Marilyn--hope you're ok in NC
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mariadnoca
Moderator
Been thinking same 
Good afternoon....thanks for checking in. I live 3 miles from the Smoky Mountains and we seemed to have been in a pocket of protection. We have 6-8" of dry fluffy snow, which is staying around since the temperatures are hovering between 5-15 degrees. Fortunately, the days previous to this storm had been sunny and ground moisture dried up, so no dangerous ice situations occurred--the big issue. Heavy ice causes tree limbs to fall on electrical lines, black ice on the mountain roads and power outages. While friends 12 miles from me lost power for 12 hours, mine never went out. Those trees around my house are 100 foot tall...and when a branch falls, it can kill a person. They are called Widow Makers.
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mariadnoca
Moderator
Glad you are doing OK! That view is absolutely gorgeous.
mariadnoca
Moderator
Oh what a double whammy! Hope you feel better soon…this is why I still wear a mask out and about. I just don’t want to get sick anymore.
My 91 year old father was hospitalized for 6 days and I spent days with him. I was masked for the vast majority but I guess it wasn't enough
music-city-missy
Well-known member
I haven't downloaded the photos from my phone yet - I just keep taking more and more photos because it's just so overwhelming here in the Nashville area. It looks like a tornado touched down. But it is sort of strange. There are areas that are devastated and then almost no damage a few hundred feet away. Same road, same types of trees, same age, etc. I wish there had been a way to study it. Why this tree broke and that one just like it didn't. Which trees broke the most - Southern Magnolias were one of the ones I noticed the most, a friend said bosque elms, and definitely lots of red cedars and Bradford pears.
We have 5.67 acres that we left most wooded when we built out here in 1994. Most of the the trees are over 50 years old. Over the past 10 or so years, we have tried to keep any trees close to the house trimmed or cut them down as they started to look iffy so nothing fell on the house. Our driveway and street, which is a closed off road with only 4 homes, were all blocked but Jeff got out and pushed the downed trees out of the way best he could that Sunday as they started falling and breaking. He gave in and ordered a new chainsaw and polesaw since his chainsaw died several years back. He started doing a little cutting up of the one blocking one side of the circular driveway a couple of days ago just trying out the new saws. This high school kid that helps him with other things came over today and worked about 4 hours getting that one tree and a couple of large limbs dangling over the other part of the driveway cut. We aren't in a hurry since we aren't in a subdivision or such.
Our daughter's apartment complex lost power sometime before 5am Sunday morning and she stayed there hoping it would come on. The nice Kurdish guys that live in the unit next to her saw her struggling to get ice off of her car and ran to help her then gave her hot food and tea they had made using a grill that they kept even when the complex 'outlawed' them a year or so ago. Finally on Monday she, her dog and refrigerated/frozen foods came over. She still lost a good bit of food because we didn't have a lot of spare room for it and she works for Sprouts so she keeps it stocked with the good stuff when it gets marked down.
Nashville Electric Service has done a really bad job handling things. I could understand the volume of the outage but the lack of communication and transparency has been unacceptable. Evidently, Kristen's power came back on late that Friday which was well before the Feb. 7th they had posted but they didn't send out notifications. They "upgraded' their system sometime long before this and it's actually a downgrade in how it performs and how much useful information it gives you. A neighbor happened to go by to get something since she was staying in a warming shelter and noticed it was on and texted her.
I went for pre-op testing yesterday down in the area near Vanderbilt and as I drove over towards TN State University campus on a major 4 lane road, there were still traffic lights and areas without power. Some were making accusations that the city and NES focused on the wealthy but our friend that lives in the REAL old money area was still without power last we heard so I don't really buy that. Plus part of our town (it all runs together but it's not Nashville) which is the wealthiest in the state (don't look at us, lol) has NES as their provider and we still have people without power including the Mayor's father. There are so many down trees and huge piles of debris that it will be a long time before things are cleaned up.
I did over 200 hours of emergency and disaster training last year and if I wasn't having surgery next week (grapefuit sized mass in my uterus - I always did hate grapefuit!), I would probably be out there volunteering or maybe even taking a temp job as a debris monitor since I already had experience working with FEMA during the 2010 flood. It's in the single digits one day and back up in the 50s a few days later and keeps going back and forth and that isn't helping the situation. But we were lucky overall and this too shall pass. A speed bump in life's over all plan. Hope the rest of you fared well with this storm.
