Lila Perry Steinhoff Archives

September 5, 2013September 5, 2013

Hurricane Frances 2004

I hadn’t forgotten Hurricane Frances, but I HAD forgotten that it was nine years ago that I was hunkered down at the office waiting for it to blow through.

This was a slow mover that was only a Category 2 storm with 105 mph winds, but it just sat on top of us and pounded away for hours.

Winn Dixie roof peeled off

I felt secure at work because the windows were designed for 120-mph winds and I designed the telecommunication area to be even stronger. The architect insisted on having laminated glass windows on the exterior of part of the area for esthetic purposes, but behind the glass, he put a gap, a sheet of drywall, a metal lath, another sheet of drywall and another air gap. He made a mockup and challenged my staff to try to penetrate it by throwing concrete blocks against it. We couldn’t, so I withdrew my request for block walls.

The building went to generator power when the winds hit about 45 miles per hour because the power lines were slapping together causing transformers to blow and surges and sags to come down the line. The big diesel was sucking down fuel so fast and the storm was moving so slowly that we were concerned that we were going to run the tank dry. (It was a 10,000-gallon tank, but it hadn’t been topped off.)

The Winn Dixie supermarket next to us didn’t come out so well. We stood in the 4th floor lobby outside my office and watched the wind get beneath the roof covering and peel it off. The repair they did after the storm must not have been done too well, because we got to see the same thing happen during Hurricane Wilma in 2005.

Neighborhood lost power

Wife Lila was in Orlando with Son Matt and family and I encouraged her to stay there. We had no power at the house (and wouldn’t for several days), and I was perfectly comfortable sleeping in air-conditioned comfort on air mattress on my office floor. If she came back, I’d have had to fire up the generator I bought after Hurricane Hugo ten years earlier.

The two-mile-drive to check out our house as soon as the winds died down was the longest two miles I think I’ve ever gone. (Until 2005 when we got hit by two more storms). I both wanted to hurry up and yet I wanted to keep from seeing if we still had a house as long as possible.

Trees and limbs down

As it turned out, we had a lot of trees and limbs down, but our house, built in the mid-1930s had stood up to the storm quite well. The apartment building across the street didn’t have our luck: a fairly large tree went through the roof.

Clean-up was NOT fun

Our side of the street had our power restored in a few days. The neighbors on the other side were fed by a different line and were dark for a week or 10 days. We “haves” on the south side stretched heavy-duty extension cords across the street to the “have-nots” so they could at least keep refrigerators and a few lights running.

Fix-a-Flat is your friend

I’m glad a had a stock of Fix-a-Flat. The streets were full of debris, nails, screws and other stuff just waiting for you to run over them.

As soon as I could, I gave my 3,000-watt generator to Matt and upgraded to a 7,500-watt one with electric start. The best thing I did was buy a kit to adapt it to run on natural gas, propane or gasoline. I also rewired the electrical panel so we could drop off the commercial grid and run the house off the generator if we were careful with our load balancing. It paid off during the next two storms.

I chased 13 hurricanes as a photographer. Let me tell you, covering somebody else’s hurricane is a lot more fun than having one chase you.

August 29, 2013

Haunting the Mailbox

I loved to get mail when I was a kid. I’d order a ring that would shoot popped wheat, then spend the next six weeks waiting for it to arrive. Even today, I like ordering from online companies so I can have the anticipation of the FexEx or UPS truck pulling up in front of the house.

Rarely, though, does a box arrive unsolicited. When one does, I remember back to my employee with a stalker ex-husband who terrorized her. One day a box with no return address arrived at the office. When she was afraid to open it, I made a big deal out of putting it on the counter, carefully slitting the taped sides and easing the top up while staying as far back as possible. I peered into the darkness and two black eyes and a forked tongue met my gaze. Even though the cop who took it to the zoo for ID said it was non-poisonous, I look upon strange packages differently these days.

When Wife Lila dropped a small package on my desk this morning, I had those same bad vibes.

THIS box had a return address, but it didn’t make much sense: GFJ + ST L; S. Sprigg / Good Hope (Around Back).

There was a watch inside

Inside the box was a rather nifty watch and the letter above. When I saw the name “McClard,” I remembered a Facebook exchange with one of Wife Lila’s Class of ’66 Classmates, Dick McClard. He had sent me a birthday wish when he confused me with another Ken he was actually friends with.

When I pointed out the error of his ways (quite a list, by the way), he countered by writing, “I bought you a really nice diamond studded watch for $25 from a fella on South Sprigg and he said he would get it to you but I don’t know which carrier. Let me know if it doesn’t get to you by March. I’m not going to risk a trip to Florida with the temp and humidity you described. IT….IS….BEAUTIFUL here today.”

Nefarious plot

Dick and I are on opposite sides of the political fence. I, of course, am a rational, pragmatic thinker and Dick is, well, he thinks Attila the Hun had the right idea, he just didn’t go far enough. He’s a nice enough guy despite that and I treat him like the funny uncle you keep locked in the attic.

When I tried on the watch, however, I was disappointed. It was so small I couldn’t even get the thingie through the first hole.

Either he had underestimated the manly size of my wrist or he more likely hoped the tight band would cut off circulation and cause my left wing to fall off.

Wife Lila has an idea

When the watch was too tight even for Wife Lila to wear, she had an idea. She’d hang it on the wall of the kitchen next to other decorative doo-dads.

