Bunker Hunkering

Is it just me, or is there something fun about hunkering down and preparing for a storm?  We’ve got flashlights and candles, lighters, snacks and blankets ready for soon-to-be here (maybe) Hurricane Sandy.  We’ve got Tucker’s books and favorite toys in findable places and have the iPad charging.  There’s something exciting about running to the store to pick up a few essentials (wine) and seeing the empty isles of water and toilet paper.  Frenzy like this makes the east coast friendlier.  People chat to one another standing in line, wondering if Frankenstorm is mostly hype or whether we really do need to be prepared to be without power this week.  I have a question though.  Maybe I’m just being blonde, by why do people stock up on so much water?  Even if the power goes out, the faucets work.  True, the hot water heater may not, but how is a bunch of bottled water going to help with that?  I got sucked into the frenzy and bought a gallon jug of distilled water myself today.  Mostly because it looked better on the checkout belt than to have so obviously run to the store for super-glue, wine and jalapeno-stuffed olives.

Stay safe, east-coasters!  And let’s hope that later this week, the closing of the DC Metro, the federal government and all of the schools is chalked up to our emergency response teams being overly cautious.

UPDATE:  I’ve already gotten inquiries regarding what we’re experiencing here.  We’re in northern VA, about 20 miles outside of DC.  It’s currently raining and the wind is picking up and predicted to continue to do so.  The biggest concern is downed power lines.  I’ll keep you posted.

UPDATE 2: 11:39 pm – we’ve lost power twice, but only briefly.  It continues to rain and the winds are a little ugly, but so far, so good.  I think it’s much worse up the coast from where we are…stay warm!

Here’s the water isle at our local grocery this morning.  The funniest part is that I saw three other people take photos of it.