Archive for September, 2017

Wind

Saturday, September 9th, 2017

We’re Getting Quite a Blow Here in the Living Room

My exasperation with the fake hurricane news industry is getting worse.

Here is the situation right now. Hurricane Irma, which is supposedly “bigger than Texas” is something like 250 miles from Miami. It’s northwest of a Cuban city called Moron (seriously). Texas is 800 miles wide. That means Miami should be over 150 miles into the hurricane right now. “Hurricane” means sustained winds of at least 75 mph. “Tropical storm” means 39 mph or more.

Get ready for some vexing figures.

The forecast on one site says Miami will have 25-35 mph winds today. That means 25 is the low side. Another site says 44. I checked the winds. Here is the actual figure (from a site which is predicting high winds on another page): 2.4.

That spot between the 2 and the 4 is a decimal point, not a typo.

Miami’s channel 7 is always the hysteria nerve center of Dade County, but right now, their website features some oddly comforting news. It has a page where you can see the marine forecast. During a real hurricane, seas will be maybe 20 feet high. Current figure: 2-3 feet. That is a hyphen between the 2 and the 3.

If you’re not a boater, let me tell you what 2-3 feet means. It’s ideal fishing weather. It can’t get much better.

Right now, immediately next to a city which is half-abandoned, you could sit in your boat with a case of beer and enjoy yourself, catching bonefish.

You tell me: how big do the glaring discrepancies have to get before we can call them lies?

If the forecast says 25 mph, minimum, then the wind should be at least 25 mph, right now. Minimum means “lowest value.” It should not be possible to see 2.4 mph on a day when the forecast says 25-35 mph.

I expect the wind to increase. I don’t think Miami will have 2-3 foot seas when Irma is at its closest, 100 miles away. I don’t think the winds will be down around 2.4 mph. But the weather people have presented strong evidence that the claims of 96 mph and so on have no support at all.

Is it possible they’re not lying? Maybe they’re using old data. Maybe they don’t update the local forecasts as fast as the big picture. I doubt that, however. Why would there be a difference? They know people are sitting at their PC’s or looking at their phones, waiting for news.

I smell lawyers and TV executives in all this. Lawyers always advise us to scare people as much as possible, so we can say they were warned when they sue us. TV executives want people scared so they’ll watch TV, and they don’t want viewers who didn’t prepare for storms to crucify them over coverage that was not sufficiently neurotic. The NHC brass probably pushes for overreaction, too.

I get it. People need to be awakened. They need to be sobered up so they’ll prepare. But lying after the danger has abated does not serve that purpose.

Barring a very unlikely event, Irma’s major winds will never get close to Miami or even the east coast of Florida, above the Keys. Let’s take a deep breath and face the truth: things look much better for the east coast than they did five days ago. It’s okay to admit it.

I should have done a much better job, getting ready for the storm. There is no denying that. But now that the outlook has improved greatly, I should not have to scour ten websites to find the good news, and I should not be seeing dishonest or misinformed Weather Channel personnel telling me the winds will be over a hundred mph over a hundred miles from the center of the storm.

If I were depending on TV and swallowing everything they said, I would have a very distorted picture of the immediate future right now. I would think I was in very serious trouble. I had to work to find the truth. I could not rely on the people whose job is to bring the truth to me. They are worse than useless. They make things worse.

Accuweather, which appears to be somewhat less panic-driven than the other outlets, says Miami should get eleven or twelve hours of winds over 60 mph. No mention of hurricane-force winds. I think we can cut the speeds by about 30%, to factor out the lawyers.

Miami looks pretty good, so on to Ocala. Right now, Accuweather is predicting maximum sustained winds of 58 mph for my area. Gusts could be a lot higher. They think we’ll get about ten hours of tropical storm winds. That’s not terrible. Gusts are local in nature, and they are brief. On top of that, if they’re predicting 58, we will probably see 35. If I had to guess, and my life depended on it, I’d predict that even mobile homes will make it, with a few exceptions.

It’s sad that I have to dig for the truth like this.

