Hurricane prep: Stabilizing the pool cage

Here in Florida, if one has a swimming pool, one often has the pool area within a screen enclosure.  Folks typically refer to the encosure as a pool cage. The idea is to keep leaves and debris from falling in the pool, keep mosquitos and other bugs and little critters out, and help provide a little more safety. We've heard stories from several people about pool cages blowing away in hurricanes, including one person who described seeing a pool cage wrapped around a telephone pole and pretty much just flapping in the wind.

So with these stories, and after having read from multiple sources that it is recommended to increase the bracing of one's pool cage beyond the minimum that building codes require, we decided to add a lot more bracing to our pool cage. Our hurricane insurance deductible is between $5,000 and $6,000, so if we were to lose the cage, we would quite possibly have to forgo replacing it for a while.

As built, our pool cage had one guy wire at each end. Each of these is a steel cable, secured at a top corner of the cage, and running diagonally down and secured into the cement with a metal plate and a couple of masonry screws. Today we added 4 more tie downs, and we plan to add yet another 4 (2 on each of the end walls of the enclosure). One of the gents where Shirley used to work has a business replacing pool screens, and we were able to order the tie downs from him at US$24 each. We figure the roughly $200 and a bunch of sweat is pretty good insurance. There's some more bracing we'll be doing, and we'll post pics of that work also, but for now, here's the pics from today's work:

Gay & Lesbian Pride Month

Yesterday was the last day of June - the last day of Gay and Lesbian Pride Month. I've never understood why some folks get so crazy about homosexuality. Gosh, if 2 people love each other and want to be together, that's great. So many people spend an entire lifetime never knowing true love - never knowing what it's like to have found someone with whom to share a life. The fuss, the rabid anti-gay sentiment of the religious right misled just makes no sense.

For any who may not know, June became known as Gay and Lesbian Pride Month due to the Stonewall Rebellion in 1969 in New York. The Stonewall Inn was finally recognized as a National Historic Place 7 years ago.

I'm a white, heterosexual male, and so really have no way to comprehend what it would be like to live with the irrational prejudice with which one is faced if one is non-white, female, gay, physically or mentally challenged, or any of the other scenarios for which some ignorant folks choose to discriminate. But at a previous job I did have a coworker who summonded the courage to come out to the rest of our group and tell us he was gay. It was no big deal at all to any of us, but the obvious struggle this gentleman had endured was heart-wrenching. Why on earth anyone should have to suffer so much is beyond me.

We are all brother and sisters on this earth. Let's start acting like it.

First my brother, now me

My previous post was about my brother being on the cover of the print edition of The Postal Record. On a smaller scale, I've been taking a little ribbing for having a pic of my lovely mug in The Weekly Planet - a local Tampa paper. The article was about the Brandon chapter of Drinking Liberally, a national (international, actually, now that there's a chapter in Dublin!) group of liberals who get together periodically to have a beer (or water or diet soda or whatever) and discuss politics, current events, and whatever else comes to mind.

Well, if you happen to have an inkling for sitting with friendly folks and discussing a fairly wide range of topics - sometimes political :) -- come on out to the Drinking Liberally near you. Cheers.

Hey, my brother's a cover model!

The US Postal Service does a food drive each year. Folks leave non-perishable food at their mailbox, and the mail carriers collect it and then see that it's distributed to help feed the hungry. After last month's  food drive, one of my brother's colleagues took a pic of Pat unloading food and submitted it to The Postal Record - the national monthly magazine that is mailed out to
all letter carriers nationwide. Anyway, Pat was surprised to see his mug as the main pic on the cover! (click the thumbnail image to see a larger pic) ...I guess the poor guy's been taking a lot of ribbing now from co-workers. Hey, it's got to be tough being a super model :)

Hurricane season starts in 10 days

Hurricane season officially starts on June 1. Last year the first tropical storm (Arlene) ran June 8-13. So one cannot assume that the real storms come later in the season (the first hurricane last year - Cindy - reached hurricane status on July 3). OK. Time to crank the hurricane preparations into full swing.

I've recently begun using the very handy, easy-to-use, and free :) Ta-da lists from the clever folks at 37signals. Pictured here is my to-do Ta-da list of items to get done soon. Last year, I installed tracks for storm panels all around the house. And we caulked all of the windows. We bought some brackets to use to secure vertical 4x4's behind the garage doors - even though the doors are the newer variety that are reinforced to handle high winds. I feel better having a hefty post every 8 feet or so. Of course, the brackets aren't installed yet, and we need to buy the posts.

Even though we have panels to cover windows and doors around the house (leaving ourselves 2 exit points for safety), we want to buy some clear panels to let light in. We'd bought one last year to experiment with and decide if it was worth it to get more. YES! The clear panel gets installed in place of a metal one, provides the same protection, and brings in some natural light, so one can reduce the 'cave' feeling that one gets when the house is shrouded in panels and the power is out.

Yesterday I finished caulking between the soffit and wall in the peak above the garage. The gap was up to 1/2 inch (ok, a little more than that in places), and when horizontal rain is blowing with gusty winds, there's too much chance of water intrusion and flying metal soffits. So I feel real good to have that done. Then there's the updates to video/photo inventory, refilling some of the emergency supplies, etc., etc. It's going to be a bit busy around here for a couple of weeks (so what's new!).

OK, people, if you live in a hurricane area, get busy!