After Ike

I've just got online at a friend's house. It's the day after the day after Ike and you all probably know much more about it than I do. We have no power, no internet and only the famous radio on which to receive news.

The news is we have been very lucky. The house suffered only the most minute amount of damage and our fence blew down. No trees came down on our street and nobody got hurt. Just driving around today we saw roofs and cars stoved in by falling branches.

Yesterday I was at a bit of a loss to begin with - after the storm had largely passed I realised I had given little thought to what happens next. But we soon got into clear up mode. The houses around us emptied and we all emerged into the rain to start moving leaves, tree limbs and other debris. It took all day, but it was one of those weird neighbourly things that the British only manage when there is a war on.

Today we have worked out how to manually open the garage doors and we have ventured as far as Caroline and Perryn's house (a few blocks away) - they have a generator so we are able to recharge the kid-occupying DS and portable DVD player, not to mention phones and the radio.

Downtown Houston is blocked off - a lot of high-rises lost all their windows (and a lot of office furniture) and it's too dangerous to let the public in. Entry to Galveston Island is forbidden for the same reason but it looks like thousands of people did not die.

Millions of people lost power though, and today they are saying that it could take 4 weeks for electricity to be re-connected. The water supply is low but we do have water and that should resume properly for everyone today or tomorrow once the appropriate tests have been performed. Really we are waiting for some normality - for electricity or at least for shops to open where batteries and stuff can be bought without a riot kicking off.

Map showing the power loss. That red splodge? That's me that is.

We have heard lots of stories on the radio from people who have been less fortunate than us - we really have escaped without a scratch - but overall it seems that the authorities are doing what they can and that the city will be back up and running soon. The clean up will take a long time but hopefully improvements can be made before the next hurricane - underground power lines would be good!

The consensus is that Houston hasn't had a storm like this in 25 years and hopefully there won't be another one soon.