We're Legal

Tommorrow October 1st, Kathy and I will be married 21 years. It's official; our marriage is now of legal age. It's hard to believe that we have been married that long. It certainly doesn't seem like it anyhow (it may to my wife). What is really freaky is that we have been married for over half of Kathy's life. She was nineteen when we got married, just a baby. We don't have any special plans for our anniversary. I'm sure we'll go out to dinner or something like that. With us going on vacation in a couple of weeks we have decided to celebrate on our cruise.

Anyhow I just want Kathy to know that I can't imagne spending the last 21 years without her and I hope we're blessed with many, many more years together. I also want her to know that I Love her more today than I did the day we were married. It hasn't always been easy but it certainly has been interesting and never boring. I Love You Gorgeous!

There, now I don't need to waste the $2.95 on the card.

Meat Sweats

Sunday after church we went to lunch at the Olive Garden. Kiel said he was very hungry so he decided to order a side of meatballs with his entree. Kiel is notorious for ordering a lot of food and then not eating hardly any of it. We told Kiel that the side of meatballs was an additional $1.95 and that if he didn’t eat them he would be very sorry. He assured us that it wouldn’t be a problem and he could easily eat them. We all ate our salad and breadsticks and then our meals came. They gave Kiel his meal and side of meatballs. Let me say this before I move on. I honestly believe that my mother (Rose Mary) makes the best meatballs in the world, they are incredible. Because of this I can’t order spaghetti and meatballs when I go out to a restaurant. I’m spoiled. Kiel must have had his grandmother’s meatballs on his mind when he ordered these things. However, what he got was something from another meatball dimension. These were not his grandma’s meatballs.

These ‘things’ were gray and hard and dry and filled with specks similar to sawdust. Did I mention they were gray? They weren’t natural. No one said anything at first. I think we all wanted to see if Kiel had the courage to actually eat one of these things. Kiel smiled as if he knew what we were thinking. He looked at the meatballs and then at us and said “No Problem”. We’ll see. After swallowing several bites of his meatball he stopped and said “These things aren’t meatballs, they're meat wads.” Disgusting I know but he was right, they weren't meatballs. Even though these things were nasty I couldn’t help but remind him that he said that he would eat them and that this wouldn’t be a problem. “I know, I know – I’ll eat them don’t worry” he said. Now it was getting fun. I must say in some demented way, I enjoyed watching him struggle with these gray lumps of mass. He couldn’t quite figure out how to attack them. He tried small bites. He tried taking a drink with them. He tried adding sauce. He tried adding some pasta with them. Nothing worked. That is until he got ill. At first I thought he was faking like he used to do when he was little. When the sweat started to accumulate sweat on his brow and his face went pale, I knew he had enough. He excused himself and went to the rest room ‘to get rid of these awful things’. (I’m not exactly sure you want to know how he did that) After purging himself of this evil, he returned and kind of slumped over in the booth until the rest of us finished eating. Being the sympathetic group we are, we started teasing him.

We told him that he had fallen victim to the ‘Meat Sweats’. You ever have them? It is where you either eat bad meat or you consume way too much meat and you have a reaction. You feel extremely bloated, miserable, uncomfortable and you sweat profusely, hence the name ‘Meat Sweats’. I must confess that I am the one who normally gets the Meat Sweats. I usually eat too much steak or sausage and spend the remainder of the evening recovering from this awful condition. This happened when we went to Chicago this past summer and met our friends Kery and Brenda. We ate dinner with them in Chicago and I got the Meat Sweats. Kery asked what that was and I explained it to him. From that point on he kind of modified the name of this disease. Whenever he looked at me for the rest of the evening Kery would say in a thick Chicago accent “Ronnie’s got the Beef Sweats”. Not exactly the same thing but I got the point. By the way, Katlin does a dead on impression of Kery saying this – it’s incredibly funny.

As is the case with the Meat Sweats, time is you friend. Sooner or later this condition will ‘pass’ if you know what I mean. If you ever find yourself with the Meat Sweats don’t drink a lot of water. You’ll be tempted to but it will only make matters worse. If you do you’ll feel more bloated and sweat worse. Just be patient and let nature takes its course. Getting back to Kiel for a moment, he never did finish his meatballs or his pasta for that matter. He went home, rested and felt better several hours later. I wasn’t too upset though. For a $1.95 it was great entertainment.

