Hurricane Survival Guide

Goodness, we woke up to some crazy weather this morning! We haven't paid much attention to Ike since we saw it was going to Texas, but we had some REALLY high winds this morning already.

In the spirit of hurricane season, I am posting something that was passed on to me. It is written by someone who lives here in Baton Rouge. It is really funny, and right on!

Gustav's Guide to Hurricane Survival
Lessons Learned During and After the Storm
The hurricane grouch quotient can be calculated by adding the number of children and pets in a home without power, multiplied by the number of days quoted on the Entergy telephone recording, divided by the number of fans or portable air conditioners powered by your home generator, (however if you were last in line at Home Depot and have no generator then multiply by the daily high for that day reported by either Pat Shingleton or Jay Grymes), then add the number of trips to the washateria and the days left until school opens. Discount by the percentage of time spent at neighbors who have power. Recalculate as often as necessary No matter how many times you flick the switch, lights don't work without electricity.
Vienna sausages only appear on the food pyramid during hurricane season.
Gas mileage is recalculated based on miles per fume.
Lovebugs do not disappear in 80mph wind gusts.
Disasters can cancel one LSU football game but there will be even bigger casualties if we cancel two.
Despite protests, kids can re-live their parents' youth when there were only 3 tv channels!
Cats are even more irritating without power.
Baton Rouge without traffic lights resembles Mexico City, Rome, Los Angeles and New York City all rolled into a single snarl.
A 7 lb bag of ice will chill 6-12 oz beers to a drinkable temperature in 11 minutes, and still keep a 14 lb. turkey frozen for 8 more hours.
There are/were a lot of really big trees around here!
Just because you're 18 doesn't mean you can stay out as late as you want. Mayor Holden meant business when he said curfew.
People will get into a line that has already formed without having any idea what the line is for.
Calories consumed during a hurricane or power outage do not count.
Telemarketers function no matter what the weather is doing. New Delhi does not check the weather report in Baton Rouge.
Most popular text message after September 1: do u hve pwr Twenty-seven of your neighbors are fed from a different transformer than you, and they are quick to point that out!
Crickets and cicadas can increase their volume to overcome the sound of 14 generators.
Dirty clothes in an unsupervised hamper multiply at an exponential rate.
Coffee, spaghetti and frozen pizzas can be made on a grill.
He who has the biggest generator wins.
Tree service companies are under-appreciated, except after hurricanes.
Our Lady of the Lake never closes. Really.
Water will fill the Acadian Thruway underpass, even sometimes when it is not raining.
There are a lot more stars in the sky than most people thought.
If you owned a store that sold only ice, chain saws, gas and generators, you would be rich With only a small amount of guilt South Louisiana can collectively pray a second hurricane to landfall in another state or country.
And so to our friends and families, some who are still without power and others who have endured great personal loss, you are in our prayers.
Hang in there, we are making progress. Thank you to all our first responders, healthcare professionals, service technicians, teachers, police officers, small business owners, and more who join with the thousands of individuals sharing their time and talent to help restore our community to wholeness.
The most important lesson of all learned from Gustav in the last week is that the human spirit has an amazing resilience that even a hurricane cannot bend. Through God*s love and amazing grace we can endure all things.

*If you don't know what lovebugs are, consider yourself very blessed! They are the annoying little black bugs that fly through the air attached to each other (hence the name). They don't bite, but they get everywhere! They last for a couple of weeks. I was hoping the hurricane would get rid of them, but no way... I think they're worse!!

Have a great weekend!