My First Sailing Regatta

Although I have sailed for many years - since childhood, actually starting at the family Adirondack camp and later on my famly's 25 foot Cape Dory - today I will be crewing in my first regatta.  There is a national regatta for Albacore class sailboats (see image below) based out of the Hampton Yacht Club, and additional classes will have races as well.  I will be aboard one of the Club's six Sonar class boats (see image above).  The weather could be prettier, but it ought to be a lot of fun.  As the club's first membership wide announced openly gay couple, our experiences at the club to date have been great and have shown that not all of Virginia is inhabited by knuckle dragging Neanderthals.  I'll let you know how the day goes.

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Over Hyped Storm Threat Leaves Some Many Power

View from Norfolk towards Portsmouth

One thing that one can always count on is that the local news media always over hypes weather threats and disasters.  Last week's non-event in the form of the years first tropical storm was a case in point as has been today's much hyped severe thunderstorm threat.  Less than one tenth of local residents have lost power and the severe winds, flooding, etc. simply have not occurred for the most part.  Our home did lose power, but with our installation of a whole house generator last summer, we have suffered little or no inconvenience (It's actually the first time the generator has run during a power outage - during Hurricane Sandy, we never lost power).  It's a strange experience to have one's home fully lighted up while most of the neighborhood is in the dark save for the other homes with automatic whole house generators.  Here are highlights from the Virginian Pilot on today's so far less than spectacular weather event:

A massive storm system that moved through Virginia caused thousands of power outages, knocked down tree limbs and is responsible for one death in Richmond.

The National Weather Service issued several severe thunderstorm warnings for the region that expired before 7 p.m. A severe thunderstorm watch remains in effect until 10 p.m., meaning the potential exists for the development of thunderstorms that could produce large hail or damaging winds.

Dominion Virginia Power reported more than 104,000 customers in southeastern Virginia were without power about 8 p.m. Most of the outages were concentrated in Virginia Beach, Williamsburg and on the Peninsula, according to a news release from spokeswoman Bonita Harris. The most significant problem was reportedly in Williamsburg where a large tree landed on a substation, knocking out power to about 10,000 customers.

Dominion crews were still assessing damage at 8 p.m. and no estimated repair times were available.
More than 307,000 homes and businesses were without power in the whole state.

Prior to the storm, the region was seeing sweltering temperatures. Highs today were in the mid- to upper 90s, with high humidity making it feel like 100 to 105 degrees.

Yes, people need to be warned of dangers.  But in this storm prone area, constantly crying wolf leads to people ignoring warnings in actual severe weather threats.  The result, of course, is that people do not take proper precautions and lives are needlessly lost.

Our 20 K generator

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