Jeanne

As much as I hate to do it, I find have to. I need to briefly mention Hurricane Jeanne. Warren (Kathy's dad) called us a little after 7:30AM this morning and let us know that they made it through the storm. They took a direct hit from Hurricane Jeanne late last night and early this morning. The eye passed directly over them. Warren was very, very upset. He lives in a retirement community in Avon Park near Sebring. Warren and his girlfriend Jean rode the storm out at Warrens house, they had close to 100mph winds. Like I said they are safe, a bit shaken up but Ok. However, Warren's house suffered some pretty significant damage. He said the entire carport and screen room were ripped up and over the top his house into a spot between his house and his neighbors yard. He noticed his car was scratched up a bit as well. He hasn't had a chance to get out and get on the roof or really investigate the damage because the winds are still pretty stiff. He did say that his girlfriend Jeans house appears to have made it through without any damage. Warren said he would never ride out another hurricane it was just to scary. They are without water and power, they have no idea for how long. Please keep Warren and Jean in your thoughts and prayers as they begin to digout from this storm. We're just thankful that they are fine and did not get hurt.

We are now in a Tropical Storm Warning meaning we are going to get some wind and rain from this storm. How much, we're not sure. The storm is supposed to start turning north away from us but once it gets in the gulf anything can happen. We'll keep an eye on it and do what we need to do to keep safe. We'll let you know if anything significant happens with this storm and the impact on us. Hope everyone is well and having a good weekend.

What Bothers You?

I am bound and determined to make a post that has nothing to do with hurricanes. So here it goes. I find getting older interesting, particularly when it comes to what bothers me. It seems that some things that never bothered me really bother me now. For example, arrogant people get on my last nerve. I simply don’t have time for them. Once I get a whiff of their “all that and a bag of chips” attitude I check out mentality. Start talking about how great you are or how important you are and you can color me gone. I’ve found that people who act arrogant are actually very insecure about themselves. I realize that this is not the right attitude to have but I’m being very honest here.

I also don’t have any patience when it comes to ‘spin’. You know ‘spin’, the art of trying to make things seem better then what they really are. It’s when I know something to be one way but someone tells me not to believe my lying eyes and believe them. This really jerks my chain. Politicians, Hollywood, Public Relations firms, Madison Avenue, Lawyers and yes organized religion are notorious for churning out spin. The idea that I can’t make up my own mind based upon the facts is insulting. I don’t need anyone to decipher the truth for me, that’s why I’m married (kidding). Just be honest and give it to me straight. Don’t blow smoke up my butt and tell me it’s a cool breeze.

While I’m on roll, know what else ticks me off? Mean People. What is so hard about being nice once in awhile? I know at some point in time everyone has a bad day or gets pissed off but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about a day in and day out attitude of being a jerk – a conscious decision to be rude. What we're really talking about is a person who is unhappy. And because they are unhappy they want everyone around them to be unhappy too. So they spread their meanness around like manure and stink up the joint in the process. Just like the bumper sticker says ‘Mean People Suck’.

Now let me stop right here, get off my high horse and honestly admit that I’m a very flawed person. There is no doubt that I’ve been arrogant, mean and dished out spin. So quit rolling your eyes at me okay, you’re beginning to bother me. They are other things that bother me as well but I’ll stop my rant right here. What’s interesting is that when I was younger these things really didn’t bother me. Perhaps it was because I was “one of them”, an arrogant, mean-spirited spin doctor? That’s one theory; maybe it was because I simply never noticed. Could I have been so self absorbed with all that was going on in my life that I never paid attention? That’s possible too. But what I really think happened is that I simply ignored these things. You know an ‘Ignorance is Bliss’ kind of thing. Now as I get older I don’t have the patience to ignore them like I used to. I thought as you got older you were supposed to develop more patience. I find myself being challenged more and more by these kind of things. The issue is how do I react when I encounter these types of people and behaviour. What's the old saying "Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you respond to it". I believe that to be true.

