She takes you places your heart cannot go during the winter (& summer!) up in Buffalo

This day has been filled with memories. This morning I was searching the web and wound up on a site that was talking about Buffalo and its lack of revitalization on the East Side. There were pictures of buildings that I recognized and streets were mentioned that I haven’t driven down in years. From the gist of what was being talked about, I gathered that someone is trying to build up those neighborhoods, but just because you build it, doesn’t mean people will come. It’s a catch-22. If you put nice, new homes in a neighborhood, the area will clean itself up and nice, new business will follow. Or is it vice versa? Well, this is not for me to ponder because I don’t live there anymore, but I thought I would mention it as something to think about.

Then my father and his email and the nostalgia he brought up about his old boat. I remember being on that boat, as he said, swimming off the stern, bucket wars in the hot August sun and as I got older, the moonlight sails to Point Abino the weekend of the Queen City Regatta and Mayor’s Cup. I remember duct tape sheets and having a race called due to lack of wind while we were 50 yards from the finish – way ahead of our nearest competition. I keep close in my mind leaning against the mast as we motored out of the channel to get ready for our Wednesday night races and preparing myself for the job ahead; setting the bag, setting the pole, jibing the chute, getting my 175 lb. frame off the bow as quickly as possible because it slows us down. I also remember being face down on the bow while setting the bag in 10 foot waves and every time we came out of a swell, a wave would crash on top of me; the whole time I’m thinking, ‘one hand for the boat, one hand for yourself’, but loving every damned minute of it. I too will miss the Getaway, but I haven’t been on her since ’99, so she doesn’t hold any recent memories for me. Dad offered her to me, but I have neither the time nor the money to take her off his hands; but oh, how I would love one more sail.

I always defend Buffalo when people criticize it, whether it’s because of the snowstorms or its sports teams, Buffalo is a very special place - home. I am often asked if I would ever return and my answer has always been the same since the day I left in ’99, “If the financial situation was better and other situations could work out, I would move back in a heartbeat." I don’t mind the snow; it’s better than running from a hurricane! I love the summers. 85 degrees and sunny almost every day is hard to beat and it’s certainly better than 105 and humid. The south doesn’t even know what fall foliage is and the area surrounding Buffalo is second to none when it comes to that. I love the architecture downtown and my dad does such a great job telling different stories about how this building was such and such and now it’s just a piece of history. Buffalo was a big part of the industrial revolution and has a huge part in American history around the turn of the 19th Century. I grew up a stone’s throw from the Erie Canal and learned about its rich history while in school. It’s close enough to Toronto to make a day trip up there and be in a world-renowned city that has a culture like no other. It’s close enough to the middle of nowhere to get lost in the country for a day and still make it home for a late dinner. You can get anywhere you need to be in 20 minutes. It’s a piece of my heart that just doesn’t die. It doesn’t matter how many times people put it down or I hear about all the economic disasters happening, I will always think of Buffalo as my home.

It's a typical situation in these typical times

This is just typical that they would pay for something that will keep us working. As opposed to not paying for the days we’ve missed because of the hurricane.

Staff:

Our office encourages the staff members to get the flu shots annually. Therefore, the office will pay for the cost of the flu shots for staff members, which will occur on October 27, 2005 in Suite 1245 from 8:30AM until 1 PM. Please reply to this email so that we will know the number of members taking the flu shots in order that we can issue a check for payment.

You drive me crazy

I know I already ranted about poor driving skills, but seriously people, let’s get it together. Time is money and sitting behind these people is costing me a lot of money! If we could take the millions of crappy drivers out there and get them off the road, just think of how much more productive the rest of us could be because we aren’t stuck in traffic!

To the two SUV’s in front of me, that’s right, you in the Toyota Land Cruiser and you too in the tractor-trailer sized Ford Excursion; your vehicles are made for rough terrain, therefore, a few bumps in the road ARE NOT cause for slowing down! I know the speed limit was only 30mph, but doing 12 over a couple bumps in the road is completely unnecessary and slowing me down from getting back to work.

Maybe you don’t know why I have to get back to work so quickly, is that why you’re driving me insane – at 12 mph? Well, let me tell you why I have to get back to work…oh wait, I’ve already covered the fact we aren’t getting paid for hurricane time and I have to gather all the time on the clock that I can.

You got a piece of me, but it's just a little piece of me.