I didn’t ask for elaboration

After she finished pounding a nail in the wall to display the watch, I thought I heard her say, “Well, at least something of Dick’s will be well-hung.”

I didn’t ask her to elaborate.

Thanks for remembering my birthday

So, Dick, you were either seven months early or six months late, but I’ll overlook the timing. It is the thought that counts.

I’ll be sure to send you something on your birthday. Oh, by the way, just for your information, snakes get really cranky in transit. That’s something you may need to know.

August 21, 2013August 22, 2013

American Queen

I see in The Missourian that The American Queen has stopped in Cape again. I shot her when she paused there July 7, 2013. You can click on the photos to make them larger.

Ambassador of the Boat

There’s a security checkpoint at the gangplank to keep non-passengers from boarding. I’d like to nominate this guy as Ambassador of the Boat. He’s the crewman who has to tell folks, “No, you can’t tour The American Queen” and to answer hundreds of dumb questions from guys like me (and worse).

I looked at his name badge and said, “Your name is Ronald Watchman, right?”

“No, Watchman is my title; my name is Ronald Moore.” Watchman Moore retired from the Memphis fire service after more than three decades as a firefighter. After about a year, he was bored with retirement and applied for a job on The Queen. He was hired almost immediately as a porter.(A percentage of the crew must hail from the home port of Memphis.)

After a short period of time, the captain called him aside and said that his skills were being wasted as a porter, and he was promoted to work security.

He’s a good-humored fellow who enjoys chatting with people and seemed to know every passenger by sight. It was clear from the way they spoke to him that he was well-liked. If he’s typical of the rest of the crew, service must be first-rate.

“I’m a character”

Passenger Lesa Knight, center, said, “I’m a character.”

“Most folks I run into are characters, so I’m not surprised.” I replied.

“No,” she protested, “I’m REALLY a character. I wear a penguin costume at the St. Louis Zoo.”

I couldn’t argue with that.

Bikes on board

I spotted several fluorescent green bikes on the streets in Cape. It turned out that they were bikes carried on board for the passengers to use when the boat docked. I asked one passenger who was returning to the boat how he liked climbing the Broadway hill. He admitted that he had walked up the hill, but it was worth it to be able to see some of the landmarks in the Tour of Rush brochure.

I should have confined our conversation to biking. He didn’t share Wife Lila’s Uncle Ray’s opinion of Rush as a “horse’s patootie.”

Tour buses followed The Queen to all if its stops to take passengers sightseeing and shopping. If a passenger literally “misses the boat,” it’ll haul them to the next stop so they aren’t left on the riverbank, Watchman Moore said.

American Queen built in 1995

I was surprised to learn The American Queen was built in 1995. It reminded me of the Delta Queen docking in Cairo in 1968.

The company that built it went under (a bad choice of words for a steamship company), and it was laid up until 2008 when it was refurbished. Most of the reviews I read were gushingly favorable, but a few folks weren’t happy with various things on their cruises. It seems like most of those were in the early days when service and mechanical issues were being worked out.

Some folks can find fault with anything. The boat has to take on water from the shore more often than fuel. One of the last things the crew did before shoving off was to disconnect the hose feeding Cape water into the storage tanks. A non-passenger on the shore commented, “I’d never sail on that boat. I saw them drop the water hose into the river when they were pulling it in.”

“Do you realize that up until recently all the drinking water in Cape came out of that river?” I asked.

Stacks lower

Because the level of the river fluctuates, some stops have to be bypassed when the water is either to high or too low to dock. The stacks are designed to lower if they need clearance to go under some bridges.

Rooms open onto decks

Some of the cabins have private balconies, but most of the reviewers liked being able to walk directly out on the decks to mingle with other passengers.

Boat has elevators

Unlike early riverboats, The American Queen has elevators to make the boat handicapped accessible. Since it sounds like there are a lot of passengers in their 70s and 80s, that’s important. Getting onto and off the boat can be a bit tricky for those with mobility issues, the review warned.

Good view from the top decks

This view from the Common Pleas Courthouse shows how The Queen towers over many of the downtown buildings.

August 21, 2013

Blue Moon, Clouds, Lightning

I noticed the moon was big when I was unloading the van last night. Wife Lila pointed out that tonight was the Night of the Blue Moon and suggested we go to a nice place on the beach for dinner and to watch it come up.

Just like when I shot the full moon over Tower Rock last month, the cloud show at sunset was arguably better than the moon. Click on the photos to make them larger.

One minute the clouds were white.

Then the sky caught fire

In a matter of seconds, it was like someone had touched off a massive brush fire in the sky.

The sky got angrier

Just before all the color disappeared, the sky got angrier.

The moon made a brief appearance

I was chomping away at my dinner when the server came over and pointed up at the sky. According to my handy-dandy Moon Phase program, it wasn’t supposed to rise out of the ocean for another 12 minutes or so, so it caught me by surprise.

It made a brief appearance, then was eaten by the clouds, giving me an excuse to turn back to my food.

Here comes the storm

A heavy thunderboomer was off the coast moving to shore. I kept trying to get a good lightning shot, but most of the flashes were well to the north of us. This was the best I could come up with. It didn’t begin to compare with this video I shot of a storm out to sea.

So, it wasn’t a GREAT night for full moon pictures, but it was a fun evening. The company was good, at least.