Sean's Mum: Oh precious laptop, did you miss me?

Yes! Finally! This evening the internet and cable was restored to the house. It is truly unbelievable how reliant we (I!) have become on the internet. I was completely lost without it! And why no internet for so long? We had the worst windstorm in the history of Dayton, Ohio....and all we got was the remnants of Hurricane Ike! Those poor, poor people in Texas had to live through the brunt of it! Hundreds of thousands of Dayton residents without power from the onset of the storm, tens of thousands without power for over a week...some still don't have it back.

There was astounding wind damage throughout the area, far more severe than in my photos. Our street is a very tree-lined street and it was pure carnage once the wind died down. We were at a classic car show that had to be shut down 3 hours early as tree limbs were falling on the cars (and on the track for the awesome trains Sean and I were riding!). While we were leaving, a large branch fell on some poor unsuspecting guy, breaking his leg! A rather large branch fell about a foot in front of me, large enough that had it fallen on me, it definitely would have knocked me out! We drove past trees that had been uprooted, pulling up the sidewalk with them. Stores that rarely close were closed for days. Major roads and intersections were without traffic lights, some are still out! Scary stuff!

Pretending to be Fangio