Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Tropical Storm Irene blows through!

Well, we made it through what became Tropical Storm Irene in central Connecticut.  We're okay, but we have a mess to deal with.  Dad, Michael and I were all looking out a picture window when we saw a sudden downward gust of wind slam down a huge pine branch in front of our house.



It is resting on power lines and so there is nothing we can do about removing it until CL&P gets out here.  We never lost our power, but they will have to turn the power off to take care of this problem.  CL&P obviously has more urgent work to do so we're guessing it could be a couple weeks until they are able to help us.


Our backyard is so full of tree debris it's crazy.  Dad is in his own little world of happiness because he has loads of yardwork to do.  He lives for that!

Our cottage at Camp Bethel is also safe, as are all the other buildings there.  However, they lost power early on in the storm and are not expected to get it back in that area for at least a week.  There are many downed trees.  Here's a picture of a tree branch that fell in front of our cottage. Our cottage is the one on the right.  Some friends took the picture of us, and removed the branch from the area, too!  We haven't gone there ourselves yet as we have enough to deal with on the home front.


My brother Lee is involved with emergency services in Lyme, CT, which is near the shoreline.  He sent me a text message today letting me know that many houses were damaged, and about 7 were totally lost.  One person died.  Trees are down and almost the whole area is without power.  A helicopter dropped food and water to them.  The emergency personnel are working around the clock and taking rest in shifts. Sounds like it has been tough there.

It is a relief that the hurricane was downgraded to a tropical storm by the time it reached us. Things could have been so much worse.

Here's some videos I took of the storm as it came through our area.






Here's the new view out our bedroom.


And now...well, I'm sick of Irene.  Sick of preparing for her arrival, dealing with her trashing our house, and dealing with picking up after her.  So to cheer myself up, I'm going to look at some cute videos of my great niece Mckenzie!

Here she was on her grandparent's proch, which overlooks the Connecticut River. Mckenzie called it "BIG water" and her little pool "baby water."


And here's one from a whole year ago that stills make me crack up!!


LOL!  Now I feel much better! 

Sue