Hurricane Ike

Here is the beginning of my IKE story:
The family and I are fine, we got power back today. Kim and the kids evacuated to her dad's house.First, let me start off by saying...A Category 2 Hurricane has sustained winds of up to 110 miles an hour. My house is built to withstand a cat. 3 according to the paperwork I have on the property when we bought it. The storm, up until 12 hours before it hit, was supposed to come in about Matagorda Bay, about 125 miles away. There were no mandatory evacuations issued for the area that we live in, it was really too late, in my opinion to get out. Hurricane Ike began to go through Baytown about 7 PM on Friday night. It started very slowly, some wind, some rain, no big deal. We were watching weather reports on the news. We started getting hit pretty hard around 11PM. Power was still on at around Midnight. Then, all hell broke loose.
Round 1
It was the first and last direct hit from a Hurricane that I will attempt to ride out. We made the kids put mattresses down in the hallway to sleep. When the winds started ramping up, it was like I had a freight train outside of my bedroom window. These winds continued from about mignight to around 3AM. Then, dead calm. I walked outside, looked up at the sky, and saw stars. There was no wind, no rain, there were no sounds. Nothing. The eye of the Hurricane was passing over Baytown, Texas. It was one of the most eerie feelings that you can imagine if you haven't been through it. My fence was gone. Blown every which way. Kids were still asleep, and the wife and I started clearing a little debris. We put it between the houses on my block to try to keep limbs from being blown into cars are homes. After we had fininshed with the minor clean-up, we tried to get a little sleep, in our own bed. About an hour later, the train came back.

Saturday:
The winds kept at hurricane force until about 8 am. That's when I went outside again. I started clearing branches from storm drains in the rain with lighter winds going on. The roads were under a little water, and I wanted to clear what I could. I helped where I could in the neighborhood by moving some branches. My neighborhood is in good shape in relative terms to the rest of Baytown. Baytown is in good shape relative to the areas south of us. On Saturday, I drove around the city to check on friends and my store. As some of you know, I manage a ... Pharmacy in Baytown and luckily enough, my store made it out in great shape. I had some awning damage and my signs are gone, but other than that, it is in great shape. Still no power in town. Saturday night was very warm in Texas, about 80-85 degrees overnight. The windows were kept open in the house, but we were all sweating.
Sunday
I finally convinced my wife to go to her dad's up north. Permission was given to check the store's out on the interior. I brought my drill to remove plywood and we checked all of our stores. Two were in good shape, one was not. I finished checking out the stores at 130 pm and by 2:15, we had a generator arrive to power a store. The electrician's got there shortly after, and just over 24 hours after the storm passed, the company I am quite proud to work for right now, we were able to open a store in a city devoid of power. Baytown staff started showing up to help. We were only able to stay open until 6PM because of a curfew in town, but it was a great start. A cool front blew in and I was able to sleep comfortably. I looked at the stars as I tried to sleep, but couldn't stop thinking about what we could do to help.
Monday:
I got to work at 7 AM. By 8AM, staff from all 3 of our stores were ready to work. We were able to fill scripts very quickly. We did little things like brew coffee to give to customers, put power strips out for our customers to charge cell phones, microwave some popcorn for kids(the only thing we asked for each of these services was a smile from a child or a chin up for a customer.) My staff and I have gotten hugs and thank yous from customers, we have had so many people come up and thanks us for being open, we have been called Saints and Angels, it has been amazing. Our Baytown staff has not asked for breaks or food or anything. Most refuse to leave work while we are open, simply because they want to help anyone they can. My store usually only checks out about 300 customers in a given day. From 8-530, we were able to check out 1000 people.

If you are still reading this, I apologize for rambling. I had one customer in particular who came in, it was her daughters birthday. She was upset, but we were able to get her a Warm Delight brownie microwaved for her daughter, so she was able to at least have a small birthday cake. We had another customer who told me that her child had not had a breathing treatment since Friday, we were able to plug up his machine and his mom knows to come find me twice a day, and I'll find him a spot in the store to sit and relax. There are times that I question whether what I do for a living makes a difference in people's lives, over the last couple of days I have been reminded that it is not what you do that makes a difference, but how you do it.

So, I want to thank the following people from Baytown stores who surely have made a difference in people's live over the last couple of days:
Rachel, TJ, Katelin, Chelsea, Gladys, Sylvia, Delores, Roger, Keitha, Linda, Kristy, Alvin, Joyce, Daniel, Douglas, Kevin, Lupe', Berling, Anil, Angelique, Yvette, Tandy, Rose and Kim.