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So the short version: we're massively inconvenienced and got a bit scared at one point, but we're ok and should continue to be so.
So Monday was a delightful snowday--got a whole bunch of stuff done, did some cooking, worked remotely. Ivy03 came over for a bit. It rained a lot. Then we looked out in the street. Which was rapidly disappearing.
Ivy03 went home while she could, since she lives down the block a little. And we watched in horrified fascination as the sea, which had at this point completely surrounded the hospital, continued to advance up the street towards us. We heard commotion in the hallway and ended up putting on galoshes and running downstairs to help the folks in the basement apartments move as much as they could out of the rising water. Then we ended up standing on the front stoop in the dark with most of the rest of the building, watching the tide continue to rise up the street. Slowly, the streetlights went off, block by block, and then all at once all the power was gone. The police had a cruiser parked at the water's edge for awhile--every five minutes or so, they backed up another ten feet. Periodically, other emergency vehicles would come screaming down the street, stop dead, stare at the water for a minute and then back up and leave us to the darkness. Eventually, the police cruiser abandoned us as well.
Ivy03 came barrelling out of the darkness--her building's fire alarm had shorted and could not be turned off. She joined us on the stoop. We all wondered if we'd made a terrible mistake, not evacuating earlier in the day--but we'd been in the FEMA dry zone, and now we were under curfew. Heck, our evacuation point was the school next door to Ivy, and they'd just been flooded out. Cars from other neighborhoods already underwater periodically circled through, looking for somewhere safe to park. The cars that had been left on our street were already goners--we watched the row down the block light up as they shorted out, and then fade as the battery died, one by one, in a row. (We heard later that one block over, the cars were literally drifting around the street.) Without anything else to do, we reassured each other that high tide was 9:21 and surely the water would stop rising soon.
Thank god, it did. The high water mark was pretty much the center of the street in front of our building. (It was deeper on the sidewalks on each side.) By 10, the water had definitely stopped and by 11, it had retreated back to the crosswalk. Ivy stayed with us--the wires in front of her building had been smoking, but the water was too deep for the firetrucks to get there to do anything about that or the alarms. I don't think any of us slept much that night. Fortunately, when the morning high tide came, we could tell the road was dry all the way back to the hospital.
We took stock. No power, no internet, no gas. Water, but we weren't sure if it was contaminated and had no way of telling.
Another friend, Xannocide, lives farther uptown and never lost power. After a bizarre breakfast of cold squash and chicken, we put together a triage package of the most perishable food and made the trek uptown to his place. It was bizarre. The pizza place that had wood fired ovens and the Subway sandwich shop had no power, but were managing to slap food together anyway and had massive lines out the door. People who had pumps were pumping frantically. A local nightclub was completely trashed--the water line on the windows was at my waist and inside, you could see all the furniture upturned and covered in mud. Trees everywhere were cracked in half or worse, none of the streetlights worked, and the streets were full of debris. We found one BMW convertible that had clearly been completely filled with water. But inside Xannocide's building, the elevators were running and they even had internet on some floors.
We had three households' worth of eggs and milk and butter, plus all the blueberries I'd put up during the summer. Since our friend had power, we did the logical thing. We made a shitload of crepes. With blueberry compote.
We finally went home before it got dark, and spent an evening staring at each other in exhaustion, repeating platitudes. Ivy's neighbors had disabled the bell, but it still clicked madly, so she continued to stay with us. After we got tired of ourselves, we played some Scrabble and ate a little and tried to burn off some nervous energy by exercising a bit. Finally made it to 9pm, when we declared it was late enough to go to bed.
Twelve hours of sleep later, still no utilities. The jackhammers were going all night, which is kind of reassuring. We may be without power until Monday, but that's pretty much the worst case scenario. The power company won't commit to more than that, but we've been watching chunks of surrounding neighborhoods get their power back, so we're cautiously optimistic. Shockingly, the water supply has been declared safe to drink. We're back at Xannoside's, who's gotten complete Internet back. Still no gas, although the water in the taps was warm--we think they turned the gas back on for a bit in the middle of the night, enough to heat some of the water in the tank, but found problems and turned it back off. We've rescued what was left of edible food, and are piecing together meals that make slightly more sense today. The neighborhood is putting itself back together again, and there's a meeting for volunteers at city hall at noon on Friday.
On the other hand, we're not leaving any time soon. The PATH is wrecked. They're saying 7-10 days some places, indefinite others. The photos from the subway system are shocking. The bridges are open, but many of the cars in our neighborhood are destroyed. The ferries are running, but in a limited way and apparently the line is a little under two hours long. We could get out if we had to, but commuting's still pretty much out of the question. But the supermarket farther from us has power, is open, and appears to be being restocked. So food and water aren't really a concern and it's still warm enough that I'm not worried about heat. We aren't showering, since the water's freezing, but we can stand a little more stinkiness. We'll see about washing up at Xannoside's, if the gas isn't back in a day or so. I'm kinda working from home, by which I mean Xannoside's living room, on a small laptop without Microsoft office or VPN. But my boss is understanding.
So. We're lucky. It could have been so much worse. We're a little uncomfortable and very inconvenienced, but we're safe, and only lost a handful of things from the fridge. Our stuff's fine. Most of our friends and family have checked in and are at our level or better. It might be weeks before things approach normal, but everything's ok. And we're grateful.
