Live Blogging the Hurricane

3:07 am
Woke up.....heard town siren, but not a call for tornado (though there are tornadoes south of here).  Basement was dry at 1:05 but is taking on water now.  Still have electricity.  Wind and rain is steady.


1:05 am
Gonna grab some shut eye for a bit.  Back up in the early dawn hours with updates....providing we still have electricity.  Go easy on us, Miss Irene. Please.

12:43 am
And it's official: The Weather Channel just jumped the shark, interviewing teenage girls at Asbury Park....talking about previous storms. So, yeah, that was informative.


12:22 am
Just had a rather blinkety moment with the lights. As wind gusts continue it seems likely that the electricity will take a holiday.  Though so far we're hanging in.


11:47 pm
The wind has picked up and the rain is still falling hard and heavy.  Boy asleep.  Pets nervous.  Grown ups hanging tough.


9:30 pm
For the record, the tornado watches are so not adding to the fun.


8:20 pm
Basement remains dry but now the rain is coming in a steady downpour.  There's wind but not of the gale force variety......yet, I assume.  Electricity is still with us.  So we're holding steady.


6:22 pm
Rain continues to fall steadily; windy. We've begun hourly basement checks. In the meantime, we're planning supper of chicken tacos and National Treasure. That doesn't suck.


4:44 pm
Steady, heavy rain has begun to fall.   But worse than that, we've had our first casualty of the hurricane: the toilet set is cracked. Strictly speaking, it may not be hurricane damage. But that's where blame is being assigned.

Unless Tiger and Lucy step up.

Damnit, Irene. Is nothing sacred?


3:15 pm
T won round II of Clue, so that game has been retired.

Just turned on the Weather (Panic) Channel. Where exactly do they find people to stand out on the pier during a hurricane?  Unsettling.

Very light rain here.  Wind picking up.

2:22 pm
A few bits of rain (though nothing substantial....yet). Some east wind has picked up, but still quite faint.  We've no choice but to eat lunch and play Clue.

Update: T won the first round.  

11:20 am
All of outdoors secured.  Cars backed into driveway between houses, as far away from trees as possible. Rain was short-lived.  Humidity seems to be approximately 110%.  Unexpected side-effect of Irene: mosquitoes in full-on swarm attack mode.  That rates below average.

10:38 am
A light rain has begun.  We're headed outside to put away the grill (it was used for burgers last night).