calm after the storm

Well, well, what have we here:

Another "don't let the door hit you on the way out" printer. Looks like someone else was also a girl with a hurricane dream. This printer, however, was truly put out to pasture. Mine is still inside. I felt too guilty to full on ditch it outside in the gale-force winds. It would probably start meowing or be all teary and "Take me back. I promise I will be faster and scan when you ask me. You won't have to reinstall my drivers every single time you need to to do anything. I'll be your forever printer..." or something heart-wrenchingly awful like that and then I would cave and have to rescue it. Because printers, like every other object in my home, have feelings.

Aside from that technological side plot, the main update is that the hurricane came and went. The anticipation was much more horror-movie suspenseful than the storm was awful. I was ok during my dinner outing at a neighborhood restaurant where everyone was celebrating and getting smash-faced like it was Irene's 30th birthday, not the end of the world. The rain en route was umbrella-and-boots manageable and the winds were still demure. On the way home, some lightening showed off and I thought, "Time to go inside, forever."

I'm not gonna lie, after the weather service issued an "AND NOW...A TORNADO" watch late last night, and my landlord went to the basement with his teenage son to reinforce the basement grate barricades but started banging around like they were actually building an ark, I started feeling a little sick with dread. I slept in regular clothes. This included jeans. You heard me. I felt like committing to pajamas pretty much guaranteed I would end up on the street, freezing and running for my life in a goofy nightgown and boots. Not cool. I wanna be Hoth Princess Leia, not Jabba's Concubine Leia. So I slept in jeans. And when I say "slept" I mean "Stayed up watching Aziz Ansari comedy routines on youtube."

This morning things were much more quiet, so I ventured outside. There were a few messes like this one:

But overall, the damage was considerably less substantial in this area than the havoc wreaked by the 2010 tornado. The striking scene this morning was 7th avenue where scores of zombie-faced residents wandered around looking for ANY open coffee place. Honestly, it looked like the storm had surged inside store fronts instead of outside on the streets. Every business along the commercial avenues was closed, boarded up, taped up with Xs like cartoon dead eyes, chairs-on-tables, all ransacked looking, and apology noted.

I found an open bakery, shared the requisite jokey moment with fellow customers in the snake-long line to the tune of, "This sure is a long line for COFFEE in NEW YORK, amirite?!", and headed to the park for a walk. The path was littered with innocuous, small-scale leafy Adam and Eve clothing branch debris, and the scene felt all "Ah. We killed Michael Meyers." sound tracky. But then the wind would blow like crazy, the trees would start bucking like those car wash air dancers...

 ...and the soundtrack would suddenly get all stabby, with everyone in the park looking totally panicked a la "OMG THE STORM ISN'T DEAD!!!!! IT JUST PRETENDED!!!!!!!!! Back to the snack bunker!!!!!"

But then everything would anchor again.

I am looking forward to a calmer night for all, and actual, jeans-free sleep.