You’re probably wondering ‘Gee Ron, who peed in your cereal bowl this morning?” Actually no one did…..today. About a month ago I had an interesting experience on a plane ride home from Missouri that really got to me. Since that time I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. I am going to try something a bit different here and put up a two part post about that experience and the lessons I learned from it. I’ll try to put the first post out sometime this weekend and the other early next week. You might be surprised by what happens, I know I certainly was. In the meantime, leave me a comment and let me know 'What Bothers You' as well (as long as it’s not me). I'll be interested in hearing what you have to say...

Getting Back to Normal

Alrighty. I haven't posted in several days. Frankly, I just didn't feel like it after last week. I felt like I was either posting to the blog or checking it every other minute during the hurricane. So I have stayed away from it for a few days, but I'm back now. I'm not sure if I'm going to leave all the post about the hurricane on the blog or not. There is a part of me that wants to take them down cause they violate intent of what this blog is about. I mean they served their purpose in passing information along but now that the storms over I don't know if I want them hanging around. I'll think about it for a few days. Let me know if you think they should stay or go. We're pretty much back to normal, which means we're busy. Don't have much to say right now. Will post more when I have the time. Hope everyone is well.

Back Home Again...

We are back home in Panama City. We left Jacksonville at abut 8:30AM and made it to Ron's parents by 1:30PM. The traffic on I-10 was heavy but steady so we made decent time. It was amazing the number of utility and tree trucks we encounterd on the way home. I haven't seen caravans of vechicles like that in years. It was cool to see how much help was on the way.

We got to my parents house first. Their place did really well in the storm. They had no damage on thier property. They did have ALOT of limbs down on thier property, so they'll have a fair bit of yard work to get it looking spiffy again. We picked up Ron's truck and Kiel's car that were parked in thier garage and drove home. I must confess I was a bit nervous not knowing exactly what to expect upon returning home. However, my worrying was for nothing. We didn't have any damage to our house either. Just like my parents, we had a lot of tree limbs and pine needles in our yard. So we feel very, very fortunate not to have any damage.

We unloaded the van and went to work. Kathy stayed inside and unpacked us, did laundry and cleaned out the refridge. We had to through away alot of food since we were without power for nearly 24 hours. The boys and I tackled the yard - first we took the boards off the windows then we picked up limbs, mowed, used the blower and put everything back in the yard where it belongs. It took the three of us about three hours to get looking normal again. It normally takes all three of us about an hour, so there was alot more work than usual but it looks good.

I spoke to my next door neighbor and he told me about the hurricane and the tornados (he stayed). He said we had a tornado drop down from the sky about 1/2 mile from our house and before it touched it went back up and then moved on and landed in Callaway. He said he thought we were going to get hit bigtime. Most people we have spoke to say that the Hurricane portion of the storm wasn't too bad because the storm went west a bit - we did get some pretty fiesty winds though. They have said that the tormados that came from the hurricane were unbelievably scary, a dozen of them hit town an hour. I don't need to see any more tornados have seen enough of them in Illinois.

I'm sure we'll have more stories and experiences to pass on as we speak with our friends. Right now we wanted everyone to know that we made it home safely and that our home has no damage and we have cleaned up from the storm. So our house hold is pretty much back to normal. We haven't been in town yet to see how things are looking and if business's are getting back to normal. Thanks to everyone for your thoughts, prayers, phone calls and emails. We appreciate your concern and support.

Ron, Kathy, Kiel and Katlin

Storm Update - Thursday Evening - Sep 16th

Spoke to a couple of friends and neighbors today and this is what we know. There was a mandatory curfew until 2:00PM today in Panama City. If you were out driving before that time you were going to get arrested. We also found out at about 8:00PM tonight we got electricity/power back in our neighborhood! Yeah! It was out for less than 24 hours and that is very good news. Just to make sure, Kathy called our house and got our answering machine. Our friends also said that not much is open at this time just a couple of mini-marts and a Waffle House. Waffle Houses are kinda like cock roaches, you could set off a nuclear bomb and they both would survive. Maybe it’s the cock roaches at the Waffle Houses that keeps them standing? Hmmm.