So Monday was a delightful snowday--got a whole bunch of stuff done, did some cooking, worked remotely. Ivy03 came over for a bit. It rained a lot. Then we looked out in the street. Which was rapidly disappearing.
Ivy03 went home while she could, since she lives down the block a little. And we watched in horrified fascination as the sea, which had at this point completely surrounded the hospital, continued to advance up the street towards us. We heard commotion in the hallway and ended up putting on galoshes and running downstairs to help the folks in the basement apartments move as much as they could out of the rising water. Then we ended up standing on the front stoop in the dark with most of the rest of the building, watching the tide continue to rise up the street. Slowly, the streetlights went off, block by block, and then all at once all the power was gone. The police had a cruiser parked at the water's edge for awhile--every five minutes or so, they backed up another ten feet. Periodically, other emergency vehicles would come screaming down the street, stop dead, stare at the water for a minute and then back up and leave us to the darkness. Eventually, the police cruiser abandoned us as well.
Ivy03 came barrelling out of the darkness--her building's fire alarm had shorted and could not be turned off. She joined us on the stoop. We all wondered if we'd made a terrible mistake, not evacuating earlier in the day--but we'd been in the FEMA dry zone, and now we were under curfew. Heck, our evacuation point was the school next door to Ivy, and they'd just been flooded out. Cars from other neighborhoods already underwater periodically circled through, looking for somewhere safe to park. The cars that had been left on our street were already goners--we watched the row down the block light up as they shorted out, and then fade as the battery died, one by one, in a row. (We heard later that one block over, the cars were literally drifting around the street.) Without anything else to do, we reassured each other that high tide was 9:21 and surely the water would stop rising soon.
Thank god, it did. The high water mark was pretty much the center of the street in front of our building. (It was deeper on the sidewalks on each side.) By 10, the water had definitely stopped and by 11, it had retreated back to the crosswalk. Ivy stayed with us--the wires in front of her building had been smoking, but the water was too deep for the firetrucks to get there to do anything about that or the alarms. I don't think any of us slept much that night. Fortunately, when the morning high tide came, we could tell the road was dry all the way back to the hospital.
We took stock. No power, no internet, no gas. Water, but we weren't sure if it was contaminated and had no way of telling.
Another friend, Xannocide, lives farther uptown and never lost power. After a bizarre breakfast of cold squash and chicken, we put together a triage package of the most perishable food and made the trek uptown to his place. It was bizarre. The pizza place that had wood fired ovens and the Subway sandwich shop had no power, but were managing to slap food together anyway and had massive lines out the door. People who had pumps were pumping frantically. A local nightclub was completely trashed--the water line on the windows was at my waist and inside, you could see all the furniture upturned and covered in mud. Trees everywhere were cracked in half or worse, none of the streetlights worked, and the streets were full of debris. We found one BMW convertible that had clearly been completely filled with water. But inside Xannocide's building, the elevators were running and they even had internet on some floors.
We had three households' worth of eggs and milk and butter, plus all the blueberries I'd put up during the summer. Since our friend had power, we did the logical thing. We made a shitload of crepes. With blueberry compote.
We finally went home before it got dark, and spent an evening staring at each other in exhaustion, repeating platitudes. Ivy's neighbors had disabled the bell, but it still clicked madly, so she continued to stay with us. After we got tired of ourselves, we played some Scrabble and ate a little and tried to burn off some nervous energy by exercising a bit. Finally made it to 9pm, when we declared it was late enough to go to bed.
Twelve hours of sleep later, still no utilities. The jackhammers were going all night, which is kind of reassuring. We may be without power until Monday, but that's pretty much the worst case scenario. The power company won't commit to more than that, but we've been watching chunks of surrounding neighborhoods get their power back, so we're cautiously optimistic. Shockingly, the water supply has been declared safe to drink. We're back at Xannoside's, who's gotten complete Internet back. Still no gas, although the water in the taps was warm--we think they turned the gas back on for a bit in the middle of the night, enough to heat some of the water in the tank, but found problems and turned it back off. We've rescued what was left of edible food, and are piecing together meals that make slightly more sense today. The neighborhood is putting itself back together again, and there's a meeting for volunteers at city hall at noon on Friday.
On the other hand, we're not leaving any time soon. The PATH is wrecked. They're saying 7-10 days some places, indefinite others. The photos from the subway system are shocking. The bridges are open, but many of the cars in our neighborhood are destroyed. The ferries are running, but in a limited way and apparently the line is a little under two hours long. We could get out if we had to, but commuting's still pretty much out of the question. But the supermarket farther from us has power, is open, and appears to be being restocked. So food and water aren't really a concern and it's still warm enough that I'm not worried about heat. We aren't showering, since the water's freezing, but we can stand a little more stinkiness. We'll see about washing up at Xannoside's, if the gas isn't back in a day or so. I'm kinda working from home, by which I mean Xannoside's living room, on a small laptop without Microsoft office or VPN. But my boss is understanding.
So. We're lucky. It could have been so much worse. We're a little uncomfortable and very inconvenienced, but we're safe, and only lost a handful of things from the fridge. Our stuff's fine. Most of our friends and family have checked in and are at our level or better. It might be weeks before things approach normal, but everything's ok. And we're grateful.
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Date: 2012-11-01 01:09 am (UTC)From: