I think he covers all the bases pretty well, and I have nothing much to add. His post is dated 01aug2011, but I’ve never heard of it from any of my feeds until my webhost sent a tweet out today.
The top of the hour [major national news] reported this morning that the polls for the upcoming Iowa Poll currently has Gingrich at 40%, Romney at 23%, and “the reminder of the Republican candidates total 10%”.
It is simply un-fscking believable that a “major news outlet” could be reporting a difference from other polls that is well over five times the normal margin of error, let alone pretending that one of the four people in the United States with a reasonable chance to win the Presidential election in 2012 simply does not exist.
I’m not sure if the Maryland primary is going to be relevant this year, but I’m downloading the form now and will mail it in to switch my party affiliation today. March 13, 2012 seems to be the deadline here in Maryland if you wish to vote in the Primary Election.
In the UK. But somehow, something like this could never happen in the USA, right?
[h/t unc]
I might as well paste it up here too:
ETA: The first bit of light rain started at about 11 AM today. Peak of the storm is predicted for 2 AM tomorrow.
ETA: First beer at 2:30 PM
17:13 update: We’ve got high winds and sometimes heavy rain, but no lighting as of yet. That means I’m comfortable leaving my main power on, though I will be switching to the laptop shortly.
06:44 next day: Never lost power. No lighting, no exploding power transformers. Buying dry ice as a magic amulet against power loss worked again!
X• Hit the ATM up for some cash, enough for a few days
X• Make sure vehicle gas tanks are full.
X• Check around outside of house and take trashcans and any loose items inside.
X• Charge up everything: phones, laptop, those car batteries I keep handy as an ersatz DC stick welder, those extra gel cells I have lying around.
X• Sort through my LED flashlight collection. I’m going to need it.
X• Clean out gutters.
X• Tape an X across windows to limit the spread of any broken glass.
X• Pack the empty space in freezer with water bottles to form ice.
X• Pick-up that dry ice if possible
X• Fill tub with water, then shut off the water main. I can use the tub water for flushing, and by sealing off the main I trap gallons of potable water in case a “boil water” order goes in to effect.
X• Unplug main computer, NAS, etc. to protect against lighting strikes. Leave the wireless router powered up and use laptop for storm progress data.
• Throw main breaker at some point before the peak of the storm if lighting is present. You know you will lose power anyway, might as well protect your equipment from lighting strikes too.
The earthquake wasn’t, the aftershocks personally haven’t been even noticed, but Irene is another story altogether.
We haven’t even had a real hurricane since Agnes, and that was back in 1974. While Agnes stalled over the area just north of home and rained for several days straight, Isabel, a mere tropical storm from a few years ago took my power out for 4 days and had most of the traffic lights fscked up for over a week.
Now if you will excuse me, I’m off to score some dry ice.