Also, one of our friends drove by our house and said that other than all the debris (which everyone has) in our yard there was no noticeable damage to our house. Yeah Again! They did say that our neighbor behind us lost a tree and it may be in our yard or knocked down our privacy fence, they weren’t sure. One of other friends is going to go to our house tomorrow and walk around the house and let us know how it looks. But so far that is good news. We have no word how things are at my parent’s house. If the power remains on, we plan on returning to Panama City on Saturday morning. We’ll have plenty to cleanup once we get home. Between our house and my parents I believe we will be busy for the remainder of the weekend. Haven’t really heard much new about how things are in Panama City and have really stayed away from the TV all day.

We didn’t do much today. Went to the mall (again) and then to dinner tonight which was exceptional. Didn’t exert ourselves too much, we’re saving ourselves for when we get home. We’re glad we left before the storm hit and have no regrets that we did. We’re actually having a good time just hanging out with my parents and doing a whole bunch of nothing. We’ll be busy again soon enough.

Not much else, except we appreciate everyone’s thoughts and prayers. They mean a lot to us. We ask that you continue to do remember us and our friends and neighbors in Panama City. Many of them have a long road in front of them.

We’ll keep you updated.

Storm Update - Thursday Morning Sep 16th

More info on the hurricane and what is happening in the Panama City area.

Calhoun County Emergency Management Officials confirmed that five persons were killed north of the Blountstown area Wednesday night. Blountstown is about 30 miles northeast of Panama City. The twister struck “multiple homes” and those killed were in different houses. It occurred around 8 PM Wednesday. There were numerous injuries but a firm number could not be given. There was so much damage over a scattered area that rescue workers had not yet been able to reach all of the injured.

Bay County Emergency Management Officials say at least 200 homes received heavy damage or were destroyed due to the rash of tornados. The Parker area of Panama City is the worst hit with emergency officials still conducting search and rescue operations.

3 mobile home parks in nearby Jackson County were hit by tornados. A total of 35 trailers were destroyed and four people were injured.

Kiel spoke to his friend this morning and was told that a tornado had touched down near Hwy 77 and Hwy 231 which is near the mall. No other details are available.

80 percent of the homes in Panama City are without electricity. We have called our house this morning and our answering is not picking up so we don’t have power either. We spoke with our neighbors and they said that we lost power around 5:00AM this morning. Our neighbor said that there is a lot of debris in the street but the houses in our neighborhood seem to be intact. No word on our house yet.

We’ll keep updating and letting you know the status of things as info becomes available.

Panama City Tornados - Wed 15 Sep

Here’s a summary of what we know and can verify to be true as it relates to the Hurricane Ivan and the impact on Panama City and the surrounding area. These reports have been verified by WJHG TV and WMBB TV.

Bay County Emergency representatives have confirmed that some 70 homes and mobile homes in Parker have been heavily damaged by tornados. There are many downed power lines in that area. This is about 5 miles from our house.

Reports say that there has been a great deal of damage to a trailer park in the Marianna area and all 16 or so trailers in this park have been destroyed by a tornado. Marianna is about 20 minutes from where Ron’s parents live. A twister also struck the Federal Prison at Marianna and there was damage, but the extent isn’t known yet.

The Bay County Sheriff announced a curfew for all of Bay County from 9:00 Wednesday night until 7:00 Thursday morning.

Two persons are dead as a string of tornados roared into Bay County late this afternoon. The twisters were spawned by Hurricane Ivan. In all, there were about a dozen tornados in a little more than an hour, and they stretched from one end of the county to the other. One person died in the Sandy Creek area when a twister demolished two houses. The second fatality came at Panama City Beach in an area off Thomas Drive near North Lagoon. A gentleman was visiting his daughter’s real estate firm, when the tornado struck. The fatality at Sandy Creek was killed when the tornado demolished her home. In addition, six people were injured including two Bay County sheriff’s deputies.

The Sheriff said Hamilton’s restaurant was heavily damaged; a number of businesses, fire station and homes in that area were demolished, including the famous Capt. Anderson’s Restaurant. The sheriff says two deputies and several customers were inside Hamilton’s at the time the twister hit and had to hang on to keep from being sucked out of the building.