We have 5.67 acres that we left most wooded when we built out here in 1994. Most of the the trees are over 50 years old. Over the past 10 or so years, we have tried to keep any trees close to the house trimmed or cut them down as they started to look iffy so nothing fell on the house. Our driveway and street, which is a closed off road with only 4 homes, were all blocked but Jeff got out and pushed the downed trees out of the way best he could that Sunday as they started falling and breaking. He gave in and ordered a new chainsaw and polesaw since his chainsaw died several years back. He started doing a little cutting up of the one blocking one side of the circular driveway a couple of days ago just trying out the new saws. This high school kid that helps him with other things came over today and worked about 4 hours getting that one tree and a couple of large limbs dangling over the other part of the driveway cut. We aren't in a hurry since we aren't in a subdivision or such.
Our daughter's apartment complex lost power sometime before 5am Sunday morning and she stayed there hoping it would come on. The nice Kurdish guys that live in the unit next to her saw her struggling to get ice off of her car and ran to help her then gave her hot food and tea they had made using a grill that they kept even when the complex 'outlawed' them a year or so ago. Finally on Monday she, her dog and refrigerated/frozen foods came over. She still lost a good bit of food because we didn't have a lot of spare room for it and she works for Sprouts so she keeps it stocked with the good stuff when it gets marked down.
Nashville Electric Service has done a really bad job handling things. I could understand the volume of the outage but the lack of communication and transparency has been unacceptable. Evidently, Kristen's power came back on late that Friday which was well before the Feb. 7th they had posted but they didn't send out notifications. They "upgraded' their system sometime long before this and it's actually a downgrade in how it performs and how much useful information it gives you. A neighbor happened to go by to get something since she was staying in a warming shelter and noticed it was on and texted her.
I went for pre-op testing yesterday down in the area near Vanderbilt and as I drove over towards TN State University campus on a major 4 lane road, there were still traffic lights and areas without power. Some were making accusations that the city and NES focused on the wealthy but our friend that lives in the REAL old money area was still without power last we heard so I don't really buy that. Plus part of our town (it all runs together but it's not Nashville) which is the wealthiest in the state (don't look at us, lol) has NES as their provider and we still have people without power including the Mayor's father. There are so many down trees and huge piles of debris that it will be a long time before things are cleaned up.
I did over 200 hours of emergency and disaster training last year and if I wasn't having surgery next week (grapefuit sized mass in my uterus - I always did hate grapefuit!), I would probably be out there volunteering or maybe even taking a temp job as a debris monitor since I already had experience working with FEMA during the 2010 flood. It's in the single digits one day and back up in the 50s a few days later and keeps going back and forth and that isn't helping the situation. But we were lucky overall and this too shall pass. A speed bump in life's over all plan. Hope the rest of you fared well with this storm.
music-city-missy
Well-known member
Deb - hope you and your father are all doing better. Jeff got something bad that started Christmas Eve and he gave it to all the kids and I. We didn't go to the doctor, just did a teledoc visit for meds. He has asthma and it always hits him hard. Lasted almost 4 weeks so he was just starting to feel better and we went out to eat for the first time Friday night before the storm hit. Except for my doctor visits, we have been housebound for a month between being sick and the storm. I am about to go stir crazy. We talked with family up your way and over in OH and they all got a good bit of snow. I would take the deep snow over the ice any day though!
mariadnoca
Moderator
Oh my, I’m glad to hear there’s no damage to the house. Sounds awful. Even our well-known horrible gas and electric company will text and/or call when the power goes down/comes back if you sign up for alerts. Emergencies is one reason I keep my wood burning fireplace. Here, to get permits to do renovations even in other areas of the house, they want you to either remove, or make fireplaces nonfunctional. Even in historic homes. No thank you. I can still remember losing power for days as a kid and all of us sleeping in front of the fireplace. I hope everyone can dig out soon and you get a warm spell. I will be thinking good thoughts for you next week w your surgery. When you feel up to it please check in and let us know how you all are faring.
