Lastbinge

Well here we go. 38 days dry and sober and into the thick of the hurricane season. My profile says i reside in South Florida....in fact I am as far south in Florida as you can go.......17 miles up US1 from Key West, at the end of the road so to speak. Thirty years I have lived here now.......a veritable drinkers paradiseit is. In those thirty years I have seen perhaps ten hurricanes come through these parts. Of course I was totally drunk by the time every one of them hit. Nothing like a hurricane party drunk after you have finished your preparations......and in some cases..to hell with the preparations......just stay drunk and let Mother nature have her way. Last year, the worst hurricane season in recorded history, we had four hurricanes come over my area...Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma. I was totally smashed for every one of them.....Wilma the worst of the bunch led to at least a two week drunk.....no electricity, no phone service...but plenty of nice warm beer to drink while in the midst of an incredible clean up after the 8 foot storm surge we got.
Fast forward to today and Tropical Storm Ernesto is rapidly building strength to the southeast of me, down by Haiti and Jamaica and Eastern Cuba. The forecast track has this baby becoming a powerhouse of a Cat 3 storm in the next 3-4 days and The lower Florida Keys are in the cone on the Hurricane Center forecast track.

These occasions of hurricanes approaching have always been a complete stress and and a complete and total excuse to drink and drink heavily.

I'm not ruining my 38 days dry for this Ernesto or for any other storm in the future. Will be interesting to ride one out totally sober.

My wife will likely evacuate if in fact by tomorrow night/Monday morning this thing is still on the same track.......when she told me this afternoon she would evacuate..I gotta admit.....drinking for the storm popped right into this drunk's brain.

I've made it this far, I've got the will power.......bring the sucker on if it that's the course it chooses to take.......I'll deal with it and deal with it with no freaking booze.

Cheers all..........

Scott

2dayzmuse

Good luck Scott. Scary.... Where I live we get high winds, but not up to hurricane standards. I don't know if I could handle living in hurricane or tornado country. Yikes! Every year you risk losing your home. I suppose if you've lived there for as long as you have, it is all you know.

NYCGirl

You show that hurricane who's got more power.

How I know those disaster parties, Here on the Jersey shore we have hurricanes (not a bad as you do ) and snow storms.... we get to drink because of the weather all year. Well I used to anyway now I'll just be weathering the storm too.

Vanc Girl

Last year when Katrina was going on and we were all watching the aftermath on TV, with people unable to get food, water, supplies....I thought to myself, "Man, it would be tough to be an alcoholic there at a time like this, how would you get your booze?" I remember a few years back we had a serious ice storm (not normal for where I live) and it literally shut the city down for about a week...there was a 2 inch layer of ice covering my car, couldn't even get out of my driveway. A few days later I managed to walk to the liquor store, but it was a treacherous walk. All the while walking there, I thought, 'how sad that I need my fix this badly, how pathetic'...never again, hopefully.

hector

Thanks for sharing, Scott. You may not like this:

Your share reminds me of the scene in the movie Forrest Gump ... are you mad yet?.... where the shrimp boat is out in the gulf during a storm and Lieutenant Dan is in the crowsnest yelling his head off, like, "Is that all you got? Call this a storm? Bring it on, sucker!"

But I think he was drunk. He sobered up and cleaned up much later in the movie. Good luck to you. Be safe.

Another favorite scene is when Jenny and Forrest, adults, are out for a walk and they come to her childhood home. Jenny was abused as a child. The house is vacant. She picks up stones and throws them at the house in a fit of rage until she runs out of steam, then collapses on the sidewalk in tears. Forrest says "Sometimes there just aren't enough rocks." I have to pause the movie there every time I watch it.

Another thought: If your wife evacuates, perhaps the sober, responsible, sane thing to do would be to go with her. My opinion only.

Lollipop

Scott

Beautiful place you live in when not being nailed by hurricanes!!!!!

I wish you the best of luck!!!! I will have to start keeping track of the storms. (havent paid much attention in a couple of years since my best friend moved back to Ohio)

I admire your courage to stick it out and not drink!!! I am a big fat chicken when it comes to the hurricanes so I know I could definately not handle it without some "good ole liquid courage" I would have to bail.

Do you have generator back up? a laptop? any way of keeping us posted on you and your safety? Please keep us posted as much as possible!!! You will be in my thoughts!!!!!

Liss

Krys_wyo

Last year when Katrina hit we started drinking at 8:30am, I had never been through anything like that before and I was scared and drinking was my only defense. If i was still down south (moved up north katrina and rita were to much for one month) and looking at Ernestos current path, he looks like he might follow right where Katrina did, I would pray for power to help me hold onto the 73 days i have acheived. Im sorry you have to be faced with this personal storm surge.
Good Luck and yeah be smart GET OUT NOW, dont take any unnessesary chances with your life or sobriety.

livefortoday

Hi Scott, I'm in South Carolina now, but was born in raised in Florida so I know about the whole hurricane thing. For me, the thing about a hurricane was the DRAMA The build up of pressure as the storm was forecast, where would it go?, would we evacuate? What would happen to our homes? Schools? Jobs? Thankfully in sobriety the attraction to the DRAMA has lessened and although I still love to track the storms I don't find myself throwing hurricane parties anymore. The last storm I had to evacuate for was Floyd in 99 and my son was five days old. I wasn't sober yet and I don't even wnat to go into how horrible that experience was. Let's just say that living in a hotel with a newborn is NOT fun. You know, I have found that no matter what goes on in the world, there always seems to be another member of Alcoholics Anonymous to ride it out with. If you insist on staying home you may want to call and find another alcoholic to batten down the hatches with. I'm watching Ernesto, and the last update I saw it seems like they're not sure of his track at this point. He keeps moving further east. I know y'all don't need any more storms so God willing, it could always miss! Pray and I will, too. tk

RubyT

Ernesto may be my first real test at staying sober. My oldest daughter just moved to Florida last week...I'm already sweating it. I wonder if that's why my hubby removed the beer from the fridge and filled it with bottled water! ; ) Things that make you go hmmm! If that's the case, I love him for it!!

Lastbinge

Thanks all for replying to my post. Ernesto is over Cuba now, just about ready to emerge back into open water. The threat to my area here in the Lower Florida Keys is not looking as bad today as yesterday. Worst case scenario seems to be Cat1 winds of 75mph or so, but I doubt it will get that bad here.
Anyway.......just checking in, I convinced my wife she did not need to evacuate for this one..LOL.....Hopefully I made the right call there cause the hurricanes freak her out a bit.
I own a construction company here and have much to deal with concerning storm prep for jobsites, etc.......that's the main reason I have never evacuated yet..I'd reconsider though if we had a strong Cat3 or Cat4 barreling down on us.
No urges to drink with the upcoming storm.....39 days today....too much good sober time under my belt to consider going back.

Cheers all

Scott

mygirls_mylife

Hey there! Florida here too. In the past two years my area has been hit directly by 4 hurricanes and indirectly by 2 others. It has been a crazy couple of years. I have lived in Florida my whole life and have seen numerous more. Yepo drinking was a big part of my hurricane preparedness. NOT THIS YEAR!!!!! LETS DO IT!!!!