So, the big question at work this week is, are we going to be paid for the two days the office was closed for the Hurricane last week? Today, we received the answer - a big, resounding - sort of? They will pay us for one day, and we can come in on Saturday to make up some of the hours, or use a vacation day to make up the other time.

Of course, we know this is total bullshit and that the office is just cheap and this is a way for them to save a lot of money. For some of us, me, I have no vacation time and the office won’t let me use a sick day for anything other than being sick (a whole different problem in this office), so I am stuck with no choice but to come in on Saturday to make up about 7 hours of work. I am going to attempt to get a couple hours of OT by Friday so maybe I’ll only have to stay 4 hours on Saturday instead.

After hearing of the negative result of our repeated questioning, I decided to try to find any info about this sort of situation from the Texas Workforce Commission via their website. Unfortunately, because this is a special situation, I had a very hard time searching and identifying any type of law that would apply to this situation. This led me to call the TWC and just flat out ask them. The flat out answer I got was a big, resounding N-O, the office does not have any responsibility to pay us for our lost time and can ask us to make up the time or use our vacation time. Most of us in the office are screaming bullshit. Had the office been open, we would’ve worked and that would have been the end of the story. We did not have a choice in this situation and some were told on Thursday not to come in at all (we already knew the office building would be closed on Friday). How can it be legal for a company and a buildings management to tell us not to come in, giving us no choice in the matter, but then have no responsibility to pay us? Bullshit.

This will be one more item on my list of laws to amend when I get myself elected, which should be sometime in the next 10 years. If you’d like to help with this issue and the numerous others I have planned to tackle over the years, feel free to send me an email and ask how you can help.

Looks like we made it

At 1102 am, we arrived in College Station, without a hitch. We drove 75mph the entire way without a slowdown except for exiting! We did see a couple hundred cars ditched on the sides of the road by people who ran out of gas. There was also a considerable amount of trash left by people who were stranded. Fortunately, we did not run out of gas and we just filled back up, at a reasonable price and without a line! Here, the first high clouds are starting to move in, although the sun is still shining though them. Now, there is a distinct line of clouds, so it's sort of cool to see the difference right in front of you. Anyway, there is nothing else new to report for now, so I will try to keep a good track of what is happening and when and report it here as soon as I can.

Running on empty

We received an email from a co-worker that headed to College Station at 5 am and arrived at 630 am which made us decide that it was a good idea to head out…immediately! Our one concern was running out of gas because I was down below half already from sitting yesterday. Nonetheless, I sent this email at 9:02 am to friends and family:

Traffic is clear, we are trying for College Station one more time. I’ll email when we get there. Leaving…now! Bye!

Damn this traffic jam...It hurts my motor to go so slow...Damn this taffic jam!

My next email, around 9 pm:

Hi everyone,

Well, as some of you noted in your emails to me, you hoped that the traffic was not as bad as seen on TV. Actually, it was worse. We went 2 miles in about 1 hour, then got off the freeway because we needed to use the bathroom, called some people who had been watching traffic on TV and they told us it wasn’t moving faster anytime soon. We then decided at that point to come home and try again later tonight after they figured out how to move a million cars off the freeways.

The secondary problem was that we had used a ¼ tank of gas while sitting in traffic because it was 100 degrees today and we needed to run the A/C. Even in the A/C, the cat was panting and we needed to wrap her in a cold towel to cool her down. There have been many, many people who have run out of gas while sitting on the freeways, which isn’t helping the traffic-jams any and we didn’t want to be four of those people (S, her sister & fiancé and me) and 2 animals ( in two separate cars)! Hence, as I said, we have come home and made a number of alternative plans. The one we are going with as of now is to stay with some friends here in Houston who have an older model, sturdy house that has hurricane shutters on the windows. They also have a generator and lots of food and supplies. We dropped off most of our stuff already and are going to stay at my apartment tonight and head over there in the morning around 8 or 9.

Another alternative is to wait a few more hours to see what happens with the traffic and then try again for College Station. I am not thrilled with either of these options, but at this point, I’d rather not be stuck in a car on the freeway…that was hell on a different scale than that of New Orleans. Of course, I will let everyone know something when we make a decision. In any event, it is still very muggy, about 85 degrees, but the stars and moon are out, the clouds will probably roll in overnight and the winds pick up tomorrow afternoon.

The positive news in all of this, well, for us at least, is that the hurricane is tracking more eastward, which means we will get weaker side of the storm, as of now anyway. Well, that’s the only update I can give for now, but I will try to keep everyone informed as best I can. I will tell you that we are trying to be as safe as possible, but again, it isn’t likely we are moving out of the city.

