Storm of the Century

We had a big windstorm in Seattle on December 14, including the highest winds recorded in more than 10 years (peaks gusts of about 70mph in Seattle). More than a million people in the area lost power. We never did, fortunately, although it flickered a lot. We did lose our cable, and therefore our TV and Internet. For 36 hours! It was horrible! :) We were the lucky ones. Some people didn't get their power back until Christmas.

I went out to get the paper in the morning. There was no paper (printing plant lost power, no paper for the first time in 54 years!) but there were a bunch of shingles in the yard. "Hmm," I thought, "those look like our shingles." We lost a patch of shingles about 3x8 feet from the house roof. I was able to make a pretty good patch with thick plastic sheet and strip material (to hold it down) that I had laying around from the garage project. Roofers in the area are quite busy, but I checked on the patch (from the attic) last night in a downpour and it was dry as a bone. I think this weekend I'll try to replace the shingles myself.

My headline, "Storm of the Century," is a comment on how breathless television news has to be every time a cloud comes by in recent years. If you believe them, every little weather system we get is "dangerous".

By the way, I bike commuted the day of the storm and rode home during its peak period. Somehow, though, my ride was during a lull. There wasn't much wind at all once I got out of downtown. However, there was plenty of rain. In one section I was riding through 6 inches of water for about 100 yards. We got over an inch of rain in an hour.

At one point in my commute I travel on a bike path that passes under a large bridge. It's dark underneath. I have a headlight, but it doesn't illuminate the ground like car headlights do. I noticed a different texture on the path and slowed a little, but soon found myself riding through a mudslide that had come down an adjacent hill across the path. It was about 6 inches of wet mud. I managed to stay up and ride through it (about 50' long). Then I scrambled around to find some cones to warn other cyclists of the danger. My bike is in serious need of a bath.