Nicholas

 

Ever since Imelda, Honey gets very worried whenever there is any sort of tropical activity in the gulf, so back when it was just a tropical wave we started preparing for Nicholas.  We ordered propane for the generator, and piled sand bags around it to keep it dry, removed files from the lower cabinets and put them on top, etc.

Then the hurricane hit and it was, for us, practically a non-event.  The wind never got particularly strong and we only had a total of two and a half inches of rain.

Then several hours after everything seemed to be over, our lights went out and the generator failed to start!  It had started on  Sunday for its weekly exercise run, but when we needed it, it did not come on. The battery was not only dead, it had a big crack down one side.

I went and got an new battery, but had to wait for almost half an hour while neighbors with chain saws and tractors removed a big tree from the road.  That tree was the reason the lights were out; the huge tree had fallen all the way across the road and taken down power lines on the opposite side of the street.

I got the battery installed and the generator fired up.  About six hours later, the lights came back on and everything was back to normal.