There was a quake on Tuesday and a hurricane on Sunday. Wow. On behalf of all of us, I’d like to say, FUCK YOU, EARTH.
There are a few things no one likes to hear about. No one cares about your fantasy team. No one cares about your poker hand. And no one wants to hear your story of how you made it through a natural disaster.
Here’s my Hurricane Irene story:
I live uptown. My office is downtown. When Mayor Bloomberg announced that the subway would be shut down during the storm, I was out of luck. I had to be at work during the buildup to Irene and, essentially, stay through the height of the storm. So, it looked like I would be stuck at work the entire time, even during the few hours when I wouldn’t be on the clock.
But, I had a wildcard. My brother and his girlfriend live downtown, within walking distance of my office. He was more than happy to let me crash there. Great. That was 11am Friday.
By 3pm, it turned into “I’m leaving keys for you with my doorman, but we’re getting out of town.”
Why? Turns out his girlfriend’s mom was nervous. The apartment is on the 14th floor of their building and has a lot of windows. All day, meteorologists had been saying the impact of Irene’s winds would be felt two or three-fold if you were above the 10th floor of a building. So, they decided to get out. There was a real chance that a strong gust could blow out a window. There was also a very high probability that floodwaters would force Con Ed to cut electricity to the building, thus deeming the elevators useless and forcing them to evacuate down 14 floors through a dark stairwell.
I learned this from my mother, who said she she agreed the two of them leaving wasn’t such a bad idea.
“But, Mom,” I said, “I’m going to be staying there.”
“Whatever,” she replied, “You’ll be fine.”
Sports Illustrated, August 29th, 2011.
