Eight Feet Deep

Thousands left here Sunday in Southeast Texas after mandatory evacuations were ordered for Jefferson, Orange and Hardin counties. I stayed and made some pretty good money freelancing. I’ve had three paid days off this week, so far, in my part-time job with Uncle Sugar. Gustav turned out to be a non-event where I live, thankfully. We got more wind and rain last night than when the storm brushed us when making landfall Monday.

I can’t say it wasn’t pleasant here during the evacuation. It was pleasant. It was refreshingly quiet. The breezes were heavenly. The temperature mostly perfect although some agonizing humidity of the type one gets in the subtropics still prevailed at times.

As far as I am concerned, and on a totally selfish level, I think officials made the right call calling for evacuations. As for my feelings geared toward the more altruistic realm, I also think the officials made the right call.

The weather service put our area under a hurricane watch only hours before Gustav hit the central and southeastern portions of Louisiana. It would not have been out of the ordinary had the storm stalled a bit, strengthened and then took a path over the western Louisiana coast and on in to our county as our blessed Rita did three years ago.

I am sure there will be a lot of second-guessing. And a lot of politics at the local level are always behind the decisions such as these and I am not all that impressed by some of those decision-makers. But this time the locals got it right. The weather service also got it right — about as right as they could at least from what it appears to me.

We aren’t wrecked and a lot of folks are enjoying this breezy, late, late summer day. So as far as I sees it (bad grammar and all): Mission accomplished. No, really, I mean it.

The last couple of days I have been freelancing with a major newspaper because of Hurricane Gustav. It’s nice to be doing that again especially with the prospect of extra moolah.

Although the TV weatherpeople of every ilk seems to think, or at least wish, Gustav will hit New Orleans, the latest National Hurricane Center forecast and discussion gives me some cause to pause about my own predicament here in good ol’ Beaumont, Texas. I will be staying but they have moved the hurricane warning over my way. Not good.

Now I got to see what is going on with Beaumont PD. I just saw two squad cars hauling ass down North Eleventh with sirens screaming as well as some kind of police SUV. The sheriff’s chopper appears to be in the air too. Too much excitement.

I’ve popped into the library for a few and the machine on which I am using has decided Blogger cannot allow me linkage, so therefore if you want to read anything I happen to mention here you will just have to look it up. Believe me, it won’t hurt a bit. I’ve spent a lifetime looking things up and still I have no better vocabulary than to call those items which I have looked up “things.” Pitiful, just pitiful.

After leaving work at noon I got into the spirit of potential Gustav victim and went shopping for hurricane supplies at Tar-jay and der Valmart. I might even be on some local TV news B-roll tonight as some station was aiming its camera right toward me. If you see me, I will be the shaven-headed old man looking confused at Target.

To be sure, a lot is available to occupy my mind right now: Gustav, GOP veep candidate Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska (a former beauty queen and local TV news sports reporter)and the post-mortem of Barack, Lunch Pail Joe and the Denver convention. But I think I will just go home from now and watch “Monk” reruns if they happen to be playing. I will keep checking frequently this weekend on Gustav and Hanna (I mispelled her-its name yesterday. Sorry, I have this problem of being a little human.)Happy Labour Day Comrade!

Whether or not Hurricane Gustav will hit my little corner of the Upper Texas Coast or not at least the politicians are determined not to let the storm slip up on them, or so it would seem.

Texas Gov. Rick “Goodhair” Perry has issued a pre-emptive disaster declaration for more than 60 Texas counties while Gustav is still cruising around Jamaica (Mon!) And I understand Louisiana Gov. Mathatma “Bobby” Jindal has done something similar.

Meanwhile, who knows what havoc TS and possible Hurricane Hannah might pull if it arrives on the East Coast near the time of Gustav hitting the Gulf Coast. That’s a lot of wind. It’s kind of like all that wind coming from the presidential race.

TS Gustav’s Cone of Incertitude targets New Orleans for now, but what about later?

Since tropical storm systems have decided once again to target areas of the Gulf coast other than Florida, those of us who got by so many years without them have learned a few virtues. Patience comes to mind and it is a virtue I have long been lacking. But the truth is if you worry about what you are going to do or not going to do on Labor Day because you might or might not get clobbered by a hurricane your head might just turn into a big, old hunk of smoldering madness which might explode into a general messiness.

Tropical Storm and now depression or less, Fay, should be a great example of just never knowing what a tropical system may do. Fay might just stick around and decide to see parts unheard of for its kind such as North Dakota or Salt Lake City. A year from now, Fay might just come calling, knock on your door and ask to crash on the couch. “Whew, I just flew in from Omaha and boy are my arms tired!”

So once again we wait to see what the tropical system might be and then where it might be followed by how bad or how innocuous it might be. Might as well, too wet to plow.