Month: September 2005

i got the certified copy of my divorce paperwork today. it didn’t make me feel closure, or better, or happy, or relieved, or anything. it just makes me sad because it makes me think about the choices my (ex-)wife has made and where our lives are now because of it. this is so far from anything i ever wanted or expected for my life or from her. but there isn’t anything i can do about it. i have no choice but to try and move on, to try and create a new life on a new track. i wish it were easier.
last week i ordered one of the posters they put out for eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. it’s the one with kate winslet and it says “would you erase me?” (poignant on so many levels.) i’ll get it framed to go next to my bottle rocket poster.

jamie and i may be disagreeing in the comments section of my “home again, home again” post, but we both agree on this: the media was over the top. here’s a shirt design suggestion from her:
i survived […] hurricane rita
so even if she doesn’t understand why it’s okay to compare these events to the boy crying wolf, she knows the media went overboard.

nothing to report. some small twigs and leaves blown out of trees. no looting. my power never even went out. to emphasize how little happened: i had two cheap, light, plastic lawn chairs on the deck in my back yard (that i left as “missles” just to spite “the man”)…they weren’t even knocked over. i’m sure there are more impressive stories to be told by those in far east Texas and west louisiana.
oh yeah, dave left so i’m officially no longer harboring any rita refugees…er…evacuees.

had a good night’s sleep last night. i am about to check out of the hotel and head home. tv appears to have gone back to normal programming. i think for the most part they finally gave up on getting much excitement out of rita. i’m sure as they find areas where there was exceptional wind or water damage they’ll play it up. as of last night, there was one known death from the weather itself, and that was a tornado in mississippi if i recall. i’m not going to say nothing at all happened, because it did, but considering the froth on the mouths of the reporters – especially here in houston – the fable of the boy crying wolf comes to mind. (i hear raj already made a similar comment on his blog…i haven’t checked other sites yet.) i’m so glad i don’t normally watch tv…i’m not sure i could mentally take it.

i got about 1 1/2 hours of sleep, then got up to eat supper in the hotel. it was nice to have a warm meal that didn’t consist of junk food. not that the food was that good. dave appeared to have not died in the hurricane, and in fact seemed nominal. i guess getting to hunker down in a $400/night room for free on some other company’s bill agreed with him. i decided to spend my own time in the crowne plaza tonight since it was already paid for. i did have to pony up $10 for 24 hours of wireless access. you have to pay for wireless in a $400/night hotel! so i’m sitting here watching cable tv, drinking some coffee, and getting online. boy, this is exciting. i’ll be going back to my house tomorrow after i check out of the hotel. hopefully no trees fell over and no idiots broke into my house. i’m not too worried, but you never know. in dumb news, i actually forgot my cell charger at my house, so even once i got back to the hotel i couldn’t use my cell phone. oh well.

been up since 9am working to get all the systems back up at the data center. mostly done, but i’m tired. i’m going back to the hotel to take a nap. maybe i can get access to some of the videos we made last night. i guess i’ll eventually get home someday. at least i’m not stuck with all the evacuees, waiting my turn to get back into town.
i’ve not talked to dave since…uh…yesterday afternoon. i wonder if he’s enjoying his free stay in the hotel? my cell went dead yesterday evening because i didn’t know i’d stay in the data center and i left my charger in the hotel room.

got about 5 hours of low quality sleep. thankfully, work provided an air matress or it would have been no quality sleep. meanwhile, i went outside and it was basically the same as last night…some wind, a bit of mist/rain now and then, occasionally a bit of a gust. nothing too bad. looks like it’s going to be much worse for those that evacuated and are trying now to return than those of us who stayed.
i’m curious to see if anything happened at my house, but i’m still at the data center at work. i’ve still got power there because my answering machine is working. i sure could go for a nice hot breakfast with some meat and eggs. maybe tomorrow.

well, i must admit the winds picked up some. enough that it was almost worth it to be outside. but we eventually bored of amusing ourselves with fake news reports and retired back to safety inside. now i’m back in the data center and i guess i’m going to go to bed. i’m sure the news reporters will continue to tell dramatic stories about the horrible, crazy, scary, cataclysmic things that are happening all around me. i’ll try my best to sleep through it.

just went outside the data center. the hurricane is still officially lame. i don’t care what the stupid over-zealous news reporters say. if people have any sense (questionable), they’ll realize this and when something really bad *does* eventually happen, no one will believe the news. they are absurd. yes, there’s wind. yes, there’s rain. yes, some places will have some wind damage, downed power lines, transformers blowing, etc. but this is nowhere near the disaster they predicted, nor the one they have continually tried to act like was going to happen, then maybe going to happen, then still might possibly happen, then they just gave up and started fabricating bogus stories that were laughable as the deployed reporters tried to act like the waves were crazy, the rain was horizontal, the wind was blowing them around, etc. it’s completely pathetic.
in other news, we’re about to go outside and record our own news story. i hope we make it back alive…

well, i’m in the data center at work now. i checked into the hotel around 1pm. my room is on the 9th floor, facing toward the northeast. we went outside about an hour ago on top of an 8-floor garage. not much wind, no rain yet. no excitement. saw on tv the quality humans who take advantage of situations to loot and break into things have started early. i hope some of them meet someone with a weapon and good aim. looks like new orleans may end up worse than houston. but we’ve got about 24 hours before we can see what actually occurred on the Texas coast.