Frankenstorm?

        No matter where you live you always have some form of natural disaster to worry about. Here in the US depending on where you live you can have tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, mud slides, floods, wildfires, tsunami's and volcanoes. We live in the Appalachian Mountains in western Pennsylvania, so we are used to snow, ice, and flooding. It is a running joke that you go from winter to construction and back (they just re-opened one of the major roads by my house Friday night in time for winter). We often get the misnamed "wintery mix" through out the fall and spring (I say it is misnamed because it sounds cute and fun like some sort of festive chex mix, in  reality it is a disgusting mess of rain/ice/snow that no one can drive in). We have had a rare handful of tornadoes or micro-bursts, we have also had a couple of hurricane's come in land enough to dump rain on us.

         For those hiding under a rock that haven't seen the news, they are calling for Hurricane Sandy to make landfall tomorrow, then to have a head on collision with a storm that is already dropping temperatures and rain on us. At this point no one really knows what is going to go on but there's a good chance we will either get a lot of rain or snow and dangerous winds. The governor has already declared a state of disaster so that he can start mobilizing in case there is as much damage as being forecast.  The electric companies are calling in technicians as we speak to deal with expected outages. Maybe this time if we do lose power it won't take as long to restore.

         Everyone is encouraged to get a storm kit ready for worst case circumstances. Basics of a storm kit include bottled water, matches, flashlights, battery operated radio, first aid kit, nonperishable food, back up batteries and a cell phone. Even if this storm is over hyped and we just get a normal storm this is always good to have around in case your power randomly goes out (say for 12 hours because a drunk idiot hits a telephone pole). We decided to update our kit because Ducky is scared of the dark. The last time we lost power we had to keep the flashlight pointed on her toys to keep her from flipping out. I wanted to get a spiffy lantern I had found that lasts up to 500 hours on 3 D batteries (Energizer FL452WRBP Weather Ready LED Folding Lantern (Google Affiliate Ad)), but when I got to Walmart they were completely sold out. In fact they were sold out of almost all but the propane lanterns, after my sister and I grabbed the last 2 mini lanterns and ran they were completely out. I thought a fight was going to break out between people pushing and shoving to flashlights after we left. We also found a cool night light that remains on even if the power goes out (GE 11281 2-LED POWER FAILURE EMERGENCY LIGHT (Google Affiliate Ad).

         Other than getting the new lanterns and a battery operated radio (we don't own well any type of radio) we didn't need to add anything to our storm kit. I do need to take care of running around and gathering up toys in case we have to hide from the winds. In the past if the tornado siren went off I grabbed a drink, my cell phone and a book and set off to whatever room had no windows. In our current house this is a lovely cell in our basement that is dark and cold and no amount of sprucing up can keep it from being gloomy. I need to have enough easily carried toys and books to convince a very hyper toddler that this is a fun room to play in until its safe to come out.

         I went from getting everything ready for trick or treating to getting everything ready for Frankenstorm. I'm really hoping we still get to go trick or treating as this is our family's favorite holiday, but we already missed out on it at my mom's place because we didn't want to risk coming back up the mountain after dark today. Are you ready for the storm? Are you ready for the storm with tiny demanding people aka kids? For all of those who are hiding under a rock here is the expected path  for "Sandy" aka "Frankenstorm".