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Chapter 17 "We interrupt this program..." 9/9/04 ***We interrupt this program for a special weather report*** Ok, so this chapter has more to do with weather and less to do with thyroid cancer. But these are after all my adventures and as no Floridian can go very long without battling a hurricane I thought it pertinent. Hurricanes it seems are lining up in the Atlantic to get a swat at Florida. Charley, which hit 3 weeks ago, was a devastating speed demon. My parents live on Ft Myers beach and are still cleaning up the mess Charley left behind. Frances, which finally left the state this morning was more like a tourist driving a HUGE Cadillac, she was excruciatingly slow and so big there was no getting around her. In fact, she hung around so long and in so many places that pretty much the entire state of Florida has been under house arrest for 3 days. We forget that there is a world outside the storm because our news stations cover nothing else but this for days. For those of you who are not familiar with the hurricane process, let me walk you through it.  First the weather folks on the news get all excited as they show you a storm brewing somewhere on the bottom right hand side of the TV screen (hurricanes are like Christmas coming early for the news folks). Then I think there's a coin toss between the east and west coast to see who's going to get it. Once this is figured out, newscasters spend the next few days subtly prodding the viewers into a frenzy. The main reason newsfolks love hurricanes is that they are weather's most fickle force. They can strengthen, weaken, speed up or completely change direction in a very short period of time with no warning. (Never attempt to let a hurricane decide where to go for dinner, it'll never make up it's mind and you probably won't be allowed back at the restaurant after it tears up the place anyway). So because of the hurricanes indecisive nature, it's very easy for newsfolks to whip people into a panic. After all, there's always the chance that your area will be affected, no one really knows until the last minute so everyone must be prepared!
 To illustrate preparedness, news crews waste no time rushing out to Home Depot to show the five people who are buying plywood for their windows. This story is a hurricane MUST! According to the National Weather Service, it is not considered a hurricane unless there's a news story at Home Depot. Sometimes there may be a story about people buying bottled water but it isn't essential.
This is followed by 3-5 days of very high tech and colorful images of a big swirling mass on its way to Florida. They have satellite images of it, super Doppler radar pictures, pictures of the projected path (which usually covers the whole state), and pictures of it on vacation with its mother. Then they will tell you that certain places are under "voluntary evacuation". Which to me doesn't really need announcing, I mean isn't an area always under voluntary evacuation? Couldn't I evacuate my area at any given time hurricane or no? I bet someone somewhere is voluntarily evacuating their area right now. But anyway, as the hurricane approaches you figure, well, I guess I should be prepared. So you gather your dusty candles, dig the flashlight out of the junk drawer, check your stores of pop tarts and diet coke…and wait. You wait and watch while rain soaked, wind blown journalists stand on piers telling you how windy and rainy it is. Occasionally they cut to a shot of a wobbling stop sign to reiterate their point. I can handle waiting.  In fact, after the last month I am a professional at it. Waiting for Radioactive Iodine, waiting for my TSH level to climb, waiting for the hurricane. Not a problem right? Wrong. For some reason, the past three days of doing the same thing I've been doing for the last month (sitting in my house) was unbearable.
We sat by our window and waited. We watched and waited while the pine branches blew down the street, while our lawn filled up with water, while our oak tree fell on our house (don't worry it's really just leaning-lots of people suffered a far worse fate). And alas the storm that seemed to never end finally passed. Now the only thing left to do is wait…. for Hurricane Ivan My 15yr old little sister has a weekly column in the Ft Myers Beach Sandpaper and she wrote an article about seeing Charley first hand from the beach. (Read Article) |
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