be it ever so humble / there's no place like home

And that’s where I am, back in Clear Lake. Woo!
Tang is meowing at my feet, and I have to take him back to Gavin and Jen’s in a bit. Our four-car caravan headed south in exactly the same way we headed north — minus 5 hours. That’s right, the drive home took us the standard hour and a half, plus a few minutes to deal with the car carrier and Gavin and Jen’s car that broke halfway down the highway and threatened to act as a wing and take their car airborne! 😉
My apartment is, well, completely fine. I have power, in fact, I never even lost it, as evidenced by the alarm clock that’s still showing the correct time and the answering machine that still answers with my voice. The answering machine is how I knew my power was on in the first place.
My apartment complex doesn’t even look any worse for the wear. A few branches, some leaves, but it’s looked worse after a big thunderstorm. According to the government, we weren’t supposed to come back until Tuesday. I didn’t hear that until after we were on the road. According to the TV news this morning, people in our area were allowed to come back. So, some conflicting messages. I’m glad I returned. And now I have plenty of time to re-order and clean my apartment since we’re off work Monday as well. I am, however, supposed to fly to JPL on Monday evening; no word on whether the trip’s still on, but at the moment I’m assuming it is.
We really dodged a bullet with this storm. The local news is starting to broadcast images from Beaumont, Port Arthur, and Lake Charles and the damage and flooding there is much, much worse. I’m thankful Hurricane Rita swerved to the east at the last minute, sparing Houston, but it’s hard to feel too happy about it when you know people a hundred miles up the coast are suffering.
Our evacuation turned out to be a fun time, and I can’t thank Gavin’s parents enough for taking us (people and pets) in for three days. Of course my parents would do the same, but we will need to do something very, very nice for Mike and Meg as thanks. What should have been three very tense days was really more like a vacation.
Anyway. I am home, and it’s nice.