Monday, March 15, 2010

One Dozen Dead Umbrellas (And A Few More Significant Things that Didn't Weather the Storm So Well)


Saturday's storm was not kind to umbrellas.

Or trees...
Storm Damage 1

Always sad when you see one of these handsome old Ditmas Park trees bite the dust, and I'm sure the homeowner was upset, but I bet at some level they are also thanking their lucky stars that that tree didn't go a few degrees in another direction.
Storm Damage 2

That was a dramatic start to my walk & sent me scurrying back to my apartment for my camera. This was more the standard scene - big branches down everywhere.
Storm Damage 3

This all happened, of course, in that big storm we had on Saturday. I went ahead & went to a party in Queens during the day, had no trouble getting there, but getting home was another story, the subway line that runs through my neighborhood got shut down because a tree blocked the line. Everything was so messed up (understandably, you can't blame the MTA for stuff like this) that it took me almost 3 hours to get home. The funny thing was that the last 40 minutes were spent waiting for a bus to take me a distance I could've walked in 15 minutes - I'd walked a couple of blocks from the subway & I could actually feel the wind shoving me, didn't like it much & was really sort of worried about things flying around. When I got to a bus stop where it was possible to hunker down in a solidly sheltered spot, I did. Seeing the scene the next day, I think that was not a bad call.

These were all taken yesterday - it still wasn't boating weather so I went for another long walk, this time to Sheepshead Bay, south down Ocean Ave. & then west to the Ocean Parkway subway station. This was a construction site on Ocean Ave - the wind had completely torn up & flung around the plywood fencing & even knocked over their portajohn.
Storm Damage 4
I think that when I feel like whining about my job this week, I should spare a thought for the poor Call-A-Head guy that has to deal with that. Ugh.

And then there were some sad sights out in Sheepshead Bay -

Storm Damage 5

Storm Damage 6

One can only hope that the owners of those boats are people who had desperately been trying to sell & will be happy to pocket the insurance money & call it a day. But it's always a disturbing sight to see masts sticking up out of the water like this, isn't it?

9 comments:

moonstruck said...

Yes there was a bit of wind!!! I lost 5 trees. Two in my driveway. Chainsaw will be busy today. None hit the house, the camper or the boat,so lucky I guess!

dennis g

PeconicPuffin said...

It got crazy. Windsurfers said something we never say...it was too windy to sail.

bowsprite said...

oh, chilling: the masts out of the water. brrrr.

O Docker said...

Poignant essay on the tragic loss of the bumbershoots. We can only hope their families carried umbrella policies.

bonnie said...

oh, oh, oooooooh, O-docker!

Too windy for the Puffin Patrol to sail? Amazing. I've been following Peconic Puffin for I can't remember how long now - think I'm counting in years, though - and I think that is the first time I've seen that!

Seems like so far everyone I know came through with all of their property more or less unscathed. Good to hear.

bonnie said...

oho...I just realized there are actually 13 dead umbrellas in my pun-inducingly poignant photo essay. Although I'm going to keep calling it One Dozen because there are One Dozen intentional subjects. Anybody spot baker's-dozen-making corpse #13?

PeconicPuffin said...

Our weekend home is a little scathed, though we can't complain while neighbors have crews of chainsaws removing trees from roofs.

I'm dealing with a flooded crawlspace for the most part. Doesn't make for good photos.

moonstruck said...

Half an apple tree is better than none. Snow was gone yesterday -- Ccrocouses are up this AM.

dennis g

Baydog said...

Where are you again, Dennis, that the snow is finally gone?
Bonnie: 12 dead umbrellas don't spoil the whole bunch, Girl!