Rant #835: Safe At Home

Well, Hurricane Sandy, at least for myself and my family, wasn't as bad as it could have been.

And I am very thankful for that.

We had power losses throughout the night, but nothing substantial.

It was just the old pain in the butt thing that when the power goes out and then, a minute later, when it goes on, you have to check everything and reset what needs to be reset.

Inside our house, the rod holding up the blinds in our living room fell down. I can't exactly figure out why that happened, but the pummeling the house took from the winds must have had something to do with it.

One of the lines outside the house was flickering last night, which probably means that the insulation around the wiring became dislodged from the winds. It sparked for about a half hour, and we did call the authorities about it.

They will get to it when they get to it, and that might be several days.

Other places in our surrounding communities were hit much harder than we were, with downed trees and power lines, water all over the place, and other calamities hitting them hard.

As for my work, I called them at 8:30 p.m. last night to tell them I wasn't coming in.

I got to one of the vice presidents, who presumably stayed over holding down the fort last night.

"Well, we'll see tomorrow how bad it is," he said to me after I told him I wasn't coming in today.

"No, I am not coming in," I replied.

And to this moment, I haven't gotten a call from them about whether our place of business is open or closed today.

But since they have said that all Nassau County roads are closed, and the rain and wind are still here, somehow, I don't think I will be venturing outside much, if at all, today.

At least I was at work yesterday.

But anyway, my parents are OK, my sister hasn't had power for many hours now, but I think we all pulled through this storm pretty well.

I know New York City is basically totally shut down. No mass transit and numerous areas that were hard hit have caused the city to be in lockdown mode.

But I still think it could have been much, much worse, and for those who were hard hit, I know that you will pull yourself up by your bootstraps and get back in the saddle as soon as possible.

Look! The sun is trying to come out as I look out the window!

That tells me that things are going to be getting better.