The plagues of Egypt

Frogs were one of the plagues of Egypt, right? Let me tell you - it sounded like a plague of frogs this morning at Chez Polson.

First off it rained all night. This isn't a sprinkle or even a solid rain, it POURED ALL NIGHT. The backyard, which was damp, but dry yesterday, now closely resembles a lake. We have about 18 inches of standing water in the backyard. Standing water = frogs! Chris and I were both awakened from a dead sleep by the croaking of the frogs. I looked out and there were easily a dozen frogs in this large pool of standing water. As far as I can tell they are probably leopard frogs, not that it really matters that much. All I know for sure is that they produce a racket.

It rained pretty heavily most of the day but stopped at about 1 o'clock. It's about 3 o'clock now and it's very calm outside, no rain and just a slight breeze.

I've been watching the news and it appears that Chris and I got REALLY lucky. There is substantial flooding on Riverside Ave (where my office is). The whole Riverside area is off-limits, shut down by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. The beaches are still getting hammered by heavy winds and surf, JTB (one of the east/west road between 95 and the beach) has been shut off and on throughout the day. The big bridges have been shut down off and on as well.

For an initiation into tropical weather, I have to say that it was amazing, but I'm glad we got off easy. (Yes, I took some pictures, but since I still need to post/edit the driving pictures these will have to wait).

So far so good

So far, despite the build up, TS Fay isn't doing much...here anyway. I heard from a coworker who lives literally on the beach and her roof tiles are all over her driveway and A1A (the highway) and she had to go chasing her screen door down the street.

We've had some significant rain and pretty blustery conditions but the power is still on. The office was closed today, but that didn't keep me from working (like that comes as a surprise to anyone!). I've been tempted to go out driving around, but a) I don't really know where to go and b) I don't want it to get suddenly MUCH worse while I'm out and about.

We'll see what happens tonight as the storm hasn't really moved much since this morning. I'll keep you posted.

Things you don't want to see in your first month in Florida

1. Palmetto bug...trust me - unpleasant! Don't believe me - check this out. Believe me now?
2. This picture:

It's going to be a rainy few days. I hear they shut down the bridges if it gets to windy...fun, since you can't get anywhere in this city without going over a bridge (no, I'm serious...you can't.) See those little Hs in that graphic...that mean hurricane folks. Nope, no starter storm for Alex - she gets a hurricane watch her first time out! Oh! See that H marked 2PM Thu...that H is Jacksonville. Hurrah!

Lucky me!

New home - new neighbors

So, the good news is I found the cord that connects my camera to my computer. The bad news is that I took 70 pictures on the drive to Florida! So, in the interest of not completely boring everyone to tears I'm going to have to do some editing, but I haven't gotten to that yet.

BUT! I did take a picture of one of my new neighbors...he's got lots of friends to. They are all pretty quiet and generally don't cause any real problems.


I hope to get some photo editing done in the next few days, and will post when I have them.

In the meantime - keep an eye on Tropical Storm Fay...she seems to be headed in our general direction. We're not worried yet, but that would certainly be one heck of a "Welcome to Florida!"

Later days.

We're here...

That's right, we've arrived in Florida. We arrived on August 1st at about 2 o'clock. We are staying at the Riverdale Inn for the next few days. We heard from our movers that our furniture is supposed to arrive on Monday.

The trip was SO uneventful it was great. There was only one incident. Chris realized on Tuesday night that he had forgotten to give his car keys to the team moving his car, so he had to drive back to Burlington on Tuesday night from Chelsea. That was the worse thing that happened, and that was minor in the grand scheme of things.

We drove through or around some major cities, including Baltimore, DC, Charleston, Richmond and New York City. We only hit stop and go traffic twice - both times in the middle of NOWHERE due to construction. Once in South Carolina and one in Virginia.

I was able to take pictures of all but one "Welcome to XXXXX" signs. I missed New York of all things. I wasn't paying attention as we entered Whitehall, but I got pictures of the "Entering Whitehall" sign, so that will have to do. I have loads of other pictures, but I can't load them until I get our computer up and running, so they should be ready next weekend.

Sophie and Simon were both troopers. Sophie spent a lot of the trip on my lap, she was much calmer there than in her carrier, so in the interest of keeping her calm that's what we went with. Sophie had no trouble getting comfortable at the hotel in Baltimore and Charleston, but here she's barely left the space under the bed. She'll come out eventually, but I think she's protesting - can't say I blame her.

Later days.