Bay County School officials say two local schools have damage, Parker and Patronis Elementary Schools but the extent isn’t known yet.

Several tornados were reported in the Bayou George area. This is where Ron’s work is located, the extent of any damage to is not known at this time. However, I called my office and got my voice mail which means we still have power. We saw this on the Weather Channel.

We have called our house several time and got our answering machine which means we still have power, and to some degree a house. We do not know if we have any damage to the house, it’s simply too early to tell.

Sorry this post is not very well written but I just wanted to let you know the impact that this storm is having in Panama City.

Hurricane Update - Wednesday, Sep 15th

Its official we’re evacuees. We got up at about 3:15AM this morning to and left for my parents at 4:15AM. We left Kiel’s car and my truck in my parent’s garage and hit the road. We left my parent’s house by 5:00AM. We encountered only a little traffic in Tallahassee on our way to Jacksonville. Other than that it was clear sailing, no problems or delays at all. We made it to Jacksonville in four hours. We got here at 9:00AM our time, 10:00AM local time. We really haven’t done to much, ate breakfast and hung out until our hotel room was ready. We did find the local mall and Kathy was true to form. She only got 50 feet inside of the first store we entered and bought a pair of shoes. Then the second store she went in to she bought a new swimsuit. That’s my girl. Reminds me of the saying, “When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.”

We’re keeping an eye on the storm and watching what it will do. Waiting and wondering what is going to happen is the worst part. We are going to try and keep busy so we don’t drive ourselves crazy by staying in front of the TV. The boys brought their X-Box and games to keep them busy. We are going to find a movie theater so we can go to the movies. We’re also are going back to the mall, Kathy didn’t quite get the chance to conquer it. St. Augustine is very close so I think we may take a ride down there tomorrow. So there is plenty to keep our minds occupied.

We just wanted everyone to know that we got of Panama City without any problems and are doing fine in Jacksonville. Say a prayer for all who have stayed behind to ride this storm out. It’s going to be a long night in the panhandle. We’ll keep posting and let everyone what are plans are and what we intend to do. Right now we’re just hanging out. That’s all for now….

Hurricane Update - Tuesday Sep 14th

Here's the latest: both Kathy and I worked today. Kathy worked until about 1:00PM and I worked until 11:00AM but then went back in at 3:00PM to do backups and shut the network down. My work is shut down for the rest of the week, as Kathy has decided to do as well. Schools are also out for the rest of week too. Kiel is working tonight at Fridays. He was scheduled to work but they were short handed and asked him to come in early. Everything in town is closing up, especially resturants so I'll bet they'll be slammed. My parents, Butch and Rose Mary came by this morning and with the help of the boys boarded up the windows on the house. They did it while we were at work and knocked it out in about a half an hour. The boys also picked up the yard and put our chairs, plants etc. in the shed. So we have prepped the house the best we know how. Kathy and Katlin washed our dog KC and cut her nails. Kathy said KC is "Hurricane Ready". For the rest of the night she is an 'inside' dog.

We will be leaving our house at 5:00AM in the morning(Wednesday) and plan to be at Ron's parents by 5:30AM. We are taking all three of our vechiles with us. We plan to leave Ron's truck and Kiel's car in Ron's parents garage. We'll then leave in our van and my parents truck for Jacksonville, Florida. It is about 275 miles east of Panama City and out of the path of the hurricane. We will be staying at the:

La Qunita Inn Baymeadows
8255 Dix Ellis Trail
Jacksonville, FL
Phone: (804) 731-9940

We have the rooms booked for three nights (Wednesday, Thursday and Friday). If we need them longer we'll book them and stay. If all goes well we plan on returning Saturday morning, again anything can happen but that's the plan. Our friends Brian and Tina Franc are going to meet us at and stay at the same hotel. The Franc's live on the beach side of town and need to leave as well. They are good friends so it will help to have them along. Our now clean golden retriever KC will be making the trip with us as well (the hotel allows pets). We tried to get her in a kennel but they were all full. Also, I'll have my laptop with me and will be able to get email and update the blog. My email address is ron_cravatta@yamaha-motor.com so you can keep in touch with us that way as well.

