Hurricane Ike- Day 6- Monday 9-15-08

Happy birthday to me! I got a couple of phone calls and texts through out today. I also found out that people keep getting a message about the fact that they could not reach me because of the hurricane in our area.

We got up and played some more cards because there was nothing else to do. I tried to call the apartment complex to find out if we had power to see about going home. I could never get through to them.

By the time lunch rolled around today, the fridge was very warm and the freezer was warm as well. I wasn’t sure if Ivy would try and cook anything today, but she did. She cooked some fried rice and an egg and sausage omelet. I made sure to say a special prayer for the food just because I wasn’t sure if it would be safe to eat. The food was definitely blessed because none of us ever got sick. :)

After lunch, Ivy decided to teach us how to play Mahjong. I think I failed to mention this in the previous posts, but Ivy is from Taiwan and so she shared a lot about her culture to us. That would also explain the food that we ate earlier when we were there. I love Mahjong and I would like to play again.

Matt and Amanda found out they had power at their apartment during Mahjong and so they both said they were leaving. We felt obligated to go home as well because we didn’t want to be left at her family’s house with out them there. Before we left, Ivy found 3 banana nut muffins and placed them on a plate and stuck a candle in the middle. They sang happy birthday to me. I wished for power to be on when we got home but I didn’t tell anyone of course! Ivy also gave me the Chinese fan that she let me use earlier to keep cool. She is so sweet! We packed all our stuff up and drove home. We surveyed a lot of damage on the hour long trip home.

We were fairly nervous to find out what our apartment would be like. We drove up and discovered that all was well and safe! What a relief! The only problem is that we had no power and no hot water. My wish didn’t come true. :( I was ok about it because the weather was still so wonderfully cool outside. We emptied out the fridge and freezer which was a stinky, disgusting mess! By that time, we figured we should find some food. We drove around for a while and found a Papa John’s that was open. We ran inside because it was busy and we ordered enough pizza to have some leftovers to eat the next day. Just after we got there they stopped taking orders.

We also stopped by Nick’s school to discover a lot of damage. We think the top layer of Nick’s roof, which is tin, flew off of Nick’s portable classroom. We don’t think there was damage done to the inside because the shingles still remained on the roof. We looked at the back yard of the school and found a huge black blanket like thing lying all over the grass. We started looking and realized that part of the roof from the main building of his school blew right off and took out a couple of light poles along the way. The field goal posts were also damaged.

Ike did not obey the speed limit!
We came home and ate our pizza by candle light, and made a few phone calls now that it was finally getting easier to make calls. We were in bed by 10 because it was so dark outside and there was nothing else to do. We are really starting to feel like pioneers or the Amish.