Randy4ut

Steve,
So glad to hear you faired better than you expected. Sorry to hear about the plants, but I am sure you can baby them and get them back up on their roots in no time... Take care and be safe.
Randy

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Bananaman88

My wife and I made it back yesterday. Minimal damage to the house, as reported earlier. Some shingles blown off, about 30' of fence blown down and a small section of flashing starting to come loose from my covered patio. No big deall all-in-all considering some of the other damage I've seen. My landscape, however, is completely trashed. All of my bananas look like someone stuck the leaves in the garbage disposal. Probably the only two still outside (most of my potted plants were stored in the garage) that look even decent are my M. laterita and 'Thai
Gold. The laterita, I laid on the ground and the Thai Gold was up against the house and blew over early on so it's pretty much OK. My Ae-Ae is laid over but not broken. I should be able to stake it, along with my Raja Puri and they will be fine. I had some 10' crepe myrtles that were completely smashed by the fence. Anything slightly herbaceous such as canas, gingers, bananas, etc, is just completely trashed. The good news is that plants like these easily recover. They'll look terrible for the rest of this year but I'm not too worried. We and our house made it through OK and that's all that really matters. Still no power at my house but when it comes back on, I'll try to post some of the photos of the mess.

Steve L

Hey Brent, it doesn't actually sound too bad for you. Glad you think everything will recover. Every day gets a little better. If you get tired of the hot house, come on over for the weekend.

Randy4ut

So glad to hear everything will be alright. Sorry to hear about all the plants, but like you said, they will be fine and probably won't be able to tell by next spring. Best of luck with the clean up and take care.
Randy

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ewitte

This place is still crazy. Luckily I wasn't on the bad side but I see all kinds of things driving around town.

Bananaman88

Things aren't too bad. There's a lot of clean up in the yard to do still. We do have water but still no power. The cooler temps have just been great, though. It was about 67 when I got up this morning around 5 a.m. But they are starting to go back up because that's about 4 degrees warmer than yesterday morning. I know they are forecasting temps around 88 for the high tomorrow but luckily I didn't see any 90's in the forecast for the next several days. It will get pretty unbearable if the humidity goes back up, though. I think we are projected to get power back on sometime after Monday so hopefully we won't have to wait too much longer. Thanks to everyone for all the well wishes and offers to help.

Bob

Brent and Steve, glad both of you and your families made it through safe with minimal damage. I have followed the weather on TV and have kept checking this post...............Since both of you are dealing with so much else already just send your AE Ae's to me and I'll take care of them!

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ewitte

We have estimates of 2-4 weeks getting power at the office. Not because the area was bad but because they fixed everyone else in the area and left!

Bananaman88

My Ae-Ae is still laying over. I haven't had time to try to stake it up. I'll probably get to that either this afternoon or tomorrow.

Our power is projected to come back on "sometime beyond Monday". That's awfully vauge, don't you think? I'm not getting my hopes up for anything earlier than mid-week, next week.

Steve L

I feel for you Brent. It's not fun "camping out" anymore, is it? If you need a generator, I've got one I could loan you. Everyone is southwest Louisiana has one now since Rita.

Bananaman88

Thanks for the offer, Steve. I think we can make it without one. We may have one for next time, though.

harveyc

Brent, I feel your frustration. Last January we were without power for 36 hours which was made worse because our house got pretty chilly (low 50s, probably). They would give us no estimate of power restoration at all, which made it hard to decide what to do. After 12 hours or so we didn't know if it might come back on in 1 hour or 1 week, so what were we to do? We have our own well which means we didn't have running water, but I got water from the swimming pool to flush the toilets, at least. After 18 hours or so I finally hooked up a couple of generators to a heater and a refrigerator. I bought a transfer switch but haven't hooked it up yet....better get that done!

Good luck to you all!

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ewitte

I was running everything off 12v battery and inverter (not much) and the power back on the exact second I started charging them back up with the car.

Moodene

Howdy..I am located about 35 miles west of Beaumont, Texas and I took a beating when Hurricane Ike came thru here...I have 5 acres of tree limb debris and couple trees snapped in half..all my big bananas around my house look like they been thru a shredder!!Some are down on the ground,some are bent in half..some got pulled out and blown away..lol..My house only lost few shingles but lost my meterloop off my pole..had that rebuilt..No power for 10 days..my hubby works for a energy company and worked 16 hour days in the warehouse getting supplies out that guys need to get power back on track..I haven't seen him since he left right after the storm slowed down enough for him to drive to Houston..lol..

My hubby and I rode the storm out....it was interesting since we were located on the bad side of Ike!!


Edit to say..I uploaded pics in my Gallery...

Bananaman88

Moodene,

Glad to hear that you made it through OK. You are really lucky since you were on the dirty side, that's for sure. Please pass along my thanks to your husband for the work he and his co-workers are doing. I still don't have power either but I know that there are guys (and girls) out there like him busting their butts to get things back online again. I'm starting to get really annoyed with all the crybabys out there whining about why their power isn't back on yet. Well, the repairmen can't be everywhere at once! I feel that they're doing the best that they can and we'll get power back eventually. They deserve our thanks and appreciation, as do all the folks who are assisting with recovery efforts, not a bunch of complaining.

Moodene

I told my hubby yesterday what you said, Bananaman88.. He told me to tell ya'll --You are very welcome!! I thanked so many people while they were taking care of me while I was out of pocket for a week cuz I was by myself. My hubby has not had a day off yet. He has to stay on the job for another week and maybe by next weekend he can come home! He told me that right after the storm,people were trying to get into the warehouse to demand that they fixed their stuff so they can have power!!. They still have the police stationed at that warehouse..There are areas that still don't have power..I am so thankful that my son finally came home from South Korea (he is in the Army) and being stationed here in Texas. He has been my rock for the past week now helping me getting guys hired to get my place cleaned up..I had too many business cards stuck in my door for tree removal and roof repair..Roof repair I can do and trees stuff is gonna mulched so I can put that stuff all over my yard..instead of getting rid of it..got 19.8 acres to store mulch...lol..

Now I have nearly 15 more bananas and other tropicals to fill in empty place in my flowerbeds given to me by my good garden friends whom I have been giving them plants over the years..What goes around, comes around..lol...
Thank you again ..
Nadine Milburn

Bananaman88

Our power came back on Thursday evening. Hopefully your husband will get to come home soon. I'm sure he's about worn out.

Moodene

My hubby was allowed to come home today and he is back on regular hours now..YEAH!!!

Bananaman88

Congrats! We all sure appreciate all his hard work.

Moodene

Finally got me a new roof and paint job on my house..and getting more stuff planted in the ground..
I posted 3 news pics in my gallery for ya'll to see...