The trickest part of this whole thing is that no one really knows exactly where this storm is going to make landfall. Trying to guess where it is going to hit is like trying to nail jello to the wall, it's almost impossible. As of the 5:00PM from the National Hurricane Center has Ivan making landfall around Mobile Alabama or the Florida/Alabama border. So they have moved it a bit more to the west, which is good news for us. However, it could do anything. Remember what just happened with Hurricane Charlie where it was predicted that landfall would be in Tampa but the storm turned inland about a hundred miles and took out Punta Gorda? That's the kind of thing you worry about. You want to be prepared but not paranoid. You simply have to err on the side of caution, which I'm willing to do. This storm is a huge monster so regadless of where it hits on the Gulf Coast, it will impact us here locally. The issue is to what degree. And that all depends on where Ivan makes landfall. The more west it goes the better for us - the more east it comes the worse it is for us.

That's all I know for now. Pray for our traveling safety and that we beat the exodus out of town(also that the big screen TV makes it through the storm). I'll probably update sometime tomorrow afternoon/evening once we get settled in Jacksonville. Leave us a comment or send us an email, we would love to hear from you. Take care and we'll be in touch...

Hurricane Ivan Update - Monday Sep 13

The purpose of this blog is going to change for the time being. I'm going to use it simply as a communication tool to let everyone know what's going on with the hurricane and what we are doing and what will be doing. Here's the latest as of 6:00PM Monday night. Keep in mind that hurricanes can and do change quickly. Right now Ivan is predicted to make landfall in Pensacola sometime early Thursday afternoon. Pensacola is 2 hours west of and about 120 miles away, which is good news. The bad news is that were are right hand side (east) which is considered the 'bad' side of the hurricane. They say the winds are worst on that side as the whip around the hurricane. Frankly the hurricane experts are unsure of the exact tract. So as time passes this can and will change.

At 5:00PM the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) in our county called for mandatory evacuations of homes in low lying areas and near the water. The evacuations are to begin tomorrow at 11:00AM. We do not live in a low lying area or near the water. If/when we evacuate, which we will probably do, it will be voluntary. The public schools in Bay County have canceled school for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The primary reason is to use them as shelters for people who have no where to go. So they need to get the schools ready to be shelters. All county offices will also be closed with the provision that can be reopened if storm takes a more westerly track. This will be reevaluated at 7:00AM in the morning and a final decision will be made. I (Ron) have to work tomorrow and depending on how the storm tracks, make a decision to leave tomorrow night or very, very early Wednesday. They say we can expect Gale force winds by 11:00AM Wednesday.

Right now we don't know where we are going to go. We are still thinking about and discussing it. It all really depends upon what track the storm takes after it makes landfall. It has changed a couple of times, so we are just going to wait and see. We would like to go only a travel a few hours if possible but to some place out of the storm track. We'll talk to my parents and decide what is best. Once we leave I'll have my laptop with me so I can make post to the blog and let everyone know where we are, how to get in touch with us and what are plans are from that point on. But as of tonight we are going to stay home, get ready, pack and decide what we are going to do. We'll keep you updated as to what is going on. Take care and stay dry.

Ivan The Terrible

OK - I know everyong is getting tired of hearing me talk about hurricanes and I'm getting tired of talking about them. This is getting really old. The latest info from the National Hurricane Center shows Hurricane Ivan taking a more westerly track away from the Florida pennnisula and into the panhandle near us. We've been through alot of hurricanes in 15 years of living down here and have only evacuated once. That was in 1995 for Hurricane Opal. If this storm continues as is, I believe we will need to or be ordered to evacuate. This is a major hurricance cable of doing major damage. They rate hurricanes on a scale of 1 to 5 and 5 is the worst. This storm is rated a 5. I was talking to a officer in charge of one of the flying squadrons at Tyndall Air Force Base today at Katlin's soccer game. He said that they were going to make a decision this afternoon/evening about moving the jets from Tyndall to somewhere in Texas to get them away from the storm. He also said they were going to make a decision about closing the base and have the base personnel leave.