My friends and I are praying again today. Leah’s rental house is on track for a direct hit. I want this storm to go south and west and move farther from the coast. Join us if you will.

The NOAA discussion said the ridge that pushed Irma down was surprisingly strong. I would say that’s the result of God, reacting to prayer. Things that don’t make sense have supernatural causes. If God is willing to push Irma away from Miami, he will probably be willing to keep confounding the forecasters by pushing it away from Cudjoe Key and Ocala.

The current NOAA discussion says there is “good agreement” that Irma will follow the current track. Isn’t that interesting? Does that remind you of anything? The Beast always takes polls, because he has to guess. When God gives guidance, there is no need for consensus. He hands down the word, and that’s it. Weaker spirits and human beings have to vote and confer. When the true prophets of the Bible were in conflict with the fakers, it was generally one prophet against a herd of frauds who were in “good agreement” that he was wrong. They had a consensus. Only one individual knows where Irma is headed, unless he has told some of his servants.

The forecasters, who are, by definition, secular prophets, were in good agreement that Miami was going to be hit directly. Over the last few days, God has consistently proven them wrong. I will keep trying to persuade him to continue. This storm would look great as a disintegrated blob in the Gulf. I wish we God’s model, to put on the map with the computer models.

More blogging as news develops or fails to do so.

Fake Hurricane News

Friday, September 8th, 2017

THE END IS HERE

It’s time to repeat my eternal criticism of the hurricane press: they make things seem worse than they are.

Whenever a storm gets close to Florida, they do their best to make people think it’s headed right for their houses. When a storm moves toward Miami and then changes direction, they wait as long as possible before admitting Miami isn’t taking a hit.

Fake news at its best.

The fake hurricane news people have a lot of reasons for lying to us. For one thing, hysteria increases viewership. When you’ve spent a lot of money gearing your station up for constant hurricane coverage, you don’t want to say things like, “Oops. Never mind.” Viewers will relax, turn off the TV, and go to bed. Here’s another motivator: if they underestimate the thread, people will raise hell later on. The news people don’t want people telling them their homes got messed up because they listened to rosy forecasts and didn’t prepare. In today’s ridiculous legal environment, a station could conceivably get sued. “Dear 96-year-old Effa May here believed you when you said Hurricane Bob wasn’t going to hit her trailer…”

I am no meteorologist, but it looks like they’re lying to us now.

According to the Internet, Irma’s hurricane-force winds extend outward from the center something like 65 miles. That means if you’re over 65 miles away, you will not experience a hurricane. You will get a tropical storm, which means winds of 74 mph or less. The 74 mph figure applies to the 65-mile mark. If you’re farther away, you will get lower winds.

They now expect the center of the storm to be about 100 miles away from Miami when it passes. That means Miami would be 35 miles past the hurricane zone. Nonetheless, they’re claiming it will be like a Category 3 storm in Miami. Category 3 means a minimum of 96 mph, sustained. Not gusts. Sustained. In order for that to happen, the center of the storm will have to be what? Maybe 30 miles away? Come on.

They’re telling us Irma is the size of Texas. No, it’s not. Not the important part. Texas is 800 miles wide. Irma’s hurricane zone is around 130 miles wide. Eyeballing the map, it appears that the tropical storm zone is around 400 miles wide. That’s half of 800. Sure, there may be clouds extending out over 800 miles. Are you afraid of clouds? A cloud 400 miles from the center of a hurricane is just a cloud.

Here is what appears to be true, from a person who is capable of reading a map and doing high school geometry: unless Irma deviates 35 or more miles east of the projected path, Miami will not get hurricane winds. If it deviates exactly 35 miles east, Miami will get low Category 1 winds. If it stays on track or deviates west, Miami will get winds considerably lower than 75 mph.

I survived Andrew. I knew Andrew. Irma…you’re no Andrew.

Andrew’s winds within the Miami area reached at least 170 mph, not including tornadoes. I saw four-foot-thick concrete power poles twisted off at their bases. That can’t happen when the hurricane’s center is a hundred miles away.

