I woke up around 01:20 with a sinus headache, telling me that the barometric pressure started dropping drastically. Took some ibuprofen, laid back down, went back to sleep. We woke up again around 04:20 when the power went out. Curiously enough, it was the UPS for Ruthann's computer that woke us, chirping that the Grid wasn't feeding it any more. I called in the loss to Central Florida Electric Coop (shameless plug for rural electric coops!) for information mostly. Still, when that first feed band of wind & rain slacked off, CFEC brought us back on-line. Power has flickered a few times since, but overall we've been powered up. In fact, it just flickered while logging on for this; thanks to laptop batteries & underground phone lines.

Serious and fairly continuous rain & wind resumed around 08:00, though we've experienced a couple of lulls even in that. The lulls keep getting shorter, the winds lasting longer. Most recent report I saw showed the eye collapsing right near the middle of the state (east to west) which is near to when projected for the storm to drop from Cat One to Tropical; it's still packing enough strength to be a Cat One.

So we've still got another eight hours of this to face, minimum. Since projections are also showing a turn right off shore to the north, towards Tallahassee, we'll stay under the north/east portion of this storm for a long time. NHC is projecting it will remain a tropical storm even while over the waters of the Gulf. My nasty, suspicious, paranoid self is expecting it to stall again over water, and start soaking up energy once more. Since it's wide enough to straddle the length of the Florida peninsula, that gives it width enough to suck water out of the Gulf and the Atlantic at the same time. Indications are it's doing just that, too.

So I figure to check e-mail and keep the server cleared off, and to post this update, staying on- line for a short period.