Hurricane Preparedness Indoors and Out

As of this writing, it's humid and warm and overcast, several hundred miles north of the current position of the hurricane, the laundry is done, and I'm doing a nice batch of chicken and hot biscuits here in progress



edible regardless of whether we lose power.

Outdoors the patio is emptied of hanging plants and bird feeder, chairs now indoors, other stuff flat on the deck.



the birds trudging around whining about where did the feeder go, and the wren's nest is safely stowed, in its hanging bowl, in the storage unit. I plan to ask if the libe would like it for the children's area, as a nice example of avian architecture.

My hurricane shopping was all about potting soil, parmesan cheese, olive oil, tomato paste and other such basics. The checkout lady pointed to the potting soil and said, this is hurricane prep?? huh? so I explained that since the plants had to come indoors a bit early this year, I may as well do the fall potting up while they're in already and outside won't be a good place to be. And I'd used up the other stuff in the process of making pizza and pesto, needed to replenish supplies in case the urge strikes.

Everyone else was buying useless stuff like water and bread and toilet paper, I ask you, where are their priorities?

I did charge up the computer battery and the cellphone, though, to be in the spirit of things. Speaking of which, the Social Security lady was supposed to call me at 1.45 yesterday for a phone meeting to establish if I have a claim for a better SS benefit based on HPs account, and I had to have various original docs. ready to quote from and give chapter and verse. Now, being a nervous and conscientious type, I had all this stuff ready in a file on the table, complete with notebook and pen.

This was just as well, since she called at 11 a.m. I always thought the gummint was too slow to be last, but here she is at me hours early. Good thing I wasn't at the supermarket or something when she called. So we got it done promptly, and I needed to track down my original marriage certificate. Folks, what? it was 1963, on another continent, another planet almost, the church probably long closed, the brits famous for flatly refusing to cooperate in matters like this with furriners, particularly furriners who were once brits....anyway, I flew over to my bank in the next town where the safe deposit box (grammar note here: it's not a safety deposit, even if bank people themselves sometimes get it wrong, where was I?) oh yes, where the box is. And phew, found the doc in there.

This is fortunate since for decades I had no idea where it was, and HP figured it was safe somewhere, he couldn't remember where, and it never seemed important, our not knowing we might be called on to prove it sometime. Then when he was unable to run his own planning and financial life, and we had exchanged Powers of Attorney, I invoked mine and after a brisk conversation with the bank officials where he had his box, who had to be virtually threatened with legal action if they didn't acknowledge that ALL financial dealings of all kinds included the box, duh, anyway, there it was with a lot of other stuff most of it sentimental rather than legally vital.

I swept it all up and closed that box, moved the stuff to my own box in a different bank, leaving the bank officer a bit angry that I'd emptied it and closed the box for HP! I felt like saying, folks, this is POWER of attorney in action, not feeble attempt at power...

Off to my own bank, and at that point got HS to come along and be officially recognized as the other person who can access my box, gave him one of my keys, and had him sign the card and actually do the transaction of putting the stuff in with me, showed him all the items in there already. This will smooth his way if he should ever have to get in the box on my behalf.

Soooooo, long story slightly less long, I found it, and now the feds want it and other originals, too, to prove I was once married, and subsequent adventures, which did not include another marriage, lucky escape I had, actually I had a few lucky escapes, but that's for another blogpost, or my exciting memoirs (!) and then, and then, they will process the claim. Gosh, not a bit of bother. And they promise the docs will come back to me.

How is this hurricane preparedness, you ask? well, if we lose power guess who will be closed for who knows how long? the banks, that's who. And guess whose roads between here and my box will be impassable if we have the flooding they're promising? well, ours. So I decided to have the doc with me just in case.

Off to have a nice cup of tea now. HS expected any minute, coming over to shut the window in the loft for me, which requires climbing. I have delegated that bit.