"...The hurricane....?"
"...Wanted to ask you about the Hurricane..."
"...Your dad, how is...?"
"...Evacuation of the Florida Keys, is he...?"
As Tropical Storm Fay makes landfall, folks who know my father lives one island down from Key Largo in Florida all wanted to know about his evacuation plans. And I tell them:
"Ha! Evacuation plans? De Pop don't need no stinkin' evacuation plans!"
And then, because it makes me sound like a horrible, callous daughter (also with a mysterious Mexican accent considering I'm a redhead living in Pittsburgh), I have to go on to explain:
You see, Fay was predicted as a Category 1 hurricane.
The Pop only considers evacuation for a Category 3 hurricane.
Cows and Auntie Em in her rocking chair have to be flying by the window before my father even considers loading up the car and leaving la vida Margaritaville. This has been discussed thoroughly and at length between he and I more than once.
Believe me. It has.
It doesn't matter if the sky turns black and the canals and palm trees swim with blood and pina colada mix. It doesn't matter if plagues of grouper fall from the sky or, say plagues of lawn furniture from a yard three canals over drop in for a visit.
It doesn't matter if the neighbor's cat, Mr. Mittens, will be clinging to the top of the flag pole down at the marina by day's end. Or if Jimmy Buffet himself crashes through the back porch screen with a plate of cheeseburgers and that lost shaker of salt....
The news says Category 1, and one laughs in the face of a Category 1. It is apparently not so much a storm. It is a sneeze... with gusto.
So around 10:30 yesterday morning, I got an email from the Pop. The gist of it was (and I'm paraphrasing here):
I guess I'm not going to get to go to Dairy Queen today for my medium pineapple milkshake and barbeque sandwich which I have every Monday night for dinner. The winds are at 60 miles an hour outside and the neighbor is out in the wind and rain looking for Mr. Mittens.
I don't know why. I'm sure Mr. Mittens has found shelter somewhere.
Now, of course, I am not only worried about my dad. I am now worried about the welfare of the neighbor, and Mr. Mittens. Who I have never even met before. (The neighbor, I mean. I think Mr. Mittens might have rubbed up against my leg once.)
Reading the news this morning, it appears Fay's winds have reached the 75 mile an hour range over the Keys... Just under what it takes to make this tropical storm an official hurricane.
And I know my father is there at home, strapping himself to the mast as the power zaps out, the first floor floods, and neighborhood pets and free-range iguanas everywhere are swimming for higher ground. But let's get back to the really important things here...
The Pop's schedule has been all blown to heck because he never did get his Monday Dairy Queen run.
Gosh, the whole week will have been thrown off!
Stupid Mother Nature.
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