We survived hurricane Frances unscathed. Phew. 2 hurricanes in 3 weeks. And Ivan may be headed our way.

I am so very glad we don't have any large trees around our house and that the retention ponds are at the other end of the neighborhood. One of the ponds flooded into the road, but luckily not onto anyone's private property. We did lose power for about 38 hours and had to toss all the fridge perishables, but amazingly the frozen stuff stayed frozen. The newscasters kept repeating that a full freezer can keep for 48 hours, and thank-the-lord, ours was PACKED.

Thursday night, friends came over and helped hubby put plywood over our windows and slider. Friday night, we went over to their house and did the same for them. Well, by we I mean hubby and the husband of the other couple. Wife friend and I hung around and ate while the guys worked.

Saturday, I picked up Mom, roommate, and the cats. Between Mom and her one pissy cat, I was ready to crack. The cat hissed at everything and everyone. Constantly. Mom was full of helpful advice like telling roommate not to flush in case we ran out of water. Umm, as long as there's water, we're flushing. Besides, we had filled the bathtub just in case. Roommate then got all stressed out about going to the bathroom. I think she held it for most of the day because she finally asked if it was OK to go. She's 85 and has a history of UTIs and kidney infections. Not a good plan on Mom's part. After the power went out, Mom was full of gems like "It'll probably be a week before you get power back." Actually, crews were already out the night of Frances fixing traffic lights and such. Our town had minimal damage and everyone around us had power (I swear our neighborhood was the only one in the area without) so we figured it wasn't that bad. And it wasn't.

On my first attempt to take them home, a tornado warning came over the car radio. It was headed straight for the area where they live. So back home it was. Finally, the weather calmed down enough for me to take them home around dinnertime last night.

Hubby and I celebrated having our house back by making grilled potatoes and homemade sloppy joes (aka shit on a shingle) on the grill. By that point we said fuck the fridge and rescued whatever we could. It was pointless in trying to do the old don't-open-the-fridge routine. Anything that was going to spoil already had, and the meat came from the freezer. We ate on the back porch, the coolest room in the house, and let the dog lick the pan after we had our fill. Finally at bedtime the power came back on. Hubby did a happy dance and the neighbors hooted with joy.

Now I keep hearing about an "Ivan". Shit.