Mess

Here is the link to a frequently updated CNN blog about the hurricane. What a mess!!!

Deja Vu

So for the anniversary of the unexpectedly devastating Halloween snowstorm last year we get a deadly, sprawling, high-wind monster.

Hurricane Sandy seems to have come out of nowhere. If I remember correctly, Irene was tracked and watched for over a week last year. This time, just boom!

Everyone is on the edge - the entire Eastern Seaboard is paralysed. All mass tansit and other means of getting around (trains, buses, airports, tunnels and bridges) are suspended or closed, schools and offices closed. New York and Washington are reported to be practically ghost towns. The hurricane is expected to make landfall somewhere in the Southern Jersey. The way it is going right now, it has a potential to bring unprecedented damage, far more devastating than Irene, apparently. The forecast for our area specifically notes sustained winds of 30-50mph with gusts up 60mph. It would appear to pass just south of us.

However you look at it, the situation is pretty grim. Coastal locations are already suffering from storm surges and flooding. The wind speed is picking up drastically. Someone posted a picture of Battery Park benches already standing a few inches of water. Damn, just damn.

Looking outside my window - nasty, nasty weather that is going to get even worse by nightfall.

 

Out of things planned for the fall that I mentioned earlier - Comic Con and Chiller Theatre were rather great. I'm glad I only planned for Fridays in each case. It was still pretty exhausting. Comic Con was predictably huge and crowdy but I got my Christopher Lloyd autograph (he looks wonderfull, incidentally, and just like Dr. Emmet Brown at this point) and had a chance to explore an enourmous Artists Alley, so I'm very happy with the experience. Chiller is not a particular favorite of mine. Simply because there are somewhat less things there that interest me. But it is a wonderful opportunity to get some great autographs pretty inexpensively. So I got one from Joan Collins, who for her age looks astounding (whatever work she had done nonetheless). The line was huge - almost two hours. I can only imagine the line when she was signing on Saturday. One thing I do regret - Robert Duncan McNeill was there as well. But since I had his autograph and photo op earlier in Las Vegas, I did not bother to go looking for him. And I really should have. I saw a few pictures people posted with him on Facebook, he looks great and so much more, well, adorable than he did in Vegas. What are you going to do. I'll try and catch him next time.

 

So, what is there to look forward to at this point (besides a hopefully calm finale to the brewing catastrophy)? The Antique Show kind of fell through - we prepared for the hurricane instead. So, perhaps, I'll catch one of the New York winter ones this year. The Harry Potter exhibition is reopening at Times Square, as I have already reported. The Enterprise will have to be visited in the new year, it's getting too cold. Just went to a wonderful birthday party and another one is looming up ahead. And then the holiday season shall commence (most of the stores are certainly not wasting their time - Halloween hasn't passed yet and they've got Christmas decorations out already).

 

Fall is Here

It seemed like the summer just kept on going and going, and then, all of a sudden, typical autumnal weather descended, many leaves turned all shades yellow and red, and it got pretty wet and cold. Strange. We seem to have missed the crispness the accompanies the beginning of both spring and fall this year.

In any case, the fall is here, another month or so and it will start feeling like holidays. I must admit I have already started on my Christmas shopping. Adding on to the holiday spirit will be the fact that Discovery Times Square is going to re-open the Harry Potter Exhibition in November (revised and updated to include all eight movies). Really looking forward to that.

The fossil trip I mentioned in the prior entry fell through - I came to the conclusion that I was not up to that kind of adventure. I love collecting fossils, and fully realize that most of the time good collecting spots are not near civilization. But I also prefer to know the details of where and how. The directions for the trip were so incomplete in my view that I decided not to risk it driving alone for over four hours in rainy weather to a poorly defined spot in the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania. Pity. Next time, perhaps.