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IVAN REDUX

Well, here comes storm number 3. This foolishness can stop any time it wants to. I'm just about hurricaned out. Actually, I don't have any major complaints. The insurance good-hand guys are getting a workout, but I don't feel sorry for them. They have been taking my money for years and I'm kind of secretly pleased to see the bastards pony up some of the cash for a change. Scroom.

I'm seeing signs of storm fatigue everywhere though. The people I work with are a good example. They're mostly just kids, and they never have had to reach down and find more. You know... more. Sometimes you just have to go get more of what ever it is that keeps you shooting into the gap. Sometimes you look outside the hole you've dug for yourself and just see another whole damned division of whatever monsters are out there trying to take you down and they're out there trying to line you up RIGHT NOW and it doesn't matter if you're tired or whipped or scared shitless... you just have to reach down for "more" and if you can't find it you have to look a little deeper until you do. It's either that or die in a hole and never see your mama again.

Several of these kids have said that they're packing up their golden retriever and their laptop computer and heading for Atlanta. Well, go ahead. I'm stuck here and so is my boss, both of us old guys... along with a group of hard cases in Unit 214 at Orlando Intake and we'll be covering the damned JAC and Detention, and Court, and all the rest of the crap that absolutely HAS to be covered because there are deputies out there in the middle of the shit storm that we are all in and they are peeking up over the edge of the hole and they're doing the job. Our alternative is to give up and let Orlando look like Granada where the storm knocked down the local jails and the inmates took over the whole town. What they call a breakdown of civil authority. Just think... Latin Kings and Crips prowling the streets of Pine Hills and not a cop in sight. Oooooweee. Is that gunfire I hear in the distance? The only thing keeping the trash from washing up into the lilly white suburbs is all those soldiers cruising around at the height of the storm and you can bet your ass that they're serving and protecting with a vengeance.

Beside, I'm not sure that you can run away from a hurricane. Have you seen the high resolution pictures that NOAA is sending back from space? Frances was the size of Texas for Christ's sake! And Ivan is about the same size and is actually twice as strong as Frances was. Can you run away from something like that? Nope.

So... get out your rapidly diminishing supply of batteries and refill the water jugs, and just throw away all that spoiling crap in the refrigerator and get used to eating the MREs (that's my solution to the hungry Bob problem... the Army surplus place sells boxes of MREs, 20 packs, the same shit that I used to live on in the good old days. Mmmmm... ham and lima beans... yum... beanie weenies... not my favorite but filling... water purification tablets if you're out in the bush and don't have clean water out of a pipe. Hell, I gained weight in combat. I only wish I could find some C4 to use as fuel.

What this will do is toughen us up. That old joke from Neitzsche really is true... that which does not kill us will make us stronger. So bring Ivan on. I kick the bastards ass.

Bob