WE'VE GOT A MESS!

It was an exciting night! When you live in the middle of 5 acres of trees and the wind is gusting around 40 MPH, it is like living in a war zone. Limbs, pine cones, and branches are flying through the air-many hitting the roof of the house. Our lights went out around 6:30 as we heard a transformer blow. It turns out that one of the neighbors had the top of a large pine tree snap off and knock down a power line. Since this was at the beginning of the storm, we had lights in about two hours. THANK YOU Entergy! The wind makes a really neat sound when it blows through our trees, and I love to hear it and the rain falling through them also. It is a little unnerving if you think about the possibility of a tree toppling onto the house. I chose not to think about that!

With the coming of dawn, we surveyed the damage done in the yard. We will be weeks cleaning up all of the debris scattered throughout the place. Did discover one hardwood that had blown over. As you will see below it was uprooted and blown over. This is caused by the wet and soggy ground unable to support the tree when the wind begins gusting. We drove around town today and all of the trees that are down were toppled in similar circumstances. We had two days of really big rains about a week ago that left the ground saturated. The rain that came with Gustav had no place to go and the ground just begins to get soggy and soft. When the wind is gusting-and not steadily blowing-it creates stress on the roots-then over goes the tree.


When BC left for work at 7 AM, he found the lights out all over downtown. The city utility crew had them up and going again by 8. Thanks Goodness-since most the evacuees are on the downtown circuits.

The worst damage in the town seems to be in the Cypress Springs area. Our friends, The Boersmas had a large oak tree to fall across their drive and take the electric lines with it. Dale is on a vent and electricity is a must. They had the foresight to go buy a generator last week when the news of the storm appeared. They have him up and going-connected to the generator. The picture below shows you the mess that they are facing. Friends, The Andersons, live just down the street from here and they are also without electricity. I am so thankful for them being prepared.!

Our town is a mess, but we will clean it up. After the rain finally ends in a couple or three days, we will be out and recovering. We have it much better than our Central and Southern Louisiana friends. Sylvia is still with us, since Baton Rouge is a mess! She had minor damage to her houses, but there is no electricity down there. The town looks like a war zone, so who knows when it will be alright to return. Our sweet friends, The Thompson's, in Zachary called and they have a huge mess. The report is the damage is worse that when Betsy came through. Barbara thinks it could be up to 2 weeks before they have lights. They have a generator, but it only runs limited appliances. They are trying to sleep with a fan and IT IS HOT & HUMID! We have asked for them to come up here since before the storm. They are like many of the residents down there-fearful to leave their property.

When you watch the national news, they would have you believe we dodged a bullet. While it is true that there was no levee flooding, there is much more to this state than New Orleans. The damage is great and it is spread over the entire state. We will all pull together and start working to get everyone home, but that cannot happen until the storm is gone. For now, Mr. Gustav is sticking around and continuing to drench us all! They say there are 3 more storms in the Atlantic! I WILL DEFINITELY THINK ABOUT THAT TOMORROW!