My parents live south of Tampa Bay, so it’s been a couple days of watching the radars and checking up on them. All went ok luckily!
In other news this weekend is (Canadian) Thanksgiving with my partners family and her suddenly(?) transphobic brother so that’ll be possibly fine, possibly a shitshow, we’ll see.
I grew up in Florida and while it’s home to lots of brutal storms, dangerous critters, and questionable people, it’s also one of the most beautiful places. Pristine beaches, rich swamps, dense forests, I think about it a lot since moving away (plus the gators, they’re awesome)
And tbh, if the hurricane isn’t a cat 3 or above you just don’t really take them seriously unless you live right on the water. Hurricane Andrew forced the state to make great strides in its building codes, so all roofs are strapped down and all external doors have to open outwards and usually have a seal (which means when the wind presses in on them it makes it water tight against the frame, neat!). So it takes a really severe storm or some bad luck with wind projectiles to have a bad time. Most cases I’ve seen is the later, Ive gone out into the storms before to drag in garden statues that my neighbors forgot to take care of before they end up in a window.
That is of course until you get storms like Milton that also spawned a ton of tornados, which brings a whole new level of damage :( hurricanes: no problem, tornados: terrifying lol