Bugged Out

According to the Free Online Merriam-Webster Dictionary:

“Definition of BUG OUT -- intransitive verb

1: to retreat during a military action; especially : to flee in panic

2: to depart especially in a hurry …”

--***--

So there I was, sipping coffee and perusing email on my newly restored laptop on Sunday morning around 9:30. Outside, snow flurries danced on the Northeast wind, the temps in the low thirties and the air faintly smelling of the pulp mills to the North. I finished the mail and clicked on the NOAA weather forecast for my area. Holy Fortune Cookies, Mai Tai! They were forecasting a significant Winter Storm, with snow accumulations of 5 to 10 inches. Ouch. I thought the forecast was for flurries Sunday and just an inch or two of the white stuff on Monday. Damn my luck.

View out the LR window on Sunday morning

Where we are (were) parked is all of 35 feet to the water. As I have mentioned in the past, the water has come up quite high this fall. If the area receives a significant volume of snow this winter, flooding of annoying, if not dangerous proportions can be expected. Unlike my brother, I am not up to wading around in near-freezing water. Then there is the whole issue of water damage to our trailer and the lack of flood insurance thereon (only available for permanent and semi-permanent structures on improved sites.) Plus the whole ‘mud season’ scenario where nothing short of a helicopter is able to extract you from wherever you have been too stupid to escape. So a quick conference with myself concluded with two words: “bug out”.

And so I did. From ten in the morning I broke camp until well past dark. I was extremely fortunate that I was only going to be hauling out to high ground a few miles away. So, I didn’t trouble about the niceties (and necessities) when seriously traveling. Breakables and the like went down low on the foor. The external shower was taken down and draped in the shed to dry out (we’ve had a lot of rain and things were soaked from that and the melting snow flurries. It took a while, but I worked ceaselessly until it was as done as it was going to get.

I loaded both vehicles and am fortunate to have a neighbor willing to drop everything to follow me over to the farm and bring me back so I could then drive the Suburban and trailer over. Thank you Katy. They were so nice, they even took pity on my bedraggled state and offered me dinner! Thanks again, folks. Sorry I didn’t have the presence of mind to photograph the standing rib Pork Roast Davey served – it was a work of art.

So here I sit, cooling my heels and other parts of my anatomy in front of the farmhouse we used to live in. The wind’s out of the West around 20 MPH and the 12” of snow that has fallen so far is starting to drift. Two space heaters barely hold the interior at 60°. I suppose I will have to attempt a heart attack tomorrow, shoveling open the drive, before firing up the ‘Burb’ and going to town for some bread and water. And fuel ... mustn’t forget the need to stay warm. Iggy barely keeps his ears above the snow. Forget about the rest of him. Like a good dad, I smush down a section when he starts to circling and that allows him to keep his butt clear of the snow when doing what comes naturally.

And that, my friends, is all for tonight.