It's Tuesday, I think.
Last night, I told Steve that it was time to return for things to normal. With us in fully assembled beds and clean clothes somewhat neatly stacked, we could get our bearings. I found a pad of paper and made a list of activities for today. One of the activities was a return to blogging. Yes, blogging has become a default activity for me. Something that makes me feel normal.
The last two weeks have been a blur with 15 hour stretches of packing, 3 hours of sleep, and periodic bouts of hyperventilation. Then we moved. Then we had a hurricane that devastated this area of Northern New Jersey. We didn't have power for days, so I'm not sure if the media really showed how bad things were around here. It was bad.
The good news is that we didn't get much water in the basement. Just a puddle in the corner. With stacks of moldy carpeting lining the streets of our town awaiting garbage pickup, I know that we were very lucky indeed.
Ugh. I'm typing on Steve's computer right now and Typepad isn't liking it. My Mac is under the weather, so I'm going to the Apple Store to buy a new one.
I do believe that I have PTS syndrome right now.
13 thoughts on “Un-Boxing Day”
Comments are closed.
Apt. 11d 
Good to see you back! Is that video you posted a link to on twitter close to where you live? I don’t watch the news, so I wouldn’t be able to tell you whether there was adequate NJ coverage. Hopefully others can do that.
I know things were probably worse for you because we had my parents (or maybe that was a bit of a problem for us too), but we moved right before the (crazy) last week of classes and then finals (and tons of grading) came. It was insane, let me tell ya!! I hope things do go back to normal ASAP for you. Are the boys back in school already? Does that help?
LikeLike
Home Depot sells a manual pump, you can put it into a sump where the electric pump has no power and crank it out into a 5 gallon bucket and pour it into a sink, etc. About $20 as I remember? A life saver for power out and a slow leak into a basement.
LikeLike
Yay — glad you’re back, and that blogging feels like a back to normal activity and not a chore.
I often enjoy the first day without power, as a break. After that though it feels disorienting and stress inducing. Moving in the midst would indeed feel like it would induce PTSD. I suspect, though that this will be the kind of stress that gets forgotten when everything is baxck in the right place.
LikeLike
Welcome back, Laura!
“Home Depot sells a manual pump, you can put it into a sump where the electric pump has no power and crank it out into a 5 gallon bucket and pour it into a sink, etc. About $20 as I remember? A life saver for power out and a slow leak into a basement.”
That sounds very useful.
LikeLike
Welcome back.
My neighbor was happy that he had a battery back up for his sump, but I still like my solution: Don’t put stuff on the floor of the basement. This may not work for everybody, but my basement is my garage in the front and it drains into the driveway. Anything an inch off the floor is safe.
LikeLike
Welcome back! No hurricane on this side of the continent but the same PTSD from unpacking copious boxes and getting settled in. A bit of culture shock going from the east coast back to the west coast…
Five trips to Salvation Army already and we had purged HUGELY before packing…
LikeLike
Laura, what a challenge. š¦ My sister is sort of up near you (Sloatsburg) and they were devastated by everything from flooding to power loss to gas main breaks to bridges being washed out. Irene went way more inland than anyone expected, and that wasn’t good. We were lucky with power here–or were we? I had a half-dead tree removed from our yard a few months ago. Maybe that made the difference between having and losing power.
LikeLike
Some people from my hometown had a Facebook post apologizing to the neighborhood because their tree went down during a storm and took out power to the whole area
LikeLike
Cool on the new Apple. Tell us what you got. I was disappointed that they’ve discontinued the plastic macbook, which I liked.
LikeLike
I am so glad that you’re starting to be able to see some light. I still can’t think of moving again and it was four years ago we bought this house!
LikeLike
I’m glad to hear you made it through the move and hurricane.
It sounds like Irene was the acid test for basement flooding. On the bright side, Irene took care of lots of deadwood around here.
Who thinks Hurricane Katia will take a sudden right-hand turn on Thursday night? (I have my doubts.)
LikeLike
Thanks, guys. I got a new iMac that is happily transferring files right now. We lurched from minor crisis to minor crisis today, as the kids started their first day of school and Steve found his way to the bus stop for the first time. So, I failed to really return to blogging as promised. Hopefully, I’ll write more tomorrow.
Those flooding pictures that I posted on Twitter were from my new neighborhood. Just down the block. It’s raining again here, so those poor people will be underwater again tonight. I’ll do a proper post tomorrow with more pictures of the horror.
LikeLike
oh no! your very neighborhood! Well, I’m glad you guys were not as badly affected, but sorry for those people who were flooded. I hope things go back to the “new normal” soon… (and I know that it takes a long time to adjust to the new normal…)
LikeLike