We Made it through the Storm

Well, we made it through Irene at Crest Avenue.  Although there was flooding and property damage and people without electricity for 57 hours in other parts of the Metropolitan area, we did not sustain any damage nor were we without electricity for other than a few brief moments.  I was up early Sunday morning surveying the property and the streets to see what happened during my slumber.  Here are some pictures.

Twigs and leaves along the front sidewalk.

A view of the sidewalk in front of Crest Avenue.  More twigs and leaves.

This is a picture between 2502 Crest Avenue and 2504 Crest Avenue.  This is a Rose of Sharon hedge planted by the owners of 2504 Crest Avenue.  It is a little windswept but no worse for the wear.

The planter of bamboo took a tumble.  I was inside when this went over and when the stainless steel planter and the bamboo reeds hit the patio stones I thought, "UH OH!  That doesn't sound good."  Fortunately, it fell in the right direction and was easy to stand up again on Sunday morning.

As I ventured further into the back yard, I started to see the true remnants of Hurricane Irene.

A view of the deck on this wet Sunday morning.  Everything still intact.

Here is a picture of the east side of Crest Avenue.  The awnings survived without a problem.  Although there was widespread damage over our area, seeing these awnings still in place gives you an idea of how strong the winds "weren't."  Had these been up during Isabel in 2003, they would never have sustained the winds.  Isabel was a really horrific storm for the Washington area.

A quick picture taken through the crepe myrtles.

And here was the big find of the morning.  This is enormous.

This fell from the Sweet Gum tree in the back yard.  I tried to find the spot on the trunk where it made its escape, but I could not.  A definite "widow maker."

So there are my pictures of the storm of the year, at least so far.  I have begun to hear rumblings from the weather guys that there is another storm in the Atlantic - Katia.  They tell us this storm is brewing, but they quickly move on to other weather forecasting and say that it is a week or two weeks out to sea and nearly impossible to predict at this time.  Hmmmm.  I don't know if I believe that.  As for me, I will continue to track Katia on MSN Storm Tracker and hope for the best.  Unfortunately, the way it looks right now, she is headed straight for the Mid-Atlantic.  Let's hope she fizzles out soon.