House of Snark v2.0

A report from the soon-to-be-ex, near Reliant Stadium:

There isn’t much open here on Main, but I’m glad to see the 24 hour porn place is up and running.

Amazing how good it feels to run the dishwasher…

Tucker the Elephant helps clean up the Houston Zoo. Photo credit: KTRK-TV

Power has been out at the house since Friday night at 11:30PM.  No word on when we’ll get it back.  There is now power a mile up the road at Highway 6, mainly so they can get the traffic light and gas station back up and running.  (The lines for the gas station make it nearly impossible to get in or out of the neighborhood.)

I’m back at work today, where we have power, phones, and internet.  The boss found the only open restaurant for miles around today and bought us all lunch.  I’ll also borrow his generator since he has power back on.

The only damage for me is the back fence.  My neighbors lost a bunch of shingles from their roof, so they got some water in their home.  I took photos after the storm which I’ll get around to posting eventually.  I spent most of the storm inside a closet, as I didn’t feel safe in a bedroom with windows on two walls.  The eye never passed over my house; I estimate that I had the eyewall overhead for 4 to 6 hours.

I did fill my gas tank yesterday… that took 2 hours.  I would have gone to the Home Depot to get stuff for the fence, but after waiting for gas, I was pretty much done.

The best way to get in touch with me is text message or email.  Cell phone service is spotty, and it’s going to be awhile before it gets better.

Boss says “everyone in this town just wants a free vacation day” so we’re open.  The storm is supposed to hit tonight.

Traffic isn’t a problem this time around.  I think it’s a combination of more people staying put this time (in Rita I’d guess that half of the people who left had no business leaving) and people leaving earlier.  It did take me two hours to find gas and propane last night.  Of course, by the time I returned home, the gas station on the corner had already been restocked.

So, I’ll get home as soon as they let me and get the grill and patio furniture picked up.  I didn’t get home from my pharmacy/gas/propane/dinner trip last night until 10:00, so I didn’t have time to deal with it yesterday.

Landfall is expected in the middle of the night, although it’s going to get windy here after noon.  I’m really hoping that we get to leave early.

For those of you who aren’t local and are getting their news via CNN and think that all of Houston is already under water, here’s that map again.  Click the little one to get a big one.

The blue dot over in Fort Bend represents my neighborhood.  The yellow and green sections are the mandatory evacuation areas (along with a good chunk of Matagorda county).

For those who are wondering, the blue dot on this map represents my neighborhood.

I’m staying put.  For one thing, if I were to leave, I’d be in the way:

Mandatory Evacuation Zones are established based on the threat of flooding due to storm surge.  Since Fort Bend County is not at risk for storm surge, the County will not be part of the mandatory evacuation of coastal communities.

Fort Bend County has been designated by the State of Texas as a “Pass-through” County.  This means that coastal communities who are designated as “Evacuation” counties will pass through Fort Bend County along designated evacuation routes to designated “Shelter” counties.  The designated evacuation routes through Fort Bend County are State Highway 6 and State Highway 36.

- Fort Bend County Office of Emergency Management

With everyone from Galveston and Brazoria coming right by the house on Highway 6, (the highway marked in red next to where my house is)  if I were to join them on the road, I’d just be in the way.  The plan calls for us to shelter in place and let people from the other counties drive through and go somewhere else.

It’s a good thing that I did the rest of my shopping last night and Tuesday, because it’s going to take 2 and a half hours to go down Highway 6 to the Target/Kroger/HEB that’s about 7 miles away tonight if Rita was any guide.  It will be hard enough to go the half mile on 6 from the tollway to the road you turn on to get to my development.  I do need to exchange propane tanks, but I can do that at the convenience store on the corner, thankfully.

I have my water, I have non-perishable food, I have batteries, I have food for the pups.  I just need propane and someone to help me get the grill into the garage tonight.