A few days ago, we were looking at a 185-mph storm that appeared likely to hit Miami dead center as a Category 5. Now it’s expected to be somewhere around 150 mph, a long way off. Big, big difference.

Maybe I’m wrong, but at least I’m giving you the same facts I pick up from the NHC’s data. Are there secret facts out there that I don’t know about? Are Irma’s winds actually 250 miles wide, making them highly likely to hit Miami? If so, why does the NHC say otherwise on its website?

Of course, hurricanes change their minds. Irma could surprise us. It could go straight through Miami. It could make a hard left and go to South America. It could veer east while staying within the cone of uncertainty. But it can’t stay on course and do what they’re saying it will do, if the wind figures they’re giving us are correct. It can’t be Category 4 in Naples and Category 3 in Miami AND have a hurricane zone 130 miles wide. Not possible.

Maybe Texas is really small, and they lie about it because they’re insecure.

If Irma doesn’t move east of its predicted track, I expect Miami to be fine. A few trees will fall, and a few thousand people will lose power because of the primitive, vulnerable power grid. That will be it. Unless those secret facts come into play.

I’m very glad I have not been watching the news. The few minutes I’ve endured have done nothing but raise my blood pressure and offend me.

I will keep praying for Irma to fail. Things look a whole lot better than they did yesterday. Thank you, God. Your patience is wonderful.

Storm Reprieve

Friday, September 8th, 2017

Irma Moved

Well, this is a good day.

I spent most of the day preparing for the guest invasion. The house was supposed to be full of kids during the storm, and my dad and I needed things, so I bought all sorts of stuff. Then my friend Amanda came by to help. We moved junk around in the garage and the workshop so she and my friend Teri would be able to park indoors, and then I decided to try to move the tractor outside. It takes up two cars’ worth of room.

Starting a Kubota is a real project. There are about ten things you have to adjust. The manual lists the whole procedure, and it lists different versions of it for different tractors. I kept looking for knobs and levers my tractor didn’t have. I still haven’t found everything the manual said to find.

At long last, I got everything adjusted so the tractor’s lawyered-up computer was happy, and it agreed to start. I moved it into the small pasture and left it there with a bag on the seat to keep rain out. There is nothing worse than sitting on a wet tractor seat and having all the water squoosh out into your pants.

Here is Amanda with the tractor. Proof that it moved.

At some point toward the end of this, I realized it was after 5 p.m., meaning the National Hurricane Center’s 5 p.m. update was posted. I checked my phone. Hurricane Irma’s forecast path had moved maybe twenty miles farther west! What a relief! If it keeps on this track, the area where all the stuff that belongs to me and my dad is will only get tropical-storm-force winds. That, I can handle. It won’t rip roofs off, break windows, or sink my dad’s yacht. Probably. A tropical storm is not a very big deal. Not unless it carries a lot of rain. Irma does not.

I have that feeling you get when you know the worst is not going to happen. It’s as if adrenaline is ice, and you feel it melting and running down out of your body, like meltwater running through cracks in a mountain.

I can’t say Irma is behind me. It can still change course. But it appears that God heard me and the other people who prayed. And maybe he heard Jennifer Lawrence, who appeared to blame the storm on people who voted for Trump.

I had been praying for the storm to move east, away from my personal concerns and also those of my friend Leah. I do not want to see her house in the Keys get pummeled. Now things are looking much better for me, but they are worse for her. I think the only option is to pray for it to keep moving west.

I feel like I just got sprung from death row. This storm was set up to cause me very, very serious problems. I hope God will see fit to keep pushing it away.

Thanks, if you prayed for us. Leah still needs prayer, so don’t stop. We will see you on the other side of this.

Bread and Water

Friday, September 8th, 2017

Preparing for the Blow

I just got back from K-Mart. That is very exciting, because K-Mart has bottled water. Every store in Marion County is dry, or so I thought. I went into K-Mart to buy a bread pan, and I saw big stacks of purified water in the aisles.

God bless K-Mart.

I took four cases. That’s a lot for two people, right? Yes. But it looks like there will be…let me count…twelve people in my house when the storm goes by.

