I wake up every morning wondering what my day will be like. This morning while I was drinking my coffee I was thinking about this past week. And believe me here in north west Florida it really has been quite a week. Thursday morning I went to work my shift went home and 2 hours later the school board closed all schools for Friday. So what every normal perrson expecting a hurriane is on it's way, I checked my emergency bag to make sure I had everything I needed. Filled bottles with water. and put bags of water in the freezer.
Friday morning I walked down to the store to get headache medicine and was amazed how the shelves were just about empty and there was no water in sight. Carts were full of things that people thought might get them through this disaster coming. Yelling at clerks about having nothing in the store. The flashlights,batteries and candles were all gone and there places were empty. But there sitting in the toy section was full spots of glow sticks. This made me wonder how come people didn't notice these were another light source. When I was checking out with my headache medicine and glow sticks I was asked why I was buying toys at this time. My response was there is no flaslights,batteries or candles so I am getting the only light source for sale here. I didn't tell them I already had my light sources safe at home in my bag. Then I walked to another stores and the shelves were in the same way clerks getting yelled at for the store not having what they wanted. It was a sad day people were not prepared and angry they couldn't get what they wanted.
![15871880_1220885714658914_6273077693668077922_n.jpg]
()
Saturday was a day of doing laundry and cleaning outside the apartment to lessing the chance of rocks and braches from hitting the windows. It was also the day we found out the schools were being closed til tuesday.
Sunday the day of the hurricane. Phone were charged,backup chargers were charged and laptops were charged. Since we were staying put we had plans to go in our bathrooms during the hurricane because they are nterior rooms with no windows and have doors. We put our pillows and blankets to keep us comfortable. We put our bags in each of our bathrooms along with our laptops and a small table. At 8 p.m. when the hurricane was suppose to get here we went into our bathrooms and stayed until 11 a.m. Monday. Luckly we never lost electricity except for a few flashes. Monday was also the day the school boards in my county said the schools would be closed until Monday 9/18/17.
That brings us to Tuesday. Today I ordered freeze dried food for the next disaster. The canned food and can opener takes up a lot of space. Also freeze dried for only requires hot water to make it and you can add the water to the mylar bags to make it up.
Next I need to replace our cook stoves with hikers burners and a fuel tank. And I need to get a air mat to make the floor softer to sleep on.
So what did I discover if more people were prepared we wouldn't see the anger people being rude in the stores because they are panic. Having a plan and knowing what needs to be done takes a lot of stress off you. By using your emergency supplies you learn what works and what doesn't. If you need to make changes do it right away and don't put it off. I am thinking a generator for the apartment would help put I don't really need one, I think a small laptop solar charger would be useful . You need 2 weeks of water per person not 3 days of water.
We was blessed we had a facebook page to checkin on everyday so they and our family would know we were safe and where we were. I see that as a good way for emergency rescuers to know where we were. They also had us checkin weather we had power or not. Around 5 million people lost power on Florida because of Hurricane Irma And a lot of people have no water and now we are getting flooding.