Re: Hurricane Dennis versus Ed Kiser


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Posted by Ed Kiser on July 12, 2005 at 01:13:24 from 64.12.116.6 user Kisered.

In Reply to: Hurricane Dennis versus Ed Kiser posted by Prue Eckett on July 11, 2005 at 21:41:53:

I say, did someone call out my name?

Prue -

You are correct in that I do live in South Florida as that info is normally appended to my name which closes most of my entries into this forum. But that label covers quite a bit of territory.

I am on the south east coast, about 20 miles north west of Ft. Lauderdale, or about 40 miles north of Miami, to mention a pair of places that perhaps others around the world may have heard of.

The Storm, Dennis, had the remarkable ability to pick a path that avoided dragging its horrible self directly across this part of the state, but went north or north-west from Havana, Cuba, up through the Gulf Of Mexico to make landfall at the very western tip of northern Florida which extends across the eastern part of the northern shore of that Gulf. It was on that south facing beach the storm hit its fury, a place that 10 months before, Hurricane IVAN had previously devastated. The damage from that visit was hardly totally recovered before Dennis took that debris and threw it around even more. Roofs that had no cover except for sheets of plastic, covering damage done by IVAN, of course stood no chance against Dennis, which quite easily ripped away that plastic and dumped it wetness into the resulting hole in the roof.

It is fortunate that Dennis was rather compact as compared with IVAN, so limited the range of its worst damage. After it was all over, it was felt that Dennis was not at as much of a hazard as was IVAN of last year.

But this is still July. Here the Hurricane Season has just begun. This business is just starting, and with an opening act like that one, it is a bit ominous as to just what is waiting next week, next month.

Surviving a hurricane is like walking a squad through a mine field. Several of the group had the misfortune to be just at the wrong place, but the rest of us, as we gather at the other side, congratulate ourselves over our good fortune, and somehow manage that old adage: "Better him than me." Then we go try to help him as much as we can. Perhaps indirectly, that is done by paying huge increases in the premium charged by insurance companies to make up for their payments they make out the the storm's victims - so we all become victims.

But these hurricanes are just nature's way of distributing the warmth of the tropics into the more temperate zones of this earth, so we get to share the bounty of this land of sunshine.

After all, that is what that Gulf Stream does in the Atlantic. It year-round gathers the sun's warmth from us here, and in the tropics, and transports it up across the Atlantic to bath a certain little island that is so very far north with its warmth. It also brings a warm damp breath to clash with the Arctic colds from the North Sea to produce that wonderful combination of FOG. But I do wonder how it would be in that island without the warmth gathered from our shores here in Florida and carried by the ocean currents.

But we live in Florida because we want to be here. It is a rather common thought among our neighbors in the USA to the north that one day, they can "retire to Florida." Our Summers are nowhere as hot as it gets in Chicago or New York up North, or even in Atlanta Georgia in the South. Our winters hardly get below the 40's (Fahrenheit of course). Snow? We see plenty of that in the Winter. It is on TV as weather reports show us what is happening in the rest of the country. Air conditioning is something that is normally in use about 10 months of the year. A fireplace is strictly a decorative addition, as there are no chimneys.

And we make sure our houses have very substantial hurricane shutters that are armoured enough to stop flying debris hurled by winds too strong to stand up in. And we make sure the hurricane insurance premiums are paid up.

If evacuation to a shelter for the storm is called for, we take an earphone-radio (and which others used earphones as well), a sleeping bag, other supplies (don't forget prescription medicines that don't wait for normal weather to be required), a flashlight with a self-generating power source (shake it to recharge it), and a good paper back copy of a Ransome story, and a lot of patience. Amazing how one can pick up quite a following in that shelter as one starts to read one of these stories out loud as the young people gather nearby to hear.

Living here is so much better than Northern Siberia (or so I've heard - never tried it.)

When others from around the world think of coming to the USA for vacation, one of the places they will probably consider to get to on that trip is right here, within a few miles of where I live. After all, just off our beaches in the surf we have sharks. And with a drive of several hours to the north, we get to DISNEY WORLD or to the SPACE PORT of Cape Canaveral, where men leapt up to the moon.

And when my many Ransome friends on this forum do manage to get into my part of the world, remember, you know someone that lives here. You know you have a friend in South Florida. Perhaps one day, I will have the pleasure of associating your face with that name that I see so often on the forum.

Prue, thank you for your concerns, and your interest, and for your many contributions to the wealth that is this Ransome Forum.

I still like the idea of the Timothy/Nancy making a pair. And as for John/Peggy... "But what if this is all we'll ever have?" Prue, you know what I'm speaking of... don't let it die... don't let THEM die.

Thank you all for your concerns and your prayers, as this world inflicts many different places with assorted horrors, both natural and manmade, and thus gets our concerns and prayers for you all, as we each in our own way, try to survive, and help each other where we can.

Thanks to Ransome for making us a family...

Ed Kiser, SOUTH FLORIDA


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