WE GET SIGNAL.

MAIN SCREEN TURN ON.


lol, okay, that aside, thank God for Yamaha Generators.


Alright, so who wants story time?  No one?  Okay...

Nah, just kidding.  So, without internet for seven days, when you live inside a house that hasn't had power, you either go insane or find ways to kill time... like coordinating survival plans, building model battleships, playing Scrabble with my mother and being called a cheat for using legitimate Japanese words...  (And win the game by using a simple, three letter word...)

There was also a bit of cleaning up involved, and some sunburn.  But yeah... good times.  Good times...

In all honesty, it was a nice change of pace... yet I sure missed any kind of cooling device.

We're not expecting main power back here until perhaps the end of the week, but we finally managed to acquire for ourselves a decent generator which is currently supplying the water pump to the house, this PC, the internet, (obviously), running the fridge and maybe a couple of lights.  But hey, I didn't mind using candles... and a butane gas cooker.  Still am, but now that we have a fridge working again we might be able to replace some of what we lost there.  (And waiting hours in queue for ice was not cool...)

So what did we lose exactly?  Trees.  Lots of trees.  We also lost a roller door and almost a second one which will need replacing, but the trees... so many lost trees.  This neighbourhood looks like a bomb was dropped on it, but I'm fine and so is my mother.  Our house has seemingly suffered no structural damage, though one dog yard got flattened by a fallen gum tree.  The garden is in shambles and we've lost a lot of fencing but fortunately for us our water tank is on a higher elevation from the house so thank God also for gravity and how it works with that.

The recovery work in Yeppoon and outlying areas has been outstanding.  Saw a fleet of trucks earlier in the day that are here to fix the power lines.  I'll be sure to update when I can about that with lots of pics regarding Cyclone Marcia's wrath.  I'll admit I didn't get many pics while it rolled over me flattening the landscape.  I kind of bunkered down in my bathroom with my noise-cancelling headphones while watching The Goonies on my PSP to keep calm.  lol, needless to say, I never want to see a Category 5 again.  We never witnessed the eye of the storm but rather we got the worst of its winds from beginning to end.  Over fifty homes in the Livingstone Shire alone have been wiped out and up until recent over 70,000 homes were without power.  Many still remain off the grid but with the tireless work of the SES, military and aid workers, things will return to normal... in maybe six months from now.

Anyway, thanks for the prayers and concern, everyone.  They were heard.