Milton | Bad Cat Chris

As most of know, we evacuated before Hurricane Milton to a hotel thirty miles north. The cats were not happy about it but they also accepted it quite well. Frankie had a nice window to look out of before and after the storm.

He even watched some television.

There wasn’t much to do so I decided to start writing my next book in the Last Healer Mysteries series.

I just finished my latest novella called “Saving Apollo,” which is about a genetically engineered dog who can understand plain English. He escapes and befriends a 12-year-old boy. It is my first family friendly story. I received the art from the artist but I haven’t been able to work on it yet

I was watching our house using my Blink cameras but they were offline when I checked around 5:30 Wednesday afternoon. Our power at the hotel went out just after 8 p.m. and the hurricane made landfall around Sarasota at 8:30.

Rose was watching the track closely. It started out hitting exactly where we live. It then slowly shifted south and then north and then south again.

Sarasota is less than 40 miles south of our house but that 40 miles makes a world of difference in a hurricane. We were happy to see that but, of course, we were sad for the people in its direct path.

The next morning the border to Pinellas county was closed so we had to wait for them to open the roads before we left. If we didn’t have cats to worry about we would have left and waited at the border. We didn’t have to wait too long before it was okay to leave.

When we got home we were stopped by a fallen tree that was behind our next door neighbor’s house.

The tree barely nicked the corner of the house behind our neighbor. Talk about luck.

Our home was undamaged except a downspout broke off and a window in the cats’ room blew out but it was undamaged and I put it back in the door.

I took Frankie for a walk because he was eager to get outside.

There was plenty for Frankie to investigate. Our back yard was filled with branches.

Later, Rose and I drove around the neighborhood. Many people suffered bad damage. Much more than the last hurricane. Here are just a few examples.

I’m writing this from the airport. We are flying to Boston and will travel up the coast to Maine for our 25th anniversary. Our power is still out but the cats will be okay. Our neighbor will take care of them.

I was on the beaches for my job yesterday and even though I knew the beaches were devastated from just getting hit by a glancing blow from Helene., it was still a shock to look down every street and see piles and piles of debris.

We maintain aquariums for two restaurants on the beach. This is one of them.

They were cleaning up from the storm surge entering their building. The other restaurant was also flooded. I felt bad for them knowing the next storm could potentially be twice as bad.

My wife managed to get us a room at the Hampton Inn in New Port Richey, almost 30 miles to the north of us.

The trip up here was not good for Frankie. The cats were stuck in their carriers for the long trip up here and then for an additional 20 to 30 minutes while we waited for our room to be ready. When we finally let them out we found that Frankie pooped in his carrier.

Since then they have settled in nicely.