My friend Amanda lives in a flimsy structure, and she has three young boys. My friend Alonzo has to work during the storm, and he doesn’t want his wife and five kids to be alone in their house in Orlando. My house (the lower story, at least) is made of concrete, so all these people will be spending the night.

There is nearly no furniture on the second story of the house. I had this nutty idea that after a week or so of settling in, I would be able to start looking for beds and so on. Then my dad had to be hospitalized, we had big problems with Atlas Van Lines, and a hurricane reared up and threatened our properties in both Dade and Marion Counties. Also, the couch I ordered arrived with forklift holes and had to be sent back. Needless to say, I am not accomplishing much RE furniture.

I suppose my friends are bringing sleeping bags and air mattresses. If not, welcome to the floor. We have a few molded lawn chairs and some rockers we are bringing in off the porches, but this house is not what you would call furnished.

I’m concerned about losing electricity. I hate life without air conditioning, and because our water comes from a well with a private pump, I would experience darkness, heat, room temperature food, and the joy of using buckets to flush the toilets. I had a stroke of very good news today. One of our neighbors works for the electric company. I am told this speeds up repairs to this neighborhood. Viva corruption, I guess.

I don’t know what to do about vehicles. I have a lot of garage space, but it’s full. I have two tractors. I’m thinking I should put one in the goat shed (don’t ask) and one in the middle of a pasture. I don’t think a hurricane will hurt a farm tractor. One of my friends just got an SUV, and the other depends on a Honda Pilot to feed her kids. I would feel funny worrying about a tractor when expensive vehicles are at risk.

My truck has an insurance policy with a $50 damage deductible. I got that after some kid shot the rear windshield out with a slingshot. I could put the truck outside and hope a huge tree hits it. New truck for $50. I don’t think the winds here will be bad enough to damage it, though, especially if it’s in the middle of a pasture. Hard to say.

I feel much better about the storm’s path, at least on my own account. They now believe it will hit pretty far west of Miami. If the predictions are right, Miami will be close to the boundary between tropical storm and hurricane. If that happens, the things that belong to me and my dad will only get winds of, say, 75 mph. That’s not good, but it beats 170, which is about what we got from Andrew.

I’m concerned about my friend Leah, who has a rental house in the keys. As Irma’s path moves west, it puts her house in more danger. On the plus side, she’s on the ocean side, and the storm surge will come from the Florida Bay side. Also, her house is on concrete stilts.

I have been fasting and praying for both of us, as well as Amanda and Alonzo. It would be nice if everyone’s property was spared.

There has been a lot of fasting this week. Leah, Amanda, and my friend Travis have all joined in. Yesterday something really crazy happened. My dad said he would fast if it would help. I did not know what to make of that. He thinks Christianity is superstition. I was stunned. I encouraged him to join us, and he fasted part of the day. We were only fasting until 6 p.m., and he didn’t know about it until after breakfast. Still! How about that God of ours?

I keep asking God to help me bring him as much pleasure as possible, and to help me avoid bringing him displeasure. The Bible clearly says our purpose is to give God pleasure; it says his pleasure is the reason he created us. Might as well be direct when I pray. Might as well confront the issue that is most fundamental to God.

This has been a very tough couple of weeks. I will not lie. We had a lot of problems we did not expect, and now Irma is threatening to obliterate a lot of our net worth. I have slept very badly. I have a lot of supernatural tools for reducing stress, but I don’t use them as much as I should, so I pay the price. Beginning night before last, I started feeling a lot more peace. Today I feel it very strongly. I hope God sees fit to continue it. If the power goes off and we end up living out of buckets in a roasting-hot house, life could be very unpleasant for one or more weeks. I don’t know what I would do. We might have to move somewhere.

In any case, God has been very kind, shifting this storm away from a city that greatly deserves it. If Irma misses our stuff, I will not waste the opportunity to prepare and strategize better.

I still have to bake bread, because buying it is not an option today. I have to take my dad to get food. I have to clean this place up. I need to check the tractor. Lots to do.

