Looks like Rita could be hitting the Texas area. Herm, I hope you are prepared.

I'm watching close. There was a lot of talk about this storm at the hospital today. I'm about 30 mile inland and if needed, I have tons of folks to stay with all over the state. I don't trust this house would stand up to winds over 70 mph so I'm watching close to see what it does. Seems the weather is staying the same around here so it is easier to determine where it's going. I'm also sure every city near the gulf is predicting it will hit them. We'll know better in several more days!

If Rita does head towards take my nephew to very high ground thank you.

Please be very careful and safe down there.
Hotts

Be safe herm

Herm I just heard Rita could hit Texas as soon as 72 hours please becareful down there.

Hotts

Here's hoping that it hits directly here:
http://www.westernwhitehouse.org/

I am evacuating. My house is 30-40 miles directly North of Galveston. I go down there all the time. Anyways, I'm getting out hopefully around 7PM Friday night when the winds should just start picking up with some rain. You see, I have to work! Can you believe it? I might not go in but I said I'd stay. We'll see. It really all depends on tomorrow and the morning after.

I will be taking the servers with me. My wife and child fly into Fort Worth Thursday morning. They'll be very safe there with Grandma and Great Grandma and Great Grandpa and all. I'm planning on hanging out in my storm torn house if it is still standing when I get back to it on Saturday night. Here, I will walk around inside with a flashlight in one hand, a beer in the other and a 40mm in my wasteband. I'll be varmit hunting until power is restored.

All is good here right now. I'll take down the servers Friday night. God Bless all. Should I not get out in time or something stupid like that happens and I get myself killed, I just want all of you to know that I loved every minute of it especially back in the days on Schwantz's Redeemer Arena. I would have been very bored very often had ya'll not given me something to do. Take care!

Herm,
Best of luck. Things can replaced. Your ass can't be!

Deadman

If I was u take your server to work .GET OUT DODGE AFTER WORK>
PLEASE BE CARFUL.....

Herm......

Tell work they can kiss your ass and get the farking hell out of there bud!!! I've already seen what Katrina was like living just 3 1/2 hours north of the MS gulf coast and and it wasn't good.

My boss and his brother went down to our Hattiesburg and Biloxi stores on Tuesday to check on damages and took a video of all of it for insurance purposes basically and what I saw was mind boggling.

(Hattiesburg is 1 1/2 hours away from the coast) The Hattiesburg store has a 2 story warehouse in the back of it and basically the whole rear corner of the building was gone! 75 foot of brick one way......50 foot going the other. Looters found their way in before this was noticed and had themselves a hay day. They basically went for the high dollar easy to carry stuff which happened to be LCD/Plasma TVs. *sigh* looters suck....

(The Biloxi store is 10 miles from the shoreline) The Biloxi store managed to somehow stay together alittle better but lost a section of roof and all the roofing stuff (tar and rock stuff) except for the bottom layer was scattered everywhere. About 2 inches of water in the place and outside a 30 ft delivery truck was turned on its side and had been pushed at least 25-35 feet from where it was parked.

The last part of the film was very sad to say the least. One of the office ladies asked them to see if they could get to her mother's house which wasn't too far from the Biloxi store. Her mom was staying with her so she was safe by the way. They managed to find the street and what they filmed looked like it should have been straight out of any major disaster movie... The street backed up to a little bay area and there were about 20 houses on there. The only thing standing in the house was the roof..... no walls.....just 4 corner boards holding up the whole roof. They did manage to grab a few things that they were able to find but basically the whole place was a loss and so was the rest of the street. Basically that area had 7 foot of storm surge come right up the street...

All I can say is get the hell out of there. It was CAT 1 when it hit me here but your gonna be catching the burnt of 175 MPH WINDS!!! If you where 3/4 hours (150-200 miles or so) more inland I'd say stick around for an interesting show but staying isn't smart.....

|<idcapri

P.S. GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE NOW!

They said, here in France, that that damn Rita will be close to your home on Saturday morning for us so, in Friday evening or a lil bit later for you.
Don't stay too much there Herm !..

Best luck for you and all your house !.. Give news asap !

I saw on new tell people to get out Houtson.SO GET OUT NOW.

i agree with the rest get out and stay out till the damn thing passes dont need to help it kill you by staying

Dark

Herm, I hope that you reconsider. Beer ain't that great when it's warm.
Seriously, I know you have been through your share of hurricanes and know the risk. Just think about that baby you have now. Is the job worth risking your life for?

Thank you to all of you. Your word did not fall on deaf ears. The storm won't be hitting Houston as hard as predicted but it will be bad enough I think to not risk it if possible.

BAd news first. My wife and son did not make it out of the city on their flight to Fort Worth. Southwest Airlines completely overbooked the flight as they always do and several thousand more people than could possibly fit on the airplanes showed up to get out of town. The lines went from one end to the other of the airport and every person you asked in the same line said they were in a different line than the person just 3 people ahead of them. Thus no one really knew what line they were in and there was no way we'd get a flight as many people there had been there since 3:00 AM and were still in line. My wife started crying as soon as we walked into the airport. I took her back to her car so she could drive to Fort Worth. That trip usually takes her 3 1/2 hours. Today she made it just over one mile in 45 minutes so she turned around and went to my mothers house in Southwest Houston. She is there now with my son and my Mom.

More bad news. Istill have to work tomorrow. I have asked to leave early and it has been granted. I will come home around noon take down the servers and grab last minute stuff that I haven't already taken to mom's tonight. I'll try to post about what is happening during the storm if I still have power lines and telephone lines at Mom's house. Worst news of all is tha tshe only has 56k. LOL

There is a curfew (Spelling?) in Houston. It starts tomorrow night at 6:00 PM and runs till 6:00 AM. I will try to return home then and restore order if possible. I suffered a neck injury last Wednesday and am leaking cerebral spinal fluid from my C5-6. They have be on Vicadin and Steroids now to try to heal it without having to get a blood patch and/or a diskectomy since one on my disk have been puntured and another is just plate flat from being punctured or deformed previously. There is even more bad news but the meds are kicking in Ithat I took 10 minutes ago so time to hit the sack.

Thanks for all of the advice and I'll take it the best way that I can. Unfortunately, I just can't get out of Houston right now as I'm sure all of you have heard about the traffic. I've already heard about people who have had there cat or dog or grandparent die in the heat while they were stuck in traffic and ran out of gas and such. Sad. This should be another huge eye opener to basically everyone about being prepared for stuff. I'm caught here with my pants down but will be in a very strong house for the storm which has already weathered severa ltuff storm before easily. I will be OK and look forward to updating you all after all of this stuff passes. CYA!