At the last advisory on NOAA (National Oceanic Atmospheric Association, i.e., the National Weather Service), Hurricane Ike was a strong catagory 2, and may go as high as a three before striking somewhere around the Galveston, Texas, area.

People have been asked to go to shelter, move inland, away from the storm.  I only pray they took that advice; I know all too well what catastrophic damage hurricanes can do:  I survived one of the worst, costliest hurricanes in recent memory--Hurricane Katrina, three years ago, when it hit New Orleans, Louisiana.

Ever since then, I've gotten out of Hurricane Country.  I don't trust the Gulf Coast any more.  Too vulnerable, people think that they are invincible; they can survive anything that Mother Nature throws at them.  They think that they won't lose anything in a hurricane.

Yeah, right!  You argue with a storm that's hundreds of miles across, or storms that pack extremely heavy rains, obscenely high winds that rip everything in its path, or have "surprise guests" as part of the package (i.e., tornadoes), adn see what it can do to you.  I don't think you are goin' to come out on the winnin' side. 

If anything, you are at risk of losin' everything, and worst of all, you're gambling with your life. 

I've been affected enough by that dambitch Katrina to know what misery, heartache hurricanes can cause.  I don't care how "small" a hurricane happens to be:  you get a storm with winds over 75 miles an hour, guarandamtee you're gon' sustain some sort of damage from the storm. 

I may be a damn Cajun, but I ain't stupid.  I've been in enough hurricanes to know that they're nothin' to mess with!

The storm can remain at hurricane status as far inland as far north as Corsicana.  Then it's expected to quickly weaken, but not before it dumps a hell of a lot of rain on parts of Texas, causing misery and grief along the way before an approaching cold front shoots the tropical storm/soon to be depression northeastward.

There are hurricane/tropical wind warnings, advisories as far north as the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.  The westernmost counties of this region probably won't get so much than an inch or two of rain and maybe some winds; but parts of Texas (east of Paris, Palestine, which is east of Dallas) can expect to get hit pretty hard. 

The towns, cities on the eastern side of the storm can get the real mess:  the heavy flooding rains, tornadoes, damaging hurricane winds.

Not good!

This is when I'm glad I no longer live in Louisiana.  I don't have to worry about a hurricane pokin' its nasty nose in the Alaskan Gulf; if it does, then we've got a huge problem, mister!  Those people who live along the Gulf Coast are only askin' for trouble, and I don't feel sorry for those shitholes, especially if they act so complacent about a hurricane and what it can do!  It's better to get outta there quick; if you remain, then you're squat outta luck, Charley!

I hate to sound cruel, heartless, but that's the chance you gotta take.  And I've already learned the hard way.  No more hurricanes for ME!  Katrina did me in (in more ways than I'd like to admit!), and I'm NOT about to experience something like that ever again!!  Once was more than enough!

Well, I'm gonna watch the CNN News channel; they're due to have another Ike update momentarily, and I don't want to miss a thing.  All I can do is pray, hope that those people in her path get the hell outta the way and pray they make it through the worst of the storm once it makes landfall!

Until later, this is Kat signing off!  Bye for now!

~Kat A. Hammer (hurricane survivor; survived Katrina).  :(

Then people wonder why I hate my first name.  It's Katrina.  NICE.  Always wanted to have a name associated with a killer hurricane!  Now you know why I go by Kat.