Thursday, October 10 - Milton is still here

 It's 4:30 a.m.  I slept off and on and finally got up at 4 to see how things looked.  I still have power which is shocking, given the winds.  It's too dark and stormy to see what's happened but here's a brief video to give you a sense of what it's like out.

Our only concern now is that the ground is sodden with standing water everywhere.  And my boy Buddy has very short legs and does NOT like to walk in puddles.  According to the news we've had over a foot of rain from the storm in the last 24 hours.

Feeling enormously grateful.

9:50 a.m. The skies are starting to lighten.  I'm dressed and put out the bird feeder.  Buddy peed in the backyard.  Only after he saw me out there and I held the doggie door for him.  There is a lot of standing water, which he hates.  So sad I didn't have my camera to catch him tiptoeing on the blocks that edge the pineapple plants.  It made me laugh out loud.

I've talked to a few neighbors.  The people across the street had their living room window blow out at 5:30 a.m. which is weird because it is sheltered by a fence.  Based on some other damage nearby, we're assuming it was a tiny little tornado.  

My next door neighbors are going to nail back the panel in my fence that came loose.  A couple of other neighbors had flooding in their garages/lanais.

My biggest problem is my poor dog.  He's been a champ but the poor guy has no idea what's going on.  Between the storm and me moving stuff in and out of the house, he is a whiny mess.  Hopefully, he'll calm down as the day progresses.  He's currently snoring in his crate, which is his safe place.

3:45 p.m.  We're seeing bits of blue between the clouds now.  No rain or significant wind for a few hours.  Buddy and I are both starting to get back to normal.  For me, the days of anticipation is stressful, as is the storm itself.  I'm giving Bud and myself time to just chill and process.

We had a fine moment earlier.  I moved all the plants back outside and went into the guest room to get something and noticed a baby lizard, which must have come in on one of the plants.  It took several minutes but I was finally able to scoop the little guy up and release him outside where he came from.  

I saw this photo in the Orlando Sentinel.  This is where I like to walk Buddy a couple of times a week.  It's a lovely area and I'd love to live there but it floods after every single storm.