Please keep praying for us. If God doesn’t want to send the storm north into the open ocean, maybe he’ll be willing to run it through the empty Everglades, and out into the Gulf. After that, it could be driven into a sparsely populated area in Central America.

Jennifer Lawrence may have helped us with this storm. Supposedly, she suggested Irma was Mother Nature’s punishment for the election of President Trump. God put Trump in the White House to help his people and to hinder the children of the enemy for a time, so I don’t think God wants godless liberals to get away with mocking the people who elected him. They seem to love it when disasters hit conservative areas. I hope God will stand up for us.

Houston is not a conservative town. It’s minority-heavy, so many people vote for the sugar daddy party. Something to think about.

Please keep praying for us. I could use a week without a crisis.

Irma L’Aigre

Wednesday, September 6th, 2017

Forget Gold; Invest in Water

I started blogging about Irma, but I have been too busy to stick to it.

I’m not sure it would be possible for a major hurricane to hit Miami at a worse time for me. We still have property there, and I am trying to sell my dad’s boat, which he keeps in the water, not in a big safe building.

Even in Ocala, which is extremely unlikely to have any major problems, the hurricane-crazy bug has bitten. I had to wait in line for 15 minutes to get gas today, and it looks like bottled water and batteries are unavailable. When I got to the gas station, some guy was putting 80 gallons in an RV, and other people were filling gas cans as well as their vehicles. Not sure if I should be angry about that.

I learned one useful thing: diesel doesn’t sell out like gas. Unfortunately, my diesel truck’s tailgate decided never to latch again as soon as I got here. I am trying to fix it. I may have to remove it. That will be fun, with no help.

In case anyone wants to help, here is what I’m praying for: I’m asking God to break Irma up and send it straight north, and for him to keep it away from the US.

Things could be worse. I could be in Miami.

Thanks for whatever prayers you are willing to offer.

By the way, people are price-gouging in Miami. What a great time to load up on bottled water and rip off your neighbors.

Dividends

Sunday, September 3rd, 2017

I always repeat something my mother told me. She said you’re very lucky if you have one good friend. I have several good friends, so I guess I’m pretty blessed.

This weekend I had to go to Miami to retrieve various things the movers didn’t bring. I also had to get my pickup truck started and bring it back to Ocala. I was not looking forward to the trip. Miami is boiling hot this time of year; it feels like the sun has turned inside out. Also, I just generally don’t want to be in Miami. I foresaw a great deal of miserable, sweaty work, combined with suffering simply from being in a rotten place full of rude people who can’t drive.

A week or so back, I was talking to my old friend Alonzo. I met him back during my Trinity Church days. We were both armorbearers. I told him about my upcoming trip. He said he was off this weekend, and he insisted on going with me. He and his family live in Orlando. He’s one of the hardest-working people I know. He has five kids, from four years old to fourteen. He never gets to sit down. But he spent his free weekend driving 300 miles to help me retrieve things from a place he hates.

He used to live in Miami. It was not a good experience. The year before he moved to Orlando, he applied for 47 jobs and got no offers. When he decided to move to Orlando, he applied for 6 jobs in the area, and he got 6 offers. He’s black, and he does not speak Spanish. Sorry to say it, but neither of those qualities is helpful in a city where Cubans do most of the hiring. He has a good job now, and so does his wife. They live in a house, not a cheesy apartment. They have two nice vehicles.

He says visiting Miami makes him feel miserable. He doesn’t even like to go there to visit family.

Anyway, he said he was going to help me get my junk, and my law school friend Amanda donated her weekend to looking after my dad. She brought her three boys to the house, and they stayed here. She cooked and generally fretted over my dad. She brought food. When I returned this evening, there were brownies and praline pecans waiting. That’s Amanda for you.

My friend Travis is watching my dad’s house while we get it ready to rent. This is advantageous to him, because he gets free housing while he attends the University of Miami, but it’s a huge help to me. No one is going to break in with him there, and he can help me with long-distance problems that pop up.

