell.
Current predictions have us just outside the probability cone — the ever-changing best guess of where a hurricane will pass directly. As everybody knows, though, predictions change right up until a hurricane has already passed. (Think Rita.)
What people often forget about those probability cones, though, is that they’re modeling the passage of the center of the storm, but there’s no magic wall between the outside of that track and the rest of the world. Outside the cone means lesser-intensity winds, not a calm sunny day.
Hurricanes are enormous storms (CNN).
Because of Earl’s size, effects of the storm are expected to be widely felt. Hurricane-force winds extend outward up to 90 miles (150 kilometers) from the center, and tropical storm-force winds up to 200 miles (325 kilometers).
So… Earl passing to our east should mean we’ll have wind here — possibly a real gale. And lots of rain.
Ha!
Weather dot com says we might have winds of 18 mph on Saturday (barely a breeze!). Thank goodness we’re not in Katy anymore. Here, nobody’s talking about evacuating. I’m not even sure anybody realizes there’s a storm out there at all.
Which is just as well… cuz there’s no chance we could ever board all of this.
Myself, I’m just hoping all the leaves stay on the trees, because if this heat ever breaks, we’re going to have a spectacular show.
And we’re going to watch it through all this glass.