On the road again...

An email I sent to family & friends around 11 am Thursday:

Hi everyone,

In case you haven’t seen the news, Hurricane Rita is bearing down on Houston and we are leaving town in about 1 hour. We are going to College Station, Texas, which is about 90 miles northwest of here and it is also where Texas A&M Univ. is. We have a place to stay with some friends up there. Personally, I don’t think this is far enough away, but I can’t convince anyone to go elsewhere. I filled up with 33$ in gas this morning, we have lots of supplies/water and enough alcohol to stay pretty buzzed for a few days! I think we took a case of rum and hurricane mix off the shelf. Anyway, I just wanted to let you all know that we should be fine, the cat is coming with us and hopefully my apartment will stay dry. I will have my laptop with me and assuming we have power and a signal to the internet there, I should be able to check my email regularly. I’ll send an update as soon as I can.

Rock You Like a Hurricane.

This is from an email sent by my girlfriends father to her and her sister, both living here in Houston. Without this email, we would still be following these instructions because I don’t laugh in the face of danger, I get the hell out of its way! We will be leaving on Thursday night after we all get home from work around 8, pack up some clothes, laptops, iPods, food, water and important belongings and then load up the animals. No, we aren’t building an ark, but we are taking 2 dogs and a cat with at least 4, possibly 6-8 people. I’m sure this weekend will be interesting to say the least.

Bad things happen to people who do not take the force of nature seriously (arrogant people), and stupid people. Misfortune rarely has something to do with solely Black or White. With that aside, I as a weather guru extraordinaire would seriously encourage you to do the following:
Add the weather channel website to your list of favorites; so you can monitor this thing from work and home. THE THINGS TO MONITOR ARE:

It's path

It's strength

http://www.weather.com/maps/news/atlstorm18/projectedpath_large.html

Keep in contact with your respective employers, and understand their emergency plans and your responsibilities therein.

Ya'll get together and try to decide if you need to act aggregately or singly.

Assuming the projected path, which you will be constantly monitoring, keeps Houston in its Bull's Eye, or the path is to your south (which is really worse) and assuming it is a Category 2 or greater, make plans to get the hell out of Dodge (or Houston as the case may be) by no later than Thursday night.

It appears that your best path would be to go east. This thing looks like it will go right through Dallas after it makes landfall. The only problem with East is you would have to almost come home to Florida to avoid all the damage from Katrina. Going west will be okay. The West side of a hurricane is the weakest. The N.E. quadrant has the highest winds and storm surge. I know heading east seems to be a dichotomy, but do you know someone with whom you can stay somewhere significantly west of Houston? You probably do, and you would be closer to coming back home sooner. You know you are always welcome at home, but are at least 12 hours away.

"Bottom Dwellers" I would either move the furniture you care about upstairs or elevate it off the floor with blocks or something.

If you are being aggregate refugees (yes refugees exist in America), I would recommend moving residual autos to the 2nd or higher floor of a parking garage. A, remember Allison?

Ladies, please take this seriously if it does become a 3 or 4, if you are stuck there, hurricanes are pretty scary. S and A were just little girls in 1985, when Hurricane Kate came through here. It was only a Category 2, and the town looked like a war zone, and we didn't have power or water for a week. I know Houston's resources are better, but so will be the damage.

Last of all remember. Things are not worth protecting, lives are. Somehow your respective employers businesses will survive without you for a day or two. Keep me informed, and I will reciprocate.

Love,
Dad

Everywhere you go, you always take the weather with you.

Here we go again. Another hurricane has the potential to slam the Gulf Coast. In the meantime, Gov. Jeb Bush has already declared a state of emergency in Florida and the Keys and Miami are bracing for what is currently Tropical Storm Rita. The Florida national guard is readying itself and I would assume a team from FEMA will be heading down there quickly.

The real issue isn't Florida, it's the Gulf Coast. After this storm breezes through the lower 1/3 of Florida, it will then fester in the open waters of the Gulf of Mexico, which is exactly what Katrina did before it wrecked the coastline and a major American city. Here in Houston, I am already thinking about my options if this storm heads our way. The cat and I may be taking another long road trip! In any case, I am in dire hope that whatever happens with this storm, it is handled 1000 times better than the aftermath of Katrina. I'll have to keep updated on the track and strength of this storm and it will surely be noted here every now and then.