Weather Fun - Here we go again

[Joe Pelonio]

:mad: Flooding, windstorm, snow, a few days rest and now we have what in the southeast might be called a hurricane of some level. I'm omline but just for a minute. The power has been off 6 times so far, since I got home at 4:30. We have some pretty good sized branches all over the roads, and sustained winds of 40-50 with gusts up to 70 expected later tonight. That with rain so hard the front and back raingutters are like waterfalls.

All of you in the Northwest be careful tonight and stay warm and safe.

I hope none of you have to get back from the Seahawks game, that's going to be a mess. On the TV it looks calmer over in Seattle than here
but then the worst is still a few hours away.

[Keith Outten]

Hang in ther Joe, I sure know how you feel.

[Scott Donley]

Hope your doing ok Joe, wind just hit 69 mph here, I have a 110 ft fir tree about 40 ft from my house, starting to worry a bit :( There have been 2 folks killed by falling trees in the area, so far. I hear they are thinking of closing the Narrows Bridge, something they have never done.
Take care.

[Jim Becker]

'Wait until the locusts arrive... :D

(Hang in there...this too shall pass!)

[Rod Torgeson]

Joe....I got a little wind last night but nothing like that. I also got a few inches of snow. And it was doing so well melting the last few days. I live about 15 miles north of the Columbia river. It is snowing right now and has been for most of the morning.

[Doug Jones from Oregon]

Joe

Wasn't it a Seahawk game when the big snow came?? Perhaps there is something to this?

We had some nasty, nasty, here in Portland last night also. Almost 300k folks without power this morning. I fortunately missed the bulk of this one!

Doug

[Joe Pelonio]

We're fine. Twenty hours without power so far though. Next door a 30' blue spruce went down but didn't hit anything. One 20' fir limb did a trunk chop on my 8' liquidamber, it's now 3'. On the way in to work I had to drive under a fir that went from one side of the road to the other, held by the power lines. Saw more of that later on and a few roofs blown off in the 3 hours it took me to go the 11 miles. With all of the signal lights out in Bellevue, traffic was awful. Still only 3 gas staions operating on the east side of the lake. Oh, and now it's supposed to snow here tomorrow, my day to move the business to the house.

Othan a real mess of branches all over, and one scratch on my car we did fine. Glad to hear you others are all OK too! Over 1 million customers without power this morning in this area.

Gotta get off now, more important things than going online to use the generator for (like heat). They think it may take several days to a week to get power.

[Steve Clardy]

Take care Joe. Hopefully the worst is over for you

[Joe Pelonio]

Last night when I shut of the generator I'd cranked up the heat to 70. This morning it 's 28 outside and 54 inside. Waited until 7am to pull the starter again, now up to 62 and climbing. The bonsais are at a nice 34 in their rebuilt enclosure. We and the rest of the 500,000 still without power may have to wait another 1-3 days. They have the substations back up but are having now to deal with all of the fallen trees on the lines, blocking roads for several hours at a time, and now icy spots on the roads. Turns out that 3 homes in our immediate neighborhood were crushed by trees, including one of our friends. No one hurt in those. They say that our gusts hit over 70 but in some areas up to 112.

I've decided to go to the shop and at least do some packing and take apart the equipment after the roads thaw a bit, then try to get the move done tomorrow.

[Scott Donley]

Joe, glad you and family made it through the storm ok and hope your power is up soon. My power came back last night, nice to be warm again. I have one sister that lives down by cougar mountain, they are telling them it might be 10 days for them. I lost a few shingles off the roof and the yard is full of limbs, a couple 20 footers, sure wish You could turn fir :)
If you make the trip to your shop make sure you have plenty of gas, might be hard to find a station that has power and those that do are selling out early. Sure hope it does not snow !

[Joe Pelonio]

If you make the trip to your shop make sure you have plenty of gas, might be hard to find a station that has power and those that do are selling out early. Sure hope it does not snow !

No snow, just 28 and some icy roads this morning. 50 hours and counting without power now. I was really po'd today to see that parts of both downtown Redmond and Bellevue still had power out but the biggest malls in both places were back under full power. I guess they have to keep that tax money flowing in from the Christmas shoppers.

I did manage to spot a gas station open with only a 10 minute line so I filled up and also got a can full for the generator. I must say it's hard to pack up a sign business with 3 computers, a laser, 2 plotters and the rest in the dark. I'm nowhere near ready but tomorrow we have to do it. Well just have to keep going back to get the less critical things later. Can't even take the junk to the dumps, the transfer statiuon is closed due to damage from the storm.

We've heard estimates that some areas like ours that were hardest hit may barely get power back in time for Christmas. Strangely our Domino's has been able to keep running with a generator, must have a gas oven, so we had pizza tonight. Went to Lowe's for a few things and to take the manager a sign he'd ordered and they have a "personal shopper" take you around with flashlights. Supposed to be mid 20's tonight, and I'm polite enough to keep the noisy generator off 9pm-7am so it could get pretty cold in the house tonight. May be running the laser and plotters by generator Monday.

One good thing, I noticed today the blue spruce that fell next door was blocking the sun from our deck, so I'm looking forward to nice sunny BBQs next summer.