I'm looking at the Kure Beach camera, and there are 1 foot waves lapping the shore while people walk their dogs.

Got a ride in this morning, roads nice and empty, kinda humid though. We'll ya can't have everything I guess?

Well, I'm just sitting here, alternating between surfing the internet mindlessly and figuring out what the next upgrade I'm going to make on my Mercier Nano is going to be, and reading Harold Lamb's Cossack stories. Oh yeah, and I just started drinking beer (sierra Nevada Tumbler).

We're getting about 1/2 of rain an hour here in Richmond Va; it moved in early this morning. Lots of small branches down; a couple of large limbs. Winds are gusting, but not terrible fierce. It's actually half way pleasant; I just finished up a hard 3 mos. of work and am glad to have an ample excuse to relax. Any later posts I make may be strewn with obvious misspeelings.

We are still getting some wind and intermittent rain, heavy rain at the moment. Got my wheels built for my son's city bike, chain installed on my expedition bike and took a nap. :D

Aaron :)

First heavy bands of rain north of Boston, very little wind, the first hint of a swell is starting to appear.

Scott

Why is this always the case. I recently brought up my desire to take a 5 day ride with some friends from San Franscisco to Santa Barbara, and my wife brought up some silly reasons why I shouldn't like:

"How will the kids get to school" (she goes to work earlier than I do) ......"What about the weekend getaway we had already planned for that same timeframe"....and the most unreasonable of all "Have you even ridden more than 20 miles at a time this whole summer? Won't you need to do some training to be ready for five consecutive 80 to 100 mile days?" Women!

I hope none of the C&V crowd ends up with trouble (more than can be reasonably expected by hurricane winds and flooding) and that all returns to normal soon. We on the left coast are certainly thinking about you.

News Update:

"As Hurricane Irene batters the East Coast, federal disaster officials have warned that internet outages could force people to interact with other people for the first time in years. Residents are bracing themselves for the horror of awkward silences & unwanted eye contact. FEMA has advised: “Be prepared. Write down possible topics to talk about in advance. Sports, the weather, etc. Remember, a conversation is basically a series of Facebook updates strung together.”

Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?

That's funny. I've been out of power since 3 am. It's such a large and slow-moving storm. It's one thing to have 40-50mph winds with a gust once in a while, but another to have steady 50mph winds with 5-minute gusts to 70. Lots of trees down, about a half million people in NC are out of power. It's a 300-mile long storm, traversing a 180-mile route up through the state, so you're talking 32 hours at 15mph to get through, front to rear.

Those of you farther north, the main thing you'll remember is that it went on and on and on. I'm in my car, trying to squeeze a few minutes of air time between the disconnects, which come every minute or so. The wind is rocking it almost to the point of two wheels, but not quite.

Fun fun. We're down to 3 flashlights and some candles, as batteries fail, and only turning on the radio on the half hour for 5 minutes at a time. I've seen the tree down that's causing my outage, it's gonna be tomorrow.

Based on what I've seen out there, doing damage assessments, take care farther north and I'll be back on the forum about 3 months or so from now.

Hang in there Robbie...I was on air card and laptop batteries for a couple of hours today, but we were west of the storm so minimal damage and we have managed to keep power for most of the day. I still can't decide if I prefer a tornado that just shows up with little warning, tears stuff up and leaves, or hurricanes where you have a chance to prepare, but have to live with it for the better part of 24 hours, then have massive cleanup across a wide area.

Aaron :)

Good luck Robbie. It is pretty mild so far in DC, the wind just now picked up to the point I can hear it inside my house.

I just drove 12 straight miles between a small city of 50,000 and mine of 5,000. Not a single house with power.
At last check, 270,000 households out for Progress Energy alone, which means close to a million souls, counting kids and the small electric co-ops, etc. Beaches fared OK, but I'm not sure they'll get taxpayer dollars to rebuild million-dollar piers.

Here's hoping we get power tomorrow. I really need a shower. At least the wind and rain have pretty much stopped in the last half hour, and I can grill bratwursts tomorrow.

Robbie, I spent 3 wondrous years of my life in coastal carolina years ago at Camp Lejeune. Weekends on Topsail beach, Surf City, Emerald Isle, rockjumping in Maysviile quarry. One of the best places in the U.S. I'm just hoping everyone is ok. At least it is warm, not a blizzard outage.

Rain,rain, rain and I live in a flood plain! :eek: Good news is the house is built up on a 12 foot foundation so we'll just watch the river flow past. The only bummer is come Monday, I'll be washing flood mud off the property for days. :mad:

Finally starting to get some action here in Brooklyn now. Rain, a little wind and lighting, but nothing serious yet.

Just came out of the basement. Tornado warnings. Not major tornadoes but you can't eff w/ nature......

We can't get my mother inlaw to leave her summer cottage that has been winterized for year round living in Connecticut. I think it's going to take other family members going and putting her in a car and taking her somewhere safe.

My Navy buddies in MD, DC, and VA are all without power, and Groton, CT has evacuated all beach area residents and folks who live in low areas.

Just saw that NY harbor is getting 2-3 ft swells and the storm is still 100 miles away.

Stay safe folks.

My Dad's house, NE of Baltimore, was hit by a hurricane spun off tornado in 2004. It is worth being careful.

Looks as if Tropical Storm Irene will track over us sometime late today, and we will be on the rain side, 6+ inches is the prediction.

It's high-tide and I've got 8 feet of water surrounding our house, we are an island. We are on a 12 foot elevated foundation but it is scary. Not alot of wind just rain, rain rain!

Good luck V-gnome ! Sounds like you've got a bit of high ground there but, hope the water doesn't get any higher. Fingers crossed .

I'm gonna need power soon. People get on my nerves.

I hope everyone out on the coast is doing OK. I drove out to my apartment in central Pa yesterday, NO I did not evacuate it was a trip planned last sunday, and the rain was off and on but not much wind. it seems the wind arrived here about 0400 announcing it by somehow blowing my bedroom door open and startling me from a sound sleep! except for two small vent type screens all the windows were closed so I guess there was a major pressure change or some thing. no loss of power other than a small outwage about 4 also.

Do all you Yankees up there in New England have your hatches battened?


Robbie just where on the Coastal Plain are you? I think it is great you are such a dedicated C&Ver that you are keeping us informed by using your car to charge your laptop.

Waiting with fingers crossed. Big issue here on Cape Cod is trees. Thousands and thousands of trees, many of them old and/or shallow rooted. Surge is going to be hairy down by the water, but I'm worried about the trees.

Glad everyone seems ok. It really didn't seem that bad here. We have power, the winds were NOT anything like what I consider hurricane force and we got far less rain than feared. The areas near rivers/creeks have flooding, but they always do.

The winds are starting to pick up here........ The lights have flickered a few times, but have not gone out (yet):(. Almost time to fire up our generator.......

Like rootboy, the trees are a concern at our house as well. We have two 75 foot pines in the front yard swaying like mad:( We live far enough inland that the tide is not a concern, but all these trees are making me nervous.