oO , oO, oO, oO, stayin' alive, stayin' alive...

I seem to have weathered the storms, but, in the process, ended up under the weather, myself.

We had to tie everything down for Hurricane Gustav's arrival, and then cross our fingers and watch the news intently for Hurricane Ike's passing. Baton Rouge got some heavy winds and rain and even lost some street lights - and Ike didn't even hit us. That storm was massive. At one point, I remember hearing the reporter on the radio say that it was dropping rain as far north as Mississippi and as far south as Cancun, Mexico. That's HUGE.

Luckily, the GameVorplex didn't take any damage. We were out of power, cable and, therefore, touch for a while, but the only threat of property damage hangs in the balance in the form of a huge branch that is broken and hanging over my office. For the moment, I can't find a way to get up to the limb to remove it (30 feet up), so JRNip and I used several ropes to secure it in place, Spidey-style. Hopefully, that will catch the limb or slow it down sufficiently if I can't get someone out to take care of the limb before it falls.

We did, however, lose some fish to the storms. My beautiful blue Betta, Dudey, had a recurrence of "velvet," but due to lighting conditions, I didn't realize that it had returned until too late. I started an antibiotic treatment, but it was too late. Also among the lost was a new small blue fish that we assume Fluff ate when it actually got completely dark when the power was out (you see, he is a nocturnal predator and the other fish, well, wasn't) and our beloved lawnmower blenny, Milton, who did a great job of keeping the tanks clean for so long, but was found one day after the storm, missing his head. We're not sure if the decapitation was causal or postmortem, but we will miss him. Without electricity to keep the tanks cooled during the day, the temperature will rise in the house during the day and will raise the temp in the tanks, as well. With increased temperature comes increased aggression, in fish, just as in people. Think about that next time it's a hot summer and you're biting someone's head off.