Monday
Woke up about 7:30 and checked in with the HAM guys while looking at the current Milton hurricane warnings. She made coffee and it doesn’t look good for Florida. We had baked chicken legs and veggies for lunch, it was excellent.
Milton is now Category 5 hurricane in 24 Hrs.
They are evacuating the people in Mobile homes and near the coast.
Our taxes need an estimate of the value of the Pahrump home when we acquired it. I don’t have that since my brother had the estate for the first five months. We did get an CMA estimate in July, but if I remember correctly, I could not download it. I checked my NAS, no documents from Oct 2022 that I can find.
I’ve sent what I could to mom, the last of it arrives tomorrow. If they get into big trouble, they have 1000W of solar panels and a Solar Generator that will help. It likely will not totally power a refrigerator 75Wx24=1800WH/Day. If they get 5 hours of sun, like I do here in Atlanta they’ll have 2KWH/Day which is just enough for the fridge. Clouds often greatly reduce the total power generated. If they manage to connect the solar trailer they might have enough and that’s a maybe…
Checked in with the GARS 2M Net on their repeater. Soup for dinner and then we watched some Faith & Family until bedtime.
Tuesday
Looks like mom is not listed, but I expect it’ll be around midnight.
Talked to Paul this morning and called mom but she was sleeping.
New bed rails arrived from Wally World today, box was pretty beaten up.
Old bedrails got bent trying to move the bed with the mattress on it.
The original 30Yr Old frame with a single 3″ foot wasn’t enough to hold us since we’ve gotten to be 400Lbs. I bought a new frame with TWO feet and then realized all the weight is at one end. I decided to distribute the weight with a 2x4x12 after I reassembled the bed. I had to use a floor jack to raise the mattress and add the 2×4 under the foot, it seems to be enough support. The black thing is a Bed Bug trap to prevent them from traveling. Apparently, I forgot the wrench and my wife’s shoes.
Wednesday (Hurricane Milton)
Got up at 8AM and checked-in on the HAM radio with the Waterway Net, which was unusually busy I might add.
Mom is in a good spot, she’s north of the path and in the middle of the state.
I ordered a cart to carry the UPS and the batteries to the Sunday Service this weekend. I still have to assemble all the wires. I had two boiled eggs for breakfast and have spent a good part of the day trying to figure out the power for Sunday.
The Hurricane should arrive in Tampa at 9PM tonight and 20MPH winds for mom.
Chicken legs for dinner, although I had to toss one of them cuz it was a little too red inside. I could have cooked it, but having warm uncooked meat might be a little scary.
Mom still should have power, that’s the 5 in the middle. In theory its one block south of her.
Thursday
Checked on Mom, she has power and is in good shape.
There are 36,000 people near her that do not have power.
We went to Wally World to get our paper stuff. We also went to the park to test the power in the Pavillion for the Sunday service. We had a light dinner at Longhorn and then returned home to do our taxes. All done at 7PM so we watched a little well deserved TV.
Friday
Did not get onto the HF radio today, we had a Dentist appointment at 9AM which went well. I had lunch with Jon at JOHNNIE MACCRACKEN’S
CELTIC FIREHOUSE PUB. I drank a little too much and had to walk it off before driving home. I was terribly sleepy by the time I got home and really needed to take a nap. The lawn service came by and I had not put out his payment, they caught me off guard. (I didn’t think the grass was long enough to mow.) I woke up having missed a couple calls and she made me a bowl of soup while we watched some TV. We got into those unproductive conversations last night about her believing she has a cavity. The reality is that the edges of her braces cut into her gums or her cheeks making her uncomfortable. I went to bed thinking that it was resolved, but it wasn’t.
Saturday
Woke up early and took my medicine, I’ve not taken it on time for the last couple of days. Emotional drama prevails. I did check in with the guys on my HF radio while checking on the news and sipping on a cup of coffee.
Went to Longhorn for Lunch after we had a rather long discussion about the unresolved issues from last night. We still have to cook the pork chops since they needed to be eaten/frozen by yesterday.
Spent a good part of the day on the phone working out how to put 1000W of audio inside a 64 Foot circle at church tomorrow. It turned out that the volumes were kept low because of the speaker placement and electronic drum set.
Sunday
Headed out to the park after loading up the batteries and solar generator. I was completely out of fuel so a gas run was necessary. The odometer was also warning me with a text message, LOW FUEL! Got to the park at the correct time and met up with Larry. Lisa and Tommy were both quite late. Tommy had all the mic stands and Lisa had all the wires. My back did not like hauling the equipment back-n forth today.
Church service went quite well, and the T-Mobile hot spot carried the service.
We went to Outback for lunch and the food was fantastic. I was exhausted by the time I got home, and the van is full of equipment that has to go to storage. My back hurt too much to put the equipment back in storage.