I went and bought plywood today to board up the house if we have to leave. We are keeping the gas tanks in cars topped off and have plenty of cash on hand. I'm unsure where we will evacuate to, obviously somewhere out of the storms path. As you can see by the picture about it is expected to make landfall somtime Wednesday afternoon/evening. There is plenty of time between now and then and alot can change. So we are watching it very closely and will be able to react on a moments notice. We're just getting prepared. At this time, the storm is also projected to make landfall about 1 1/2 hours east of us near Appalachicola. Which is very close.

Like I said, we are going to watch it very close and keep you posted as to what we intend to do.

Not Another Hurricane...

Kathy's dad (Warren) left for home on Wednesday morning. Kathy spoke to him last night and he was missing a few shingles from his roof and other minor damage. All in all they were lucky...again. Hopefully Ivan stays away from them else they may need to leave again. The way it's looking now, Florida is once again the target. The last thing we need is another hurricane to hit. Kiel's girlfriend (Liz) left on Tuesday afternoon. She had a few delays getting home but got home late Tuesday night. About 2-3 hours later than expected. So all our company is gone for now. But like I said, we'll see what Hurricane Ivan has up his sleeve. Who knows Ivan may even come our way. Hopefully we won't see Warren again before our cruise next month. Not that I don't want to see him but just under the circumstances. Speaking of our cruise, we leave the middle of next month on a 7 day cruise. All four of us along with Butch and Rose Mary (Ron's Parents) and Warren (Kathy's dad) and Jean (Warren's girlfriend) will be going together. There will be eight of us going together. We'll be leaving from New Orleans and are supposed to go to Jamacia, Grand Cayman and Cozumel. There may be nothing left of the islands after Ivan passes through. Regardless it will be fun.

Not much else this week, we're all busy with work and school. Everything is going well, for being a short week it seems very long. Please keep us in your prayers we have some major decisions to make and want to do the right thing. Can't say much about it right now but we will at the proper time. Hope everyone is well - I'll try to post more this weekend.

Labor Day Weekend Recap

Kind of like I expected, the long weekend was both fun and interesting. Warren (Kathy's dad) made it up Thursday night to escape Hurricane Frances. Liz (Kiel's girlfriend) made it in from Lousiana on Thursday night as well. We all went to Mexico Beach on Friday and met up with Butch and Rose Mary (Ron's Parents). Mexico Beach was awesome, the weather was simply beautiful on Friday, Saturday and Sunday until about 5:00PM. There was no one at the hotel we stayed at and at the beach because of the oncoming hurricane. In terms of the weather it couldn't have been any nicer. We are all sun burned pretty good. We all had a great time relaxing, playing in the water, throwing the football and of course eating. Butch fixed his famous buttermilk pancakes for breakfast and then he did a shrimp boil as well. It was a great time.

Saturday morning we were in the pool messing around and I (Ron) decided to try walking on my hands in the pool. I did pretty good and went a long way but I didn't go straight. I ended up walking into the side of the pool head first. No one in my family was kind enough to stop me and I about knocked myself out. When I surfaced I was a hurting unit. Kathy came over and all she was concerned about was "all this hair on the side of my face". Come to find out, I scapled myself and took off a patch of hair about the size of a quarter on the top of my head. No kidding, it looks like someone just took an electric razor and cut a patch out. Time for the old comb over.

About 5:30PM on Sunday the weather got bad, I mean real bad. It got really dark, the wind was gusting near 50mph and the rain was coming down side ways. We found out that the bridge we crossed to get to Mexico Beach closed when the wind was over 50mph. So we made a decision and decided to not to spend Sunday night at the hotel and come home. We packed in about 15 minutes, checked out and were fully refunded our last night. We came home, unpacked, ate dinner and settled in to ride the storm out. At about 1:00AM this morning the weather started getting bad. The power was flickering on and off and then stayed off for about 1 1/2. We woke up at about 8:00AM and started checking things out. Kathy went outside and said "Hey, our tree is down!". The storm had knocked over an oak tree in our front yard. Fortunately it fell towards the road and away from the house. It also didn't hit any of the cars parked in the yard. If it was going to fall, it fell in a good place. We notice about 3 different wires tangled up in the tree. So we called the power company and cable company so they could remove them. Both of them came out within in 2 hours. I also called Butch and he came by with his chain saw, trailer and a friend. We had the tree cut up and out of our yard by noon. Like I said, we were fortunate. Other than that the impact of the storm has been limited. It made landfall about 2 hours east of us - we got lucky again.

