The last 36 hours

Haven’t had winds like this since Hurricane Gloria (’85)

3-13-10 The time is 8am. Little Joe and are I up and having a damn good time. I have fed, medicated and readying him for the gym. Nina’s still asleep which isn’t so bad since we alternate and such. As per our Saturday ritual we sneek into our bedroom and I gently settle Joe on the bed and he crawls up what is "mommy mountain" until he is at her peak, a rather deliciously round summit which I plan on hiking to myself later that evening.

As soon as Nina wakes up and opens her eyes my son’s eyes get really wide and he shrieks with joy. We are now all awake and moving to get to the gym. Before this happens some twenty five minutes later H2 melts down and is submitting to his morning nap routine a tad early. Yet with some foresight this isn’t so bad considering tomorrow (3-14-10) will be the time switch and I’ll be down an hour. So I tell Nina to head off to the gym on her own, with a slight pause of shock that I’d offer she is out the door and I am settled at the dining room table thinking about the current weather.

Time to renew the fire, it’s cold outside and starting to rain so I’d rather not get caught mid downpour and have to reload wood so with two bagfulls in the house I’m doing my thing and have the fire set.

Nina’s back and while we’re both sitting at the dining room table I see a flash of light reflect off the dining room wall.

"What the hell is that?" I say, Nina flashes a look of puzzlement and then we hear a burst like pop, as if someone was unloading a shotgun round into the air some distance away.

Then the light again, we look out the window to see the main line sparking. Not good.

Calls to LIPA are made, a service truck arrives, checks and finds nothing. We get the curt explaination that if they found nothing but if something happens again to call.

Ok.

I go to the gym, I pound chest and back in an all but vacant gym. Downstairs in the basement of the place with one other guy at the other end of the room. Dusty 80 lbs dumbells resound in a sweet metallic tone as they arch and collide above my chest only to slowly descend as my lungs draw in fresh fuel. 

I have my apppointment with the doctor on monday 3-15-10 and am somewhat nervous. I know what I need to do but I need a push.

No, I need a swift kick in the ass with a steel tip boot.

Honestly I need direction.

I put up the Trinacria my father picked up in Sicily for me and it looks good.

Dinner comes and  Nina has made peach & apple pancakes, eggs & bacon.

Little Joe gets some too.

Mine

His.

So beyond this the wind has mounted considerably and I took the camera out and got some footage.

What you can’t see here is the aftermath, that other pine tree on the left? That one got uprooted too.  By the way? The winds in this video was like a walk in the park, the damaging stuff happened at 11pm that evening.

Then later on in the evening we lose the lights, the t.v., phone and internet

It was this guy

Bastard Paper Birch tree, an epic fail on the zone 6 hardiness scale. The roots below barely had spready out, and I had been wanting to cut it down.

Anyhow at this point I have another load of wood brought inside and it is fuckin’ wailing outside. 75 foot tall trees are swaying like marrionettes outside and honestly I’m somewhat worried.

Outside I can see the telephone pole next door has shifted, it is angled 15 degrees towards the Polish Army neighbor’s house.  I am worried about it falling and therefore penning us in because of the downed lines. The next morning I notice there is a large crack at the base of the telephone shaft. 

Not good.

As the night is winding down and we are going to retire we are upstairs and have some "us time", we both needed it let me tell you.

Nina spent the rest of her waking time trying to figure out if her alarm clock was going to reset itself and was a bit panicky. 

Little Joe woke at 5am just as Nina was getting ready so I scooped him up after feeding him and we settled into our bed. Little guy just nuzzled into my bicep and got real comfortable with his blue blanket.

That was good.

Today was spent for the most part at my parents who had everything running. 

Now we’re home and winding down the day.