one year ago

A year ago, the October Storm hit Buffalo. And while it might not seem very noteworthy, it was actually a very crazy time!

It was a Thursday night and I was planning on going to Paul's to watch The Office and Grey's. It had started to snow and my dad had decided it would be a good idea for me to take mom's car. So I was driving up to his house and when I was on Route 5, I got a phone call from dad. Here is how it went:

Me: Hello?
Dad: Hi honey.
Me: What's up?
Dad: I was watching the weather report and it looks like we're going to get a big storm tonight. Maybe you should think about coming home.
Me: Well I'm halfway there, so I think I'm just gonna keep on going.
Dad: Ok, be careful.
Me: Bye

So I continued to Paul's house and hung out in the freezer. (Ben used to not turn on the heat and I'd have to bundle up in blankets.) So after hanging out downstairs and starting to watch The Office, the cable went out. So Ben yelled that we'd be able to see it in his room on the regular tv. Of course, we only saw a minute before the power went out. I stuck around for a few more minutes and then decided to head home.

When I got outside, I could see that it was snowing like crazy and there were tons of branches down everywhere. So in order to drive down Main Street, I had to swerve around branches, in the snow, and avoid falling branches. It was kind of scary! And the scariest part is that it was lightning outside and I was following all the power outages home. The only reason I know this is because when I passed a street light, it went out! lol

By the time I got home, there was absolutely no power in Hamburg and half the tree branches were in our driveway. I was afraid to get out of the car because branches were cracking and falling into the yard. It was crazy scary! Thank goodness that mom was waiting for me with a flashlight and I literally ran into the house. Once I settled into some warm pajamas cuz there wasn't any power and it was getting cold in the house, I kept hearing all these cracks. It was awful! The worst one was when we heard this god awful sound and then the house shook. Mom and I ran into my bedroom and saw that one of the branches fell onto our house!

After that, Mom decided that we weren't going to be staying in our bedrooms because she was afraid the big tree in the backyard would fall on the house. (It's not a stable old tree.) So she woke up Dad and made him drag the futon mattress into the living room. I got the couch and they slept on the floor.

In the morning, there was still no power and thankfully I didn't have to go to work. In the light of the day, I got to see the rest of the yard and it was absolutely COVERED with trees. There was literally not one inch of grass that was not covered with branches. I have never seen anything quite like this before or probably ever again! I spent most of the day inside with Mom eating hot chocolate and looking at the snow and crap outside.

The next day I had to do an inventory in Wellsville and had to drive all the way down there. The craziest thing is that everywhere outside of Western New York there was no snow! Absolutely NO SNOW! On Sunday, I spent the day with Dad and the neighbors dragging branches out to the street. It was so nice to spend the day with them. Paul even came over to help. After we were done clearing out our yard, we went over to Paul's grandparents and helped them clean out their yard.

So one year later, there's still reminders of the storm. There's large stumps in people's yards and bunches of trees that have been taking out. Neighborhoods just seem so different now. But what I remember most about this storm is how nice everyone was to each other. The neighbors helped each other out and I got to spend some quality time with my parents (sans power).

~*~

S0 here we are at 11:00 on a Saturday night and what am I doing? I am watching my new DVD of Brothers & Sisters and doing some work. How pathetic is this? I talked to Beth online earlier and we agreed that that if we were still in college, we would be getting ready to go out for a night at Heenans. And we would be working on staying out until at least 4 when we'd hear "last call". Oh how times have changed. What an old bore I am!

This week should be interesting. Paul is in San Antonio for work, so I'm off to fend for myself! But Monday starts busy season at NFG, but unfortunately 5/6 th's of the team will be in Philadelphia for Utilities training. And who is the 1/6th who is still home? Me. Who was the one that really wanted to go to Philly? ME. UGH. I wanted to go visit Treen and hang out for a while. But that's not happening. Anyway...

So I should be doing lots of work this week, but realistically there's not going to be a whole lot to do. So hopefully if I work efficiently and get a lot of stuff, I'll be working regular hours. I'd like to see some friends this week that I don't get to see a lot of because our schedules are so crazy. Should be fun if we can all get together!

I'm off to finish this episode of Brothers & Sisters and then it's time for bed!