Warren and Jean have talked to folks at thier park in Avon Park and the damage they received has been minimal to non-existent. We were all glad to hear that. I believe that they are thinking about heading home on Wednesday. However, they may be back depending on what Hurricane Ivan does. Liz heads home Tuesday afternoon. It has been great having her here. She has fit in well, we have been teasing and having fun with her. She is a sweet girl and we have enjoyed getting to know her better.

All in all we had great weekend. Like I said Mexico Beach was great and everyone enjoyed it. So much so that we decided to move Thanksgiving dinner from our house to Mexico Beach this year. The El Governor Hotel is running an incredible 3 day special over the Thanksgiving holiday and we decided to take advantage of it. We booked three rooms and each room has a full kitchen. So we'll try something a bit different this year for Thanksgiving. If you're interested in joining us let me know and I'll tell you about the special they are running. The more the merrier. I really believe that Mexico Beach is one of Florida's best kept secrets. It's beautiful, inexpensive and not crowded. Enough for now, it's been a great weekend but I need to start getting around for the work week. Hope everyone is well and had as much fun as we did.

Here are some pictures from the past weekend.

Mexico Beach

View of Mexico Beach from the deck of the El Governor Hotel. It's hard to believe that a Hurricane is on it's way. This picture was taken Saturday afternoon, notice how calm the water is and how few people were on the beach.

Sunset at Mexico Beach

Katlin taking a break from skim boarding to check out the sunset.

Liz and Kiel at Sunset

Liz and Kiel sitting on the sea wall in Mexico Beach. To be that young again...

Frances, Boop and The Hottie

It's been a short but interesting week, but for all intents and purposes the work week is over. Both Kathy and I have tomorrow (Friday) off and it is a holiday weekend. So that means four, count em', four days off. This is probably one of my favorite weekends of the year. We spend this weekend at Mexico Beach with Butch & Rose Mary (Ron's Parents). We each rent a room at the annex (not the highrise) at the El Governor Hotel. The rooms are beach front - you walk out the front door and there's the Gulf of Mexico. The rooms come with fully equipped kitchens, so we prepare our own meals. We'll go out Friday morning and come back Monday afternoon. This is basically our kick-back, do-nothing, eat-a-bunch and relax weekend. We'll go to the beach, eat, swim at the pool, eat, take a nap, eat - then have breakfast. We've been going for about 5 or 6 years now and look forward to going every year. It's a lot of fun.

I have the feeling that this won't be our normal Mexico Beach weekend. There is a major Hurricane (Frances) in the Atlantic that is going to hit the Florida Peninsula and may cross into the Gulf of Mexico. We are unsure how it is going to effect us and our weekend. We're just going to have to keep an eye on it and act accordingly. Warren (Boop), Kathy's dad called us last night and let us know that they will be coming up to our house sometime today. They don't feel like enduring another Hurricane and frankly I don't blame them. The storm is supposed to pass close by his house. They are going to stay at our house while we're at the beach. They'll come and hang out with us at Mexico Beach during the day. Kiel's girlfriend Liz (The Hottie) will be coming in from Louisiana today and will be joining us for the weekend. I'm thinking I'm going to need buckets of cold water and a crow bar to keep them off of each other. It's going to be a long night - Katlin has an 8:00PM soccer game, we'll need to get everyone settled and fed and we haven't even begun to pack or buy supplies for the beach. So it's gonna be fun. Please keep us in your prayers for the impending hurricane that is about to hit, also pray that Hurricane Frances stays away.

Given the additional elements of Frances, Boop and The Hottie we are bound to have an interesting Labor Day Weekend. We'll be back on Monday night, I'm sure I'll post then. I have an idea that something interesting might happen. Hope everyone has a safe and fun Labor Day. Later.