Hurrican Ike

Hi everyone,
With Hurricane Ike at our doorstep, I thought I’d send out a note to let you know our status.
We are told to “Run from Water, Hide from Wind”. Because we don’t live in a storm surge area, we are not part of the Houston/Galveston area under mandatory evacuation. So we are to hunker down and ride out the storm.
School is closed tomorrow. The business is closed tomorrow. Jerry is pulling all the computers out of the training rooms with windows (isn’t that ALL our rooms?) He will shut down our server, turn off our phone system and do so before they padlock the building tonight at 8:00 p.m.
We can expect downed trees and power lines. Tornados are a possibility in our area, and broken glass (though we are not boarding up the windows). Jerry gassed up the cars yesterday (he washed my Jaguar, so naturally a storm is on its way). We have moved everything out of the back yard into the garage. We have water, food, and fuel. We will likely loose power for a while. CenterPoint Energy said the Worst Case scenario is 18 days without power. I suspect it to be only a few days. I have batteries for my hand held fans. It’s going to get hot here.
Later today we will learn if there will be any contra lanes opening up on I-10 West (to San Antonio), I-45 northbound (to Dallas), Highway 290 (to Austin) and Highway 59 North.
Our stake developed an Emergency plan a few months ago and we had a presentation of the plan on August 30th. Jerry is a group captain responsible for about ten families in our ward. He is to know if they have their 72 hour kit and where they would go if they were to evacuate. He has made his before the storm calls today and will make after the storm calls….after the storm. We will keep you posted as long as we have power. I figure I can get help around the house organizing my piles of paper. I have a captive crew.

We love you all and ask for your prayers that Ike will make landfall in the least populated area and cause minimal damage.
Love,
Veniece