Wendy and I went on a long drive today just to get away from normalacy. I guess that's also what we do when we go to the movies, escape the ordinary, add a little bit of the "fantastic" to our lives. Today's "fantastic" was a drive down to Florida City to explore the Everglades National Park, and then up to a Miccosukee Indian Village off of Tamiami Trail. I bought a little guide to the Miccosukee Language, a pamphlet really. I'll share some of it with you later, I know a few of my friends will be curious to see it. :)

Ivan pounded the Cayman Islands today. Here's my latest map. I am glad to see the thing head even more westward, but I feel bad for the people in Grand Cayman.

Horrible, horrible storm. Here is my latest map.

Pray for the people in Grand Cayman. They are about to be run over by a storm with 174 MPH sustained winds. Do you think the gusts will get over 200 MPH?

I have seen fierce storms in the Pacific... They call them Typhoons there instead of Hurricanes... When I was living on Guam, we would get into the second alphabet of names every year. (Let's not even talk about Paka) They were always beasts in that region, but only rarely here in the Atlantic. They just don't have the legroom over here, not like in the warm endless reaches of the Western Pacific.

Ivan certainly is Terrible. Aptly named.

Well, Ivan looks like he will go a bit west of us. We were originally going to hang some more plywood today, but the storm is far enough off that we will have plenty of warning should the storm change course. Since we just got our power back, I think I'll spend the day cleaning house and getting things back to normal.

I'm still keeping a close eye on this hellacious hurricane. Here is my latest homemade map.

Well, here comes our third hurricane this season. Ivan looks like it will run up the West Coast of Florida like an unforgiving cheese grater. I'm starting to track the storm in detail now, so for those of you that like my "Microsoft Streets and Trips meets NOAA prognostication" homemade maps, here is the latest. I don't put any of my own opinions into the map, I just track the probable lat/long coordinates published four times a day by NOAA and the National Hurricane Center.

The red circle on the map represents hurricane force winds, a much smaller circle than Frances had... smaller and much more powerful. The Orange circle is tropical storm force winds. I can handle those, bring 'em on. Keep that red circle away from me!

Well, the power line to our house is still hanging from a tree.

Ivan is right around the corner, no one knows if we are going to be hit or not. [ Ivan is a professional hurricane, not like that sissy Frances. ]

My blogging will be limited until the power is properly back up.

If Ivan hits, that might take a while.