Be Prepared For A Hurricane, and Zika Virus Prevention

Well, Hurricane Hermine has come and gone from Florida, but the damage is immense. Where we are, damage was pretty minimal. Most people have power back in our county, and we never left power which I can not even believe. A puff of wind and our power usually goes out. However, I was outside trimming branches away from incoming power lines, and cleaning up before the storm was close. I noticed our neighbors doing the same. Maybe that is why our power stayed on, we were diligent. Of course you can't stop a tree, unless you just cut it down. It rained, hard, even before the storm got close, but there was really not much wind, or thunder and lightning. We have lived in FL for 11 years, and this was our first land falling hurricane experience. Cedar Key, which is about an hour from us was just inundated with water from storm surge. The Weather Channel predicted this storm surge days ahead of the storm, and were pretty much spot on. The pictures from there are devastating and sad. Cedar Key is just a lovely little fishing, and resort town in the big bend of Florida. Hermine beat it up pretty good. For a Cat 1, it was plenty scary. It really was not too bad until the eye started to get close to land. I mean within seconds weather went from not to bad, to frightening. We had no tornado warnings up until then, and and all of a sudden they were popping up everywhere around us, one after another. So scary! My husband is a firefighter so I could here all the activity, for our county, and it was something to hear. Our power did go in and out almost constantly during this time period, so we did have to turn off the air, for about 4 hours. I grew up with blizzards, so howling wind is not so scary, but losing power in the night time with howling wind, and not seeing what is going on outside your house, is plenty scary. I will probably never buy a generator, but I would recommend it if these things really frighten you. I was fully prepared to be without power for 3 days, thank goodness that did not happen. I think I slept one hour, and when I went out in the daylight we did have tree limbs everywhere, some of my plants look like someone took scissors to their leaves, and even some of my flowers had browned edges like they got wind burnt. Two pieces of older fence got broken up and had to be taken down. A gutter was torn off, but easily fixed. So, all in all we came out of it pretty good. But, what did I learn from all this?

1- If the authorities tell you to leave, leave. Thank goodness there were no deaths, in places that were evacuated, and I understand why people would stay for some reasons. But, when they say they are not going to come help you they mean it in this state.

2- Prepare for your pets, and elderly friends or loved ones. My mom is stubborn and won't leave her home, but I can help her be ready. She has been through several of these so she knows better than me what to do.

3- Even though we were prepared to be without power for days, I forgot to consider a battery powered radio for weather alerts. I do have walkie talkies that will do this, but I didn't think to dig them out and charge them. I won't make that mistake again, tornadoes in the dark are frightening.

4- Think about possibly renting a room for a couple of nights, ahead of time, and reserving just in case.

5- We were smart enough to have cash on hand, because ATM's don't work without power.

6- Talk to your children about how frightening it might get. We talk about a meeting place, and such. But, I was surprised how scared my 12 year old was. I was not prepared for that. Children, and adults all react to fear in different ways, be prepared for them to not do what you expect.

I do not want to do this again anytime soon, but at least we have an experience now to evaluate and improve. Note, the weather man said FL gets hit with a hurricane, typically, every other year. Good grief it had been 11 years, and I am not sure I like that stat, lol.


Now, that the hurricane has passed, mosquitoes will be everywhere. Zika is already in FL, but only in small amounts. The video below will explain how to prevent exposure to Zika. I am not a huge fan of bug spray, matter of fact I hate it, but even I bought a can of bug spray. Safe sex, and or abstaining, imo, are the best prevention methods for spreading it from human to human.