I guess our family really needs to fess up. It's clear that we're responisble for all the Hurricanes pounding Florida. My family migrated from Arkansas to Washington State way back in the Mid-19th Century where we homesteaded and got our start. Gradually agribusiness has taken over much of the wheat farming in Washington, and as our family members retired and sold off their holdings they looked for somewhere else to go. Recently my sis and bro-in-law had a diagonal urge and moved to Florida, not so much to retire as to start a new era. Now, our family has not been involved in Florida since Booth Tarkington settled there and wrote Penrod, and although that state has always had rather schizophrenic weather patterns things haven't really been this bad since Uncle Booth lived there in the second decade of the last century.
So, we're baaack, Florida. And the whole doggone family is traipsing there like water to a corner drain, and we're bringin' our weather mojo with us. Sorry about that, but I guess you're gonna hafta get used to weather that's even crazier than normal, because the Talkington/Tarkington's are calling forth the mighty forces of nature. We're tilting the country around the Southwest/Northeast axis just the same way Dorian Gray modified that picture in his attic.
I'm 175 years old, by the way. And my sister looks like she's 19. Uncle Booth would still be alive if the 'gator hadn't got him.
Update: Haven't been able to get in touch with my sister. No one answers the phone, so I figure they must've bugged out of Key West. But where would they go? It looks like Ivan's going to go right up the gut of Florida.
Posted by Demosophist at September 9, 2004 05:35 PM | TrackBack