Home in Cayman

We flew back last night and anxiously drove home to find out how our kitties and our house did in the storm. We were very pleased to find the cats doing great and our house had no flooding. There does appear to be some water damage to our kitchen ceiling that we will need to run down and make sure it is from the storm and not a leaking pipe. There was flooding on other parts of the Island, in particular in lower valley and Bodden town. The college cleaning lady got 4 feet of water in her house. The college also sustained water damage and this morning we are going over to assess and help with clean up. The Sister Islands are in really bad shape and everyone should keep the Brackers and residents of Little Cayman in their thoughts and prayers. We had a great time with Kevin, Kristy, Kelsey and Little Scott at Universal Studios and want to thank them for such a fun weekend.

Orlando

We are in Orlando today spending time with Scott's brother Kevin, his wife Kristy and their kids, Scott and Kelsey. We drove up this morning from Miami. We have been able to find out some news from home and it sounds like Grand Cayman didn't get hit as bad as the two sister Islands. We don't have any firm news on our house and cats but the posts about Grand Harbor neighborhood seem to indicate that the flooding was limited and hopefully that means our house was spared. The big issue now for us will we get home Monday. The planes should start flying tomorrow and assuming that we don't get bumped down lists hopefully we get home Monday night. The government lets Caymanians and status holders in first followed by residents on work permit. There wasn't much time for people to evacuate so there shouldn't be a big group trying to get back. Tomorrow will be Universal Studios day so that should help us take our minds off the storm and home. Monday early we will drive back to Miami to finish up the seminar and then hopefully get our flight out.

Stuck in Florida

We arrived in Miami yesterday morning and by late afternoon discovered that Hurricane Paloma would be coming to Grand Cayman and that there was no way we can get back before the storm. We are dealing with a group of 20 very worried students but there is nothing any of us can do. This late season storm gave very little warning of rapid intensification and no warning of its path. On Tuesday it looked like it would go over Central America and even Wednesday had multiple tracks. We are just happy we put all the shutters back up just in case and unplugged all the electronics and moved the computer upstairs. Since there is nothing we can do we will head up to Orlando tomorrow to see Scott's brother and his wife and our neice and nephew. We know now the feeling of helplessness that comes with not being able to do anything about our house, our car (which is sitting at the airport long term parking lot) and most importantly our cats.

Late Season Storm

It looks like the Cayman Islands will get an unwanted visitor this weekend. The big issue is whether it will be a depression, a tropical storm or worst case a hurricane. The storm is about 227 miles south of here and is expected to move north tomorrow. We leave for Miami early tomorrow so to be safe we have put back up our hurricane shutters on the front window. If a hurricane comes it will be Saturday while we are off Island. We have someone checking on the cats to feed them over the weekend but it looks like they will have to ride this storm out on their own. There was a late season storm last year but it went well east of the Island, this ones track is not as favorable. Lets all hope it is just a depression and leaves us only rain from its visit.

Training for the Half Marathon

On December 7 (the same day as our graduation ceremony) we are running the Cayman Islands Half Marathon. Actually, walk/jogging is a more appropriate description. In preparation, we are walking most mornings and slowly building up to the 13 plus mile distance we will have to traverse. Its also not just about finishing but finishing with enough left in our tanks to go do the graduation ceremony later that day. The marathon starts at 6:00 a.m. and we are hoping to get to a pace of 16 minute miles meaning we would finish in the neighborhood of three and a half to four hours. That would give us some three hours before we had to go to graduation and five hours before the ceremony would begin. Today we did a short 4.2 km walk just as a warm up for the week. We will continue to increase our distance over the next four weeks up to about ten miles one week before the marathon then some 5k walks during the week and the full 13.1 miles on the Seventh.

We haven't gotten the tests back on Ginger so we are still waiting to hear if she will need thyroid surgery. We have moved her kitty litter onto the couch and she seems to be going in the litter so we aren't sure what to think.

This Thursday we are headed to Miami for two days of work on the seminar, then a drive up to Orlando to spend a couple of days with Scott's brother Kevin and his family. We return to the Island on Monday which is a national holiday here in the Cayman Islands for Remembrance Day. The Longhorns finally lost a game on Saturday, a gut wrenching defeat with literally one second to go in the game. They are still 8-1 and on Saturday we will have to find a sports bar in Central Florida to watch them play Baylor.

We are now back on eastern time with the end of daylight savings so even though nothing changed here, our tv shows on the weekend are now an hour later.