I picked Alonzo up on Saturday morning, and off we went. We had a funny conversation as we got closer to Miami. We kept noticing the rudeness of the drivers increasing. Aloud, we wondered what acts of rudeness would welcome us to Dade County. We knew it was coming. It always does. You leave town, you relax, and then when you drive back, the tension increases, and suddenly people are cutting you off in traffic or tailgating or being nasty to you when you stop to get gas. I guess everyone says the same thing we do: “Welcome to Miami!”

He kept correcting me when I used the word “home” to refer to Miami, and I thanked him for that. Miami has never been my home, and it damned sure isn’t now.

Excuse my emotion.

When we got to the house, Travis had arranged the remaining junk as well as possible, so the house looked less like the scene of a tornado. I appreciated that. He wasn’t home, but Alonzo helped me with everything I needed to do. He helped me put two new batteries in the truck. He helped me remove all the valuable items from my dad’s yacht, which is important now that we’re selling it. He put boxes together. He organized the whole affair.

The next day, Travis, Alonzo and I spent several unpleasant hours packing things and putting them in my truck and my dad’s SUV. The sun was so hot, stepping out of the glare and into the shade felt like walking into an air-conditioned house. Sweat ran off of all of us. They never complained. Not once. They grabbed the heaviest things before I could.

We got two scuba tanks, an 80-cubic-foot C25 tank, a 125-cubic-foot argon tank, over a dozen big toolboxes, numerous rifles, heavy ammunition, cast iron cookware, stainless pots, lots of power tools, a 3-foot pipe wrench, and other things I can’t even remember. A compressor. A refrigerated air dryer. A huge phase converter in a steel cabinet.

We didn’t get to the house in Ocala until nearly 7 p.m. When I got there, Amanda and Alonzo flew into action. Amanda carried the C25 tank and the refrigerated air dryer. That startled me. Alonzo carried the compressor. I was busy myself, so I couldn’t stop them. I would turn around, and there they would be, lugging my belongings.

Loading the vehicles took several hours. Unloading probably took fifteen minutes. Even my dad got into the act.

When we were done, Alonzo’s wife showed up in their SUV with their 5 kids. They poured in. The whole house lit up. Alonzo’s kids and Amanda’s kids got along great. I showed them the pool and told them they were welcome any time their parents saw fit to bring them.

I saw my goddaughter Gabriella hugging Amanda’s son Sean like he was the greatest thing she had ever seen. She hugs everyone. I don’t know what has come over her. It hasn’t been that long since she bit me at my old church.

Everyone had to clear out in a very short time because of the hour. Alonzo and crew had to get back to Orlando, and I’m sure Amanda was ready to go home.

The house was in better shape than when I left it. Most of my crucial junk was here where I needed it. Not bad.

Alonzo insists he’s going to make another run with me. I can get a U-Haul and a hitch for the truck, and he wants to start on a Friday night and drive back on a Sunday. This is the guy who hates Miami more than I do. Maybe.

When you invest in people, it pays off. You may not be able to get a return from the people you wish would return your feelings, but God will send you people who will reciprocate. He will choose them for you, to replace the dysfunctional relatives, selfish spouses, and so on.

The Bible says we should seek to accumulate treasure in heaven. That means people. When you make a good Christian friend on earth, you create a treasure that will be with you forever in heaven. Paying off, eternally.

It’s nice to have people visit, especially when they’re real friends and not superficial business acquaintances. It warms the place up. I know of a few more who will come eventually.

The house seemed somewhat cold and lifeless when I first got here. There were a lot of disturbing, unpleasant problems to contend with, and there were only two of us, banging around in a big empty place. I started to wonder if God had really guided me here. Maybe I had chosen the house myself, in selfishness or recklessness. Things keep happening to suggest that his hand is in this move. I’m very grateful for that.

I better get in the shower. I have to mow tomorrow. And who knows what else I’ll have to do? I really hope Irma doesn’t hit Miami. I can’t even guess how I would deal with that.

God will fix it. He always does.

Make sure you invest in people. People are the only wealth you can take with you.