Earl's Adventures, The Fireman, and the Beached Coast Guard

Well, despite all the havoc Hurricane Earl is wreaking on the U.S. east coast, many should consider themselves lucky that the storm finally started turning north. This kept it further off the coast of all the states it has been and is going to be terrorizing. My Mom put our minds to rest when she said what seemed like the entire navy fleet was tucking itself in near her, which meant they obviously thought Norfolk was the safest place to put their ships. She wasn't even going to take her patio furniture in. Nifty. Of course now though, the storm is looking right at Cape Cod, which is where Paula, Mr. X's Shiggidy Shack's main winter bartender, is home trying to enjoy her summer (you know, away from the Caribbean hurricanes). Keep turning!! Good luck Paula!

I know that I always get a warm and fuzzy when I see the scheduled cruise ship come into port. If they're here, it's still safe out there.



Tropical Storm downgraded to Tropical Depression downgraded to Remnant Gaston fizzled out so much that he was actually stripped of his name. Personally, I think that kind of ticks the gods off (I can hear them saying "Oh yeah?!") and now the nameless one is trying to regroup. It may or may not merge with the action behind it, so who knows what's going to happen. I mention it because people who look at a map once and then go spreading around horror scenarios never tend to relook at the thing and cancel the alarms; so everywhere I went yesterday I got a worried look and a "Have you seen that scary Gaston?" Well, yes, and it's not there anymore...I'm watching it, but I'm not closing my hurricane shutters yet.

So guess what we did last night? We met up with some blog readers, Priscilla & Scott, that had found our website recently and wondered if they should come take their planned vacation this week with all this hurricane craziness. I gave them a resounding yes. Fiona was going to be a dud and anything behind it would be days away, come and play! So we met up at Mr. X's Shiggidy Shack (oddly subdued last night), watched the Fireman show,



listened to Jazzique & The Green House Band,



while catching up on what brought us all to the Caribbean (they're now in Puerto Rico). Fun times! So we might take them to Sandy Bank with us on Sunday if they're up for it and the weather cooperates. It's kind of gloomy at the moment and I have no idea where the clouds are coming from (nothing on radar). Oh well, it keeps things cooler.

So only one Coast Guard cruiser is still on the S Frigate Bay/Timothy beach and should be off today. You can't see it in these pictures, but excavators have torn up the east side of The Strip's beach trying to dig the dumb thing out, and now a floating crane has been brought in to lift it back into the water. They just might want to think twice about doing that again.